The Gospel was meant to be lived out in a place of real-world application where people live, suffer, and try to figure things out. The point of contact where the Gospel engages the gut-level realities of life where truth encounters falsehoods, naivety, and deception is a place of traction. That point of contact gives the Gospel the traction it needs to move us forward and not become a static and motionless representation of faith.

Traction is not always appreciated by those in control of social or religious institutions and their message. The presence of traction can dismantle the structures that held people back before personal study and inquiry revealed another perspective. Traction will also create concern in the camp of the enemy because gaining traction with truth will begin to move a person forward leaving behind the lies and half-truths that had previously held them in a captive state. As traction moves a person forward it will also be used to help others find similar freedom. Traction will be seen as a threat to the captors and the status quo they feel called to protect.

If the challenges of the last few years have taught us anything, at the top of that list would be the fact that all we were told and assumed was true was not the truth. We assumed leaders in all facets of expertise had our best interests in mind. Some were just as confused and compliant as we were and continued to read from the same script of assumptions until the traction of truth began to shake things up.

Some of the social, scientific, and theological confusion we see taking place is not really confusion. It is a developing recognition of a newfound freedom that comes when people have been set free to think as individuals, not as sheep from another pasture who cannot think for themselves. 

Gaining traction is both dangerous and wonderful. It is dangerous because it will destabilize the status quo creating enemies who feel called to defend the assumptions that kept us from gaining spiritual and intellectual traction. It is wonderful because it offers a freedom not found when we choose to remain silent and unmovable in the prison of other people’s assumptions – assumptions we are told were the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.