What's culture got to do with it?

Here's my current notes for my second talk at the upcoming SBM weekend away. I'm tackling the difficult issue of Christ and culture. Does this make me brave or foolhardy? Hmmm....
Again, I haven't read any books on this topic yet. I've just started reading Don Carson's "Christ and Culture Revisited". Shall post a review if able.
Anyway - as usual, I seek feedback. Please gimme your thoughts.
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Definition of culture
“Culture” has two meanings:
1. The taken-for-granted rules, habits and customs that define acceptable relationships and communication. All communities have a culture, a way of doing things, which is different to other communities. Communities and their cultures can be ethnic (Chinese, Italian, Sub-continental); geographic (north-shore vs the “shire”); or based on interests & professions (computer geeks, surfies, train buffs, foodies). All these different communities will have subtle rules and customs that define acceptable relationships and communication.
2. The human capacity for organising, constructing, and generally ruling the world—science, technology, the fine arts—what we might call “high culture”.

Culture before sin: a way to worship God
Before sin, culture—in both senses of the word—was a means to worship God.
1. God defined acceptable relationships and communication.
2. Humans were called to rule the world and subdue it (Gen 1:28), under God, as God’s image-bearers.

Culture after sin: a way to reject God
After the fall, both senses of culture were corrupted, and became a means to reject God.
1. We want to define ourselves and our societies our own way, against God. Sometimes we do this explicitly: today, communist Russia and China are explicitly atheist. But explicit atheism is unusual: most of the time, we just dream up gods to suit ourselves—hence, the various religions of the world, with their respective moral codes.
2. Human ingenuity, science, and technology become a means of rejecting and replacing God. Eg: Genesis 11: the tower of Babel. Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel ch 4: “is this not Babylon, which I built by my own power”. The 18th century Enlightenment explicitly rejected a God-centred view of the universe, and replaced with a human-centred view: humanity was free, powerful, able to rule the universe. But most people aren’t that sophisticated: we just stuff our faces with the good things of the world, and forget the God who gave them to us.

Culture and God's redemption: towards a Biblical theology of culture
In the face of this human rebellion, God acted to judge sinful culture, and create a Godly culture. He created the nation of Israel, and gave them his law: God’s own relational instructions, his own “culture”. God always intended Israel to show their culture to the world, to be a “light to the nations”. The Queen of Sheba visiting Solomon is an example of this.
Israel failed to live by God’s law, God’s culture. God judged them by kicking them out of his land, to the lands of the nations, where they had to submit to a foreign, anti-God culture.
Jesus was born and lived in a particular time & place, in a particular “culture”. He submitted to ordinary first-century Jewish cultural customs: he was circumcised (Luke 2:21), and obeyed his parents (Luke 2:39). When he spoke, people understood him, so we assume that he spoke the ordinary language of first-century Israel: Aramaic. In his teaching, he tends to use metaphors from fields and farming, which suited rural Galilean culture. All this shows that culture is not necessarily only sinful: it can be used to communicate divine salvation.
However, Jesus is unique: he is the incarnate Son of God. We cannot build a sinless culture here on earth; that awaits the second coming. Jesus perfectly fulfilled God’s culture. He perfectly obeyed the law, both outwardly—he was circumcised, celebrated the Passover—and inwardly—he loved God with all his heart, soul, mind and strength, and loved his neighbour as himself. He loved God so much that he obeyed the Father’s salvation plan, even though it meant sacrificing his relationship with the Father. He loved his neighbours—us—so much that he died for us, even though we were his enemies. Christ’s death and resurrection are God’s culture.
As God’s culture, Christ’s death and resurrection simultaneously judges and redeems our human cultures. Jesus demonstrates real love, real sacrifice, real relationship: we all fall far, far short—we sin. This is his judgment. But in his death and resurrection, Jesus forgives us for that sin. He also gives us a new, worldwide community, with a worldwide culture: the church, the new Israel, the new people of God, where we are called to love each other as Christ loved us. This is his redemption.
Jesus has perfectly fulfilled Jewish Old Testament ethnic culture. Therefore, we don’t have to become cultural Jews to be saved: we don’t have to be circumcised, keep the food laws, the clothing laws etc. Christian culture is a culture of loving sacrifice: giving ourselves freely, for each other, and for the world, just like Jesus did.

Using culture as a way to communicate the gospel
The risen Christ now calls us to use human cultures in two ways: discipleship and evangelism. We must learn to relate to other Christians, from our various human cultures, within the worldwide church. We must also use culture to reach out to the world.
Because God created all the people of the world, every culture will have some point of contact with the gospel, some way of communicating with that culture about Jesus. But because of sin, that point of contact will not be perfect: it will be similar, but different. Eg: in sub-continental culture, families are closer-knit than in traditional Aussie culture. Prima facie, that’s a good, Godly, Biblical thing: God is positive towards families (Deut 6:20-24; Ps 22:30-31; the Proverbs are addressed to “my son”; Eph 5:21-6:9). However, in sub-continental culture, parents may rule and dominate their children, which may lead to resentment—neither of which is Godly. Eph 6:4a: “Fathers, do not exasperate your children”.
So, our challenge is to ponder carefully how we can use our culture to express our loyalty to Christ, in discipleship and evangelism. The order is important: Christ is the goal; our culture is an instrument to serve that goal. We are Christians first; sub-continentals (or any other culture) second. If we rightly use our human culture to express our loyalty to Christ, then we will clearly communicate the challenge to repent. Because we are using culture, we will communicate clearly. Because we are loyal to Christ, the content of what is communicated will be the challenge to turn from sin, and follow him. Clear communication involves speaking, but also ways of relating: it involves “culture”. If we clearly communicate the challenge to repent, people will understand us enough to hate us—just like they hated Jesus.

Two dangers to beware
If we miss either side of the equation—clear communication of repentance—we will be safe, but ineffective.
We could withdraw from the world, and set up little Christian communities, where we live by our nice, clean, safe Christian culture, insulated from the big, bad, wicked world. Then we’ll be safe, but irrelevant. We’ll be a curiosity; a laughing-stock; a bunch of old-fashioned eccentrics.
On the other hand, we could accept human culture so much, as to merely reflect back to the world what they’re saying. Rather than challenging them to repent, we can affirm them in their sin. Again, we’ll be safe, but irrelevant—and this time, irrelevant to God.

Conclusion
Christ enacted God’s culture in his death and resurrection: a culture of sacrificial love. Christians, and the church, are shaped by that culture. We must use human culture to clearly communicate the challenge to repent and follow that crucified & risen Christ. To be effective in this, we must be ready to suffer as Christ suffered.