What do you think?
Rate this book
In Search of the Common Good Lib/E: Christian Fidelity in a Fractured World
Common life in our society is in decline.
Our communities are disintegrating, as the loss of meaningful work and the breakdown of the family leave us anxious and alone—indeed, half of all Americans report daily feelings of loneliness. Our public discourse is polarized and hateful. Ethnic minorities face systemic injustices and the ever-present fear of violence and deportation. Economic inequalities are widening.
In this book, Jake Meador diagnoses our society's decline as the failure of a particular story we've told about ourselves: the story of modern liberalism. He shows us how that story has led to our collective loss of meaning, wonder, and good work, and then recovers each of these by grounding them in a different story—a story rooted in the deep tradition of the Christian faith.
Our story doesn't have to end in loneliness and despair. There are reasons for hope—reasons grounded in a different, better story. In Search of the Common Good reclaims a vision of common life for our fractured times: a vision that doesn't depend on the destinies of our economies or our political institutions, but on our citizenship in a heavenly city. Only through that vision—and that citizenship—can we truly work together for the common good.
Our communities are disintegrating, as the loss of meaningful work and the breakdown of the family leave us anxious and alone—indeed, half of all Americans report daily feelings of loneliness. Our public discourse is polarized and hateful. Ethnic minorities face systemic injustices and the ever-present fear of violence and deportation. Economic inequalities are widening.
In this book, Jake Meador diagnoses our society's decline as the failure of a particular story we've told about ourselves: the story of modern liberalism. He shows us how that story has led to our collective loss of meaning, wonder, and good work, and then recovers each of these by grounding them in a different story—a story rooted in the deep tradition of the Christian faith.
Our story doesn't have to end in loneliness and despair. There are reasons for hope—reasons grounded in a different, better story. In Search of the Common Good reclaims a vision of common life for our fractured times: a vision that doesn't depend on the destinies of our economies or our political institutions, but on our citizenship in a heavenly city. Only through that vision—and that citizenship—can we truly work together for the common good.
Audio CD
First published June 25, 2019
50 people are currently reading
1238 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews
August 27, 2019
Summary: Observing the breakdown in community in both church and society, the author traces the root causes, and the practices of Christian community that can lead to recovery of community and a church that seeks the common good in society.
Many attentive culture watchers have noted the parallel declines of both church and wider American culture. Attendance is dropping in many churches even as churches are rocked with scandals of sexual abuse and financial mismanagement. The seduction of the church to corrupt political alliances, whether of the left or the right, in the author's view, is only the final step in a church that has given itself to power instead of the doing of "small things with great love." While all this goes on, America is "bowling alone" to even a greater extend than when Robert Putnam first published his study of the decline of social capital and community in America. Suicide rates are up, life expectancy is dropping, and the professionalized care industry is booming, even as local community and a sense of cohesion and pursuit of common good is vanishing in a land of toxic discourse.
Jake Meador chronicles these parallel declines and traces them to three factors. One is a loss of meaning, a pervasive existentialism that pretends to meaning in choices of radical freedom, yet without hope. A second is a loss of wonder, a dis-enchantment with the world as the buffered self cuts us off from both danger and wonder, resulting pervasive boredom. A third is the hollowing out of work, where efficiency and profitability is the sum total of work's meaning, where we are alienated both from our work, and by our work from home, family, and religious life, as work becomes all-consuming.
Meador proposes three practices that may play a crucial role in restoring Christian communities to health, enabling them to exercise a societal presence that fosters a wider common good. He begins with the surprising proposal of keeping sabbath, as a tangible way of underscoring that human beings were made, not for work, but for God, that we are human beings, not human doings. One of the things Meador argues for is corporate worship, as one tangible way of keeping sabbath that begins to restore a sense of our being part of some "common good." He adopts Wendell Berry's idea of "membership" in which we recognize that we are embedded in both a human and wider biological community. He advocates for work that is sacramental--that work is good and offers ways to bless others, that produces wealth, and is attentive to the membership.
His final section consists of two parts. The latter grounds the former, and really all that he has written, in the new heaven and new earth, a hope that is even more real than life in the present age. The former talks about what it means for the community of God's people to be citizens in earthly societies. It is here perhaps that he makes one of his most trenchant observations:
Put another way, the political priorities of many American Christians in recent years have been precisely backward. We ought to have begun with doctrine because doctrine defines the good life as it relates to political systems and societies. Then we ought to have turned to the formation of citizens. We should have asked what kind of virtues are necessary to live well in community with one another and what particular virtues are necessary for responsible political action. Then we should have asked how to cultivate those virtues within our people. Finally, only after attending to these issues, we should have moved on to debating policy....American Christians, and evangelicals especially, have done the exact opposite. (p. 161).
He argues for a political doctrine shaped by the Kuyperian ideas of solidarity and sphere sovereignty, and the practice of subsidiarity--that government should only do those things it is large enough to do, leaving other matters to other spheres of life.
Reading Jake Meador as a sixty-something took me back to what it was like to read as a college student a young Os Guinness in The Dust of Death, with his sweeping discussion of culture, and what it meant for Christians to live as a third way. There is the same scope of considering cultural forces, the intellectual ideas behind them, and a fresh vision of what Christian faithfulness might look like in the present time. Sadly, a boomer generation fascinated with "fast-everything" circumvented doctrine and virtue and communal practices in pursuit of policy influence, power, or a personal prosperity without a sense of our membership and solidarity with others and all living things.
This leaves me reflecting. Os Guinness is still speaking and writing. Jake Meador has written for a number of publications. But who is reading? And who is heeding? I hope someone is and that the American church wakes up to how far it has declined over forty years, before all we can do is cry "Ichabod. The glory has departed!" (1 Samuel 4:21). Meador's ideas and commended practices offer light for those tired of groping in the darkness.
________________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
Many attentive culture watchers have noted the parallel declines of both church and wider American culture. Attendance is dropping in many churches even as churches are rocked with scandals of sexual abuse and financial mismanagement. The seduction of the church to corrupt political alliances, whether of the left or the right, in the author's view, is only the final step in a church that has given itself to power instead of the doing of "small things with great love." While all this goes on, America is "bowling alone" to even a greater extend than when Robert Putnam first published his study of the decline of social capital and community in America. Suicide rates are up, life expectancy is dropping, and the professionalized care industry is booming, even as local community and a sense of cohesion and pursuit of common good is vanishing in a land of toxic discourse.
Jake Meador chronicles these parallel declines and traces them to three factors. One is a loss of meaning, a pervasive existentialism that pretends to meaning in choices of radical freedom, yet without hope. A second is a loss of wonder, a dis-enchantment with the world as the buffered self cuts us off from both danger and wonder, resulting pervasive boredom. A third is the hollowing out of work, where efficiency and profitability is the sum total of work's meaning, where we are alienated both from our work, and by our work from home, family, and religious life, as work becomes all-consuming.
Meador proposes three practices that may play a crucial role in restoring Christian communities to health, enabling them to exercise a societal presence that fosters a wider common good. He begins with the surprising proposal of keeping sabbath, as a tangible way of underscoring that human beings were made, not for work, but for God, that we are human beings, not human doings. One of the things Meador argues for is corporate worship, as one tangible way of keeping sabbath that begins to restore a sense of our being part of some "common good." He adopts Wendell Berry's idea of "membership" in which we recognize that we are embedded in both a human and wider biological community. He advocates for work that is sacramental--that work is good and offers ways to bless others, that produces wealth, and is attentive to the membership.
His final section consists of two parts. The latter grounds the former, and really all that he has written, in the new heaven and new earth, a hope that is even more real than life in the present age. The former talks about what it means for the community of God's people to be citizens in earthly societies. It is here perhaps that he makes one of his most trenchant observations:
Put another way, the political priorities of many American Christians in recent years have been precisely backward. We ought to have begun with doctrine because doctrine defines the good life as it relates to political systems and societies. Then we ought to have turned to the formation of citizens. We should have asked what kind of virtues are necessary to live well in community with one another and what particular virtues are necessary for responsible political action. Then we should have asked how to cultivate those virtues within our people. Finally, only after attending to these issues, we should have moved on to debating policy....American Christians, and evangelicals especially, have done the exact opposite. (p. 161).
He argues for a political doctrine shaped by the Kuyperian ideas of solidarity and sphere sovereignty, and the practice of subsidiarity--that government should only do those things it is large enough to do, leaving other matters to other spheres of life.
