Whatever else is true of the modern, Western world, this much is beyond dispute: It is not what it used to be. We have entered into a new world that is very different from the one that came before, a new world that in many ways feels so very strange. Many of us feel like immigrants who have inadvertently found ourselves in a new world and are learning to adapt to its new rules, its new norms, its new mores. Many of us are struggling to do so.

Carl Trueman has made a deep study of the origins of these changes and has shared his findings in Strange New World: How Thinkers and Activists Redefined Identity and Sparked the Sexual Revolution. “For many people, the Western world in which we now live has a profoundly confusing, and often disturbing, quality to it,” he says. “Things once regarded as obvious and unassailable virtues have in recent years been subject to vigorous criticism and even in some cases come to be seen by many as more akin to vices. Indeed, it can seem as if things that almost everybody believed as unquestioned orthodoxy the day before yesterday—that marriage is to be between one man and one woman, for example—are now regarded as heresies advocated only by the dangerous, lunatic fringe.”
If the problems were only “out there” it would be bad enough, but many are finding the problems are also impacting work, church, family, and every other part of life. “Welcome to this strange new world,” says Trueman. “You may not like it. But it is where you live, and therefore it is important that you try to understand it.” And that is what his book is all about—trying to understand the world as it is by understanding how it came to be this way.
To that end, Trueman considers the thinkers and leaders who led the way from the former world into the current one. Before he can do that, though, he must introduce some key concepts such as self, a term that has taken on new and inordinate meaning in the past few decades so that “the modern self assumes the authority of inner feelings and sees authenticity as defined by the ability to give social expression to the same. The modern self also assumes that society at large will recognize and affirm this behavior.”
This understanding of self is defined by what is called expressive individualism, a term meant to describe the notion that “each person has a unique core of feeling and intuition that should unfold or be expressed if individuality is to be realized.” This leads to a world in which authenticity is achieved when a person’s inward feelings are fully acted out publicly while receiving the unanimous praise and affirmation of society. This is seen in many ways, but particularly in the area of sexuality where a person’s identity is most fully defined by sexual desires and most fully considered authentic when they are acted out with the full affirmation of the public.
How did society get here? To answer that question, Trueman looks to thinkers such as Decartes and Rousseau who began to ground identity in the inner life rather than in external factors such as family, faith, or culture, and then to the Romantic poets who fostered this idea in popular ways. He looks to Marx and Nietzsche, to Freud and Reich, each of whom contributed ideas that are central to the Western mind’s self-understanding. He looks to the sexual revolution and to changing notions of personhood. He looks at the rise and dominance of the LGBTQ movement and, in its wake, the rise of transgenderism as perhaps the most complete and significant evidence of the seismic changes that have swept through society.
Many who consider this book will want to know how it differs from Trueman’s previous work The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self which was released less than two years ago. He answers the question in the preface where he says that “this short book is not a precise précis [summary or abridgement] of my larger work … [it] covers the same ground in a briefer and (hopefully) more accessible format.” The arguments are essentially the same, but the information significantly reduced. Strange New World also addresses some of the constructive critiques of the first work, including its relatively brief handling of the “now what?” factor, while also addressing some of the changes that have taken place even in just the past couple of years. Speaking personally, I studied The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self very closely and took thousands of words of notes. Yet I still benefited from Strange New World and am glad I read it. In that sense, I’d recommend it to those who have read the first work as well as those who have not.
As I have traveled the world, I have often hired tour guides to lead me through unfamiliar locations. Their expertise has always proven helpful in explaining what I am seeing and experiencing. And in much the same way, Strange New World is essentially a guided tour to modern times. Trueman acts as a wise and trusted guide to a culture that has become increasingly uncomfortable and unfamiliar. I highly recommend you take the tour.

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Charles Spurgeon said it. Billy Graham said it. And even though it’s not really all that funny anymore, most of us have probably said it as well. It goes something like this: “Don’t bother looking for the perfect church since, the moment you join it, it won’t be perfect anymore.” Zing!

