Christ for Kentucky, Part 2: Our Mission
The details of our mission and how we hope to bring it to fruition.
“Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven”
This is our prayer. In it, we plead for the world as we know it to become the world as we ought to know it. But as I said in my previous post, Jesus does not merely ask us to be passive prayers but also active participants as the answer to our own prayers. As we long and pray for God’s kingdom to come, we labor as ambassadors of his coming kingdom, and Christ for Kentucky exists to offer leadership in that kingdom work in Kentucky.
But how? We all want a better world, but these genuine desires can suffer the death of ambiguity, perhaps even futility. To bring clarity to ambiguity and protest to futility, we offer our mission statement as a way forward: Public theology and strategy for the common good of the Commonwealth. Effectual change requires three components, and all three are represented in our mission.
Public Theology
Societal change begins in the arena of ideas. It doesn’t end there, as I will explain in a moment, but it does start by shaping the public imagination with robust Christian thought, and that’s what we mean by public theology. Typically, people associate theological work with the study of Scripture (biblical theology) or the summation of Scripture into logical and coherent doctrines (systematic theology). But there is a theological disciple that, historically speaking, was central to the Christian project but admittedly is now often neglected called public theology. Public theology is the application of our theology to a cultural context, the skillful administration of the Christian worldview within the public square.
There was a time when the clergy voice was an influential voice within societal life. When tragedy struck, controversies arose, and important public decisions were made, people welcomed the perspective of pastors and Christian thought leaders. Regrettably, those days are nearly gone. The Christian perspective has largely been privatized with little to no public implications. Why is that? I do not deny the growing hostility of an increasingly secular society, but before we place all the blame on the persecution of “cancel culture” there is an internal critique to consider. Perhaps the marginalization of the Christian perspective reflects an active cancelation from a hostile world…or perhaps the Christian perspective offered is not a particularly compelling perspective to consider.
Perhaps we are proposing shallow answers to life’s deepest questions and simplistic platitudes to life’s complex struggles; perhaps our perspective has become predictably partisan; perhaps, most of all, our public voice is drowned out by the resounding gong and clanging cymbal of our failure to love (1 Corinthians 13). Perhaps it’s less an external malevolence and more an internal negligence.
As one who has dabbled in the arena of public thought, it has been my experience that the paranoia of the pundits is greatly exaggerated. Of course, I have received the occasional nasty email or social media message (many from fellow Christians, by the way). However, in my anecdotal experience, there is still room for public theology in the modern public square. In fact, as our society grapples with its unsustainable secular project, I have discovered a renewed intrigue and openness to the Christian perspective that has endured for two millenniums. Therefore, our aim is to offer serious, thoughtful, courageous yet courteous, critical yet charitable Christian thought for the greater world to consider. While I will speak and write in various public mediums, our podcast and this blog will be the primary outlet for our content, so be sure to subscribe to both.
So, our mission begins with public theology for the public square. But it does not end there. Do ideas alone change anything in any substantive way? My concern, especially in our informational age, is that ideas are relegated to an inconsequential ether serving the purpose of content monetization. They get trapped in the algorithm echo chamber, tickle the ears of consumers, avoid substantive consideration and application, and then get quickly discarded by the next approaching hot take. That pattern has proven to be an impotent thought habit when it comes to cultural change. Instead, true change requires a “word made flesh” commitment wherein ideas become incarnate in societal life. Therefore, Christ for Kentucky will offer “Public theology and strategy.”
Public Strategy
When compelling public theology finds manifestation via intentional public strategy, change becomes plausible. Before I outline the particulars of that public strategy, let me share who will benefit from it. All that Christ for Kentucky will do is for the lost and least of Kentucky. Meaning we are prioritizing those the Bible commands we prioritize: those outside the Christian faith and the “least of these,” as Jesus refers to them.
I state this upfront because as I unpack our strategy, I do not want anyone to suppose our ministry is reserved for cultural elites. It is not. But here is the reality of cultural science: the plausibility of change belongs to those who hold cultural capital.
