The other day April made a wonderful lemon pie for our date night. It looked and smelled delicious, just as a pie should. But then something horrible happened as I attempted to find a place for it in the fridge - I dropped the pie on the floor. Thankfully it landed right side up in the pan, so most of it was still edible, but it looked a mess. I joked that what was once a beautiful confection was now a deconstructed pie.
It was then that I realized that that is exactly what is happening to American society and Western Christianity today - all of this deconstruction is simply us making a mess of things and slapping a catchy name on it. The only difference is that what I had done was an accident. What is happening in our culture today is completely intentional.
Throwing the baby out with the bathwater is now being repackaged and labeled as deconstruction. That's not how it starts, but that's how it ends. We find one flaw in the system or the religion and, instead of trying to fix it, we dismantle it all and lose all semblance of heritage and history. Some people are totally fine with that, but anyone who truly cares about the present or the future will look to the past for inspiration and direction.
So many parts of our beliefs and values as a nation and as the Church do deserve criticism and restructuring. People started with this truth and instead of just working on things that were observably broken, they proceeded to say that if one part was broken, the whole thing must need fixing. The next step was to say "if the whole thing needs fixing,then we better just demolish it all."
Parts that worked just fine were scrapped in favor of shiny new ones that aren't quite up to par simply because they are more aesthetically pleasing. Something is dirty? Don't clean it, just get a new one! Our culture has become the equivalent of buying paper plates and styrofoam cups instead of simply doing the dishes. We aren't willing to do the dirty work of fixing or cleaning useful things that are broken or unclean because we have produced the ability to simply replace it with something intended for destruction.
At the top of it all we have the people who benefit the most from it. Profiteers sit atop a mound of the resources needed to fix the problems and demand that we do it their way. And the worst part is, we're going along with it. We grab ahold of these disposable philosophies and defend them until the next thing comes along.
This is happening on the personal level with so many people that it has now moved on to the social platform. Celebrities and "leaders" invite us to join them on their "deconstructing journeys”. Some follow along out of admiration, and others out of curiosity, but regardless of the reason, we pick up some of the things they put down and eventually become convinced that the only way to fix everything is to destroy everything.
This kind of soft brainwashing is now happening on the national level of both faith and policy in America today. And if you dare to hold to a traditional view of my kind, you are accused of being a part of the problem.
People use all kinds of rationale to defend deconstruction and “exvangelicalism”. The bottom line is a weariness that leads to apathy. I ran across this little gem of an attempt to excuse the philosophy on Twitter recently:
“Paul rips the early church up in his letters. God sends mean prophet after mean prophet to his people in rebuke. Folks start deconstructing evangelicalism and the response is ‘hey that's not nice.’ No. Repent.”
First of all, Paul loved the Church and helped build the Church up. He never treated Her ungraciously in his letters. He addressed its problems and encouraged its strengths by speaking truth in love. Secondly, the prophets weren’t mean. They were honest. And they were sent to correct Israel, not deconstruct her.
And third, I have never heard anyone say anything to the effect of “hey that’s not nice.” We aren’t concerned with manners. We are concerned with souls, and a deconstructed soul is not what God requires. He is near to them that are of a broken and contrite heart. He lifts up the humble. But there is an inherent aspect of pride in deconstruction which says, “I know better.” C.S. Lewis referred to this as “chronological snobbery”.
Don’t get me wrong - I understand why so many today are deconstructing. They have been hurt and they feel (and perhaps have been) deceived. And I do believe we should expose abuse and the abusers. People who misuse power should be removed from such positions. We should work diligently to correct the errancies we find in our institutions. When there is a problem in the church or the nation, we should address it and deal with it.
But that does not mean our entire religion or government needs dismantling. Perhaps it means fresh leadership perspective is needed. Maybe large parts of our ideology need reforming. And maybe an overhaul of our institutions is necessary, but let’s take it one step at a time.
If you are going through this process, please avoid the temptation to take others along with you. Seek help and accountability with like-minded and even different-minded souls, but do not encourage others to follow you. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” (Philippians 2:12b) Otherwise, you could very well become the type of false teacher warned about in 2 Peter chapter 2.
And if you are deconstructing your faith, please know that I pray God will lead you to the truth. I realize we all have a different journey of faith and, for some, this could be part of it. I simply encourage you to have a goal of eventual reconstruction in mind. Sometimes we have to tear something down in order to rebuild, but don’t forget to rebuild and leave something better for the next generation.