Jamin Bradley

Ideology and nostalgia are dangerous bedfellows. Our love for the “good ol’ days” is a powerful drug that blinds us to momentum and justice. The Hebrews wanted the splendor of Jerusalem back, but as the prophets pointed out, Jerusalem wasn’t splendid for many. German leaders preached that their country would find a better future if they returned to the ways of old, paving the ideological way forward for parts of the Nazi uprising. The belief that America could be great again if it just got back to what it used to be set the stage for an attempted insurrection that still lies dormant in the hearts of many. The belief that God only wrote holy, sacred music between the 1500’s and 1960’s has caused many evangelicals to disunify their congregations with separate services, in which leaders must often pay a great price if they ever try to intertwine them.

There is plenty we can learn from the past, but when nostalgia becomes the defining factor of what is good and right, bad things happen. Saddest of all, our nostalgia blinds us to the fact that sometimes things change because what was the “good ol’ days” for us, were nightmares for others.

To “make church great again” disunifies the body and prevents us from reaching new generations. To “make America great again” means massive amounts of injustice to countless minorities. To “make Germany great again” meant concentration camps and genocide. To “make Jerusalem great again” meant hanging an innocent man on a cross, for he was seemingly a danger to the new temple that represented the good days of old.

Not all new things are good, but not all old things are good either. Nostalgia has nothing to do with good ethics, but it is often the motivator of bad ethics.

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For more insight this direction, see Ancient Echoes by Walter Brueggeman and Defending Democracy from its Christian Enemies by David P. Gushee.