There’s a lot I would like to say, but let’s keep it to five. Ex: The definition of postmodernism that drives these criticisms is uniformly rejected by emerging church-sympathetic theologians and philosophers. (See James Smith’s book.) Why do we continue, then, to read page after page explaining that all postmodernism is evil enlightenment philosophy? And then there’s the entire matter of whether the emerging church is routinely confused with the Rick Warren/Boomer style church marketing approach. And on and on and on…Anyways.

1. Would it be possible to hold on to the basic goodness of words like “missional” and “incarnation?” I’d hate for these good words to become casualties of conflict. I don’t think it’s too much to ask for clarification of why Ed Stetzer missionalism is good but Mall church’s missionalism is bad. Better yet, let’s just declare these terms off limits and find better words, or even whole sentences, to describe the problem.

When I read bloggers saying that “missional” is a term that should be avoided, it’s a Twilight Zone moment. And when we are warning about churches that stress the incarnation too much, I want to call John Shelby Spong and ask if he’s watching the same channel I am.

There are substantial criticisms that can be made without taking away words that we need to trust and promote.

2. How about chapter and verse on what it is you are criticizing? By chapter and verse, I mean specific quotations and citations from books and talks.

I can’t speak for everyone, but my head is completely spinning here. Who and what are being criticized? Your criticisms are obviously serious, but they are aimed at a huge, dispersed target that starts to look less real the more I look for it. When Dr. Piper took on the issues of open theism and the new perspective on Paul, he wrote books with specific targets, lots of footnotes, and direct citations and quotations from Boyd and Gundry. That’s missing in much of the current criticism of the emerging church, and it’s getting worse. You’ve gone after Brian Mclaren, but after that it’s very murky. Where are Jones, Kimball, Bell, Bolger, McKnight and company wrong specifically? Exactly? And since we’re all flawed, what is the import of those errors?

For example, in the recent DGM conference, Dr. Carson spoke of those advocating the great commandments in contrast to the cross/resurrection. Who exactly is he talking about? Where? Is this a reference to Scot McKnight’s Jesus Creed? (That was my feeling, but Dr. McKnight disagrees, for the record.)

I don’t mean to be disrespectful to men far more knowledgeable than me and to whom I am greatly in debt, but after we’ve done in a few quotes from Brian Mclaren, I’m not hearing many helpful specifics. (I’m not counting the research department at Slice.) Could this be repaired? I think a lot of good men deserve to be distinguished from those truly deserving criticism, and I’d like to have some specifics to blog about in my free time.

3. When you refer to the “emerging church,” it’s very confusing. You seem unaware of any differences in Christians identifying with this conversation. I know that reformed Christians like for distinctions to be made between reformed with various emphases and teachings. The differences among the reformed on sacraments, ecclesiology, worship and relationships with other Christians are substantial. It seems relatively simple to ask that everyone who says “we are trying to reach the postmodern emerging culture,” not be saddled with every fault and criticism of every book/talk by Mclaren. It’s safe to say that anyone who knows the emerging church well is immediately put off by a critic who assumes every emerging church is Rob Bell preaching, David Crowder leading worship and a candlelit midrash on Colossians following a prayer walk through a maze.

Conservative evangelicals would find it immediately revealing of one’s level of understanding if someone showed no apparent knowledge of a substantial difference between J.I. Packer and T.D. Jakes. I’d suggest that what may be under the umbrella of emerging Christianity is a diversity at least as wide. It occurs to me that Calvinists, in particular, know what it’s like to be misrepresented, and ought to be more careful about doing so to others. If I call the SBC Founders or James White “hypers,” I’m going to be justifiably lectured and straightened out. Well.if the shoe fits folks. And it does.

In particular, it’s strange to hear the emerging church spoken of as denying the deity and supremacy of Christ, or of de-emphasizing the cross and resurrection. I am sure there are some emerging church types doing exactly that, but those of us listening to the emerging church—and I am listening to a diverse group of emerging voices without joining any of them—are not necessarily hearing these things. Some of us are hearing a recovery of interest in the incarnation and a recovery of the importance of the Kingdom life, ministry and proclamation of Jesus. This is a good and valuable recovery. Good scholars like N.T. Wright, Scot McKnight and Stan Grenz, however, present a strong emphasis on the supremacy of Jesus and his death/resurrection for our sins and justification.

I am all for criticism that specifically points out the errors you protest, but I do not believe a kind of generalized, pop-level, broad stroke criticism of all emerging churches is fair. Frankly, it appears to be calculated to hang an albatross around the neck of a whole branch of the Christian family. Many- most- emerging churches preach and teach the Bible, believe the creeds and know the Gospel is a message of a crucified God dying for sins. Many emerging churches are presenting this in places and in ways few traditionalists dare. Make fun of churches in bars and coffeeshops if you want, but somehow I think that the safety of the sanctuary of old First Church is a considerably less difficult place to name Christ Jesus as Lord than in the gathering places of the world. If these emerging Christians are going to pubs and talking about beer, then criticize them. If they are having theology discussions and naming Christ as Lord, leave them alone. Better yet, let’s pray for them.