There’s truth behind the quote, of course. It would be impractical and, frankly, ridiculous to expect that a bunch of sinful people could join together to create a sinless community—to imagine that perfection could arise from the confluence of a hundred lives as imperfect as yours and mine. Yet, though we know perfection is impossible, don’t we all sometimes still grow frustrated at the sheer messiness of Christian individuals and Christian churches? Don’t we all sometimes face the temptation to pack up and move on when our fellow believers act like the sinners they are?
A little while ago I was speaking to a young man who is a fan of computer-based Role Playing Games. He explained that what draws him to these games is the ability to custom-craft a character, then to discover how that unique character interacts within the world of the game. When he creates a new character, he is given a finite number of points that he can allocate in a nearly infinite number of ways—some to strength, some to intelligence, some to charisma, some to agility, and so on. In the end he has always created a character that has both strengths and weaknesses, all depending upon the way he has allocated the points. What he can never do is create a character that is only strong and not the least bit weak.
Though the comparison between a church and game may threaten to be trite, I have actually found it helpful and, frankly, encouraging. There seems to be a law in this broken world that every strength is tempered with some kind of a weakness, almost as if there is a finite number of “points” that can be allocated to any individual or any church. A pastor who is an especially powerful preacher may be an especially weak counselor; elders who are skilled and vociferous in defending the truth may fall short in grace and love; a church that takes worship services seriously may be lax when it comes to evangelism. None of these weaknesses is defensible and none of them is okay. Yet some kind of imperfection is always inevitable on this side of glory.
What’s true in churches is true in families. A husband may be extremely diligent in leading and providing, but lax in his spiritual disciplines. A wife may have penetrating insights into the Word, but be uncommitted to extending hospitality. Kids may be obedient but lazy, or hard-working but mouthy. We ourselves have to admit that for all our virtues, they continue to be tempered by a host of vices.
This being the case, it is irrational to expect that any one church, any one pastor, any one husband or wife, friend or child, can excel in every way. And this faces us with a challenge: Can we learn to tolerate their shortcomings? Can we learn to live with the way their “points” have been allocated? While we certainly don’t need to embrace sin or apathetically accept ungodliness, we do need to accept the inevitability of some faults, some defects, some areas that will always remain a sore disappointment. And, realistically, we have to know that even if there was strength in one area we lament, it would probably mean there would be weakness in one area we admire. No individual and no community of individuals can be the complete package. It just doesn’t work that way.
Hence, the path to joy in church, marriage, and life is to accept that there will always be imperfections, to accept that there will always be areas of disappointment—but to be willing to celebrate the strengths while tolerating the weaknesses. Just as it is the glory of a man to overlook an offense, it is the glory of a Christian to overlook a weakness—to find greater joy in what encourages than in what disappoints.

Good morning. Grace and peace to you.

Today’s Kindle deals include some top-notch books on the Trinity.
(Yesterday on the blog: One Woman in the Right Mightier than Four Hundred Men in the Wrong)
Not What I Expected
“One of the most shocking television moments I ever witnessed was on L.A. Law in the 1980s. A character everyone loved to hate, Rosalind, stepped into an elevator mid-sentence and unexpectedly plummeted to her death. That’s kind of how I felt when I became a mom. Like I took a step and the floor wasn’t there. The drastic life change was so much harder than I expected, in ways I didn’t anticipate.” That’s an apt illustration, I think!
A Legacy of Covenant Love
I enjoyed this look at beauty in an arranged marriage. “As an outsider looking in for the past fifteen years of their long marriage journey, I am astounded at the depths of their relationship. I am humbled by the way friendship and romance grew out of covenant and choice. I am deeply indebted to their marriage, not only for producing my husband, but also for painting a realistic yet regal picture of covenant love.”
Why We’re All Manhattan Now
There are lots of interesting insights in this article. “We’re all Manhattan now. What was once an outlier culture because it was a city centre – the city centre – is now downtown mall-rat thinking in the backwater towns of not just the USA, but the rest of the Western world.”
Ministry in the Mundane
This one is written specially about motherhood but pertains to so much more.
Teach Us to Number Our Drives, That We May Gain the Hearts of Our Children
And this one talks about making the most of one of those mundane tasks of parenthood. “My job as a Mom means my secondary office is my car. On days when we have sports commitments, I spend hours and hours shuttling my kids around town. This is nothing new for me, and I know parents all over the world experience the same thing.”
Did not meet expectations
“As a teacher I was once asked to avoid ever using the word ‘Failed’ on academic reports. It was felt that the term carried too many negative overtones and could be psychologically harmful to a young child. The instruction was to rather use the term ‘Did not meet expectations’.”
Flashback: Just Forget About Marriage for a Minute!
Ephesians 5 tells a husband he must love his wife as Jesus Christ loves his church. So let’s forget about marriage for a minute and reflect simply on how we are loved by our great Savior.

God is always mindful of His own, always redeeming, always acting to bring about His kingdom purposes—in His way and His time. —Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth