On the Economist Blog, a posting from December 2012 deals specifically with the issue of falling birth rates, but also with a second falling demographic: immigration. A commenter on the first post on the Economics of Birth below suggested that Indian immigration has fallen off in recent years, and the Economist blog agrees. And it is not simply Indians who have stopped migrating, but Mexicans as well. Mexican migration is the largest contributor to US immigration, but some statistics suggest that more Mexican immigrants may be headed back to Mexico than are coming into the US. The reasons cited by the Economist are, of course, economic, but many other factors contribute as well. The commenter from India suggested that lax American morality has a part to play, and the current climate of America towards illegal (and legal) immigrants is certainly a contributing factor as well. As birth rates fall in America, down since 2007, and as immigration trails off, the Economist predicts that their will be a significant economic impact within two decades from a smaller population. The number of retirees will account for 22 percent of the population, with the working population accounting for 57 percent. What is perhaps just as worrisome is that while the working population has grow recently by 5 percent, only an additional 1 percent of new jobs were added to the economy. As the population demographics shift and shrink, the time is quickly ending where Americans can point to the demographics of other countries and laugh. Instead, the problems will be here at home. Christians need to be cognizant of these issues as they relate to immigration reform and to social issues affecting birth rates. There is now an economic conversation piece available to Christians when talking about birth and immigration.

As Greg has pointed out in his article below on the similarities between America and Rome, something is wrong with American society. A recent book review on the Gospel Coalition shows that this ‘something wrong’ is not only seen in the decline of moral values, the bitterness in Washington D. C., or the ‘serve me’ mentality in the average American, but also in falling birth rates. Kevin DeYoung’s review of the book What to Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Disaster points out the economic troubles that occur when birth rates fall. The review and the excerpts from the book are both intriguing and worrisome, but the problem with low birth rates should not really be a surprise to anyone who has been paying attention.

The United States is on the brink of a Social Security nightmare, when more Americans will be in retirement than working. Some politicians have claimed that the solution lies in raising the age of eligibility for social security payouts. What is noteworthy is that no one has suggested that this might current financial crisis might be the fallout from removing 50 million people from our population due to abortion.

I find it quite ironic that many historians will point to the Pre-Civil War Confederacy and suggest that slavery was economically unsustainable in the long term. And yet, no one seems to be examining the economic ramifications of our own social decisions. There is no self-examination or global examination of the results of American social policy; instead, social policy seems to be viewed as completely separate from economic policy, as though the two had absolutely no bearing on one another. As the emphasis shifts socially to what we want without regard for the national good or the good of others, social decisions that divorce procreation from marriage, create taxation that no longer promotes having children, and that undermine the family unit through abortion, no fault divorce, and legalized homosexual marriage will continue to be made without the thought of the economic results.

The most worrisome fact about the falling birth rates is not that very few have noticed that it is an economic concern, but that almost no one can connect the dots to see that our national social policies have created a climate where having children is no longer promoted. The birth rates will continue to drop until the connection is seen. Which gives yet another opportunity for Christians to engage their culture, both when asked why Christians have so many kids (statistically Christians have more children than non-Christians), and when talking to secular thinking Americans about social issues. Because to use the wise thoughts of Bill Clinton, everything in America about economics, (apparently even morality!)

This past week I was at my denominations national assembly where we deal with issues that impact our entire denomination. Midway through the assembly, there was a point of contention regarding a series of charges brought against a pastor for teaching improper doctrine. I will try not to bore you with all of the details, but the real point of contention involved a Minority Report that had been filed in response to a decision made by one of the denominational committees regarding the case. The only problem is that the main motion was ruled Out of Order, and according to Robert’s Rules of Order, Minority Reports cannot be issued on motions Out of Order.

As I sat in my seat watching this unfold, I chuckled to myself. Presbyterians love everything to be done “decently and in order.” And yet, what they really mean is “decently and in order and I still get what I want.” I believe very few of us in the assembly disagreed with the point the Minority Report was making concerning the charges brought against that pastor, but the rules stated that minority reports could not be filed. We love the rules of assembly and being “in order” unless that order prevents what we want.

I was reflecting upon this phenomena as I stood in line with my family at the county waterpark. When our waterpark is at capacity for visitors, guests have to wait in line to enter until someone leaves. I told my wife how annoying I thought it was that if you left the waterpark for any reason, even to run to your car, you had to wait in line again to enter. My wife responded that she hated that rule as well, unless she was in line waiting to enter, then she loved the rule!