4. It’s possible that you may have opted to criticize the emerging church at a point where its flaws are most obvious and its assets less visible. The prominence of McLaren as a target, and the silence about the many, and there are many, churches gernuinely reaching the lost in emerging, postmodern culture indicates to me that the consideration of the emerging church is quite possibly on-target, but also too early.

Many of us believe that the questions and critiques of the traditional church in the last 30 years have been well placed, but the response, especially in theology and ecclesiology, is not yet obvious. The higher profile emerging church leaders have been reluctant to speak for one another for this very reason: what the emerging church response to the traditional church will be is an on-going process. It is not the liberalism of some in Emergent Village. It is not an embracing of the liberalism of the mainlines, even though some emerging leaders have gone over that fence. It is quite possible that the eventual result will be very influenced by the reformed resurgence of the past 20-30 years.

If that proves to be true, a declaration of war/heresy by reformed critics will be unfortunate. When I read reformed critics openly ridiculing the appearance, music and worship styles of twenty-somethings, all in the name of criticizing the emerging church, I am saddened. One major reformed critic ran a picture of David Crowder as an object of humor on a post. In fact, Crowder and this critic have very much in common, and the brushing of Crowder into the category of promoting the betrayal of the Gospel because he is popular with the emerging church is a huge mistake.

5. Finally, I want to admonish you to consider if the emerging church is not the true child of the missionary principles and missional theology that have been influential in evangelicalism for more than half a century. When evangelicals learn the principles of taking the Gospel to other cultures, they begin to see the traditional church through missionary eyes. It is not insignificant that the leaders of the emerging church are missional thinkers, evangelists, missiologists and students of the church in other cultures. They have taken the perspectives course. They have been to OneDay. They know what the 10/40 Window is all about. They are aware of missions like few other generations of western Christians.

The Reformers did much that was right. They also failed at some key points. A fully articulated, cross-cultural missionary theology was one failure. That failure was repaired by later generations, but the idea that the church is to become comfortably allied with the dominant conservative culture remained. Today, thousands of dying churches are memorials to the influence the church once had in culture, but has no longer. Many of those churches have specifically said no, over and over, to making changes that could reach the culture. They are dying rather than embrace missionary principles that could save them.

Emerging churches have sent up the signal that the church is not the expression of a post-war boomer and greatest generation culture. They are ridiculed for “tattoos and piercings” in the congregation, but this is because many critics are invested more in the preservation of a cultural expression of the church than in a missional approach to the Gospel that goes with culture, and goes into sub and counter cultures. It is not a matter of “holiness,” as some blogs strangely assume, but a matter of Christ for all people and all cultures.

To blanketly criticize the emerging church is, honestly, to criticize thousands of missionaries who love and minister to people who will never find their way into the traditional church. It is often to criticize churches and church plants who are growing by true conversion growth rather than by sucking up Christians out of the suburbs into the megachurches. It is to criticize those who do what we commend missionaries for doing.

In fact, many of the critics of the emerging church talk about the supremacy of Christ while their criticisms suggest the supremacy of a kind of church culture. All who deny the supremacy of Christ should be called out and confronted. All those who safeguard the supremacy of established evangelical culture in America should be criticized as well. Everywhere I go I see American flags in church sanctuaries. Yesterday, I saw the American flag displayed over the Christian flag on a flagpole in front of a large fundamentalist church. In that same church I heard emerging churches castigated for their music. Does anyone think the emerging church would have the American flag in a worship center? It’s laughable. Yet where is the criticism for that idolatry? Why the silence? Is that not a denial of the supremacy of Christ?

Many of the criticisms brought to the table and leveled at the emerging church are valid. There is a myriad of flaws with the emerging church movement, and much that must be corrected. There is also a myriad of flaws and concerns with the traditional conservative church. Some emerging critics of the traditional church have been too strident, and their town has been arrogant and unkind. This probably makes criticism of the emerging church easier.

Perhaps both sides should look closer, listen better, pray more and speak with more awareness of what the other party is seeing, feeling and saying. I pray that a time of constructive guidance and partnership will come soon, and that emerging churches will be mentored and encouraged, rather than only being portrayed in exaggerated terms as betraying the heart of the Gospel.

Michael Spencer has been a minister, youth specialist, writer, teacher and communicator in churches and schools for over 30 years. “I am deconstructing and moving past my evangelicalism; rediscovering what it means to be vitally connected to Jesus. That process is always worth sharing.”

Print PDF

The Decline of the Emerging Church Jan10 Next-Wave Cover

[This article first appeared in the January 2010 issue of Next-Wave. You can find the rest of the articles from that month here: http://www.the-next-wave.info/archives/issue133/ ]

For the past sixteen months, I have been on sabbatical regarding my written contributions to the emerging church dialog. The decision was intentional. It was personal. In hindsight, it has been a marvelous blessing, in ways I presently struggle to fully appreciate. For me, writing became a primary tool to process my own spiritual growth; including embracing the sacred tensions, contradictions, challenges, reverence and awe-inspiring beauty the privilege of breathing the reality the God of Abraham, Isaac and Joseph presents me with each and every day.

However, I have not been cloistered in a monastery in some remote, faraway place (Although there are those who might characterize central Oregon that way).  I have been an unrepentant, albeit distant, observer of the emerging church during this time. Thus, I have occupied a distinctly different vantage point during the last year and a half. Perhaps that’s what motivated Charlie Wear, Next Wave’s shepherd, to contact me and invite me to write about this subject — to share the observations of one who was formerly a passionate, outspoken, regular, contributor to /immersed within the dialog — to one who made the intentional decision to occupy a very different place from which to observe; to pray, to listen, to be quiet, to read, to wander, to explore, to process, to question, to ponder. It is from this perspective that I share the following with you:

How do we measure what God’s Spirit is up to? Who could be bold enough to posit such an equation that might capture the depth and breadth of this sacred mystery?

During the past year and a half, I have come to appreciate the explosive, timeless truth Jesus spoke in John 16:12-15: “I have more to say to you, more than you can now bear (emphasis is mine). But when he, the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all truth.” God’s Spirit has more to say to us, collectively and individually. More than we can now bear. Imagine for a moment that God has more to say to you, to us — more than you/we can now bear. What’s the obvious question, assuming you authentically desire to hear what God has to say? The question becomes: What must I do to hear you God? It is me, it is you, and it is us who must become willing to change our current posture to reposition ourselves to be able to bear what God has to say. For some of us, that may involve wholesale changes in the way we have been living our lives — like surrendering to the subtle persuasions of God’s Spirit to take an intentional sixteen month sabbatical from the noisy inertia inherent within well-intentioned, time consuming, fulfilling habits we’ve become immersed in like seemingly incessant writing, blogging, texting, reading, ministering, preaching, mentoring, teaching, tweeting or whatever.

God’s Spirit is alive. It is active among us in immeasurable ways I cannot pretend to understand. I find an excerpt from the work of Harvard’s Charles Handy to be helpful to me in considering the question; How might we measure what God’s Spirit is up to? “The first step is to measure whatever can be easily counted. This is OK as far as it goes. The second step is to disregard that which can’t be easily measured or to give it an arbitrary quantitative value. This is artificial and misleading. The third step is to presume that which can’t be measured easily really isn’t important. This is blindness. The fourth step is to say that which can’t be easily measured really doesn’t exist. This is suicide.”

To posit an equation that might capture the depth and breadth of the sacred mystery of what God’s Spirit is up to is to humbly acknowledge that God is here and is not silent. God’s Spirit has more to say to us, more than we can now bear. For many who claim the name of Christ as Christians, we have become smugly comfortable measuring our relationship with Jesus, and the world He beckons us to serve. We have become enslaved to counting only that which can be easily counted (like church attendance, money, gatherings with like-minded friends), arbitrarily disregarding that which can’t be conveniently incorporated into our orthopraxy (e.g. the reality that God’s Spirit has more to say to us). Finally, we are blinded by the self-righteous presumption that whatever we (or others) can’t measure really isn’t important — preserving our posture as those who cannot bear the thought of the effort and sacrifice required to abandon our deafening smugness to hear the cry of our God beseeching us to allow his Spirit to say what he has to say to us. Perhaps the above leads to vastly more personal questions (As they have for me): Do you really believe God is alive, God is here, God is not silent, that the Spirit of truth has more to say to you, more than you can now bear? Or as one author asks, do you “function as though the supernatural were not there?”

The results of my sabbatical have produced refreshing responses to these questions that possess a new depth, breadth and texture; a new form of ‘Yes’ to the first five questions posed above. Without the influence of those who have been characterized as emergent, I sincerely doubt if I would have concluded this sabbatical and be able to honestly and unequivocally share this outcome with you. For this, I am inhabited by a deep, unspeakable, enduring gratitude.

Who gives content to God? Francis Schaeffer helps me here when he wrote: “Let us notice that no word is as meaningless as is the word “god.” Of itself, it means nothing. Like any other word, it is only a linguistic symbol — g-o-d — until content is put into it…the mere use of the word “god” proves nothing. You must put content into it.”

