Christians sometimes seal themselves off from the arts, the sciences, academia, and other pursuits not overtly religious. The apostle Paul did not shut himself off from culture; he invaded it. He went to Athens and spoke to pagan philosophers and thinkers about their altar to an unknown God.

When country music singer Johnny Cash died in 2003, Time Magazine ran a special report on “The Man in Black.” Cash would never have been so well known for his Christian faith if he hadn’t first become a great musician.

C.S. Lewis is quoted as saying, “We don’t need more Christian writers. We need more great writers who are Christian.”

Christians must prepare to compete in the marketplace and academia and the public sphere. We must strive to be among the best.

Christians may rail against much that they see in today’s society, but such admonition is useless to a non-Christian who sees Christians as being mostly against things he has no problem with. We may not agree with today’s standards of right and wrong, but, for many reasons , the Christian world view is no longer the dominant one in our culture.

In the past, we’ve had a lot of hangers-on when it was popular to be a Christian. Now the hangers-on are leaving.

Christians now will be respected for who they are rather than what they say.