"Cultural Counterfeits" (Jen Oshman)

TITLE: Cultural Counterfeits: Confronting 5 Empty Promises of Our Age and How We Were Made for So Much More
AUTHOR: Jen Oshman
PUBLISHER: Wheaton, IL: Crossway Publishers, 2022, (208 pages).

Since the first sin committed by Adam and Eve, the human race has been living with emptiness in their hearts. Cain was deemed to become a restless wanderer. People become vulnerable to all kinds of temptations. The biggest weapon used by the evil one: Idolatry. As long as people could be led away from the Truth of Jesus, idols are pretty effective ways to stumble all people, especially believers.

The author begins by showing us how our modern culture has shaped our perceptions of feminism, liberal sex, free choice, and negative images of Christianity and the Church. Sadly, mainstream media has coloured people's general perception of the Christian faith. "The Handmaid's Tale" TV series caricatures Christianity as some fundamentalist cult that degrades women into mere child-bearing slaves. The "Da Vinci Code" makes people question the Church about hidden "secrets" of the past. For all the well-intentioned beginnings, parts of modern feminism have degenerated into detrimental movements that promoted the Sexual Revolution, of free love, including illicit sex. On the #MeToo movement, Oshman is convinced that this movement would never have happened "without millennia of influence from the Bible."  In this book, author Jen Oshman highlights five of the idols that pose extreme dangers to our spiritual lives. With women as her key audience, the author describes the five empty promises of the following idols:

1. Beauty & Ability
2. Cheap Sex
3. Abortion
4. LGBTQIA+ 
5. Twisted View of Marriage and Motherhood.

The first empty promise drives home our culture's infatuation with what looks good, appearances, and abilities. This has implications for the way that we allow aesthetics to dictate how we behave instead of letting Truth be the primary motivation to be who we are. With regard to abilities, the author makes a keen observation about how the lack of abilities could become a strong driver for ending one's life! All of these aesthetics, appearances, and abilities, or the lack of them try to fill the hole in our hearts but they are by themselves empty. The second empty promise is about our culture's infatuation with sex, so much so that they reduce a person's worth in terms of sexuality. What is needed is a correct view of sexuality, marriage, and what it means to keep our covenant promises to one another and to God. The third empty promise focuses on the topic of free choice and abortion. We learn about how worldviews like dualism could give rise to justifications for abortion. The fourth is about the root of the LGBTQIA+ movement, where one's fixation on a particular form of sexuality as an absolute right could become problematic. Instead of allowing any form of sexuality to form our basic identity, Oshman pushes back by saying: "It's not who you love; it's who loves you" that should form our foundation. It is not us who define who we are, but God alone. Oshman's arguments are quite thought-provoking and counter-cultural. Finally, she looks at marriage and motherhood. Far too many women are feeling less fulfilled either because they are single or are unable to have children. 

Oshman concludes with some powerful exhortations to help us move away from these empty promises to the Promise of God. To the question, "Why is it good to be a girl?" she provides ten answers to anchor readers on the Word of God.

My Thoughts

The problem of idols and empty promises from the culture around us is so prevalent that there are not enough resources to counter them. Thankfully in this book, Jen Oshman helps push back against this deceitful avalanche of false hopes. I think Oshman is spot on to identify the problem of appearances and abilities. For many people, especially the younger ones, the seductiveness of fame and self-promotion can be too enticing to avoid. Just see how many people are launching their own social media platforms and profiles to battle for more likes and followers. Is there a point at which they would sacrifice Truth just to get ahead of others? Appearances can affect one's self-esteem, but pretense and false facade could be worse. The empty promises of abortion and sex have been traditional areas of contention for decades. By listing them in this book once again, we are reminded that the problem is not old but continues to be a controversial area that Christians ought to counter. I know there are many in society who sees Christianity as a threat to their cultural way of life. I prefer to see it as a healthy counter, or to be politically correct, an alternative point of view. This counterview is increasingly more difficult. The rise of "cancel culture" has been used to deny or threaten the very expression of such counterviews. A true democracy needs to defend the right for all expressions of worldviews. Thankfully, Oshman's book is among the few voices bold enough to push back. More importantly, it is letting the Bible's voice speak amid a climate of unbiblical philosophies floating around. Without a biblical voice, even Christians could be misled by the world.

The chapter on LGBTQIA+ is probably one of the most difficult and contentious chapters for anyone to write. With the legalization of rights of this group, the concern is the eroding of religious voices, so much so that any alternative to the increasingly mainstream view could be labeled as bigotry or hate speech. I wonder. Such labeling is mischief at best and demonic at worst. Readers do not need to be female to benefit from the reading of this book. Fathers, preachers, husbands, and adult males can benefit too by knowing the struggles their wives, sisters, daughters, and female friends could face daily.

Jen Oshman has been in women’s ministry for over two decades as a missionary and pastor’s wife on three continents. She’s the mother of four daughters, the author of Enough about Me: Find Lasting Joy in the Age of Self, and the host of All Things, a podcast about cultural events and trends. Her family currently resides in Colorado, where they planted Redemption Parker, an Acts29 church. She blogs at jenoshman.com.

Rating: 4 stars of 5.

conrade

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This book has been provided courtesy of Crossway and NetGalley without requiring a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.