Reading Jake Meador as a sixty-something took me back to what it was like to read as a college student a young Os Guinness in The Dust of Death, with his sweeping discussion of culture, and what it meant for Christians to live as a third way. There is the same scope of considering cultural forces, the intellectual ideas behind them, and a fresh vision of what Christian faithfulness might look like in the present time. Sadly, a boomer generation fascinated with "fast-everything" circumvented doctrine and virtue and communal practices in pursuit of policy influence, power, or a personal prosperity without a sense of our membership and solidarity with others and all living things.
This leaves me reflecting. Os Guinness is still speaking and writing. Jake Meador has written for a number of publications. But who is reading? And who is heeding? I hope someone is and that the American church wakes up to how far it has declined over forty years, before all we can do is cry "Ichabod. The glory has departed!" (1 Samuel 4:21). Meador's ideas and commended practices offer light for those tired of groping in the darkness.
________________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
May 7, 2020
There are a lot of reasons to lose hope in this fallen world. Relationships are failing, there is a break down in community, and rising depression. But there is something--Someone greater than all the brokenness in the world around us.
This book attempts to find middle ground in our deeply divided world, especially in matters of financial status and politics. It's not hard to look at the world and be depressed and hopeless.
But there is a bigger story at play, one that is build upon a stronger foundation--in which we can take part.
While a good read, this book didn't quite give me that thought provoking feeling that I felt that it kept grasping at. There were some issues that I thought that the author had an interesting view on, it seemed to be written for people who might not have read as much on this topic before, yet on the other hand I felt that it lacked conciseness in some areas, and I didn't always feel like the arguments were presented evenly. It was interesting to read about the author's convictions on the New Earth and Heaven, though I personally always take such teaching with a grain of salt as I surely can only speculate from what I know from Scripture.
In the end I felt that this book was underwhelming and perhaps that is a result of the previous books that I read. It is a good reminder that while there is so much to be disheartened about, there is also a greater hope in Jesus Christ.
I received a complimentary ecopy of this book, opinions are my own.
This book attempts to find middle ground in our deeply divided world, especially in matters of financial status and politics. It's not hard to look at the world and be depressed and hopeless.
But there is a bigger story at play, one that is build upon a stronger foundation--in which we can take part.
While a good read, this book didn't quite give me that thought provoking feeling that I felt that it kept grasping at. There were some issues that I thought that the author had an interesting view on, it seemed to be written for people who might not have read as much on this topic before, yet on the other hand I felt that it lacked conciseness in some areas, and I didn't always feel like the arguments were presented evenly. It was interesting to read about the author's convictions on the New Earth and Heaven, though I personally always take such teaching with a grain of salt as I surely can only speculate from what I know from Scripture.
In the end I felt that this book was underwhelming and perhaps that is a result of the previous books that I read. It is a good reminder that while there is so much to be disheartened about, there is also a greater hope in Jesus Christ.
I received a complimentary ecopy of this book, opinions are my own.
September 14, 2019
I've very much enjoyed a fair number of Meador's essays, and I encourage him to keep writing books. I simply didn't find this one to be as helpful as his essays. I felt I got a lot of genuflection toward good ideas (I share his unease with available political options, for example, and his general Kuyperian framework) without a lot of mature wrestling with specifics. This feels to me like a freshman offering, like the beginning of a writing career that (I hope and pray) will grow in strength.
Fundamentally, I didn't learn anything. Nothing was new to me. I heard a rehash of ideas I've been reading elsewhere for years. And that's not the way I feel when I read his essays, which are insightful, topical, and current.
And forgive me, because I believe that there are surely regenerated people who attend Roman Catholic congregations—but quoting numerous Catholics favorably without some caveats for all the lectors out there does bother me. Either Rome preaches a false gospel or it doesn't. And if it does, that's serious. The common good will not be found through false gospels. It was Meador who said, "doctrine defines the good life."
Kind of meh.
Fundamentally, I didn't learn anything. Nothing was new to me. I heard a rehash of ideas I've been reading elsewhere for years. And that's not the way I feel when I read his essays, which are insightful, topical, and current.
And forgive me, because I believe that there are surely regenerated people who attend Roman Catholic congregations—but quoting numerous Catholics favorably without some caveats for all the lectors out there does bother me. Either Rome preaches a false gospel or it doesn't. And if it does, that's serious. The common good will not be found through false gospels. It was Meador who said, "doctrine defines the good life."
Kind of meh.
December 17, 2020
This was one of Christianity Today’s 2019 Books of the Year, and when I saw it was free to listen to on Hoopla, I started listening to it this summer. Though it must have been written in 2018 or 2019, it seems prescient, and I think I’ll always associate this book with 2020, because one of my vivid memories of it is listening while sewing COVID masks for my family out of cloth scraps from old clothes and previous crafting projects. But it also befits such a tumultuous year because between the pandemic, protests over racial injustice, and a contentious election, questions of what makes a good life and how Christians are to pursue the common good have never been more relevant. Reading (even the auditory kind) has been a challenge for me this year. What with all the uncertainty, I’ve spent more time following the news and social media than in books, and I grew distracted from this book for a few months. But I wanted to finish it before the end of 2020, and I’m so glad I did.
Quoting many thinkers from Wendell Berry, Calvin, Kuyper, to J. Todd Billings (from my little Kansas hometown, so I’m always happy to see him referenced) and others, Meador gives a good, broad overview of issues related to community, identity, family, place, vocation, and politics. I was all set to give this a solid 4 stars until chapters 8 & 9 on faithful political formation and the eternal city to come, which propelled it to a 5 star book for me. Meador contends that Christians of late have often gotten political discipleship completely backward, prioritizing policy exclusively and neglecting the proper flow of doctrine—>citizenship—>virtue—>policy. He briefly touches on the traditional teachings of solidarity, sphere sovereignty, and subsidiarity, and coming out of the 2020 election, I found myself wishing I could play this chapter from the rooftops and that someone would expand this chapter into an entire book. While the whole book was good and worthwhile—and I hope many others read it all—if someone wanted to check it out on Hoopla and just skip to the last two chapters, I think they’d find even only that to be worth their time. But do read the whole thing if you, too, seek answers as to the nature of the good life and what it looks like to live faithfully as a Christian in the 21st century.
Quoting many thinkers from Wendell Berry, Calvin, Kuyper, to J. Todd Billings (from my little Kansas hometown, so I’m always happy to see him referenced) and others, Meador gives a good, broad overview of issues related to community, identity, family, place, vocation, and politics. I was all set to give this a solid 4 stars until chapters 8 & 9 on faithful political formation and the eternal city to come, which propelled it to a 5 star book for me. Meador contends that Christians of late have often gotten political discipleship completely backward, prioritizing policy exclusively and neglecting the proper flow of doctrine—>citizenship—>virtue—>policy. He briefly touches on the traditional teachings of solidarity, sphere sovereignty, and subsidiarity, and coming out of the 2020 election, I found myself wishing I could play this chapter from the rooftops and that someone would expand this chapter into an entire book. While the whole book was good and worthwhile—and I hope many others read it all—if someone wanted to check it out on Hoopla and just skip to the last two chapters, I think they’d find even only that to be worth their time. But do read the whole thing if you, too, seek answers as to the nature of the good life and what it looks like to live faithfully as a Christian in the 21st century.
June 10, 2019
An exploration of the challenges of early 21st century Western culture.
The author does well at even-handedly investigating what has gone wrong with our culture: the loss of community, the rise of rampant individualism, the loss of value in work and effort, the commodification of everything, etc. This is not a partisan work; he finds as much at fault in modern conservatism as he does modern liberalism.
The author no doubt finds in faithful Christian living some kind of antidote to these difficulties, and a presumed path to the common good, but I found the work much lighter in terms of figuring out the way forward than it was in ascertaining how things have broken down. The author is a fan of Dreher's "Benedict Option," and much good could be done with more effective Christian catchesis. But that doesn't seem like something that's going to bring everyone in our pluralist society around to the common good, although it might well be that the author is convinced there can be no common good without communal confession of Christianity. If that's the case, then the common good was rarely, if ever, activated, and has little prayer in the future as a going concern, and is chasing after a myth...or the definition of what it might look like to find common ground in a secular society to improve the lot of everyone would need to be considered to be possible. Is it an impossibility or just beyond the imaginative purview of the author and his associates?
