LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1998, Page 73

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2. Evangelism in a Postmodern Age
Introduction
On Monday, Dr. Pittelko helped us to understand the
“what” of evangelism. What does it mean to go to the ends
of the earth? Yesterday, Dr. Gibbs spoke of the “when” of
evangelism. “Now is the day of salvation.” Today, we want
to consider the “where.” What is the context in which the
Good News is to be shared?
All evangelism is done in a context. Jesus addressed the
context of the Samaritan woman at the well. Paul spoke to
the context of the Athenians on Mars Hill when he proclaimed the “unknown God.” The Apostle desired to be all
things to all people that by all possible means he might win
them (1 Cor. 9:22). The culture provides the context.
We live in what has become a new and strange cultural
context. We are experiencing an alleged paradigm shift
similar to the time of the Renaissance, or the industrial
revolution, or the advent of the age of enlightenment. As
Bob Dylan put it, “The times, they are a-changin’.” We are
moving from the modern age to what is being called postmodernism.
What are the tenets of postmodernism? In the time allotted to us, we will seek to understand this strange way of
thinking and design a potential strategy for reaching this
generation with the Good News of the Gospel.
The issues raised by postmodernism are not simple. We
can only scratch the surface. For further study, I have included at the end a selected bibliography. On your own, you
might also want to read the endnotes.

Disillusionment
From the perspective of a new breed of philosophers and
social critics, this modern age has crumbled around us.
Human reason as the instrument of progress has allegedly
failed. The Second World War demonstrated that the age
of reason and enlightenment had produced very little in the
way of human evolution. In the years following the war,
this disillusionment was compounded by the rise of the
Communist ideology, the Vietnam fiasco, weapons of mass
destruction, youth rebellions, assassinations, political corruption, racial wars, and gas shortages.
While the modern age produced many technological advancements and successes, they had their drawbacks. The
automobile, for example, created a mobile society, but it
also polluted the environment. While modern technology
improved our lot in life, it trashed Mother Earth. Consequently, philosophers and social critics began to question
our ability to produce a great society via human reason,
knowledge, and technology.
When did this modern era seemingly end? Some point to
the Second World War while others say the modern age
ended with the baby-boomer youth rebellions and the
dawning of the Age of Aquarius. One sociologist has pinpointed the end of the modern age of reason and enlightenment to a day in 1972 when the Pruitt-Igo housing development here in Saint Louis was blown up. Once standing
as a classic example of social engineering, high crime, the
difficulty of policing, and urine-soaked elevators caused its
demise. Thomas Oden suggests that the modern age lasted
exactly 200 years from the storming of the Bastille in 1789
to the pulling down of the Berlin Wall. Whenever this alleged paradigm shift occurred, many suggest that the mod-

The Modern Age
Human reason, education, science, and technology defined the modern age. Man with his enlightened understanding and technological genius had within his grasp, so
he thought, the possibility of engineering a great society—
or at least a very good one. We desired human growth and
the pursuit of excellence. We were dedicated to ideals. Our
fathers and grandfathers willingly sacrificed their lives on
foreign soil to see the triumph of good over evil. We sought
education, wisdom, and knowledge for its own sake, not
merely for the income that we could derive from it. As a nation, we attempted, with a good level of success, to export
our culture, our ideals, our values, and our political system
into the world community so that freedom and democracy
would mark every society.
As a church we responded to the rationalism of the modern age by pursuing a sound doctrinal theology built upon a
biblical foundation. We developed an educated clergy who
were equipped to confront modern, educated people. We
trusted the efficacy of the Gospel to break into the human
heart with the light of the knowledge of Jesus Christ. The
rationalism and scientific inquiry of the modern age clarified our mission. We were not about confronting reason
with reason. We were a people of Law and Gospel who depended upon the Holy Spirit to convict sinners and produce
saving faith.
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