Well, it should be clear to all concerned that the human race has had no difficulty whatsoever injecting content into “god.” Let’s remember this is exactly what Jesus did? He was crucified for it. Let’s recognize that before, during and after the time Jesus physically walked this planet, human beings have been engaged in putting content into “god.” Is it possible that divinely inspired human beings continue to contribute to the human capability to comprehend the ongoing, emerging essence of “god?” If so, is the message these folks are sharing more than we can now bear? For some, the answer is distinctly “yes.” Is there scriptural evidence for God speaking to folks throughout the history of our respective sacred texts, revealing his character, wisdom, guidance, and bestowing His ongoing transformative influence on us? Absolutely!

Let’s look around ourselves. There are more flavors of Christianity being consumed globally than there are flavors of ice cream and yogurt combined. Without exception, they all claim to be divinely inspired or inhabited in some form, either formatively and/or ongoing. Our sacred treasures – the sheer number and diversity in our precious texts, traditions, rituals, doctrine, places, patriarchs, and saints could cover the surface of a mid-sized nation. Yet, instead of celebrating the vast, awesome expression of God’s revelations among us, the historical record reveals our ongoing unholy penchant to digress into divisive, dismembering displays of conflict. This propensity neither authentically reflects the products of transformation we claim to be, nor honors the God whose glory and might we trumpet as the source of the same. As Frances Schaeffer suggests, “The central problem is always in the midst of the people of God, not in the circumstances surrounding them.” Thus, we ‘Christians’ remain mired in an unholy spiral, measuring what can be easily counted; money, sales of books and faith related paraphernalia, time, staff, people, places, cash flow, votes on social issues, practitioners, parishioners, donations, volunteers, programs, support for missions, parishes, pews, seminaries, students, baptisms, attestations to statements of faith and the like. That’s OK – as far as it goes.

Then we take the second step, as illuminated in the quote from Dr. Handy’s work:  We disregard that which can’t be easily measured or give it an arbitrary quantitative value. These are things like our enemies, our competition, perceived threats to preserving the status quo, defending our time-honored truths, how we might worship, discipleship, our fears, our differences, conversions, purported impacts our respective efforts have produced both within and outside the Christian subculture. Like Handy wrote, this is artificial and misleading. Stay with me — to be misled is a process, not an event.

As we approach the third step, we awaken to our blindness; to presume that which can’t be measured easily really isn’t important. Human activity produces byproducts. The practice of the Christian faith is no exception. What we overlook as we are immersed in counting, as identified in the first two steps, is that we fail to account for what we’re not counting. We overlook stuff like; how the act of our counting looks to others, how others might feel about being excluded from our count, the feedback from others regarding whether what we count actually counts.

The final step, to say that which can’t be easily measured really doesn’t exist; well, that’s an avoidable, self-inflicted, fatal wound. It embodies the posture of our self-righteous smugness when we say, “We’ve heard all there is to hear.” (Or in other cases, “I’ve heard enough! Or I can’t take anymore”). It is at this juncture where we halt our responsibility to continue to fathom the seas of faith. It is akin to dropping a weighted rope 40 meters long into the sea and declaring we have accurately measured the depths, when the sea floor is thousands of meters below the weighted end of our rope. For many of us, the invitation of God’s Spirit to “draw near” or “follow Me” is fraught with fear, insecurity and uncertainty. We cannot seem to easily measure matters like our capacity to love, to be peace-makers, forgiveness, care for the resources of this planet, compassion, sacrifice, mercy, honesty, authenticity, justice, benevolence, kindness, tolerance, civility, humility, our ignorance, our willingness to be changed by God’s power — and the voice of God’s relentless pursuit of our lives reverberating in our hearts; “I have more to say to you, more than you can now bear.”

Perplexing? It is for me and many millions more like me. The dilemma is characterized succinctly by Samir Semanovic in the following: “As far as Christianity is concerned…what perplexes us is being part of a religion that interprets its sacred texts, its history, and its practices in a way that confines and manages God.”

Yet, as I return from my sabbatical, I am energized by the reality that I am no longer trapped in this morass. I have permission to seek God beyond the content that currently confines him. The words of Brian McLaren capture the essence of the freedom I proceed with:

“The essential emphasis on spirituality reminds us, then, that a new kind of Christianity is not simply new — in the sense of a new tree being planted at some distance from an old one. It is rather, the green tips growing out on many of the fragile branches of the ancient tree of faith and spirituality that has been growing throughout history.”

Fathoming the undiscovered in the life of faith, the dimensions of God Whose Spirit has more to say to me, more than I can now bear, Who cannot be measured, Who is alive, Who is here, Who is not silent, Who declares there’s more to counting than I presently comprehend — is the sacred, life-giving treasure bestowed upon me by the emerging church/emerging Christianity.

Please join me in celebrating the recognition of the reality of the ongoing miracle of “the green tips growing out on many of the fragile branches of the ancient tree of faith and spirituality that has been growing throughout history.” I cherish the fact that “our ancestors’ images and understandings of God continually changed, evolved and matured over the centuries. God, it seems, keeps initiating this evolution.”