Again, when we think of morals and creating moral laws and rules for our governance, we often think of rules and laws which hold other people in check. Very rarely does a politician stand up and argue for a rule which would prohibit their own behavior. There are very few proponents of guns arguing for gun control. We most often want laws to keep our neighbor in line. We want waterpark rules to get us into the waterpark faster, Rules of Order to allow us to pass the motions we want in assembly yet prohibit other motions we oppose, and moral consensus to restrict what other people do.

But for moral consensus to truly function, each person must be willing to compromise for the greater good. Those on one side of the issue must be willing to give up as much as those on the side. This means that a liberal (using dictionary definition, not political ideology) must be willing to let themselves be restricted and a conservative must be willing to allow others to be released. Consensus cannot mean that eventually comes to a conservative position. This also means that conservatives need to know what issues they are willing to relax on for the greater moral consensus and what hills to die on. Liberals need to know what issues they will not accept restrictions and where they will give up liberty.

It is only when opposing viewpoints and ideologies allow the law to affect themselves as much as others that true consensus can take place. If moral law is simply a means to get my neighbor to do what I want, then I am not truly interested in moral consensus. Then I’m simply trying to get into the waterpark faster.

In Amy Sherman’s recent book, Kingdom Calling, she quotes Doug Spada of WorkLife, Inc. when he refers to the church as an aircraft carrier. An aircraft carrier, of course, is a warship designed to fuel, arm, and ready aircraft for battle.

According to Spada, too many churches consider themselves like cruise ships. People come onboard, are entertained, refreshed, and pampered before heading back to the real world. Too many churches have made their priority entertainment or even spiritual refreshment without ever suggesting to their constituents that the church is at war. The reality is that people do not simply return to the ‘real world’ but to a war zone. A spiritual battle is raging around us as the Kingdom of God fights to take territory from the Kingdom of Satan. Churches need to stop thinking of themselves as cruise ships and instead as aircraft carriers, where people come to be spiritually refueled, armed, equipped, and taught to do spiritual battle for the Kingdom of God during the week. People do not just come to church to be served, but to be prepared to serve. Spada’s analogy is an appropriate one and one which the church does well to remember.

Unfortunately, the church also often falls into the trap of striving to be a battleship rather than an aircraft carriers. The differences between a battleship and an aircraft carrier are fairly obvious. An aircraft carrier has very few offensive weapons; most of the weapons found on an aircraft are defensive weapons for defending the ship from attack. The ship’s mission is not to attack but to support the aircraft with weapons to do the attacking. A battleship, on the other hand, is comprised entirely of offensive guns. The mission of this type of ship is to do the attacking.

The question of what kind of ship the church is called to be is actually a question of mission. What is the church’s mission? Is the church to be on the offensive, attacking the forces of evil? Absolutely! But is the mission of the church to accomplish this task through its members or to through its own organization? If it is discovered that an unscrupulous, villainous individual is running for the school board, should the church as an institution choose their own candidate to promote and make it their mission to see to it that evil persons are not elected as school superintendents? If it comes to the church’s attention that a stretch of highway is notoriously littered, should the church leadership engage in a campaign to end liter, organize work details, and stamp out the trash problem? Or, should the church encourage its members to become politically involved and care for the environment? The difference between these two perspectives is the difference between a battleship and an aircraft carrier.

When Jesus prepared to head back to heaven in Matthew 28 and Acts 1, He told His disciples to “go make disciples” and to “be witnesses.” For nearly two thousand years the church has understood its primary mission to be proclamation of the Gospel, of the message that the Kingdom of God has come, we all stand condemned as rebels against that Kingdom, but in the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ we can find forgiveness for our rebellion and instead become disciples and members of that Kingdom. As we are made disciples of the Kingdom of God, we naturally live out of faith socially, politically, environmentally, morally, athletically, ethically, and so on. We are called as members of the Kingdom of God to advance the Kingdom, but the Church is called primarily to proclamation of the Gospel.

When a church starts acting like a battleship, many problems occur. For one thing, many churches quickly slip into a social gospel, where the preaching and teaching becomes less focused on the gospel and more focused on whatever social issue the church is currently engaging. In addition, a battleship can only go in a limited number of places, whereas an aircraft can go just about anywhere. What good is to make the church’s primary goal the cleaning of a highway when some of the members live in a nursing home? Rather than being told how the Gospel, the message of the Kingdom of God impacts their lives, they sit on the side lines while the church tackles pollution. If, however, the church focused on applying the Gospel to the lives of its members, these members would then spread out around the community into places where the church as an institution could never go. By acting like an aircraft carrier, spiritually refueling and trainings its members with the truth of the Gospel, the church remains faithful to its calling of proclamation through teaching and preaching, making disciples, while those disciples then go to war spreading the Kingdom of God.