Nevertheless, a good read to consider the situation in which we find ourselves.
**--galley received as part of early review program
The author does well at even-handedly investigating what has gone wrong with our culture: the loss of community, the rise of rampant individualism, the loss of value in work and effort, the commodification of everything, etc. This is not a partisan work; he finds as much at fault in modern conservatism as he does modern liberalism.
The author no doubt finds in faithful Christian living some kind of antidote to these difficulties, and a presumed path to the common good, but I found the work much lighter in terms of figuring out the way forward than it was in ascertaining how things have broken down. The author is a fan of Dreher's "Benedict Option," and much good could be done with more effective Christian catchesis. But that doesn't seem like something that's going to bring everyone in our pluralist society around to the common good, although it might well be that the author is convinced there can be no common good without communal confession of Christianity. If that's the case, then the common good was rarely, if ever, activated, and has little prayer in the future as a going concern, and is chasing after a myth...or the definition of what it might look like to find common ground in a secular society to improve the lot of everyone would need to be considered to be possible. Is it an impossibility or just beyond the imaginative purview of the author and his associates?
Nevertheless, a good read to consider the situation in which we find ourselves.
**--galley received as part of early review program
May 21, 2019
“The recent evangelical movement has been designed to do two things: first, grow churches through innovative worship practices and uncritically adopting the cultural garb of suburban Middle America. Second, to secure political power through an alliance with the Republican Party.... A movement designed to obtain power and prestige and status will end up where Jesus predicted it would and where the American church has ended up. Modern American Christianity was never intended to produce morally upright people given to sacrificial love of neighbor.”
Wowza, huh? In the rest of the book, Jake points to how we can adjust our aims and therefore the results too, for the flourishing of our soul, homes, and communities. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I am challenged to consider my place in the world and how I am an integral part of seeing goodness birthed right here in my midst. I struggle with that, often assuming that my role is so minor that it doesn’t matter if I do much of anything. (Such an Enneagram 9 thing to think.) But Jake’s arguments and vision are so lovely and inspiring, I want to embrace them. And I want our world (and the hearts I know in it), to know the greatest Good I know: Jesus, the one who is Goodness personified.
Wowza, huh? In the rest of the book, Jake points to how we can adjust our aims and therefore the results too, for the flourishing of our soul, homes, and communities. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I am challenged to consider my place in the world and how I am an integral part of seeing goodness birthed right here in my midst. I struggle with that, often assuming that my role is so minor that it doesn’t matter if I do much of anything. (Such an Enneagram 9 thing to think.) But Jake’s arguments and vision are so lovely and inspiring, I want to embrace them. And I want our world (and the hearts I know in it), to know the greatest Good I know: Jesus, the one who is Goodness personified.
February 19, 2020
Need to formulate my thoughts and re-read some passages, but this offers a different, more holistic, and community-oriented view of how we live as Christians. Lots to ponder.
March 30, 2020
This is an absolutely fantastic book. If you're like me and grew up with a good childhood, you look at the world with something of a mixture of horror and desire to change the world and help all those lost folks out there find themselves. I've never been much of a people person and in many ways even my hobbies are very limited. I like to go to work, read my books, hang out with my room-mates, and eat food. And yet you sometimes wonder if there isn't some way to help people and as you look at culture and watch us have more and more goodies and yet things seem to be getting worse.
If you've ever felt something like this, Jake Meador's book about the fractured world AND what we can do about it is for you. It also does something else which I think people like me who have lived in genuinely good Evangelical and Reformed Churches need to hear: reminds us of how bad Evangelicalism as a lived experience actually is in many places. Let's face it, Evangelicalism is now as much a feel-good industry as Disney. The amount of schlock out there and the amount of disfunction even in orthodox Bible-believing churches is huge, and the limited way the religious right has approached things is, though better than the left, not mature. Currently, I am on a mailing list of a pro-life group and whenever I open an email, I feel sad because of all the sentimentalism and immaturity that you see there. This isn't just Evangelicals: Reformed churches are FULL of schism and pettiness and has plenty of skeletons in it's closet.
This and some other opinions that Meador has will probably put this book out of some people's sympathy. He also takes individualism to task and argues, in my mind persuasively, for more scocialistic policies (national healthcare, for instance). He balances this out with strong defenses of subsidiarity (handling things on the smallest level possible) and sphere sovereignty, but some people will be impatient with it. He points out that capitalism, as it currently exists, is not enabling women to work in the home and be good mothers. As it stands, it's pushing them in the market. At the same time, most people would say we just need to "value" it more and we could just as easily detach capitalism from women in the workforce, and Meador does not anticipate that argument or dialogue very long with the people who read Sowell. I myself am reading some of this stuff, and I recognize that the motive usually is honest concern for the betterment of average people (lifting them out of poverty). Meador does point out that actually often capitalism still leaves a lot of people poor and makes the rich crazy rich in its current set-up, but still many of his points would be difficult for his audience to accept. Someone needs to start having a conversation here between the sane capitalists and sane socialist-distributivists.
So there's a fair warning. However, I agree with him on everything, so here's some of the more important stuff. Meador's book is also meaty and full of lots of quotes from literature, philosophy, and theology. It is written cleanly, but is so rich you feel like you're going to a three-course dinner, or better yet, you're getting a rich, home-made barbecue. Which is Meador's basic solution to the problems of modern individualism, loneliness, social fracturing, and political disfunction that we now have. He calls us to enjoy reality as it now is, and gives an illuminating reading of Luther's doctrine of vocation and for preterism: the world as we see it will be transformed, not destroyed.
He also has a marvelous discussion of how we can show hospitality, live slower lives, and live in Sabbath. Make food as good as you can and with care. Do not treat the world like so much raw matter that can be molded in any number of ways. Remember that people are people and that they are not someone you can dismiss as stereotypes: they are members of the human race, as are you (his chapter on membership was quite challenging for me). Don't treat everything in the world as explainable in terms of a pre-packaged set of ideas called Christianity, and don't have such a narrow focus on politics that it only covers abortion, homosexuality, religious liberty, and pet set of libertarian positions. Think about how you can be a good citizen. Again, have a slower life, spend less time ruthlessly working at the office, and have people over. Have TIME for people. That is Meador's vision for the world, and it is one that I will be coming back to again and again. This is a book worth re-reading and more importantly, it's a book that points you back to that big and scary thing called the real world.
So if you care about this stuff, give it a whirl. You will come away with more desire for the real world and for other people.
If you've ever felt something like this, Jake Meador's book about the fractured world AND what we can do about it is for you. It also does something else which I think people like me who have lived in genuinely good Evangelical and Reformed Churches need to hear: reminds us of how bad Evangelicalism as a lived experience actually is in many places. Let's face it, Evangelicalism is now as much a feel-good industry as Disney. The amount of schlock out there and the amount of disfunction even in orthodox Bible-believing churches is huge, and the limited way the religious right has approached things is, though better than the left, not mature. Currently, I am on a mailing list of a pro-life group and whenever I open an email, I feel sad because of all the sentimentalism and immaturity that you see there. This isn't just Evangelicals: Reformed churches are FULL of schism and pettiness and has plenty of skeletons in it's closet.
This and some other opinions that Meador has will probably put this book out of some people's sympathy. He also takes individualism to task and argues, in my mind persuasively, for more scocialistic policies (national healthcare, for instance). He balances this out with strong defenses of subsidiarity (handling things on the smallest level possible) and sphere sovereignty, but some people will be impatient with it. He points out that capitalism, as it currently exists, is not enabling women to work in the home and be good mothers. As it stands, it's pushing them in the market. At the same time, most people would say we just need to "value" it more and we could just as easily detach capitalism from women in the workforce, and Meador does not anticipate that argument or dialogue very long with the people who read Sowell. I myself am reading some of this stuff, and I recognize that the motive usually is honest concern for the betterment of average people (lifting them out of poverty). Meador does point out that actually often capitalism still leaves a lot of people poor and makes the rich crazy rich in its current set-up, but still many of his points would be difficult for his audience to accept. Someone needs to start having a conversation here between the sane capitalists and sane socialist-distributivists.
