\u201cDo you know ____?\u201d I had a conversation with an old acquaintance that was about 45 minutes of this question in some for or another as they ran through a list of the connections they had made during their time in ministry. It reminded me of conversations around lunch tables at large Evangelical conferences centered around questions like: \u201cwhere do you pastor?\u201d, \u201chow big is your church?\u201d, \u201cwho goes to your church\/who has visited your church?\u201d, and \u201cwhat have you accomplished?\u201d. This mentality has permeated our churches and our seminaries. It\u2019s your answers to these questions that determine if you get hired or if you don\u2019t. Depending on what you\u2019ve accomplished, what papers you\u2019ve published, or who you know, you get invited to speak at conferences, professorships, book deals. And it\u2019s a positive feedback loop. The more you think, talk, and act this way, the more influence and power you wield, so you become more entrenched in that mode of operation, continuing to gain more influence and power. They in turn become role models (or dare I say, idols?) for fellow believers to follow and aspire to. The irony is that Jesus, the person whom Christianity revolves around, was humble. He existed completely outside of the norms of his time and in some respects completely opposite to some of the norms (even Christian norms) of our time. He was saturated in humility, so much so that the God of the universe took on flesh. So humble that he became obedient to death, even death on a cross. But a large majority those that display this Christ-like humility are often never heard of.<\/p>\n
Polanyi, in his book The Great Transformation<\/em>, sought to expose a similar irony in the rationale behind the new market driven economy by highlighting the reality of what was happening. \u201cPoverty was nature surviving in society; that the limitedness of food and the unlimitedness of men had come to an issue just when the promise of boundless increase of wealth burst in upon us made the irony only the more bitter.\u201d[1]<\/a> \u00a0The market economy was supposed to bring newfound wealth and prosperity but seemed to leave a majority of society behind. Polanyi identifies the idea that the self-regulating market is \u201cnatural\u201d[2]<\/a> as a main problem. He makes clear that not only is it unnatural for an economic system to be disembedded from social relationships, it\u2019s also impossible.[3]<\/a> As a result, the implementation of the SRM produced grave consequences in the form of societal and political uprisings.[4]<\/a><\/p>\n With that understanding of the effects of the SRM on society, perhaps the adoption of \u201cthe ontology of the SRM\u201d[5]<\/a> by Evangelical Christians explains the irony I began my post with. Clark incisively states that:<\/p>\n \u201cthe market is, if not a false body, then at least a competing body, to which humans have ceded all sociologic, because of its promise of actualizing community desire; however, it has never produced a community, but rather fostered an idealization and unrequited desire for community.\u201d[6]<\/a><\/p>\n I continue to ponder what it might look like for Evangelical communities and leaders to act humbly, disentangled from the influence of the SRM. More personally, I find the tension of attempting to live separate from a production and accomplishment oriented perfectly described by a scene from the movie, Forgetting Sarah Marshall<\/em>. The main character is being taught how to surf. \u201cDo less\u201d the teacher tells him, \u201cno you\u2019re doing too much\u2026 now you\u2019re doing nothing.\u201d[7]<\/a><\/p>\n <\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Karl Polanyi, The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our Time, 2nd ed. (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 2001). 88.<\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Ibid, 130.<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Ibid, 5.<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> Gregory Baum, Karl Polanyi on Ethics and Economics (Montreal: McGill-Queen University Press, 1996). 6.<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> Jason Clark, \u201cEvangelicalism and Capitalism: A Reparative Account and Diagnosis of Pathogeneses in the Relationship\u201d (Faculty Publications, Portland Seminary, 2018). 153.<\/p>\n