Redefining Relevance

I have been reading farther in the book I posted about earlier, A Matrix of Meanings, and I am getting to a point were I am having a hard time agreeing with him. Here is my reasoning.

First of, the church will never be relevant if it is trying to reach a "post modern" crowed, because post modernism died like 10 years ago. This generation, my generation, has grown tired of the "noise" of post-modernism. We no longer want everything all at once from every direction; we want something solid, something real. You are seeing a movement in young churches doing back to their roots, the truly relevant churches, turning back to TRUE Orthodoxy. We are using more hymns then we use to, we are exploring church history and embracing some forgotten traditions, not the traditions of materialism, hypocricy, gossip, greed, and over programing. We are see the effects now as my generation makes a mass exodus from the suburban mega churches we grew up in, the very churches that throw themselves face first into trying to be “relevant”, to the point of delivering us prepackaged, meaning less garbage. We want something real. The gospel is real.

In the book, the author states "There's no arguing that Generation X is largely unmoved by the language of traditional Christianity, but you don't see many church leaders wondering if maybe the message itself is the problem. With so few people believing in hell, what’s the point in getting so worked up about salvation, whether it’s by grace or otherwise?” arguing that “the message of Christianity does not communicate to people who have grown up in a world in which pop culture is amniotic fluid, largely because what religion talks about does not speak to the spiritual needs of today’s seeker.”

Well, I can tell you right now that the problem is not the message; the problem is the church has lost the message. It is buried under $500,000 sound systems and video screens, under banners advertising the next big thing in the Christian ghetto industry. When the modern church wakes up and realizes it has the truth in it’s hands, and that the Word of God does not lose relevance, that the word of God is not a list of what you “should” or “should not” do, it’s bigger then how you vote or whether you drink or smoke, then they will see my generation regain an interest.

*EDIT*
We are no longer satisfied with the simple answers. We want to dig deeper. The reason the church is loosing a grip on our age group is because the church has become so watered down it has, as Toney Campolo put it, “neutered the gospel”. I have learned more about God, Theology, scripture, original language, and church history sitting around talking with friends then I ever did in church, because most churches refuses to serve us the meat of the gospel.

We are a generation screaming out for something genuine. A church can not be relevant until it understands this. We look at a church following 10 years behind pop culture and it is neither genuine nor relevant, who wants to be a part of that?

So, it boils down to this: “Keep it real!”

PS – We have been lucky to find a church that understands this. Thanks guys.