For my church in particular, this is not simply an academic issue. Directly across the street from our church is a Planned Parenthood Clinic, one of the few in the city where abortions are actually performed. Do we as a church engage this issue like a battleship? We are contemplating renting the billboard next door to the clinic to advertise a free local Christians women’s clinic, but we believe from scripture that our primary calling as a church is not to eliminate Planned Parenthood but to proclaim the Gospel. Through the Gospel, we as a church encourage people to engage their own community wherever they are located and in whatever positions God has placed them. For some of the businessmen that live in the neighborhood around our church, that does mean engaging Planned Parenthood. For the stay at home mom who lives half an hour away, being a disciple of the Kingdom of God looks completely different. We as the leadership of the church believe we are called to be an aircraft carrier, spiritually equipping disciples of the Kingdom to fight on the front lines.

Several weeks ago, Greg posted an article that stated that stated that Christians should be better workers. This is too important of an issue to allow Greg’s article to silently fade back into the archives of Hang Together. As I reflected upon his article again and upon my own preaching, it occurred to me that there is often a lack of specificity in preaching and teaching when it comes to the difference that faith makes in our work.

The underlying assumption of the connection between faith and work is not that Christians WILL be better workers but that they SHOULD be better workers. But why aren’t they? One reason is that we are sinful, fallen creatures and the reality that even after we are redeemed we continue to fall into sin. We do not live perfectly after coming to faith in Jesus Christ and we do not suddenly become super workers. The second reason, in many cases, is a lack of understanding of what it looks like to be “better.” People are told they should be ‘better’ but fail to grasp what that means.

This lack of comprehension often comes when preachers and teachers fall into generalities. When on average there are sixty or so adults sitting in one’s congregation, the temptation is to make broad applications of a given topic or scripture that will apply to as many people as possible. Thus, a pastor might say from the pulpit something like Greg’s article “Christians should be better workers.” But this general statement falls short because it fails to defines itself or offer specifics. Case in point, examine the comments section and push back following Greg’s article. Not everyone fully grasped what Greg was trying to say.

The main question revolves around what it means to be ‘better.’ Does ‘better’ baseball player mean higher batting average (or on base percentage for you followers of sabermetrics!) Does ‘better’ mean that a worker makes more money, signs more contracts, or sells more product? The answer to these questions is ‘not necessarily.’ A baseball player may have higher statistical averages once they understand the connection between their faith and their work, but this does not have to be the case. Instead, ‘better’ means that the overall qualities of that person as a player improve. They become less self-centered and more team oriented, they are more respectful of coaches and fellow players and officials, their play is more ethical, they try their hardest, give above and beyond their best effort, and they are known for moral behavior off the field as well as on. These changes in a player may very well affect batting average, but regardless, the Christian ballplayer is a ‘better’ player.

As one might notice, it took an entire paragraph to explain what a ‘better’ baseball player might look like, and many of those qualities do not apply to lawyers, doctors, bus drivers, or garbage collectors. Out of fear of being specific to only one group and not having time to address all the others, many teachers and preachers settle for being general. Yet, as I have noticed in my own preaching, generalities are not particularly helpful, especially if there is a lack of agreement on what that generality means. To simply say “better’ is not as effective as specific applications. But is there time for specific applications to all different types of people?

The solution to this dilema is to realize that specific application is actually a further illustration. For instance, one might include a specific application to an auto mechanic in a sermon, but this specific application is actually an illustration of what ‘better’ looks like, not simply an exhaustive check list of what must be done to be ‘better.’ As the Christian auto mechanic hears the specific application, he or she further understands what it means to be a ‘better’ mechanic and can apply this application to other areas of their job as. Likewise, as the lawyer hears they examples of what ‘better’ looks like for auto mechanics and secretaries, the lawyer better understand what ‘better’ means and is challenged to think of what ‘better’ looks like for lawyers. The specific examples have served to further define ‘better’ so that everyone can grasp the concept.

Preaching, teachers, and yes, even bloggers, need to take the time to find specific examples and applications when talking about faith and work so that workers know exactly what they are being called to by their creator. This makes more work for the teacher, but they are called to be ‘better’ teachers as well.