Uncommon Ground: Living Faithfully in a World of Difference
When I taught the course on current social problems at Dayton Christian High School, I would teach my students that if we want to follow the way of Jesus in our response to the issues of the day, we will often find ourselves in a no-man’s land between the two camps shouting each other down. Like Jesus, who never fit into any of the ideological categories of his own day, we too will be ideological misfits.
If we reflect the compassion of Jesus, we’ll be too soft for our friends on the Right. If we express the moral courage of Jesus, we’ll be too rigid for our friends on the Left.
In our fractured cultural moment, it’s hard to find thoughtful, faithful voices that haven’t been co-opted by either the Right or the Left. Tim Keller is one of those thoughtful, faithful voices. He doesn’t flinch when he speaks out against both racism and abortion.
It was Keller’s name on the cover that first attracted me to Uncommon Ground: Living Faithfully in a World of Difference, edited by Tim Keller and John Inazu (Thomas Nelson, 2020). I knew this would be a book where I wouldn’t find a diatribe or a jeremiad but a thoughtful, well-reasoned response to the issues of the day.
Uncommon Ground, co-authored by legal professor and author John Inazu, is divided into three parts with four chapters in each part, each written by a different contributor:
1. Framing Our Engagement (how to think about the issues) includes chapters by a theologian, a pastor (Keller) and (surprisingly) an entrepreneur.
2. Communicating Our Engagement (how we express our convictions) includes chapters by writer Tish Harrison Warren, song writer Sara Groves, and spoken word artist Lecrae.
3. Embodying Our Engagement (how we act on our convictions) includes a chapter by Trillia Newbell.
The thesis of the book is “finding common ground even when we don’t agree on the common good.” That idea alone will make the book anathema to ideologues in both camps, who cannot imagine finding common ground if we cannot agree on the common good.
Keller and Inazu speak of three essential virtues that must characterize the way Christians engage on the issues:
1. Humility: Since we must recognize that “in a world of deep difference about fundamental issues, Christians and non-Christians alike are not always able to prove why they are right and others are wrong,” we must set aside hubris and self-righteousness posturing to approach one another in a humble spirit.
2. Patience manifests itself in the way we listen to people we disagree with.
3. Tolerance: What do Keller and Inazu mean by “tolerance”? They speak to the need for “a practical enduring of beliefs and practices that we do not share.” In a tense atmosphere where either the Right or the Left is poised to mount up in self-righteous indignation, a humble-minded patience will manifest itself.
The furor surrounding the overturning of Roe means that we may find ourselves in conversation with people who disagree profoundly with our views. This book would be a good primer to prepare us to navigate those conversations with both grace and truth.
Persevere, Paul Pyle Discipleship Pastor