An immeasurable blessing.

Finally, one last question: “How might we become willing to change our current posture to reposition ourselves to be able to bear what God has to say?” Frances Schaeffer suggests, “The history of theology is all too often a long exhibition of a desire to win.” More recently, David Kinnaman’s ground breaking research and book place the challenge squarely in front of us: “We can’t change what we are known for unless we change how we live.” Yes, we human beings are equipped with the capacity to develop presuppositions. Our ideas have consequences. “By presuppositions we mean the basic way an individual looks at life, his basic worldview, the grid through which he sees the world. Presuppositions rest upon that which a person considers to be the truth of what exists.”

Ah yes. We now enter the arena where what we know to be true, correct and sufficient is antagonized by our God inspired imaginations. One author treats the subject in this way: “The great changes in history occur, I believe, not through argument but through seeing things differently. Jesus did not tell people what to do or think but invited them to see things with new eyes or the eyes of a child. He was confident their conduct would then change on its own. He appealed not to their reason but their imagination.” Another says, “The gospel is always more than we imagine, the Bible always has something for us greater than we expect, and Jesus is always beyond what we can conceive.”

It was a struggle for Jesus to get through to His disciples then, just as it is now. They struggled to imagine how they might accept, comprehend and live out this new reality Jesus was sharing. This struggle possessed practical, risky implications then, just as it does today. Daniel Taylor writes: “Tradition is not primarily a set of creeds or theologies, though these are included, but a history of persons and communities and relationships. And when I see faith in terms of the struggle of people, alone and together, to know and be known by God, then I do not object to the risk that is the price for being part of that struggle.”

Yet, it is a fundamental change in the nature of that struggle among us, that is pertinent to the question “How might we become willing to change our current posture to reposition ourselves to be able to bear what God has to say?” As Schaeffer characterizes this struggle amongst Christians, “We build ourselves up by tearing other men down. This can never show a real oneness among Christians.” Still others have suggested that regarding persons of other faith persuasions, “we must assume the posture of a guest.” Kinnaman’s research reveals, “like it or not, being judgmental is intricately connected to our image as Christians…They believe we are more interested in proving we are right than God is right. They say Christians are more focused on condemning people than helping people become more like Jesus.” Finally, let’s get real shall we? “It’s amazing what people have cooked up to do to others in the name of God.”

Admittedly, one of the core motivations for my sabbatical was to take myself off the battlefield, well beyond the possibility of my heart being shattered by another incoming barrage of unequivocally the most hateful, hurtful correspondence I have ever received — from self-proclaimed Christian zealots, portending to be defenders of what is right, correct and true. What might a change in posture look like regarding the diversity of the differences that exist among us? Perhaps Schaeffer’s suggestion is a place to begin when he says: “So let us consider this: Is my difference with my brother in Christ really crucially important? If so, it is doubly important that I spend time upon my knees asking the Holy Spirit, asking Christ, to do his work through me and my group, that I and we might show love even in this larger difference that we have come to with another brother in Christ or with another group of true Christians.”

The decline of the emerging church? I don’t see it. On the contrary, I continue to celebrate “the green tips growing out on many of the fragile branches of the ancient tree of faith and spirituality that has been growing throughout history.”

New growth: It’s a subtle, simple, amazing wonder to witness.  Listen for it and you just may hear the voice of God in the breeze: “I have more to say to you, more than you can now bear.”

For me, it took a sixteen month sabbatical to change my former posture to reposition myself to be able to bear what God had to say to me. I’ve shared some of that here with you.

What might you do in 2010 to change your current posture to reposition yourself to be able to bear what God has to say to you?

No clue? Confess the same to Jesus. He is here, He is alive, He is listening and He is not silent…I assure you.

See – McLaren, Brian – A New Kind of Christianity – Ten Questions That Are Transforming the Faith, HarperOne – An Imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, San Francisco, CA USA Copyright © 2010 by Brian D. McLaren– Available February 2010. pp. 228 & 229.

---

Bill Dahl is a freelance writer from Redmond, OR. His work has been published in dozens of national and international publications, websites, ezines, journals and newspapers. Contact Bill at wsdahl@bendbroadband.com or see his site at www.theporpoisedivinglife.com or www.billdahl.net. All Rights Reserved. For Reprint Permission contact Bill Dahl in writing.

Print PDF

Is the emerging church a fad?

What does it mean?

As a pastor, what should I be doing about it?

Is D.A. Carson right?

What about Chuck Smith, Sr.?

Is the emerging church a sign of the end?

Is it a forerunner of last days apostacy?

Has Slice sliced it correctly? Has Pyro burnt it appropriately?

Is Mark Driscoll the poster child for the EC, or is Spencer Burke?

