We must prepare this generation to be different in meaningful ways. We must prepare this generation–like no other–to be in the work but not of the world. As Josh Harris loves to say, “American cannot take another Christian generation that just fits in.†The postChristian age is one dominated by anxiety, irrationalism and helplessness. In such a world, consciousness is adrift, unable to anchor itself to any universal ground of justice, truth or reason. Consciousness itself is thus “decentered”: no longer agent of action in the world, but a function through which impersonal forces pass and intersect [Patricia Waugh in Gene Edward Veith, Jr., Postmodern Times: A Christian Guide to Contemporary Thought and Culture, p. 45]. Let’s examine some modern trends.
The first is a pervasive and abiding concern about the future. To those of us who lived through the Cold War this seem ludicrous. But it is real and this generation is one of the most hopeless in history. Interestingly enough this hopelessness has made us rather sentimental. We have become very sentimental about the past. We have lost our way; lost our dreams.Dr. Harvey Cox: “We once had dreams and no technology to bring them to pass.†Now we have technology but no dreams! Even in our most creative creations it is more of the same: Star Wars are going after the same thing we want and still not finding it. Notice bar scene. The Star Wars phenomenon is so appealing because it is about the past; not about the future. Luke Skywalker is more like John Wayne than he is like Tom Cruse. To this hopeless generation history is not sacred; it is merely utilitarian. It is not didactic; it helps make them feel better. The modern psychologist B.F. Skinner, for instance, disdains history and gives mm’s to monkeys. We have no actions–only fate driving us. We are rudderless. The fact is we Christians know, however, that God is in absolute control of history. We need to teach our children to be tirelessly hopeful. We need to make sure that we are not mawkish! We can easily do so by speaking the Truth found in the Word of God in places of deception.
Next, there is a serious breakdown of community. The Christian teacher Oz Guinness says . . .It is now questionable whether America’s cultural order is capable of nourishing the freedom, responsibility, and civility that Americans require to sustain democracy. Modernity creates problems far deeper than drugs, etc. It creates a crisis of cultural authority in which America’s beliefs, ideals, and traditions are losing their compelling power in society. Sociologist Peter Berger says. . . One of the features of our modern day has been the loss of mediating institutions, so that we now have increasingly atomistic individuals and a powerful state, with no buffers in-between. The Christian homeschooler, therefore, must not merely talk the talk, he must walk the walk. We must create an alternative community of hope. We must sabotage the conspiracy of hopelessness and self-centeredness that is so pervasive in our nation.