John 17:14-17 — I have given them thy word; and the world hath hated them, because they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
In our Sunday School class today an old friend — the topic of “in the world, not of the world” popped up again. It’s an old question — what should the relationship be between the Christian and the world? Jesus made it clear — “in the world, but not of the world” … but what does that mean? Jesus prayed to His Father (and ours, of course) not only that we be in the world but not of the world, but that we be “sanctified”. We are to be set apart. 

I was fortunate today to have someone point me in the direction of H. Richard Niebuhr (brother of Reinhold) who analyzed the question in 1951 in his masterpiece “Christ and Culture”. Jesus is the God-Man. His position relative to the culture is our position in the culture. He makes it clear when He says “they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.”.

Niebuhr outlines five possible positions (O.K., so I haven’t read the book, and this is shameless superficial plagiarism, but the ideas helped me and I wanted to share). What follows are just my thoughts about his categories — maybe when I’ve tracked down a copy of the book I’ll come back to this!

One position is that, somehow Christ is against the culture. I’m not sure that position makes sense to me. If the culture is entirely the creation of satan, perhaps it would make sense. If the culture is a creation of man though, surely Christ would feel compassion at the very least. Christ against culture would be God-Man against man.

Another position is that Christ is “of” the culture. That would seem to imply that somehow the culture encapsulates the God-Man. How can culture shape God. It seems to take that God out of the God-Man.

Yet another position is that Christ is “above the culture”. That must surely be true. God is above us, for sure. And yet this is the Christ who laid aside His godhead to be with us. 

The fourth position that there is a paradoxical, interacting, relationship between Christ and Culture. In this view Christians in the culture owe loyalty to Christ but are trying to take responsibility for the culture. But the culture is sinful. Sin and grace exist side by side. This feels closer to truth …

Niebuhr’s last position is the Christ of transformation. This feels closest to truth. The culture is man’s creation. Man is God’s creation. We work on redeeming and improving the culture by keeping our eyes on Jesus. We are in the world, but we are not of the world … but of Jesus.