How do we preserve our identity if we're in exile?

In my last article of this series (which you can read here), I considered how migration and exile are experienced by Christians in the UK in a variety of ways.

Whilst exile is usually associated with geographical displacement, exile can be experienced in various ways without ever leaving home. Cultural, economic, political and/or ecclesiastical exile can occur to any group of Christians, migrant or not. British evangelicals may be experiencing all kinds of exile, whether or not we have moved. When we find ourselves living in exile, how should we live?

Carl R. Truman wrote an article for Banner of Truth in 2015 on exile, in which he said:
"[Exiled] communities living within a wider alien, and even hostile, culture need means by which to preserve their identity AND keep hope alive for an ultimate return to their homeland. If they are not self-conscious about this, then the values and patterns of the host culture will over time penetrate their community and lead to their assimilation. The question is, how do we preserve our identity?"

Identity and exile

Preserving identity is not easy. There is a tricky path to tread between cultural nostalgia and assimilation, between preserving identity and mission.

We must avoid time-capsuling the church. The church should not become a museum of bygone ways of life and yet we must avoid losing our distinctiveness and identity as followers of Christ.

And yet, striving to avoid assimilation can exclude genuine Christians of a different culture who would otherwise wish to join in.

Consider the difficult experience of Windrush generation Jamaicans and other Caribbean Christians, who did not receive a warm welcome by many white British churches in the 1950s and 60s. Migrant Christian communities were told to culturally assimilate to British Christian culture or segregate in exile.

Truman suggests exiled Christians need to do four things to preserve Christian culture: preach the word, in season and out of season; duly administer the sacraments; exercise church discipline; and sing the songs of exile.

Advantages for the church in a world of migration

Preserving identity is important. So too is seeing advantages for the church in a world of migration and exile.

African-American Biblical scholar, assistant professor, theologian and writer Esau McCaulley suggests we need to widen our interpretive location. McCaulley was born in 1979. He grew up in Alabama, one of four kids, with a gospel-hearted, Christ-centred mother. He writes: "We watched Christian cartoons and went to midweek Bible studies and as many Holiday Bible Schools as we could imagine.

"But I was also a child of my environment. I was a southern black boy from Alabama in love with hip hop. That music helped me interpret the world that seemed to have its foot on the neck of Black and Brown bodies in my city. Put simply, I knew the Lord and I knew culture."

McCaulley goes on to explain how hip-hop described his political, cultural and economic exiled reality. He also speaks of how the gospel filled him with hope.

His formation led to him writing a book titled Reading While Black, which begins with a chapter on cultural interpretation of the Bible. He writes: "The job of the scholar is to probe and press and challenge simplistic readings. It is also important to challenge simplistic readings using our own experiences that might provide insights that others who do not share those experiences might have missed."

He introduces a principle to interpreters in general. He believes interpreters need to acknowledge the social location of interpretation without letting the location eclipse the text itself.

Developing a Biblical theology of migration

I will adopt three principles from Esau McCaulley as I look at what the Scriptures say about exile and migration for Christians in the UK.

1. The social location of evangelicals in England influences both our own interpretation of our situation and our interpretation of the Bible. When we speak about exile, we interpret it from our own social location.
2. We must not let our social location eclipse our interpretation of the Scriptures. Simplistic interpretation will not do. The Biblical text itself has authorial intent and universal truth which is independent from our historical and social location.
3. We can learn from the experiences of others in exile, like Esau McCaulley, about what exile is like for others and how to interpret the Scriptures from a different exiled location.

In the first three articles of this series on migration and the Bible, we have considered the disruption of migration; different experiences of universal, physical, cultural, political, economic and ecclesiastical exile; and the need to learn from those whose interpretive location differs from our own.

We live in a complex culture of overlapping exile and have much to consider and learn from each other as we dig deep in God's Word.

Next time, I will consider lessons on migration and exile from the history of 16th and 17th century migration to the Dutch Republic.