Casting a Narrative: Why Everything Must Change!

This is the first of a five part review of the new book Everything Must Change: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of Hope by Brian McLaren.

Like an infomercial full of high
hope, restless vigor, and a secret knowledge hidden away—until now!—Brian
McLaren has thrown his full force against the all the problems of the world in
his new book Everything Must Change. And does he mean everything! McLaren outlines the three major systems that
make up our American driven world, the security system, the prosperity system,
and the equity system; these systems rule the way of life as we know it, and in
order for everything to change, these systems must be reformed, reworked, and
reimagined. How will McLaren change
everything? The key is in the subtitle: Jesus, Global Crises, and a Revolution of
Hope. McLaren is not like the
infomercial pitch-man, though he has as much passion, for he does not see his
own ideas as the solution to world problems, he is instead fleshing out the
revolution of hope preached by Jesus as the answer to global crises.

McLaren
does not try to wow us with statistics, five step plans, requests for
donations, or fancy rhetoric. McLaren is
neither an economist, a politician, a social advocate, a lawyer, a diplomat,
nor a businessman, what he does is instead cast a narrative to answer the
questions of global crises.

Casting a
narrative instead of building an argument on piles of statistics, arguments,
and policy is a shrewd and wise decision.
One must admit that McLaren is not the type of person one thinks of to
come out with a world-changing book, yet in humbly casting a narrative for
change he hides his publicly perceived lack of academic skills to tackle these
issues and graciously and humbly lets the narrative of Christ speak.

In the
first four parts of the book, McLaren attempts to peel away the layers of
cultural and worldly notions of the world and bring us a reframed Jesus who
cares about the whole world. We live in
a world rife with injustice, greed, and war, as most Americans are well
accustomed to seeing on a daily basis (just watch the news). We hear the whispers of secular apocalypse, a
human-driven end of the world through war, violence, or environmental
tragedy. We all think it would be great
if we won the lottery, because then we would have no worries and could just
spend our time helping others. Worrying
is the foundation for the three oppressive systems built into the ecosystem of
humanity: equity, security, and prosperity.
Those are the things our humanness yearns for so badly. Yet, McLaren pleads that we look to Jesus as
the center of our new ecosystem, the kingdom
of God, and believe with
sincere hope, a Jesus who tells us

that good will prevail by peace,
love, truth, faithfulness, and courageous endurance of suffering, and that
domination, violence, and torture are among the things that will be
overcome. In this view, no good deed
will be forgotten or wasted, so we should start doing the next good thing now,
faithfully continue, and never give up until the dream comes true. Even if doing so will cost us our life, we
must press on, because death is not the end, and even death itself cannot stop
the advance of the peace and love of God. (146)

McLaren does not try to persuade us, he tries to let the
prophetic, kingdom-building, and loving Jesus persuade us, and no fancy rhetoric,
politics, policy or avant-garde economics are needed to do that.