Evangelicals tend to have a grassroots view of transformation. Sociology has proven that isn’t how change occurs. The only exception is times of revival. There are these blessed moments of awakening, which are so organically overwhelming they are able to reshape society in many ways. But for the most part, the power of cultural formation belongs to those who hold cultural power—financial power, academic power, legislative power, institutional power, artistic power, traditional and social media power—these are the ones with formative influence. Thus, while we pray and labor for revival, we must also do what evangelicals are notoriously poor at doing, thinking strategically about cultural power.
That said, let me intercept a common critique I know will be offered. This doesn’t feel like the Christian way. The kingdom of God is upside down from the ways of this world. Whereas the world functions via power, the kingdom comes via weakness. Paul tells us that God uses the foolish things of this world to shame the wise. Jesus himself blesses the poor in spirit, the meek, the merciful, the persecuted, and so forth.
Therefore, we are left with this tension: sociology tells us the world changes via power, and the Bible tells us the world changes via the beatitudes. What gives? How do we reconcile these seemingly opposite ideas? Well what if those in power embodied and practiced the beatitudes? What if they redeemed their power via subversive kingdom ethics? Certainly power can be exploitative, and indeed, it typically is. But it doesn’t have to be. Power can be leveraged for the weak. Privilege can be leveraged for the underprivileged. Wealth can be leveraged for the poor. Security can be leveraged for the vulnerable.
Such is the way of our Savior, who is the personification of subversive power. All authority in heaven and on earth belongs to Jesus, and yet all his authority was exercised for helpless sinners like us. When Jesus commenced his ministry, he did so with these words, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…” That’s not just power; that’s omnipotent power. But for what purpose? “…he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed.” There you have it. Messianic power for the poor, the captives, the blind, and the oppressed.
That model of subversive strength is our strategy. Networking, collaborating, and yes, challenging the leadership of Kentucky to practice a kingdom-down form of subversive leadership, leveraging power and privilege for those who have neither. This is how things change. When Africans were enslaved by Western power, they certainly needed some measure of anti-slavery grassroots support, which was there to a small degree. But what our enslaved brothers and sisters truly needed was a Wilberforce. They needed somebody in the halls of power to hear their cry and sacrificially act on their behalf. And we want to be that prophetic voice to powerful institutions and leaders within Kentucky. We are not just a ministry of ideas; we are a ministry of influence. All for Christ’s glory and the good of Kentucky, which brings us to the final component of our mission.
The Common Good of the Commonwealth
Kentucky’s own Wendell Berry has been an open critic of Christian thought and activism. And one of his main critiques is its lack of localism. Christian leaders tend to seek national, even global, platforms. Now that’s problematic in many respects, but an underappreciated problem is that it is simply not effective. And its ineffectiveness, according to Berry, is because expansive Christian work requires a level of generalization and simplification that never meets the demands of local communities. And this is true of both our public theology and strategy.
If I, as a public theologian, had to consider contexts such as New York or California, it would dramatically change how I speak and write. Kentucky is its own culture, with deeply held convictions, values, traditions, and so forth. In order to offer compelling ideas to Kentucky, I have to speak pointedly to Kentuckians. Simply put, if our public theology was aimed nationally, it would fail locally. So too, would our strategy.
Kentucky’s needs are unique. If we adopted grand delusions of changing America for the better, not only would we be hopelessly mistaken, the greater tragedy is that by focusing broadly, we would neglect kingdom concerns locally. But in committing to localized intentionality, change suddenly becomes plausible. Do we have an arrogant messiah complex, thinking our organization can fix Kentucky’s ills? Of course not. But do we believe that by focusing exclusively on Kentucky, we can leave our Commonwealth better than we found it? Yes. In the grand arch of Christ’s redemption, we can do our small part in this little moment of time entrusted to us to make Kentucky look a little more like heaven. Therefore, the final component of our mission is an unapologetic indigenous focus.
What does true change require? Three things. Compelling ideas (public theology) and capable influence (public strategy), all with a localized emphasis (the common good of the Commonwealth). By God’s grace, that is what we hope to accomplish.
For Christ and Kentucky,
Robert