Christianity in the Age of Wokeness: A Brief Introduction
For the past couple of months I have been reading and writing about a topic that is important to me: Wokeness. In some respects, I have been thinking, writing, reading, and preaching about this for most of my adult life. Only recently, however, has it seemed to coalesce into an identifiable movement in mainstream society. It reaches into every aspect of our culture, and has especially influenced the Church in America. As with everything else I have written and preached about, my primary concern is with God’s people. Where does Christianity stand in the Age of Wokeness? Should Christians be Woke? How can the Church engage Wokeness and remain faithful to Jesus Christ? Why do so many evangelical Christians seem to abandon their faith and take up the banner of Wokeness?
These are the questions that I am turning my attention to in 2022. Throughout the year I will be publishing (with no set schedule in mind because my life is quite full already) essays in a series called Christianity in the Age of Wokeness. My hope is that readers will find them engaging and helpful, particularly in, and this is where I lay my cards on the table, fortifying their faith against the poison of Wokeness. In addition to these essays, I intend to start a podcast with my friend Corey Brecht in which we will discuss these matters in more detail. My hope is that these discussions will be lively and insightful, and that anyone who stumbles upon them will be both encouraged and entertained.
If you would like to follow along with this series, please use the subscribe button below to make sure you get notifications of publication. I may post some essays to social media, but I have not found discussions on these matters to be productive on those platforms. While I am happy to engage the Woke amicably, I have no hope that they will repent and turn to Christ. Too many of the Woke people I know have rejected Christ and embraced what I will demonstrate is a new, and radically different, religion. They have already made their choice. My concern is with helping the people of God remain faithful to him, to equip them with the knowledge and insight we need to both resist and combat Wokeness, and to be a voice that warns against our postmodern slide into apostasy. I hope you will join me on this journey.
Yes and amen. I’ll be in line as one of your first readers! I’m so glad to see a faithful follower of Christ stand up to the poison of wokeness, as you so accurately described it. May the Lord help us to prepare and to stand up to it in love.
Thanks April! First essay drops tomorrow morning.
Looking forward to this topic
Do you plan to write an essay on the history of “wokeness” in the church? Would you agree that cultural “wokeness” began impacting the church with the second wave (radical) feminism movement culminating in mass acceptance of women ordination? The church has always and will always struggle with cultural sin because we are fallen but it seems, to me, to be the point where the global church flipped God’s order on its head, opting to match Satan’s order in the garden. I believe that it was at this time we saw the rotation from church order influencing worldly beliefs to cultural order influencing Christian beliefs. I’d like to hear your thoughts on historical church “wokeness”.
Eric, I hope to get to this topic, but I haven’t researched it yet so I don’t know for sure what to say about it. I’m hoping to cover as much ground as possible, so we’ll just have to see. Thanks for commenting!
Definitely looking forward to this!!! Thank you
I think it’s dangerous to weaponize term like “woke” as being a poison. It’s just a slang word that means somebody who had a very limited perspective learned something about the world and reality they didn’t know before. It’s seeing something from someone else’s perspective and realizing that your experience and beliefs were based on a limited understanding of reality. Any time anybody learns something that changes what and how they think. Being woke simply means being aware of racial prejudices that exist in society that you didn’t know before and being aware of the injustice. In the United States individual and structural racism certainly make life more difficult for black people than white people. As a white myself who only know one black person as kid, I didn’t realize this. When I learned the truth about this topic technically I’m woke now I guess. Saying being woke is a poison to me means saying you are denying the truth that black and white people are treated differently. I’m sure this is not the argument you are going to making, but demonizing a term like woke I think is dangerous and polarizing.
I am sure that the character of some “woke” people there are things to criticize, but I think the words we should criticize are not words like woke , but words like hypocrisy, and pride, idolatry, greed, etc. many people who are “woke” are perhaps may be pointing out those sins in the Christian community, while being unaware of the sin in their own lives, but as Christian rather that demonizing all “woke people”, perhaps we should be convicted and pray that Jesus will make us aware of all our sin and thank him for his forgiveness, grace and mercy he has extended to us all, The real danger with any belief you have whether it’s being aware of injustice or being a Christian in my opinion is pride, and you elevate yourself above others because of your beliefs. I believe woke people and Christian’s are pretty much the same broken people who need Jesus. Christian’s should be the most woke people there are. We just need to make sure we aren’t woke without Jesus, or Christian without Jesus. When we reject terms like woke, we often throw the baby out with the bath water and the truth that is being spoken is rejected, and can steer people to other things that are poison like white nationalism, and white supremacy. I know people who this has happened to.
James 3:13-18
[13] Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom. [14] But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth. [15] This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. [16] For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. [17] But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. [18] And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.
Hi Joseph, if you stick with me you’ll see that I define Wokeness much more thoroughly than you describe. It’s a large-scale social movement that could be reasonably defined as a religion, and it is about so much more than race. I would recommend taking a look at some of the books in the photo, especially the one at the top, Woke Racism by John McWhorter.
Joseph,
Thanks for the detail in your comment. I would say I especially agree with the notion that it is incredibly dangerous for Christians to go along with the weaponization of a word, especially a word that it’s so very clear does not and likely will never have a common understanding or view point. While I would never discourage from reading a book, I would say you must read anything written by McWhorter with an incredibly critical eye as he is an atheist. As you well know our views should be radically changed by the Gospel and our mission is to radically change others views for the Truth. We should always read something written by non Christians with the view: how will this help me in my mission of Christ to an unbelieving world.
Happy reading!