"The
other day I was one of a crowd who spent much of a wet Saturday
afternoon in a hot tub. My student advisees, who formed the crowd, had
advised me to try it; you’ll like it, they said. Previously I had
thought of hot tubs as reserved for hedonists in Hollywood and sybarites
in San Francisco, but now I know that under certain circumstances
members of Regent College’s teaching faculty may also use them. Every
day, it seems, one learns something new.”
“As I sat there savoring hot tubness, cracking small jokes and adjusting to the feel of being bubble over from all angles, it struck me that the hot tub is the perfect symbol of the modern route in religion. The hot tub experience is sensuous, relaxing, floppy, laid-back: not in any way demanding, whether intellectually or otherwise, but very, very nice, even to the point of being great fun.”
“Many today want Christianity to be like that, and labor to make it so. As I hot tubbed on, slumping deeper into uninhibited floppiness, I saw why the chromium-plated folk-religion of which I am speaking has gained such a hold. Modern life strains us. We get stimulated till we are dizzy. Relationships are brittle; marriages break; families fly apart; business is a cutthroat rat race, and those not at the top feel themselves mere cogs in another’s machine. Automation and computer technology have made life faster and tenser, since we no longer have to do the time-consuming routine jobs over which our grandparents used to relax their minds.
We have to run more quickly than any generation before us simply to stay where we are. No wonder that when modern Western man turns to religion what he wants is total tickling relaxation, the sense of being at once soothed, supported and effortlessly invigorated: in short, hot tub religion. He asks for it, and up folk jump to provide it. What hot tub religion illustrates most clearly is the law of demand and supply.”
“Certainly a rhythm of life that includes relaxation is right; the fourth commandment shows that. Alternating hard labor with fun times in right too; all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and Jesus so often went to banquets, the fun times of the ancient world, that he got called glutton and drunkard. Enjoying our bodies while we can, as opposed to despising them is part of the discipline of gratitude to our Creator. And uninhibited exuberances like clapping, dancing, shouting praise and crying out in prayer can be approved too, provided we do not hereby stumble others.”
“Without these hot tub factors, as we may call them, our Christianity would be less godly and less lively, for it would be less human. But if there were no more to our Christianity than hot tub factors- if, that is, we embraced a self-absorbed hedonism of relaxation and happy feelings, while dodging tough tasks, unpopular stances and exhausting relationships– we should fall short of biblical God-centeredness and of the cross-bearing life to which Jesus calls us, and advertise to the world nothing better than our own decadence. Please God, however, we shall not settle for that.”
J. I. Packer, Hot Tub Religion
“As I sat there savoring hot tubness, cracking small jokes and adjusting to the feel of being bubble over from all angles, it struck me that the hot tub is the perfect symbol of the modern route in religion. The hot tub experience is sensuous, relaxing, floppy, laid-back: not in any way demanding, whether intellectually or otherwise, but very, very nice, even to the point of being great fun.”
“Many today want Christianity to be like that, and labor to make it so. As I hot tubbed on, slumping deeper into uninhibited floppiness, I saw why the chromium-plated folk-religion of which I am speaking has gained such a hold. Modern life strains us. We get stimulated till we are dizzy. Relationships are brittle; marriages break; families fly apart; business is a cutthroat rat race, and those not at the top feel themselves mere cogs in another’s machine. Automation and computer technology have made life faster and tenser, since we no longer have to do the time-consuming routine jobs over which our grandparents used to relax their minds.
We have to run more quickly than any generation before us simply to stay where we are. No wonder that when modern Western man turns to religion what he wants is total tickling relaxation, the sense of being at once soothed, supported and effortlessly invigorated: in short, hot tub religion. He asks for it, and up folk jump to provide it. What hot tub religion illustrates most clearly is the law of demand and supply.”
“Certainly a rhythm of life that includes relaxation is right; the fourth commandment shows that. Alternating hard labor with fun times in right too; all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy, and Jesus so often went to banquets, the fun times of the ancient world, that he got called glutton and drunkard. Enjoying our bodies while we can, as opposed to despising them is part of the discipline of gratitude to our Creator. And uninhibited exuberances like clapping, dancing, shouting praise and crying out in prayer can be approved too, provided we do not hereby stumble others.”
“Without these hot tub factors, as we may call them, our Christianity would be less godly and less lively, for it would be less human. But if there were no more to our Christianity than hot tub factors- if, that is, we embraced a self-absorbed hedonism of relaxation and happy feelings, while dodging tough tasks, unpopular stances and exhausting relationships– we should fall short of biblical God-centeredness and of the cross-bearing life to which Jesus calls us, and advertise to the world nothing better than our own decadence. Please God, however, we shall not settle for that.”
J. I. Packer, Hot Tub Religion
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