So there's a fair warning. However, I agree with him on everything, so here's some of the more important stuff. Meador's book is also meaty and full of lots of quotes from literature, philosophy, and theology. It is written cleanly, but is so rich you feel like you're going to a three-course dinner, or better yet, you're getting a rich, home-made barbecue. Which is Meador's basic solution to the problems of modern individualism, loneliness, social fracturing, and political disfunction that we now have. He calls us to enjoy reality as it now is, and gives an illuminating reading of Luther's doctrine of vocation and for preterism: the world as we see it will be transformed, not destroyed.
He also has a marvelous discussion of how we can show hospitality, live slower lives, and live in Sabbath. Make food as good as you can and with care. Do not treat the world like so much raw matter that can be molded in any number of ways. Remember that people are people and that they are not someone you can dismiss as stereotypes: they are members of the human race, as are you (his chapter on membership was quite challenging for me). Don't treat everything in the world as explainable in terms of a pre-packaged set of ideas called Christianity, and don't have such a narrow focus on politics that it only covers abortion, homosexuality, religious liberty, and pet set of libertarian positions. Think about how you can be a good citizen. Again, have a slower life, spend less time ruthlessly working at the office, and have people over. Have TIME for people. That is Meador's vision for the world, and it is one that I will be coming back to again and again. This is a book worth re-reading and more importantly, it's a book that points you back to that big and scary thing called the real world.
So if you care about this stuff, give it a whirl. You will come away with more desire for the real world and for other people.
April 26, 2019
This is a thoughtful and extremely clear distillation of some big ideas. Meador makes the case that the social fabric of American culture is disintegrating (a claim that shouldn't be too controversial in a post-2016 world), but backs up his case in a uniquely-Christian way.
Part 2 of this 3-part book was my favorite, bleak as it is. Meador expounds on the loss of meaning, of wonder, and of "good work (my favorite chapter, to my own surprise) with strong language, but a thoughtful tone. He draws heavily on the work of Charles Taylor, as well as some surprising nods to John Calvin, to diagnose our cultural moment. To my reading, he represents those other thinkers well, and also gives his own take. I found this section particularly compelling.
Part 3 proposes some forward-thinking ideas for engagement in politics, as well as a brief take on ecclesiology for our time. This is helpful, lucid, and builds well off the previous chapters.
Overall, this is an enjoyable and insightful read. It's a uniquely-Christian perspective, but a thoughtful one, in a refreshing departure from either the "culture wars" or "withdrawal from culture" postures that are represented by so many Christian books today. Those deeper in the theological weeds should know that Meador comes from a thoroughly-Reformed perspective, though it is more in the vein of Kuyper than Neo-Calvinism (thankfully).
I'm glad I read it, and would recommend it to Christians looking for more depth in their response to our cultural tumult, though one may ultimately want more than what Meador is offering in this short volume, and for that his references and footnotes provide plenty of deep material to chase down.
Part 2 of this 3-part book was my favorite, bleak as it is. Meador expounds on the loss of meaning, of wonder, and of "good work (my favorite chapter, to my own surprise) with strong language, but a thoughtful tone. He draws heavily on the work of Charles Taylor, as well as some surprising nods to John Calvin, to diagnose our cultural moment. To my reading, he represents those other thinkers well, and also gives his own take. I found this section particularly compelling.
Part 3 proposes some forward-thinking ideas for engagement in politics, as well as a brief take on ecclesiology for our time. This is helpful, lucid, and builds well off the previous chapters.
Overall, this is an enjoyable and insightful read. It's a uniquely-Christian perspective, but a thoughtful one, in a refreshing departure from either the "culture wars" or "withdrawal from culture" postures that are represented by so many Christian books today. Those deeper in the theological weeds should know that Meador comes from a thoroughly-Reformed perspective, though it is more in the vein of Kuyper than Neo-Calvinism (thankfully).
I'm glad I read it, and would recommend it to Christians looking for more depth in their response to our cultural tumult, though one may ultimately want more than what Meador is offering in this short volume, and for that his references and footnotes provide plenty of deep material to chase down.
January 18, 2020
Fantastic! I've recommended this book to everyone I've talked to this week.
At times Meador's critiques could use a little more development in order to avoid simply being the author talking about a pet peeve or intellectual hobby horse, (e.g. his critique of the worldview movement. He makes some really good points, but without further development, there are some weaknesses to his argument).
At times Meador's critiques could use a little more development in order to avoid simply being the author talking about a pet peeve or intellectual hobby horse, (e.g. his critique of the worldview movement. He makes some really good points, but without further development, there are some weaknesses to his argument).
December 25, 2019
Five Stars! Mr. Keller provides an incisive analysis of our problem and provides insightful recommendations for my Christian friends.
Actually the recommendations are something we should all, including those such as myself who are not Christians, follow. If you are not maintaining our comity and demanding virtuous behavior of yourself, your friends and your leaders, then you are the problem.
Pre-Modernist philosophers are correct. From Machiavelli through Hobbs and Smith, the Enlightenment made a tragic mistake in devaluing virtue and attempting to design systems where people behaving badly ('greed is good,' etc.) would produce good outcomes.
Not to say that I am against 'markets.' I am not. But the system is no excuse for non-virtuous behavior nor to they prevent its damage to society. Donald Trump is the culmination of this mistake as he destroys the habits and customs that have allowed our Republic to flourish.
Lest there be any doubt about what our Founding Fathers thought, "In a letter written to the Massachusetts militia in 1798, president John Adams wrote, 'Our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other'" (167).
"At the end of it all, they marvelled at how 'God provided'" (13).
"White evangelicals are more likely than any other religious group to support the use of torture" (15).
"From the 1970s onward, American evangelicalism has been prone to the same errors" (19).
"One study found that loneliness affects both physical and mental health in ways comparable to the damage done by smoking fifteen cigarettes per day" (35).
"Thus the existentialist story is one of liberation, of how people can be freed from unjust and unchosen norms imposed on them against their will" (52).
"Climate change is the story of have seen the chief purpose of the earth as being to facilitate their own immediate freedom from constraint, even at the cost of the planet's health" (62).
"Thus many young Americans now find themselves putting in enormous amounts of time at work in hopes of future success" (83).
"A vocation is a calling, ultimately something that God calls us to do or pursue. We all share one common vocation in that we are all made to know God" (85).
"One of the underlying assumptions we bring into discussions of work today is that a person has an absolute right to dispose of their property in whatever way seems best to them" (96).
"In confronting our mortality, we quite reasonably confront the question of what it is to live a good life. . . . . The end toward which we are made is to know God" (112).
"Scripture regularly assumes that nature can speak to us in these ways. . . . Job . . . via the testimony of nature" (129-130).
"Moreover, Calvin continues, every good thing we receive in creation is meant to direct our vision toward God" (131).
"So we know God through a consideration of His work in the world, through studying his creation. . . . . 'An error concerning the Creation ends as false thinking about God,' said the great medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas"(132).
"We should have asked what kind of virtues are necessary to live well in a community with one another and what particular virtues are necessary for responsible political action" (161).
"John Calvin . . . commentary on the Sermon on the Mount. . . . . And experience certainly shows that, the more mildly their wickedness is endured, the more bold and insolent does it become. . . .'" (170). Brace yourself if (when?) Trump is reelected.
"In 2016 evangelicals made the choice to dress as a wolf" (171).
"That is why both doctrine and virtue are so important" (174).
"And this is why a literally endless ocean of time to exist in God's world is such glorious news. Imagine the beauties we will find in the world given a literal eternity to explore it" (183).
Actually the recommendations are something we should all, including those such as myself who are not Christians, follow. If you are not maintaining our comity and demanding virtuous behavior of yourself, your friends and your leaders, then you are the problem.
Pre-Modernist philosophers are correct. From Machiavelli through Hobbs and Smith, the Enlightenment made a tragic mistake in devaluing virtue and attempting to design systems where people behaving badly ('greed is good,' etc.) would produce good outcomes.
Not to say that I am against 'markets.' I am not. But the system is no excuse for non-virtuous behavior nor to they prevent its damage to society. Donald Trump is the culmination of this mistake as he destroys the habits and customs that have allowed our Republic to flourish.
Lest there be any doubt about what our Founding Fathers thought, "In a letter written to the Massachusetts militia in 1798, president John Adams wrote, 'Our Constitution was made only for moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other'" (167).
"At the end of it all, they marvelled at how 'God provided'" (13).
"White evangelicals are more likely than any other religious group to support the use of torture" (15).
"From the 1970s onward, American evangelicalism has been prone to the same errors" (19).
