A Post-Christian America

I have not yet read the Newsweek cover article about "the decline and fall of Christian America" but I have to think that, though the timing of the article is offensive (coming during Holy Week), the conclusion is unavoidable. Whether or not this is a post-Christian America, I am certainly living in a post-Christian Vermont.

But the fruit has been rotten for some time, even if it's only now falling off the vine.

Pin oaks die back in autumn. Their leaves turn leathery and brown while the maples turn a vivid red. And then, when the ground is crunchy with every other sort of leaf, the leaves of the pin oak hunker down for a winter of dead lingering.

When those leaves do finally fall off in the first flush of spring it is because of the inauguration of a new set of leaves. It is only the exuberant vitality of the new things that shrugs the former things away.

I believe this is the season of dead lingering for much of the American church. There will be a time when the last of those leathery leaves falls away, a time when the pews and pulpits are even more empty than they are now. Praise the Lord for that! The welling buds are just beneath.

Consider this from John Newton:

Though cloudy skies and northern blasts
Retard the gentle spring awhile;
The sun will conqueror prove at last,
And nature wear a greener smile.

The promise which, from age to age,
Has brought the changing seasons round,
Again shall calm the winter's rage,
Perfume the air and paint the ground.

The virtue of that first command,
I know still does and will prevail,
That while the earth itself shall stand,
The spring and summer shall not fail.

Such changes are for us decreed;
Believers have their winters too;
But spring shall certainly succeed,
And all their former life renew.

Winter and spring have each their use,
And each, in turn, his people know;
One kills the weeds their hearts produce.
The other makes their graces grow.

Though like dead trees awhile they seem,
Yet, having life within their root,
The welcome spring's reviving beam
Draws forth their blossoms, leaves, and fruit.

But if the tree indeed be dead,
It feels no change, though spring return;
Its leafless, naked, barren head,
Proclaims it only fit to burn.

Dear Lord, afford our souls a spring,
Thou know'st our winter has been long;
Shine forth, and warm our hearts to sing,
And Thy rich grace shall be our song.