I’m a Syncretist

I’m a Bible major with a Missions concentration. But several case studies deep in Theology of Missions, I also realized…I’m a syncretist. Scenario after scenario I was stunned by the problems missionaries faced in their host culture. Men with multiple wives, damaging cultic practices, and strange burial rituals. Then I saw similar situations on the mission field. Haitians mixed Christianity with voodoo. Indians went to church on Sunday but kept idols in their homes. Syncretism was everywhere I turned!

Except, of course, in my own culture. Thankfully, I could clearly see the difference between godly and ungodly practices. There was one way to use money, one way to steward possessions, one way to evangelize—and I had it right.

Eventually though, I learned words like common grace, contextualization, and culture-making. The clear line separating my culture and its idols became blurred. Sin seemed a little less obvious and a little more nuanced. One day, I asked a friend if she thought a Christian could own a yacht in good conscience. To my dismay, she said yes. Though I don’t think I’ll ever own a yacht, it took me a while to realize I was asking the wrong question.

Maybe I was also asking the wrong question when I visited other cultures. Why did I expect their practices to be well-ordered and tidy when my own practices weren’t? If Christians disagree on how to engage culture where the gospel is common, what makes me think they’ll agree in places the gospel hasn’t been known? There is a spectrum of acceptable convictions within my Christian freedom in the United States. Is it not also the case in Indonesia, Syria, and Papua New Guinea?

My answer, I’ve noticed, shows my level of trust in the Holy Spirit. Do I trust the Spirit to convict as Jesus promised he will? Do I trust God’s presence in his global church? If I don’t, perhaps that indicates I don’t trust him with my own cultural navigation. Maybe I’ve begun to believe I can discern the difference between contextualization and syncretism in my home country, without the power of the Spirit.

My point is this: unless the Spirit first reveals my own syncretistic tendencies, I will approach other cultures with arrogance. Whether at home or abroad, there are complex motivations behind every behavior. If I’m quick to reject instead of quick to listen, I’ll be doing a disservice to the gospel. My desire for clear lines may cause me to call good things evil. Even more, I may replace their syncretism with my own! I may trade their bad theology for my bad theology, swapping one misguided practice for another. Didn’t C.S. Lewis say, “If a man thinks he is not conceited, he is very conceited indeed”? I think it can be put another way. If a man thinks he is not syncretistic, he is very syncretistic indeed.

For a while, I thought contextualization meant indifference to sin. I assumed giving up my need for clarity meant not caring about God’s commands. Now I realize it’s the opposite. Some sin is certainly objective, but there are more subjective areas than I originally thought. Culture is a complex mix of beauty and corruption, holiness and depravity. What is vicious for one Christian may be virtuous for another. Is this not what Paul thought when he refused to circumcise Titus and then encouraged Timothy to be circumcised on another occasion? (Galatians 2:3; Acts 16:3). Sometimes he freely ate meat and other times he considered it sin (1 Corinthians 8:1-13). Freedom in Christ leaves room for many different decisions.

I’ve learned that contextualization is exactly how it sounds: working out the gospel in a particular context. People, systems, and nations are ever-changing, so this should be seen in our contextualizing. If the context is dynamic, then our application will be also. But we can trust the Holy Spirit to help us discern contextualization from syncretism. He will help us embody the timeless gospel from Greece to China to India.