"One study found that loneliness affects both physical and mental health in ways comparable to the damage done by smoking fifteen cigarettes per day" (35).
"Thus the existentialist story is one of liberation, of how people can be freed from unjust and unchosen norms imposed on them against their will" (52).
"Climate change is the story of have seen the chief purpose of the earth as being to facilitate their own immediate freedom from constraint, even at the cost of the planet's health" (62).
"Thus many young Americans now find themselves putting in enormous amounts of time at work in hopes of future success" (83).
"A vocation is a calling, ultimately something that God calls us to do or pursue. We all share one common vocation in that we are all made to know God" (85).
"One of the underlying assumptions we bring into discussions of work today is that a person has an absolute right to dispose of their property in whatever way seems best to them" (96).
"In confronting our mortality, we quite reasonably confront the question of what it is to live a good life. . . . . The end toward which we are made is to know God" (112).
"Scripture regularly assumes that nature can speak to us in these ways. . . . Job . . . via the testimony of nature" (129-130).
"Moreover, Calvin continues, every good thing we receive in creation is meant to direct our vision toward God" (131).
"So we know God through a consideration of His work in the world, through studying his creation. . . . . 'An error concerning the Creation ends as false thinking about God,' said the great medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas"(132).
"We should have asked what kind of virtues are necessary to live well in a community with one another and what particular virtues are necessary for responsible political action" (161).
"John Calvin . . . commentary on the Sermon on the Mount. . . . . And experience certainly shows that, the more mildly their wickedness is endured, the more bold and insolent does it become. . . .'" (170). Brace yourself if (when?) Trump is reelected.
"In 2016 evangelicals made the choice to dress as a wolf" (171).
"That is why both doctrine and virtue are so important" (174).
"And this is why a literally endless ocean of time to exist in God's world is such glorious news. Imagine the beauties we will find in the world given a literal eternity to explore it" (183).
September 4, 2019
When I saw that Jake Meador was writing a book, I knew I had to read it. His insightful work at Mere Orthodoxy has been a source of great encouragement to me over the last few years. He has a wonderful ability to blend a practical knowledge of people, politics, and the church with perceptive wisdom about the ideas and assumptions that govern so much of our modern world.
And our modern world is in desperate need of wisdom. Meador moves methodically from a general discussion of the breakdown taking place in our communities (both sacred and secular) to a more detailed exploration of the specific problems which lie behind this breakdown (Meador focuses in on three: the loss of meaning, the loss of wonder, and the loss of good work).
But this book is not a doom-and-gloom jeremiad. It's a book of hope, and that hope shines through in the second half of the book where Meador outlines the practices and promises of community. He highlights three simple (but profound) practices which can restore and revitalize our communities. Drawing on the rich heritage of his Reformed background, Meador makes a compelling case for a recovery of the traditional doctrine and practice of Sabbath observance. Meador corrects the misconception that the Sabbath is merely a source of legalistic virtue-signaling and argues instead that the Sabbath is a positive good. To quote another advocate for Sabbath observance: "The Sabbath was made for man."
Meador further draws on the work of Wendell Berry to explore how the factory mentality we bring to society needs to be reshaped around the more biblical and healthy concept of membership. Flowing out of that is his argument that our relationship to work in our post-industrial world needs reflection and reform.
I said that this book is a book of hope, and the final chapters express that hope in helpful ways. Meador explores how these simple practices can be sources of light in places of darkness. The book avoids political posturing and levels criticisms against both Right and Left equally. While the reader might sometimes wish that Meador would give more detail about the practical (or even policy) details that would promote his vision of fidelity and renewal that's not really the point of the book. The real virtue of the work is to begin cultural conversations that explore ways to maintain fidelity and promote health in our churches and communities. And in achieving that end, Meador is entirely successful.
And our modern world is in desperate need of wisdom. Meador moves methodically from a general discussion of the breakdown taking place in our communities (both sacred and secular) to a more detailed exploration of the specific problems which lie behind this breakdown (Meador focuses in on three: the loss of meaning, the loss of wonder, and the loss of good work).
But this book is not a doom-and-gloom jeremiad. It's a book of hope, and that hope shines through in the second half of the book where Meador outlines the practices and promises of community. He highlights three simple (but profound) practices which can restore and revitalize our communities. Drawing on the rich heritage of his Reformed background, Meador makes a compelling case for a recovery of the traditional doctrine and practice of Sabbath observance. Meador corrects the misconception that the Sabbath is merely a source of legalistic virtue-signaling and argues instead that the Sabbath is a positive good. To quote another advocate for Sabbath observance: "The Sabbath was made for man."
Meador further draws on the work of Wendell Berry to explore how the factory mentality we bring to society needs to be reshaped around the more biblical and healthy concept of membership. Flowing out of that is his argument that our relationship to work in our post-industrial world needs reflection and reform.
I said that this book is a book of hope, and the final chapters express that hope in helpful ways. Meador explores how these simple practices can be sources of light in places of darkness. The book avoids political posturing and levels criticisms against both Right and Left equally. While the reader might sometimes wish that Meador would give more detail about the practical (or even policy) details that would promote his vision of fidelity and renewal that's not really the point of the book. The real virtue of the work is to begin cultural conversations that explore ways to maintain fidelity and promote health in our churches and communities. And in achieving that end, Meador is entirely successful.
July 24, 2019
I did find this book helpful, because it strove to be non-partisan without being anaemic and aimless. Quite the opposite, Meador strives to challenge both Left and Right according to their specific weaknesses, whether it be over-confidence in the Market or in the Big State to address our ills. I found the sections on Economics. community and Sabbath and work to be most challenging.
One quibble: there as no need, in my opinion, to use the phrase "Gay Christian", not that Meador is at all accepting of the homosexual identity, but it felt like a concession.
Here is the outline:
Part 1: The Breakdown of Community
1. The Passing of the American Church
2. The Unwinding of Common Life in America
Part 2: The Problems for Community
3. The Loss of Meaning
4. The Loss of Wonder
5. The Loss of Good Work
Part 3: The Practices of Community
6. Sabbath and the Chief End of Man
7. The Membership
8. Work
Part 4: The Promise of Community
9. Political Doctrine and Civil Virtue
10. The Eternal City
One quibble: there as no need, in my opinion, to use the phrase "Gay Christian", not that Meador is at all accepting of the homosexual identity, but it felt like a concession.
Here is the outline:
Part 1: The Breakdown of Community
1. The Passing of the American Church
2. The Unwinding of Common Life in America
Part 2: The Problems for Community
3. The Loss of Meaning
4. The Loss of Wonder
5. The Loss of Good Work
Part 3: The Practices of Community
6. Sabbath and the Chief End of Man
7. The Membership
8. Work
Part 4: The Promise of Community
9. Political Doctrine and Civil Virtue
10. The Eternal City
July 6, 2019
This was a thoughtful and well written book. Meador’s prise are smooth and engaging. And accessible.
I think Meador did a good job of adding to the conversation and not merely seeking to amplify one part of the conversation around cultural engagement. He takes a centrist approach that is hopeful and tender.
What I appreciated most was that he didn’t propose easy answers. And he named some of the postures and virtues that we need to develop as Christians in the west.
This is a great introduction to the topic.
I think Meador did a good job of adding to the conversation and not merely seeking to amplify one part of the conversation around cultural engagement. He takes a centrist approach that is hopeful and tender.
What I appreciated most was that he didn’t propose easy answers. And he named some of the postures and virtues that we need to develop as Christians in the west.
This is a great introduction to the topic.
Read
July 4, 2020This is such a refreshing book. Basically, Meadors covers both the breakdown in our society of community and politics and how a Christian can faithfully help to restore them.
Excellent book that challenges both those on the right and the left toward a more faithful, Christ-exalting, neighbor-loving vision.
Excellent book that challenges both those on the right and the left toward a more faithful, Christ-exalting, neighbor-loving vision.
January 12, 2023
4.0 // Helpful and insightful. Meador makes a solid case for both the reality and the significance of the breakdown of community in America, and offers a stirring call for Christians to right the ship, rooted in Biblical truth. I especially appreciated his chapters on Work and The Eternal City.
February 3, 2020
A plea for a return to virtue, beauty, and the first principles that will see christians reflect light to the world.
February 7, 2020
3.5. I like a lot of what this book has to say but I do not think the practical applications at the end feel fleshed out enough.
