When I began my undergraduate studies at Davidson College, I wanted to study history or political science then go to law school. As you may have gathered, that did *not* happen. Admittedly, I don’t even know much about lawyers. What I do know I probably learned from lawyers in our church. They all do different kinds of work, and they are all great folks. I really respect each of them & the work they do.
But surely you know the caricature of the ambulance chaser – the self-promoter who is always looking for a problem that could lead to profit. It’s a pretty simple game. Make yourself visible, find a problem, make a quick buck off it, and repeat. I realize I may be throwing shade here, but I really am agnostic about this phenomenon. Even ambulance chasers gotta eat, and perhaps they have some role to play in our legal ecosystem. But as far as I can tell, most aspiring attorneys do not set out to become ambulance chasers. It just kind of… happens.
As another day leads to another kerfuffle on the Christian interwebs, it feels like a very similar game is playing out on my timeline — a sort of theological ambulance chasing. Someone lights a fire with a controversial take about an influential person or a controversial idea. That prompts an immediate response, which prompts a response to the response, which then often provokes a response to the response to the response.
If you are an aspiring pastor or theologian (or pastor-theologian…) and you want your name out there, you gotta get in on one of those responses. You gotta get that clout while there is clout to be had! You gotta be the first attorney to the scene of crime, if you will. These platforms don’t build themselves.
But, I’ve had to ask myself, must we play this game? Why do we feel the need to be “on the record” when no one is keeping any record? What do we gain from engaging every issue? Like, even helpful responses are fleeting because there will be another flare up tomorrow. We so often believe the lie that engaging the minutiae of daily Christian quibbling is somehow helping. We’ll spend time we don’t have arguing with people we don’t know to get clout we don’t need.
And this is not a victimless enterprise. The people we do know suffer. Honestly, we suffer. We don’t give our attention to the true, good, and beautiful, but to the alluring, pressing, and controversial. The immanent swallows up the transcendent. Our lives become like podcasts – relevant today, unhelpful tomorrow. We set out to be shepherds, to be theologians, but it’s so easy to become theological ambulance chasers.
This is, in some ways, my inner dialogue played out on my very inconsequential blog. I’m learning how to navigate these digital streets – how to responsibly create theological content, how to graciously engage in the arena of ideas. I don’t have many answers, but I think I’m starting to ask the right questions. I’m open to the idea that I’m just being cynical. I’m even open to the idea that a reflection like this is its own sort of theological ambulance chasing.
But perhaps a reflection like this will lift our eyes, if even for a moment, to the God of glory and grace, who himself is worth endless contemplation and worship.
