If we want to make a difference in the culture, we must be distinct. It’s definitional for Christian discipleship. It’s part of the church’s mission. Renouncing the world for the sake of the world. Rejecting sin in order to save sinners.

In other words, it’s not nostalgia that our churches need, or strategies to reclaim the culture, or more political posturing. Nor should we separate ourselves and forsake our neighbors. Instead, we encounter the world with something otherworldly. We respond to cultural chaos with a new culture—a culture of faith, hope, and love; a culture steeped in grace and truth; a culture exulting in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Amidst social change, our focus must fall first upon our churches (1 Peter 4:17). The more our culture opposes God and his people, the more the gospel distinctness of our churches should shine. Opposition sets a backdrop for the display of the glory of God in our lives.


Christians respond to ominous cultural change by actually being the church, that the nations might know the way of God.