Not long ago, I attended a national pastors’ gathering of one of the movements that came out of the Jesus Movement revival of the 70s. At this stage the gathering looked a lot like me, a bunch of middle-aged guys in Hawaiian shirts and Bermuda shorts and sandals (at least those of us from California). In a panel discussion on the first day, the national director was insistent that he had the “correct” numbers on the number of movement pastors age 35 and under and it was 30 (out of 500, wink, wink), not 20, he would have you know, by Golly! He went on to say that he just didn’t want others to say that we are irrelevant. (He must not be a regular subscriber to Relevant Magazine!).

On the third day of the conference a young (35 yrs. of age) pastor spoke on the emerging church. His definition? The emerging church is, “Churches that are trying to reach young people.” He then started his categorizing and comparing and I had to get up and leave! You see he was trying to make sense of something that defies categorization and comparison. And he was trying to speak to an audience of pastors who want to know if the EC is a passing fad, or how they should react when a beret-wearing, goatee-sporting, graduate student approaches him and asks him if he is “missional.”

©Alexander Zhilyaev | Dreamstime.com

Let me address some of these, uh, burning issues: The emerging church is not an “it.” It is not Emergent or Allelon, or Forge, Catalyst or ReImagine! It is not neo-monastic, or universalist, for that matter. It is not a bunch of Birkenstock-wearing, granola-crunching, Yoga-practicing midwest urban folks. It is not a “church within a church,” gen-x service, candles and worship installations, liturgy practicing, hours prayers. It is not daily blogging with cool names and ipod loaded teaching. It is not a fad, anymore than Methodism, Presbyterianism, Anglicanism, Catholicism, Lutheranism, uh, you get the idea, were passing fads. It is no more a fad than the Calvary Chapels or the Vineyards. It has no more apostacy than the rest of the apostacy that passes for Christianity today. And by the way, it is not Rob Bell, Mark Driscoll, Doug Pagitt, Brian McLaren, Leonard Sweet, Spencer Burke, uh, did I leave anyone out, yes, of course I did!

And yet, it is all of the above and so much more. It is what God is raising up to reach the rising culture and the rising generations.

Pastors, if you think you are prepared to deal with today’s cultural atmosphere, go watch the 2007 film, Juno. Then ask yourself this question: What is my congregation doing to make Jesus real to the Juno-Generation in my community?

---

Charlie Wear is the publisher of Next-Wave. He and his wife Loretta and son Benjamin live in Moreno Valley, CA.

Print PDF

I love Next-Wave.  “Humbling” does not begin to describe my feelings about this opportunity to serve as editor.  I know the story behind Next-Wave because my dear friend and mentor, Charlie Wear, told me all about it.  I know that Charlie has been plowing this field long before anyone was using words like “emerging” and “missional.”  His passion for whatever God is doing to gather a generation disenchanted by church and religious culture to his kingdom is something that I am continuously inspired by.

Charlie is one of the only people that really “gets me” when I talk about what I’m hearing from the Spirit and how I’m trying to follow his lead.  In the mission that my wife and I are on right now, laying the foundation for what might be a church in Northwest Indiana, it’s Charlie’s counsel that I seek.  Mostly because I know he’s going to force me back to the Lord.  “Listen to God.  He’ll talk to you,” he says.

To me, that’s what Next-Wave is about.  That’s what comes out through so many different voices, every month.  I catch a whisper from the voice of the Spirit with every issue.  This is my goal as editor – to continue to listen to God and let him do all the talking through Next-Wave.

Church as I have known it (American, cultural Christianity) is no longer serving God’s purpose of intimacy and relationship.  So that’s why the conversation that goes on here is so important.  It may have been ordained and sanctioned by God and maybe it was serving His purpose at one time.  I do not believe it has the ability to go on serving Him in the future.  The next wave or “new wine” that He is bringing into the fold of His kingdom needs a new wineskin.

In Isaiah Chapter 1, God speaks through that prophet to condemn the religious practices of the Jews of that day.  What suddenly occurred to me while reading the chapter is that God was not dealing with idol worship.  He was talking about the religious system inherited from Moses.  The system he once allowed had lost all of its original meaning.

They were going through all the correct motions but it was not serving the purpose of drawing them into relationship with him.  The challenge was to surrender their notions of serving God and accept the “new thing” he was trying to give birth to within them.  God seems to force this type of confrontation in several places throughout Scripture.  Another encounter I think of is found in Mark 6, when Jesus sends his followers away in the boat while he stays on land to pray.  The gospel makes a special point of telling us that the storm blew up when they were “in the middle” of the sea.  They were too far to turn back and not far enough for the safety of shore on the other side.  In this journey out of conventional church, I’ve often felt out in the middle with nothing to grab onto at either side.  It’s pretty scary even when I remember it was Jesus who told me to take this trip in the first place.

