There’s a lot to be said about the way things are presented.
I am not a style guy. It took other people to kindly help me gain an appreciation for being presentable regarding clothes selection. To this day, I’m largely unfussed with clothing. My main things are comfort and fit rather than style, colour coordination, and all that.
I appreciate those who make it their duty to look the part. They invest the time to have the right clothes, fit and look to pull off the desired effect. Some have that approach regarding how things are presented where an organisation is concerned, in the marketing and media, and how the building and systems are set out. The thinking is fair - it's unlikely to attract attention if it doesn’t look appealing. There’s also something off-putting about something that looks messy, ugly or out of sync with its surroundings or purpose.
I acknowledge it: how it looks is important.
God cares about how things look. Creation and relationships were designed to look good. Jesus is preparing His Bride to look good. Aesthetics have their source in God.
What also has its source in God is substance. It is good not just because of how it looks but also because of how it functions and flows, and it fulfils its purpose far deeper than its appearance. The fruit is good not just because of how it looks but because of how it tastes and what it does to supply what is needed in how we function. The manner of deceit was to entice not just on looks but on something deeper than that.
The manner of deceit these days is to help confuse substance for style. If I can present something compellingly, people think that is enough for the substance. Look at how media works. Fizz and pop at soundbites that gather comments said to be “analysis” to stir the emotions of viewers and listeners. Done in a condensed fashion deliberately to trigger and stimulate. With little to see as to the actual substance of things. People are to reach conclusions and make decisions based on the splendour of style with little to no substance underneath that offers a fulfilling function.
Like style, in some cases, I admire quite a lot of that. It takes skill and ability to perpetuate this, and it’s superb at influencing individuals and cultures to be caught up in all kinds of extreme views and slowly shift to an ever more fraught place of existence.
In a sense, it can be picked up in how some people are keen to condense the gospel into bite-size chunks that can be regurgitated quickly to get people to make a decision. It can be seen in how gatherings can be pitched to be efficiently run services that get the hype, and the feels in and are stylised in the presentation of content that tends to the itching ears and won’t require too much before you get back to life. Yet it is so much a part of the pattern of life that the style is confused for the substance, even as there’s little to account for substantial change that reflects divine encounters.
I am certainly not encouraging a curmudgeonly approach. I’m not saying that technology, applications and whatever is trending is necessarily a hindrance and a problem to substance. The problem is not what is produced; the problem is the approach to what is produced. The problem is what it says about us: we revere the style and have little time for the substance. The problem once more is who we’re worshipping with these approaches.
The thing about style is that there’s nothing wrong in itself, but when we confuse it for what it is, it’s not too dissimilar to what leads to idolatry. We take what God establishes as good, and we distort it. All at the cost of the true, noble, right, pure, lovely, excellent, admirable and praiseworthy. It’s a pity, but it’s not a hopeless cause.
Jesus did not rush to fit in with the quest for relevance and displaying the style that would capture the audience. The Teaching on the Mount recorded in Matthew 5-7 is often seen in soundbites and keynotes. Yet, like the Law, this is not the design of the teaching. The authority is as much how it’s taken as a whole as it is about the nature of its parts. Appreciating the teaching can impact people only, as seen in the radical and substantial teaching it is. This is just the tip of a massive iceberg of substance that God refers to from the Law and Prophets to the Gospels and Epistles through the Wisdom Literature and everything else that constitutes His Word to us.
The beauty of this Word and how gifted and wonderful people deliver it in a way that invites people to consider the wonderful words of life says that we don’t have to be held down by a drudgery approach. As though only one style of delivery can make it worthwhile. The journey is full of light and joy and filled with the substance of the life and nature of God; who knows that there’s got to be substance that backs the style and fills us to deliver fruit for His glory.
For His Name's Sake
C. L. J. Dryden
Shalom
