Page 10 - Cedarville Magazine Spring 2013 Volume 1 Issue 1

10 | Cedarville Magazine
by Bill Brown If, for example, the Dream consists
only of the accumulation of riches, then
everything in life has cash value — not
only jobs, but relationships, experiences,
and even spiritual beliefs.
Chuck Palahniuk’s anti-hero, Tyler
Durden in Fight Club , claims that the
American Dream requires people to take
jobs they don’t want so they can buy things
they don’t need. Rather than empowering
people with freedom and opportunity,
Americans lose their personal identity in
the tsunami of advertising and celebrity
materialism. Durden laments, “We’ve all
been raised on television to believe that one
day we’d all be millionaires, movie gods,
and rock stars. But we won’t. And we’re
slowly learning that fact.”
On the social side, the civil rights
movement confronted the inequities in
American society that deprived minorities
of equal standing and opportunity. In his
famous “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., recognized that
prejudice and racism had warped society’s
understanding of the American Dream. He
wrote, “When these disinherited children of
God sat down at lunch counters, they were
really standing up for what is best in the
American Dream and for the most sacred
values in our Judeo-Christian heritage.”
Sharing the Message
While these and other distortions of
the Dream are real, the prevailing focus
question at the conference was: How should
Christians live out their faith in a culture
defined by the American Dream?
Arecent USA Today/Gallup poll sounded the alarm for
a declining belief in the “American Dream.” Half of the
respondents think it is unlikely that today’s youth will have
a better life than their parents, and most Americans believe that our
country’s best years are behind us.
While this is a sobering snapshot of the current mood in
America, the idea of the American Dream still pervades the social
ethos of our country. The Dream has drawn — and continues
to draw — millions from around the world to the freedom and
opportunity that embody it. They come to live in a land where
social mobility is not determined by circumstances of birth and
class structure but by commitment, hard work, and talent.
But the idea that every person has the freedom to achieve success
and prosperity is not easily maintained in practical ways. Political
and social tensions have dominated American society as leaders and
citizens discuss, debate, and argue about the best ways to preserve
the values embedded in the Dream. How involved should the
government be? In what ways should it enforce social equality and
economic opportunity for all citizens?
These were some of the many issues explored at Cedarville’s most
recent national program, American Dream Conference: Christian
Perspectives on the Economy. The conference took place on
October 25–26, 2012, and featured some of today’s most influential
evangelical minds presenting Christ-centered perspectives on the
economy, the government, and a biblical response to wealth.
There were areas of wide disagreement — yes, even among an
evangelical Christian group. But the points of agreement provided
a stirring awareness that we are all on the same team serving Christ
and bringing hope to a world in despair. This was a powerful
reminder of the strategic value and effectiveness of Cedarville’s
Critical Concern conferences.
Living the Dream
While the American Dream still provides hope for personal
achievement and the public good, experience has shown there is a dark
side. Without amoral and spiritual foundation, the AmericanDream
becomes distorted by individual expectations or societal prejudices.
and
American
Jesus