Jesus does something wild and dramatic to come to the aid of his friends.  He walks on the waves and then quiets the storm with his presence in the boat.  I think he’s ready to do these things again.  I think he is glad that we’ve gotten ourselves out here in the middle, with no more props to cling to and no more comfortable “normal” to soothe ourselves with.  I thinks he’s on the water now and heading toward people all over the world who have followed his call into rough seas.

© Andrzej Dro?d?a | Dreamstime.com

So how can we go about building this new wineskin idea of service and worship?  God gives us some great direction in Isaiah chapter 1:

Think about your intimacy and relationship with God in these terms.  If all the props of church were removed, would there be anything left?  Have you had that encounter yet?  Are you too far from shore to turn back, but not close enough to the other side to be certain that you’ll make it?

What if He did away with the praise and worship band and all the external stimulants?  Would you still find ways to worship?  What if there were no more children’s programs or church ministries to kids?  Would you still find ways to lead your children (or any children) to be disciples of Jesus?  If God eliminated all the missions programs and “outreach” initiatives, would you still find ways for the Gospel to be advanced through your life?  If there was no more church to receive your tithe, would you still be a fountain of giving and generosity?

What if God really is finished with our systems of service and worship, like He was expressing in the days of Isaiah?  What if His soul hates them (Isaiah 1:14)?  Are we ready to leave it behind and find other ways to serve His purpose of intimacy and relationship?  Again, I see direction coming from Isaiah the prophet:

That is the mission and all these centuries later, it still needs doing.

I’m thrilled to be part of this Next-Wave community.  I love the risks that are taken here and the passion that is expressed here.  Next-Wave People really wear it on their sleeve.  You can feel it in the comments and emotions ebbs through each article.  But I’m most excited just to be included somewhere in the story that our Lord is writing.

To this Next-Wave community:  Thank you for the fire you’ve provided to purge and refine my life.  I look forward to serving you!

Print PDF

Tenth Anniversary Issue

[This article first appeared as the cover story for the January 2009 issue of Next-Wave. You can find the entire issue here: http://www.the-next-wave.info/archives/issue121/index.cfm.html ]

As Next-Wave turns ten years old with its January 2009 issue, it provides a good opportunity to look back over the short history of the emerging church in North America.  Next-Wave, after all, is the publication most closely associated with the emerging church conversation and many of the movement’s most prominent leaders have contributed articles to the online journal over the years.

January of 2009 finds us at a crossroads for the emerging church in North America. There’s increasing discomfort with the term “emerging church” itself, with a number of leading lights in the movement expressing hesitations about the term.  Andrew Jones, who was an early leader in the conversation, recently announced that he would no longer be using the term “emerging church” as “the word no longer communicates what i want it to.”  Prominent emerging church blogger, and Next-Wave Contributing Editor,  Bob Hyatt, a pastor with The Evergreen Community in Portland, OR, recently posted his frustration over both the term and the identification of the movement itself, commenting, “I’m more often than not now answering a question about what we aren’t than what we are about- and that saddens me.” Bob also shares,  “I do have some deep concerns about some of the things I see in the movement as a whole- and to be honest, though I once spent a lot of time defending the emerging church, I want to be about the Gospel.”  Theologian and author Scot McKnight, who has vigorously participated in the emerging church conversation through his Jesus Creed blog, expresses his reservations:  “I like the diversity of ‘emerging’ but the problem is that the term has been so abused by its critics that embracing the term leads to endless discussions of just how one is part of that emerging conversation. I’ve basically given up on using the term except in audiences where I think it is understood.” Dan Kimball also limits when he uses the term saying, “I don’t use the term too much anymore because of the confusion and also that it means so many things, depending on who you ask.”   Then there is the cyclical parsing of any difference there might be between the term “emerging church” and “emergent.”

But while there is a significant degree of discussion over the terms around and even of the core identity of those in the conversation, what’s not controversial within the movement is that the emerging church has made some positive contributions to the Christian church.

To both assess the state of the conversation today and to get some perspectives on the history of the emerging church, Next-Wave reached out to some of the movement’s most notable leaders.  We interviewed:

Brian McLaren – Named by Time Magazine as one of The 25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America and often considered the father of the emerging church, Brian’s books A New Kind of Christian and Generous Orthodoxy are considered by many to be two of the most important books published within the conversation.

Jordon Cooper – Canada’s Jordon Cooper is an influential emerging church blogger. Jordoncooper.com, which Jordon began in 2001, was an important early clearinghouse of emerging church information.

Tony Jones – Tony, the author of The New Christians:  Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier, until very recently was National Coordinator of Emergent Village and has been engaged in emerging church conversation since the famous Dallas Pappasito’s Cantina meeting in August of 1998.

Scot McKnight – Scot, an author who serves as the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University in Chicago, is a prolific blogger who has been participating in the emerging church conversation for many years. Scot also serves on the Creative Team of The Origins Project.

