Next Step Evangelism

Brad Stevens (source: Wikipedia)

My interest is in a story by Robert King of the Indianapolis Star on Coach Brad Stevens of Butler University, the  34-year old basketball coach who has taken the Butler Bulldogs to the NCAA final each of the past two years.

King’s article looks at Coach Stevens’ faith, which was formed during his childhood at the United Methodist congregation in Zionsville, Indiana. The coach remains a committed Christian and member of St. Luke’s UMC in Indianapolis. He inspires his team and his community with his character, and he expresses his faith in practically everything about the way he lives his life. In general King’s story is a wonderful profile of a man who, by all accounts, is exemplary. (I’ve seen other articles online in the past about Stevens’ faith, including this one on the UMC’s website and this wonderful anecdote by blogger John Meunier; all of them have been complimentary without reserve.)

What gets me is the way in which Stevens is contrasted with former NFL coach Tony Dungy, who is well-known for being outspoken about his own Christian faith and has become a prolific author and speaker on matters of faith and character since his retirement from coaching. (Dungy is also well-known to the reading audience of King’s Indianapolis Star, of course, since he coached the Indianapolis Colts for several years.) In presenting Brad Stevens’ approach to the practice of his faith, King states that the Butler coach “has always thought faith should be something that’s lived out, rather than talked up.” But the journalist is not alone in expressing those views: both Judith Cebula of Butler University and the Rev. Kent Millard (Stevens’ pastor) are quoted making statements later in the article that support King’s initial contrast of Dungy and Stevens.

This sort of thing punches my buttons — and here I’m not talking about Cebula or Millard, who could have been quoted out of context and used to support a point-of-view the article’s author (King) was wanting to advance regardless of their own sentiments. I’m also not talking about Brad Stevens for that matter, who makes no statement at all in the article to support the negative connotations that King is applying to those (like Dungy) who speak openly and publicly about their faith. I’m talking about Robert King himself, who has set up the entire profile of Stevens as based on a view with which he implicitly expects us to sympathize – i.e., that those who are outspoken (read: “preachy”) about their faith are uncouth and probably somewhat inauthentic, since clearly they only care about “talking up” their faith instead of living it out. The positive converse, of course, is the humble and quiet approach of Stevens, who leads by example and supposedly won’t make anyone uncomfortable at a dinner party by bringing Jesus into the conversation.

If you read King’s article and follow what I’m saying here, you can start to see how unfortunate this sort of thing is. First – and most important – it would be entirely possible to profile the faith and character of Brad Stevens on its own merits. That is, after a fashion, what both the other stories I cite above are doing from UMC.org and Meunier’s blog. And anyway, the fact that there are other stories are out there about Stevens’ faith indicates he’s not as quiet about it as King would have us believe: Stevens sat for the interview with the UMC.org author, he’s noted in Meunier’s post that he was appearing in two services at his home church to be recognized for his accomplishments with the Bulldogs, and the photo attached to King’s own article in the Star is of Stevens speaking before his congregation on behalf of his church’s capital campaign. Those might not combine to add up to “preachy,” but I wouldn’t exactly call them “quiet” either.

Second, and most disappointingly, Tony Dungy is used as a complete foil in the article. There is nothing presented as evidence to suggest that Dungy is a hypocritical or inauthentic Christian. There is only the vague suggestion that Dungy’s more vocal approach to his faith is obviously less desirable. That’s unfair to Dungy, perhaps inaccurate to Stevens, and unnecessary in general. If you want to state that Tony Dungy is a loudmouth hypocrite, then state it and offer your reasons. If you want to make the case that Christians are tolerable when they don’t offend polite society, then make it. But don’t use a man like Dungy as a foil to shine a positive light on someone else. Both Dungy and Stevens seem to be positive role models and faithful Christians, each in his own way. Can’t you just let them?

Third, the tack taken by Robert King here represents one of the most oft-cited and most erroneous opinions about religious faith. He’s implying that you can either preach it or live it, but not both. It is clear what he favors, and that’s why I said at the outset that his article is offering us a representative commentary on the media’s view of Christianity in broader American culture. It is okay so long as it is so unobtrusive as to be almost unnoticeable; in fact, that’s when we’ll praise it. The media is tolerant of Christians when it doesn’t see them as threatening in anyway. It wants a Christianity that equates to good, harmless American citizenship and acceptance of the values of a liberal democratic society. Giving voice to faith is what makes it start to seem threatening, and that’s when the forces of culture bear down with persecution and, ultimately, with violence. If you don’t believe me, read the Acts of the Apostles.

Don’t mistake me. I’m not being critical of Brad Stevens or the way he goes about the practice of his faith. I admire the man, and I suspect his character and witness are far superior to my own. I’m simply trying to point out a phenomenon that appears again and again at the intersection between the church and the culture. In the end, it can never be either “preach it” or “live it.” It has to be both. Those who preach but don’t follow up their words with deeds are hypocrites and liars. And those who live their faith but are unwilling to give voice to it are cowards who are ashamed of the gospel by which they claim to abide. The culture will always try to domesticate the church, and for that reason its efforts must be vigilantly pointed out for what they are and resisted at every turn.