A Faith of Our Own: Following Jesus Beyond the Culture Wars

Jonathan Merritt. New York: Faith Words, 2012. 159 pp. (Paperback).

It shouldn’t be surprising that the son of former Southern Baptist Convention president James Merritt would be a Southern Baptist. Or that he has published over 300 articles in a wide range of outlets. It might surprise you that he has a mind of his own and doesn’t always see eye-to-eye with traditional thinking — or maybe not, since he was raised in the Baptist tradition of staunch independence. 

In his second book Merritt takes on the bitter political partisanship in which many Christians have been involved since the late 1970s, arguing that the current generation wants more. He writes that members of his generation “believe we can call a truce to the culture wars while remaining faithful to Christ.” In fact, they believe faithfulness requires such a cease-fire. 

There is a degree of Monday morning quarterbacking in the book; it is much easier to look at the past and see where the leadership went wrong than to chart a new course whose errors and omissions may not show up for decades. Merritt acknowledges this, noting that his generation will also make “grave mistakes” and be criticized by the next generation. That doesn’t stop Merritt from issuing a challenge to answer the call of Jesus “to be broken for Him. In the end, our beliefs, our love, our ‘values’ cannot be simply voted. They must be embodied.”