February 28, 2021
If you’re trying to decide to read this book, YOU SHOULD READ THIS BOOK.
June 8, 2020
Combines sociological insights and theological convictions to put forth a path toward reconstructing healthy communities in the United States. Christian political ethics at its finest.
May 16, 2023
This is a really good book. Jake is a friend in real life, so for what he’s trying to do, I think it’s as good of a book out there. It’s a book to get Protestants to think seriously about serious things, and for that reason alone it’s excellent. A criticism that might be levied is that there’s not much new on it, which is true. Another—and I think this would be mine—is that it’s obviously aimed at a certain type of former fundamentalist or conservatives evangelical that limits its accessibility for others a bit.
October 19, 2021
This book kind of reminded me of Charles Murray’s Coming Apart without all the data and from a Christian perspective. It is both a theology of life and a sociological study. I read it back in May and I’m wanting to reread and refresh.
October 30, 2019
Too many pop culture references for my liking. In fact, I believe Christians should be a little farther removed from the norms of the culture than Meador probably does. But a good overall view of what we, as Christians, should be considering while in the current world.
January 10, 2021
Meador points out how many contemporary churches and Christians (I see myself here) are selfishly seeking to advance their own agendas rather than loving their neighbor sacrificially. We seek freedom to be who we want to be, desiring power and prestige and status and expect a life of comfort and wealth. That very pursuit distances us from what God wants for us and often results in stepping on others to get what we want. Meador reminds us that we are created to be in solidarity with those around us--to view our gifts, abilities, and resources as presents given to us by God for the purpose of helping our neighbor flourish.
Some quotes I want to remember:
The American church, Catholic and evangelical alike, has produced politically opportunistic people who are de facto moral relativists and are largely ignorant of the teachings of the faith. Given that, we could ask why these movements have failed to produce deeply pious Christians impressed with the image of Christ and given to love of God and neighbor. But it is probably better to ask if these churches were ever designed to produce such a thing in the first place. (24)
Christianity is not, as is often thought, some set of individual principles a person can try out if they want to find a greater sense of meaning and purpose in their life. It’s actually a true account of the basic nature of reality. (35)
The modernist story defines love as that which maximizes the freedom of individual people to act and identify in whatever way they choose for themselves. This quickly leads to a problem, when one person’s freedom comes into competition with another’s. Because of this, love necessarily becomes a zero-sum competition in which I must maximize my own freedom even if it means undermining another person’s. And so our “love” ends up being consumptive in nature—to grow itself it must cause something else to diminish. (66)
The modernist story, then, does to the social and relational climate what industrialism has done to the ecological climate. It promises great freedom but promotes it by destroying the very things that make freedom possible. So the story is inherently unsustainable and must fail, one way or another. (67)
Good work does not simply yield a material surplus, though it does that. It also serves the health of a place by ordering its life to look more the way God wants it to look. And it dignifies the individual by giving them a part to play in turning the creation toward God’s ends. (92)
There are three aspects we must understand of the sabbath. First, we must see how the sabbath orients us toward the world of time. Second, we must learn to set aside the sabbath for public worship of God. Third, we must learn to see in the sabbath a glorious indifference to the factory, which is the inevitable consequence of orienting ourselves to time and, ultimately, to God. (110)
Common goods, in contrast, cannot be sliced up and served individually. They must by their very nature be held together with others. Thus they are less like a pizza and more like a symphony: If you remove the brass section from an orchestral piece, the piece is not the same. You need the entire symphony for the good of that musical composition to be fully enjoyed. It is not possible for the trumpet player to go off by himself, play only his part, and still experience the same good that he would were he playing in the orchestra. (116)
Lifeboat communities assume that our most natural state is to be alone and autonomous. Relationship, then, is an unnatural thing, something we take up under stress and in order to help ourselves. The lifeboat mentality looks at a person, or a thing, and wonders only if that thing will benefit them. Will this person or thing make me richer? Prettier? Stronger? Happier? Then I must have it. If it will not, well, better to let it go. The membership, in contrast, assumes that human beings are communal and gregarious by nature. We cannot live the good life alone. And so we do not evaluate relationships with an eye only toward what they offer us. Rather, the membership directs us to look at another life and ask, “What does it demand of me?” (127)
Solidarity gives us a way of thinking about politics that foregrounds peace as a political goal by rejecting the antisocial assumptions of modernism. The modernist understanding of politics thinks the chief good that politics secures for people is sovereignty, which is simply another way of saying the right to narrate one's own identity, to create it over the course of one's life through meaningful action and choice. ...Sovereignty is the way we mediate the conflicts that inevitably arise when millions of self-interested people are locked on the same planet and have to figure out how to self-actualize without killing each other. (161)
Thus we pursue social peace because it is in fact the natural state of affairs in creation. It is how the world is meant to work: it is a seamless tapestry, composed of many millions of threads that come together to create a single beautiful thing, all existing in praise to God. We are not, first and foremost, detached autonomous beings defining our own identities; we are, rather, members existing in an interlocking web of life meant to promote the health and happiness of the entire creation. (163)
The second idea we need to recover is ... sphere sovereignty. ...In other words, distinct spheres of society exist with distinct responsibilities to promote the peace of the community. (163)
Finally, the third doctrine we need to keep in mind is that of subsidiarity. ...Subsidiarity means that when a social problem arises, the body that should address it is the smallest, most local body possible. If a problem can be solved by a household, it should. If a household can’t but a neighborhood can, then the neighborhood should. The progression simply continues on upward until you get to the largest social institution, which is usually the state. (164)
The first virtue every Christian who aspires to responsible citizenship must take up is humility and its companion, which is a humble reliance on God to take our meager loaves and fish and turn them to something greater. (169)
The second virtue we must take up is wisdom. To understand what this means, we should contrast Christian wisdom with ... worldview. (169)
How do we acquire wisdom? ...Wisdom is cultivated over time through careful reading, conversation, and a steady, slow following of Christ in the stuff of daily life. It is the result of regular habits of receptivity by which we open ourselves up to the instruction of God as he offers it to us in Scripture and in nature. (170)
How does Christian wisdom differ from worldview? Christian wisdom does not begin with predefined categories and questions and answers. It does not begin with simple boxes into which people can easily be sorted. Rather, Christian wisdom begins with a careful consideration of reality. It enters the world confidently, expecting that whatever it finds will be interesting and will show us a bit more about who God is. (170)
A note about this last quote: Seeking wisdom sounds similar to the practice of exegeting people. But Meador is pointing to an added dimension in this pursuit of a deep understanding of people. He rightly adds the need to, at the same time, open ourselves up to the instruction of God.
