The man who adopted my great-great grandfather, Judge Orlando Burrell of Carmi, Illinois had a colorful life. He was a US congressman, a colonel in the Union Army during the Civil War, he was a judge and a mayor. He made his “fortune” during the California Gold Rush which provided him with the resources to chase other dreams that he had and gave him influence and opportunities as well. He was an exception to those who ran West during the height of the great Gold Rush.
Thousands of people uprooted their families and moved to California in search of quick riches. Some fully expected to find chunks of gold sitting on river bottoms ready to be loaded up and turned into an instant fortune. Others picked up rocks flecked with gold only to discover that what they had was of no value and instead was what would be called “fool’s gold”. Whether chasing for gold that they never quite found or picking up the illusion of gold to find it worthless, many found nothing but disappointment, emptiness and shattered dreams.
Today, in many ways, we haven’t progressed much past that kind of thinking. Take a look at the typical advertising campaign. How many times do we buy one brand of soda over another because of the catchy sales jingle? Sometimes, the more fantastic the claim, the better we like the “experience”. Seriously, does drinking your favorite fruit punch make a tropical island surrounded by swaying palms and girls in hula skirts suddenly appear? If you purchase new glasses, will you look as cool as the guy with the spiked and highlighted hair and the chiseled body who is seen in the magazine ad? Does any single woman on the planet really believe that the only way to get the man of her dreams is to wear “Maybelline?” Of course not, but that really isn’t the issue. We KNOW the commercials and actors and manufacturers are LYING to us and frankly, we don’t care! We enjoy indulging in our little fantasy that we can buy or paint or clothe ourselves to youth, sexiness, success and ultimately, happiness. What does it really hurt?
Glen Ward wrote a book a few years ago entitled, “Postmodernism“. In it he wrote, “The increasing invasion of signs and images (in media, display, advertising and so on) into the fabric of everyday life has created a dream world ideal lifestyles
for us to fantasize about and identify with. For example, many commercials are more concerned with attaching a sense of lifestyle and experience to the product being sold than to giving details about the product itself. (One only needs to look at ads for Abercrombie and Fitch to realize they are selling sex, not clothing and in doing so are one of the top retailers to the young and hip. — DB) Because of this, we get as much satisfaction from consuming the images attached to goods as we do from whatever practical function the goods might serve.”
An old friend of mine, Pastor Rick Shrader who pastored a church in Colorado for many years once wrote in a little paper he produced called “Aletheia” that we have become so used to this form of communication in our lives that we fully expect to be lied to. He went on to warn against the movement within churches to jump on the “experience” bandwagon. He noted that sincerity has become of greater worth than reality. Experience and emotion are to be coveted above accuracy and fact.
In other words, people are more interested in feelings than facts. They want to “experience” a spiritual feeling even if that feeling comes at the expense of neglecting orthodox and doctrinal instruction. We are more desirous of affirmation and inspiration than challenging information. We want a God that makes us feel better about us more than we want a God Who helps us to see us for who we really are and what we genuinely need.
Thus, our churches spend great energy and resources on creating an experience in “worship” rather than the presentation of the “Word.” Doctrine is downplayed as divisive, boring and even transitional. What matters is the pragmatic effect of shared experiences, emotional movement and a sloppy form of self-affirmation that emphasizes style and sincerity and a nebulous form of spirituality. In this world, Oprah is as much a spiritual leader as Billy Graham; Joel Osteen and Robert Schuller outshine more studious prophets as John MacArthur or Warren Wiersbe.
There is a danger in a cold orthodoxy that never touches the heart. We can’t be so afraid of emotion and compassion and 
expression that it make our faith impotent or simply a matter of intellectual assent. The practical effect of the gospel is a changed life, rearranged priorities and a passion for the things of God demonstrated in daily living. But one has to wonder if the typical Western church today spends as much time in exegeting the Word as it does in creating an “atmosphere”. Does the average preacher plan the feel of the service with as great precision as he studies the content and context of the Gospel he preaches? Have we sacrificed our sound doctrine for a social activism which leaves us with a false sense of accomplishment that lasts only as long as the adrenaline rush of self-congratulatory emotion that follows a pseudo-spiritual exercise?
I don’t believe it necessarily has to be either/or and those who argue such are guilty, in my mind, of a false dichotomy. At the same time, much of what I disdain about the modern church movement today (which includes the CGM, Emergents, etc…) is that we get far more worked up about feeding the homeless than we do preaching the Gospel. At the same time, I fully recognize that one of the sins of our past was our willingness to step over the bodies of those who were starving in order to preach a message on compassion.
We must pause and remember that the moral relativist and the post-modernist believes that truth is a product of experience. Therefore they put great value on image, stories, self-interpreting histories, drama, sensory experiences, narratives and even illusion. One write notes that, “We are in a logic of simulation which has nothing to do with a logic of facts and an order of reasons.”
I’m afraid that by now I may have lost some of you in this philosophical monologue. But I want to you consider how our culture gets caught up in experiences and emotions -from the way we exalt athletics, to the ads we will have pummel us as Christmas approaches, to what passes as worship these days in a typical evangelical church. Even we as believers tend to get swept up in catastrophe or tragedy and almost become paralyzed in an irrational frenzy of grief or morbid curiosity such as when a celebrity dies like Princess Diana, Michael Jackson or Anna Nicole Smith.
I personally question if our electorate would ever again choose a seasoned old statesman over a thin, vibrant, good-looking-but-untested political newcomer. What was it that compelled so many conservatives, evangelicals and faith/values voters to vote for a President who promised to stand against the values so many of them claimed to hold dear — like smaller government, pro-life, traditional family values, etc… — simply because he was more attractive and eloquent and charismatic? And why are they so shocked now that he is keeping those very promises as they wake up to the reality that we have a man in the White House who is committed to an extreme liberal agenda more so than any President in American history? Why is that Kanye West and Taylor Swift are followed more enthusiastically than the nine men and women who interpret our very constitution?
It’s time we ask ourselves if we are chasing fool’s gold. In our personal lives, our homes, our businesses and yes…. in our churches. Today’s evangelical believer is more offended by someone who speaks with authoritative passion and a sense of absolute truth than they are about the carnal and sensual messages of today’s entertainment industry. As a result, our churches are filled with “show”, our sermons are filled with “fluff” and our hearts are filled with “darkness.”
Believers must be careful to search for truth. Preachers must be careful to preach the Word. And all of us must take care to keep from chasing “fool’s gold”.
As I’m currently looking for additional teaching opportunities on the collegiate and graduate level, several school have required that I submit a one-page philosophy of education. Sometimes I think that few people involved in their area of vocational pursuit — even ministry — have taken the time to consider the philosophy behind doing what they do. Philosophy precedes process and process precedes product, so I think that developing a sound philosophy should be a priority for all of life’s pursuits from marriage to family to work to recreation to entertainment and more.