Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling by Andy Crouch was one of the hot books of 2008. It has endorsements from such people as Lauren Winner, Richard Mouw, Tim Keller and James Emery White. As such, it is not a book for a narrow group of people but is respected by a broad spectrum of Christian leaders. As a result, I was looking forward to reading the book as I worked through Genesis.
I was not disappointed. I expected an interesting, challenging read. As far as specifics, I was not sure what to expect. It did not go in some directions I had hoped, but took me in directions I probably needed to go.
One of the main things that Crouch does is look at the cultural import of Scripture. This takes up much of the book. He develops the way in which Scripture traces major developments in Scripture, and how culture affects the people in Scripture. Scripture places us in a variety of cultures (ancient Canaan, Egypt, ancient Israel, Babylon, post-exilic Jerusalem and Galilee, etc.).
Crouch begins at the beginning- how the Scriptural account of creation is very different from the myths of other cultures. There, we find the importance of structure for creativity. Structure creates regularity without which no creativity can happen. There must be some type of predictability for us to manipulate creation in order to display creativity. Too much structure though stifles creativity.
“Culture is the realm of human freedom- its constraints and impossibilities are the boundaries within which we can create and innovate.”
He lays out some of the common questions regarding culture, and a few I hadn’t thought about before.
- What does this cultural artifact assume about the way the world is?
- What does this cultural artifact assume about the way the world should be?
- What does this cultural artifact make possible?
- What does this cultural artifact make impossible (or at least very different)?
- What new forms of culture are created in response to this artifact?
Questions 3 & 4 address the horizons of the possible and impossible in a culture. This was some of the new material that I had not really pondered before.
“Family is culture at its smallest- and its most powerful!”
This stood out to me in the context of Genesis 4. Big things started in small places. I began to think about the culture of my household- what we make of the world. Each of the families of our congregation has the power to create culture (good or bad) which directly influences generations of families.
Part of his critique of most evangelical ponderings about culture are that they are mostly intellectual. We THINK about culture. This does not change culture, even if we critique culture. It is good to analyze culture, but to really change culture we must create culture too.
As you compare worldviews, I believe Christianity has a better worldview, a better, more compelling story. We create culture in keeping with the story (not just the good parts). Culture is not the same as a worldview, but flows out of a worldview. It reflects it, AND seeks to shape the world view of other people. Christian culture need not be explicitly Christian, or explicitly about our story of creation, fall, redemption and restoration. But it will flow out of that story, much like The Lord of the Rings or The Spitfire Grill. Sadly, so much of the culture created by Christians is merely copying the work of non-Christians and slapping Jesus on the cover.
Crouch’s style makes for enjoyable reading. At times his theological leanings poke out in other areas. While I didn’t agree with some/most of those, I don’t think that detracts from the book. Crouch goes beyond Niebuhr, and Carson‘s updated discussion of Niebuhr. The church needs to take this next step so we don’t just react to culture but begin to thoughtfully create culture. More artists of various sorts who claim the name of Jesus ought to reading this book. More pastors who lead their people as they think about culture (avoiding the extremes of knee jerk reactionism and enculturation).
Cavman Considers 
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