Some quotes I want to remember:
The American church, Catholic and evangelical alike, has produced politically opportunistic people who are de facto moral relativists and are largely ignorant of the teachings of the faith. Given that, we could ask why these movements have failed to produce deeply pious Christians impressed with the image of Christ and given to love of God and neighbor. But it is probably better to ask if these churches were ever designed to produce such a thing in the first place. (24)
Christianity is not, as is often thought, some set of individual principles a person can try out if they want to find a greater sense of meaning and purpose in their life. It’s actually a true account of the basic nature of reality. (35)
The modernist story defines love as that which maximizes the freedom of individual people to act and identify in whatever way they choose for themselves. This quickly leads to a problem, when one person’s freedom comes into competition with another’s. Because of this, love necessarily becomes a zero-sum competition in which I must maximize my own freedom even if it means undermining another person’s. And so our “love” ends up being consumptive in nature—to grow itself it must cause something else to diminish. (66)
The modernist story, then, does to the social and relational climate what industrialism has done to the ecological climate. It promises great freedom but promotes it by destroying the very things that make freedom possible. So the story is inherently unsustainable and must fail, one way or another. (67)
Good work does not simply yield a material surplus, though it does that. It also serves the health of a place by ordering its life to look more the way God wants it to look. And it dignifies the individual by giving them a part to play in turning the creation toward God’s ends. (92)
There are three aspects we must understand of the sabbath. First, we must see how the sabbath orients us toward the world of time. Second, we must learn to set aside the sabbath for public worship of God. Third, we must learn to see in the sabbath a glorious indifference to the factory, which is the inevitable consequence of orienting ourselves to time and, ultimately, to God. (110)
Common goods, in contrast, cannot be sliced up and served individually. They must by their very nature be held together with others. Thus they are less like a pizza and more like a symphony: If you remove the brass section from an orchestral piece, the piece is not the same. You need the entire symphony for the good of that musical composition to be fully enjoyed. It is not possible for the trumpet player to go off by himself, play only his part, and still experience the same good that he would were he playing in the orchestra. (116)
Lifeboat communities assume that our most natural state is to be alone and autonomous. Relationship, then, is an unnatural thing, something we take up under stress and in order to help ourselves. The lifeboat mentality looks at a person, or a thing, and wonders only if that thing will benefit them. Will this person or thing make me richer? Prettier? Stronger? Happier? Then I must have it. If it will not, well, better to let it go. The membership, in contrast, assumes that human beings are communal and gregarious by nature. We cannot live the good life alone. And so we do not evaluate relationships with an eye only toward what they offer us. Rather, the membership directs us to look at another life and ask, “What does it demand of me?” (127)
Solidarity gives us a way of thinking about politics that foregrounds peace as a political goal by rejecting the antisocial assumptions of modernism. The modernist understanding of politics thinks the chief good that politics secures for people is sovereignty, which is simply another way of saying the right to narrate one's own identity, to create it over the course of one's life through meaningful action and choice. ...Sovereignty is the way we mediate the conflicts that inevitably arise when millions of self-interested people are locked on the same planet and have to figure out how to self-actualize without killing each other. (161)
Thus we pursue social peace because it is in fact the natural state of affairs in creation. It is how the world is meant to work: it is a seamless tapestry, composed of many millions of threads that come together to create a single beautiful thing, all existing in praise to God. We are not, first and foremost, detached autonomous beings defining our own identities; we are, rather, members existing in an interlocking web of life meant to promote the health and happiness of the entire creation. (163)
The second idea we need to recover is ... sphere sovereignty. ...In other words, distinct spheres of society exist with distinct responsibilities to promote the peace of the community. (163)
Finally, the third doctrine we need to keep in mind is that of subsidiarity. ...Subsidiarity means that when a social problem arises, the body that should address it is the smallest, most local body possible. If a problem can be solved by a household, it should. If a household can’t but a neighborhood can, then the neighborhood should. The progression simply continues on upward until you get to the largest social institution, which is usually the state. (164)
The first virtue every Christian who aspires to responsible citizenship must take up is humility and its companion, which is a humble reliance on God to take our meager loaves and fish and turn them to something greater. (169)
The second virtue we must take up is wisdom. To understand what this means, we should contrast Christian wisdom with ... worldview. (169)
How do we acquire wisdom? ...Wisdom is cultivated over time through careful reading, conversation, and a steady, slow following of Christ in the stuff of daily life. It is the result of regular habits of receptivity by which we open ourselves up to the instruction of God as he offers it to us in Scripture and in nature. (170)
How does Christian wisdom differ from worldview? Christian wisdom does not begin with predefined categories and questions and answers. It does not begin with simple boxes into which people can easily be sorted. Rather, Christian wisdom begins with a careful consideration of reality. It enters the world confidently, expecting that whatever it finds will be interesting and will show us a bit more about who God is. (170)
A note about this last quote: Seeking wisdom sounds similar to the practice of exegeting people. But Meador is pointing to an added dimension in this pursuit of a deep understanding of people. He rightly adds the need to, at the same time, open ourselves up to the instruction of God.
January 3, 2021
One of my top books of the year - the sort of non-partisan, political theology with local, ecclesiastical, philosophical, and ordinary insights about the big problems for the church in America and small, loving approaches to addressing their brokenness.
You probably won't see all of this book coming and are in for a treat.
You probably won't see all of this book coming and are in for a treat.
July 16, 2019
Jake Meador’s new book In Search of the Common Good: Christian Fidelity in a Fractured World is a gem. At just about 200 pages, it is a small book with big truths.
A Fractured World
The book is divided into four parts. Part One: The Breakdown of Community examines the passing of the American Church and the Unwinding of Common Life in America. He makes examples out of the Catholic Church and President Trump, as well as Tullian Tchvidjian, Ted Haggard, and Mark Driscoll. He focuses on Instagram and Facebook and our growing loneliness.
Part Two: The Problems for Community looks at the loss of meaning, the loss of wonder, and the loss of good work. He paints a bleak picture of our modern world. It is here where Meador makes the biggest impact. He has a way of writing that tackles grand, complex ideas beautifully. He does not simply them. Instead, he walks you through them and shows you what he sees.
Christian Fidelity
Meador turns everything around in Part Three: The Practices of Community and pushes us towards the Sabbath and the Chief End of Man, the membership (examining marriage and celibacy), and work. His strategy for taking down modern liberalism is quite simple and straightforward. But he allows his points and ideas to breathe, giving us practical examples along the way.
In Part Four: The Promise of Community, we are presented with the necessity of political doctrine and civil virtue as well as the hope of the eternal city. He is most hopeful here to point out that Christians can be a positive force in the world at large. And he makes a compelling case for the doctrine that God is not going to destroy the world. He will purify it.
The Common Good
This book has opened my eyes to the loss of beauty in this world. But it has also opened my heart to meaning, wonder, and good work steeped in Christian faith. I am motivated and inspired. I am moved to love and good works by reading these words. With my highest recommendation, I urge you to do the same.
I was provided a complimentary copy of the In Search of the Common Good: Christian Fidelity in a Fractured World in exchange for an honest review.
A Fractured World
The book is divided into four parts. Part One: The Breakdown of Community examines the passing of the American Church and the Unwinding of Common Life in America. He makes examples out of the Catholic Church and President Trump, as well as Tullian Tchvidjian, Ted Haggard, and Mark Driscoll. He focuses on Instagram and Facebook and our growing loneliness.
Part Two: The Problems for Community looks at the loss of meaning, the loss of wonder, and the loss of good work. He paints a bleak picture of our modern world. It is here where Meador makes the biggest impact. He has a way of writing that tackles grand, complex ideas beautifully. He does not simply them. Instead, he walks you through them and shows you what he sees.
Christian Fidelity
Meador turns everything around in Part Three: The Practices of Community and pushes us towards the Sabbath and the Chief End of Man, the membership (examining marriage and celibacy), and work. His strategy for taking down modern liberalism is quite simple and straightforward. But he allows his points and ideas to breathe, giving us practical examples along the way.
In Part Four: The Promise of Community, we are presented with the necessity of political doctrine and civil virtue as well as the hope of the eternal city. He is most hopeful here to point out that Christians can be a positive force in the world at large. And he makes a compelling case for the doctrine that God is not going to destroy the world. He will purify it.
The Common Good
This book has opened my eyes to the loss of beauty in this world. But it has also opened my heart to meaning, wonder, and good work steeped in Christian faith. I am motivated and inspired. I am moved to love and good works by reading these words. With my highest recommendation, I urge you to do the same.
I was provided a complimentary copy of the In Search of the Common Good: Christian Fidelity in a Fractured World in exchange for an honest review.
September 19, 2019
There was much I agreed with and found moving in this book. Jake Meador has a helpful and refreshing blend of wide-reading and local roots that manifests itself in often lyrical prose. His descriptions of his grandparents, parents, and personal encounters with the beauty of God's creation I found deeply stirring. There is also much I would agree with and commend in his diagnosis of problems in American society and political engagement.
My primary critique is that the book suffers from a weakness in ecclesiology and eschatology, and the relationship between those two doctrines. On the former point, Meador actually does a great job pointing Christians to local church membership as the first place we counteract the isolation of the "buffered self." But his vision of how Christians then engage the culture around them relied solely on scanty exegesis of Genesis 1-2 (with little deep reflection on the problem introduced by sin), and of Revelation 21:24. My concern is that Christians who attempt to live out Meador's vision are not prepared well for a vision of Christian cultural/political engagement that includes martyrdom and "faithful witness unto death" (Rev 2:10, 12:11). Christians do need to consider the problem of a fractured society with no visions of the common good - but that consideration needs to take into account all of the biblical witness (e.g., at least Psalm 2 and Rev 13, not merely Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2). There is a more careful middle ground somewhere between "it's all going to burn anyway" and "the road to heaven does not run from the earth, but through it," a middle ground in which the gospel is cosmic good news (not just about "vague future bliss"), but only to the community of the redeemed who are eagerly awaiting a Savior (Phil 3:20-21). I wish Meador had attempted to lead the way into that middle ground, even as I commend him for contributing to an important conversation.
