If there were an inanimate object to which our culture would compare itself, one would need to look no further than that of the snowflake. On any given wintery night, millions, billions even, will fall to rest on the ground. If one were to look at them under a microscope, none of them look the same; they would all be unique as if each was cut from their own mold. Each fleck of snow can be celebrated for its distinct complexity and beauty.
In our culture today, we have adopted this analogy to describe ourselves. We are all distinct from each other, each person a conglomerate of different likes and dislikes, desires and fears, preferences and drives. We are unique; the psalmist sang true when he wrote in the 139th Psalm, “For you formed my inward parts; for you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made,” (Psalm 139:13-14). However, our celebration of the individual person has broken from a healthy admiration into an obsession that has us bow at the altar of individuality. We are taught that we are extraordinary and exceptional. We crave the limitless customization of our lives, from our varied senses of clothing style to our unique favorite coffee drinks. Burger King tells us to “Have it your way,” and, by and large, we have adopted this as our motto.
Instead of catering to the unit, the village, the city or the family, we fold around the individual. This concept isn’t horrible in itself; like the snowflake, the individual is unique, special and loved. The problem occurs when a spirit of entitlement and elitism evolves from the message that has been bored into the individuals within our society. There is a sense in which we have been told that we are the protagonist in our own story. This message isolates us from our human counterparts as we often imagine ourselves on higher pedestals or as being more important. This may not seem surprising in a nation that is wrapped up in consumerism, but it has reached much farther than the popular culture.
It has crept into the institution of the church, spreading like an infection into different facets of church life. Some of the symptoms may seem to be trivial on the surface, but the effects are nothing short of detrimental. Many worship songs that we sing on Sunday mornings focus on the singer’s feelings, often leaving out the glory of God — or even the Divine entirely. It becomes easy to take the consumeristic outlook and treat church like another strip mall: it is a place that is meant to serve the individual. Instead of being a place where broken people come together to serve one another as a community, it has become a place where people are expected to be served. Whether it be programs for children, a caffeine fix from the church coffee shop, or a concert during the worship time. While none of these things are wrong in and of themselves, the sense of entitlement for these things reflect a heart condition that shows that shows an individualistic worldview.
In the hustle and bustle of our culture, we as the church have forgotten the community that makes up the church. Paul compares the church to a body that works together to fulfill the work of God. While there is the fact that the individual is the Bride of Christ, there is the much larger fact that we together as the church are the Bride of Christ. In his book "The Good Who is There," Francis Schaeffer sheds light on the subject. "If we only speak of and exhibit the individual effects of the Gospel, the world, psychologically conditioned as it is today, will explain them away. What the world cannot explain away will be a substantial, corporate exhibition of the logical conclusions of the Christian presuppositions. It is not true that the New Testament presents an individualistic concept of salvation. Individual, yes: we must come one at a time; but it is not individualistic only." We are individually connected to Christ as a branch is to a vine, but in a larger sense, we are a part of something larger; we are a part of a universal unit: the church.
The humbling, yet relieving fact is that we are often not the extraordinary people that we think we are. We are broken, finite and just as much in need of help as the next. Returning to the analogy of the snowflake, Michael Gungor once said in his meditation entitled “Vapor” regarding the snowflake: “In our society we worship our individuality. We love to talk about our fingerprints and snowflakes and how every individual is unique. But have you ever looked at a snowflake? I mean, they all kind of look the same. Back the camera up a little bit and you are nothing but a human being.” This isn’t said to put down the individual. Rather it is just the opposite. It frees us up. We can take a step back from the rat race around us and appreciate the people that are around us. When we realize that we are a just an ordinary person, we can live as functioning members of society and truly change it for the better.
