The Church must not conform to the patterns of its day (Rom. 12:2); it must vigorously engage the imagination of its contemporary setting. It is a postmodern world and the Church must engage the milieu of its environment as the missional agency of God. Premodernism, modernism, and postmodernism are all active and observable in the contemporary Christian context. One can observe a kind of active premodern faith in sectarian institutions and their superstitions in some forms of Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy. One can observe a kind of active modernist faith in the rational, principle-based approaches of various fundamentalist and evangelical traditions. One can also observe a kind of active postmodern faith in the spiritualism found in certain experientially based, neo-pentecostal movements. All forms of Christian expression must be evaluated against the biblical paradigm revealed by God, while every cultural context must be engaged with the Bible’s message. One can utilize what is positive about each culture’s contextual paradigm and connect it to Spiritual formation through authentic contextualized preaching of the Word of God.
Lorne Wilkinson sees the rise of this new, proud, and popular philosophy in western culture as a throwback to ancient, earthy cults, while at the same time, is a hip, eco, pseudo (post-quantum physics) science-loving, postmodern, marketing-savvy religious phenomenon. Wilkinson lives in Vancouver, which is the Mecca of Canadian left-coast ideologies, and boasts a historically low church attendance of 2 percent of the population. In a recent survey of adolescents, 75 percent of British Columbian teenagers reported having no religious affiliation whatsoever. Wilkinson is aware of these statistics and lives amongst the people who embody them. One could despair over the lack of commitment to the historic, biblical, Christian faith of a generation ago. Wilkinson, however, sees great opportunities for the gospel to be heard in new and fresh ways. He also demonstrates, through his understanding of these throwback ideologies, something of authentic, Christian spirituality, which has been lost through Evangelicalism's ties with the modernist agenda.
Over the last 400 years, the western Church has identified too much with the Newtonian paradigm of the universe. The collective realization of God was lost. Wilkinson argues for a rescuing of this respect for the earth and a capitulation to the “spiritualities” of neopaganism where they have got it right. Here is common ground for introducing people to the Creator of the earth, the God of the universe. Wilkinson argues that Christians do not need to be afraid of these people. They have more to fear from us. In the past, rather than seeing where God may be revealing himself to them through his creation, Christians burned many of them at the stake.
