Communicating With the Younger Generation
In a world that’s moving from the modern era to the postmodern era, the way people react and relate to information and truth about anything, including God and faith, is changing. This is especially evident in gen Z and millennials.
People in the older generations wanted facts and information and a scientific, logical argument for practically any opinion, whereas today, younger people are moving away from that. People have become suspicious of intelligent-sounding arguments that appear to manipulate people.
They no longer want people to tell them what to think and how to act, even if they can give a good argument why. People have rethought the philosophy that knowledge is everything, as this devalues the importance of experience and emotions and relationships. They don’t want the ‘big picture’ explanations. They want a compilation of ‘small picture’ stories that connect with their present issues, feelings, and experiences. They want to come to the ‘big picture’ conclusion for themselves as a mosaic of their many smaller experiences.
“People are open to conversations exploring spirituality and spiritual experience, but turned off by Christians making bold statements of certainty and truth.”
It's true that postmodernism comes with the negative issue of people giving up on finding truth and ignoring the fact, but an important way to deal with this is by talking about the objective truth by revealing that although it stays the same, it can be experienced and viewed through a variety of perspectives. This takes into account a person’s own uniqueness and feelings. It's important to note that we haven’t reached a post-modern world yet, but it is becoming more so.
It is beneficial to see the world through a balance of modern and postmodern thinking; where both fact and truth, experience and feelings are important and valued.