My primary critique is that the book suffers from a weakness in ecclesiology and eschatology, and the relationship between those two doctrines. On the former point, Meador actually does a great job pointing Christians to local church membership as the first place we counteract the isolation of the "buffered self." But his vision of how Christians then engage the culture around them relied solely on scanty exegesis of Genesis 1-2 (with little deep reflection on the problem introduced by sin), and of Revelation 21:24. My concern is that Christians who attempt to live out Meador's vision are not prepared well for a vision of Christian cultural/political engagement that includes martyrdom and "faithful witness unto death" (Rev 2:10, 12:11). Christians do need to consider the problem of a fractured society with no visions of the common good - but that consideration needs to take into account all of the biblical witness (e.g., at least Psalm 2 and Rev 13, not merely Romans 13 and 1 Peter 2). There is a more careful middle ground somewhere between "it's all going to burn anyway" and "the road to heaven does not run from the earth, but through it," a middle ground in which the gospel is cosmic good news (not just about "vague future bliss"), but only to the community of the redeemed who are eagerly awaiting a Savior (Phil 3:20-21). I wish Meador had attempted to lead the way into that middle ground, even as I commend him for contributing to an important conversation.
set-aside
August 24, 2020I have heard many good things about this book, but its argument hasn't grabbed me. If I were reading this book for a book club or class, I would have pushed through to the end. As it is, I will not rate the book because I have not given Meador a fair reading. I have only read through chapter 4.
Meador observes that God's creative love holds this world together, but people face despair, grief and loneliness. The question driving his work seems to be how Christians can help others experience God's love. His answer seems to be through faithfulness (hidden fidelity) to one's community. "A simple life of work and prayer in a particular place among a beloved people is all that God's people need to aspire to" (p. 22).
Unfortunately, chapter 3 focuses on finding fault for the way things are. The existentialist are blamed for offering us false freedoms and loss of meaning. And while Meador may be right, placing blame alienates rather than heals. I am not concerned about who caused the problem so much as how to address it. I would have preferred that Meador consider how Christianity offers what the existentialists seek, "the freedom to be their true, authentic selves" (p. 57).
Still, I pushed on to read chapter 4. In chapter 4, Meador considers the loss of wonder. It's not really wonder that is lost. We encounter the wonderful, but we fail to discern what is behind the wonderful, "the faint echo of God's voice speaking the world into being" (p. 66). We acknowledge the supernatural, but we don't feel it's otherworldliness. Meador touches on the trouble, "our modern self is 'buffered,' meaning that there exists a barrier between ourselves and the world around us" (p. 78), but his solution (recovering religion, family and place, p. 79) needs further development.
Meador is asking good questions, but he is taking them a different direction than I want to go.
Meador observes that God's creative love holds this world together, but people face despair, grief and loneliness. The question driving his work seems to be how Christians can help others experience God's love. His answer seems to be through faithfulness (hidden fidelity) to one's community. "A simple life of work and prayer in a particular place among a beloved people is all that God's people need to aspire to" (p. 22).
Unfortunately, chapter 3 focuses on finding fault for the way things are. The existentialist are blamed for offering us false freedoms and loss of meaning. And while Meador may be right, placing blame alienates rather than heals. I am not concerned about who caused the problem so much as how to address it. I would have preferred that Meador consider how Christianity offers what the existentialists seek, "the freedom to be their true, authentic selves" (p. 57).
Still, I pushed on to read chapter 4. In chapter 4, Meador considers the loss of wonder. It's not really wonder that is lost. We encounter the wonderful, but we fail to discern what is behind the wonderful, "the faint echo of God's voice speaking the world into being" (p. 66). We acknowledge the supernatural, but we don't feel it's otherworldliness. Meador touches on the trouble, "our modern self is 'buffered,' meaning that there exists a barrier between ourselves and the world around us" (p. 78), but his solution (recovering religion, family and place, p. 79) needs further development.
Meador is asking good questions, but he is taking them a different direction than I want to go.
June 29, 2019
I search out books to read that help me see old truths through new eyes. Fresh-faced Jake Meador (I love his author photo on the book jacket) nails modern society's collective spiritual condition: Unsettled, fearful, lonely, disgusted and despairing. Global politics and world economies can't fix this disaffection.
The author brings us back to the basics. Live a Christ-centered life. Act from a Spirit-filled heart. Participate in a love-your-neighbor economy that works together for the common good. The challenge Christ gives His followers in today's culture is as radical as it was when he first delivered the Sermon on the Mount.
Meader advocates for working out what the Christian faith should look like in the public arena. That's a hotly debated issue among Christians at both ends of the liberal/conservative spectrum. One of my takeaways is that if Christians are to live in community the way Jesus taught us, we will have to challenge the self-aggrandizing our culture promotes. The example that sticks in my mind is telling a teenager she can be anything she wants to be. That's a lie. Better to introduce her to the One who can help her be her best self. That's empowering.
Meader presents a concise review of the history and philosophy that has brought our society to an alarming point of discord. He reminds us that we are called to unity around the common goal--promoting peace in our communities that we might know and love God. Given the rapid decline in church attendance, I wonder how many people are in a position to hear this call. But, Meader is not declaring doomsday. He encourages us to focus on the whatsoevers--truth, honesty, purity, loveliness, reputable, virtuous and praiseworthy things. The author's message is hopeful.
The author brings us back to the basics. Live a Christ-centered life. Act from a Spirit-filled heart. Participate in a love-your-neighbor economy that works together for the common good. The challenge Christ gives His followers in today's culture is as radical as it was when he first delivered the Sermon on the Mount.
Meader advocates for working out what the Christian faith should look like in the public arena. That's a hotly debated issue among Christians at both ends of the liberal/conservative spectrum. One of my takeaways is that if Christians are to live in community the way Jesus taught us, we will have to challenge the self-aggrandizing our culture promotes. The example that sticks in my mind is telling a teenager she can be anything she wants to be. That's a lie. Better to introduce her to the One who can help her be her best self. That's empowering.
Meader presents a concise review of the history and philosophy that has brought our society to an alarming point of discord. He reminds us that we are called to unity around the common goal--promoting peace in our communities that we might know and love God. Given the rapid decline in church attendance, I wonder how many people are in a position to hear this call. But, Meader is not declaring doomsday. He encourages us to focus on the whatsoevers--truth, honesty, purity, loveliness, reputable, virtuous and praiseworthy things. The author's message is hopeful.
November 13, 2020
This is book is looking at some of the culture breakdowns in society and seeing how it can be changed for the common good.
This book is very much written from an American view and issues there. I am not saying that as a negative just a point to know about the book.
The first Part of the book is The Breakdown Community of the Passing of the American church. Looking from the outside I can see many of the issues that he is raising. It grieves my heart to see how the church has bought into so much of the world's values and views. "The tragedy is that when the church fails to preach the gospel faithfully and submit its life to the lordship of Christ, the effects are not limited to the church."
Part Two - The Problems for Community - What is the purpose of community? We have loss of meaning. I life in a large city but in the community where we life we are a small community that cares for one another.
Part Three - The Practices of Community - there is some hope given in this section.
Part Four - The Promise of Community -
Overall I felt that this point had numerous good points and things that Christians need to be addressing. At times is seemed to be disjointed bits of information trying to join to together but not always succeeding.
I came to the end of the book and could not really summarise what I had read. There were parts that I underlined, things that caused me to think, and information to help me understand what is happening in America.
Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to review this book.
This book is very much written from an American view and issues there. I am not saying that as a negative just a point to know about the book.
The first Part of the book is The Breakdown Community of the Passing of the American church. Looking from the outside I can see many of the issues that he is raising. It grieves my heart to see how the church has bought into so much of the world's values and views. "The tragedy is that when the church fails to preach the gospel faithfully and submit its life to the lordship of Christ, the effects are not limited to the church."
Part Two - The Problems for Community - What is the purpose of community? We have loss of meaning. I life in a large city but in the community where we life we are a small community that cares for one another.
Part Three - The Practices of Community - there is some hope given in this section.
Part Four - The Promise of Community -
Overall I felt that this point had numerous good points and things that Christians need to be addressing. At times is seemed to be disjointed bits of information trying to join to together but not always succeeding.
I came to the end of the book and could not really summarise what I had read. There were parts that I underlined, things that caused me to think, and information to help me understand what is happening in America.
Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to review this book.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews