Medium and Message
I’ve been reading The Hidden Power of Electronic Culture by Shane Hipps. In this book Hipps make the case, relying heavily on Marshall McLuhan, that the “the forms of media and technology–regardless of their content–cause profound changes in the church and culture” (p. 23). In other words, “the medium is the message”.
I don’t plan to do any sort of review of the book here. I would like to pass on an interesting quote from the book though. It would be better if you could read this quote after having read the first four chapters, but here it is anyway.
In Christ, God’s medium and message are perfectly united…More than just the words he said, the life Jesus lived was the revealed Word of God. After Jesus died and ascended into heaven, God found a new way to ensure the divine presence would remain active on earth, creating the mysterious medium of the church–the body of Christ. If God’s chosen medium was Christ, and the church is the body of Christ, then the church is God’s chosen medium for God’s ongoing revelation to the world…if the medium is the message, the message of the gospel is profoundly shaped by the way the church lives in the world (p. 92, italics added).
That last sentence indicates that the way we live as Christian individually and, even more so, corporately is extremely important. Let’s forget about evangelistic techniques and live as God’s people in this world!
[tags]books, reading, McLuhan, media, communication, church, gospel, Christianity[/tags]