Andrew Jones – Andrew is a New Zealander pastor and missionary who currently lives in the United Kingdom and serves as Director of the Boaz Project.  An A-list ec blogger, Andrew was an early leader in Emergent Village and spent several years ministering in the United States.

and

Dan Kimball – Dan, who serves Vintage Faith Church in Santa Cruz, California as their Pastor of Mission and Teaching, wrote The Emerging Church.  Dan’s also one of the founders of The Origins Project.

There are a number of helpful lenses that one could use to view the emerging church.  One lens that could be used to consider the history of the emerging church would be its involvement in social justice and social relief issues.  The conversation has been a part of a resurgence of interest and activity in these areas within the larger evangelicalism movement which birthed the conversation.  Another lens could be the impact of the conversation on religious publications.  The movement has precipitated a veritable cottage industry of books dealing with the emerging church by both its leaders and critics.  The interested observer might also view the conversation from a social networking perspective, considering how such sites as The Ooze and Facebook have advanced the movement.

But the aspect of the emerging church that has generated the most controversy has been its forays into theological reformulation.

Though the original motives of the early emerging church leaders were evangelistic, for many a concern with reaching Generation X and understanding their culture quickly morphed into a larger epistemological concern with modernism and postmodernism.

A seminal moment towards this wider focus occurred at a Leadership Network (LN) sponsored “GenX 1.0” gathering in 1997 near Colorado Springs, Colorado.  Doug Pagitt, one of the founders of Emergent Village and today a pastor of Solomon’s Porch, was leading LN’s Young Leaders Network at that time and brought the group there together to discuss how to reach 18-25 year olds.  In attendance was a volunteer young adult pastor at Pantego Bible Church in Fort Worth, TX named Brad Cecil.  Brad, a student of Jacques Derrida, Richard Rorty and other postmodern writers, introduced the other attendees to the postmodern turn.  Tony Jones documents what happened next:

As the conversation diversified, so did the concerns and agendas of those participating.  This broadening then brought others outside of the initial group into the conversation.  Dan Kimball comments, “Initially in the USA, the emerging church conversation was primarily evangelical suburban churches asking the question of ‘where are the 18-35 year olds?’ … As it was rightfully realized that what was going on around us was far more than just a generational and style issue – the conversation then broadened.”  Dan continues, “As the emerging church conversation broadened, those who participated in it broadened.  The focuses of what was discussed broadened.  The theologies and philosophies within it broadened.”  This broadening multiplied agendas within the emerging church, which lead to some confusion within the movement.  Dan explains, “…how you now define the emerging church…is different depending on who you ask.”  Dan sees this feature of the conversation as being the reason why various individuals have proposed different emerging church taxonomies.  It’s easy to argue that the degree to which various groups within the emerging church are interested in theological reformulations has, more than anything else, brought about the various taxonomies that have sprung up over the course of the last few years.²

Tony Jones hates these categorization efforts.  He says, ”One of the things I despise is all of the taxonomizing that takes place.  I think it’s such a modern tendency to place everyone in this silo or that silo.  So I reject all talk of ‘emergent’ vs. ‘emerging,’ or the Four R’s of Ed Stetzer or the categories of Mark Driscoll or anyone else. …Haven’t we learned our lesson after the era of hundreds of denominational labels that so many of us now reject?”³

Part of Tony’s concern appears to be that these kinds of groupings disrupt relationship.  For Tony and others there is an unwelcome and – in their view – unnecessary tension between theological diversity and harmonious relationships within the emerging church.  This tension is best illustrated in microcosm when Tony Jones, Doug Pagitt, and John Piper, a well-known author, conference organizer, and pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church who does not consider himself a part of the emerging church, met for lunch on 13 September 2006.⁴

All three men live and work in the Minneapolis, MN area and Tony thought the meeting would be a good opportunity to clear up any misconceptions John might have about the emerging church.  During the meal, Doug suggested that Bethlehem Baptist and Solomon’s Porch could mutually explore ways to work together even though they had theological differences.  But it appeared that John believed that there had to be some foundational theological agreement before any kind of partnership could be struck.  Their conversation centered on the meaning of the atonement, specifically, the penal substitutionary theory.⁵ Tony and Doug did not believe that agreement on this specific doctrine was necessary for mutual endeavor.  Tony used the incident to illustrate his Dispatch #7 in his recent book The New Christians:

Tony reiterated this principal in our interview with him:  “It concerns me when leaders who were formerly friends of mine back away from me and from emergent because they find my theology too risky.  I think that’s sin, plain and simple.  Friendship should trump doctrinal differences, and I’m quite sure that Jesus would agree with me on that” (emphasis mine).

John Piper also has provided his perspective on the conversation using some language somewhat similar to Tony’s.  In an interview with Justin Taylor, John said,

In addition to the similar verbiage, what is also ironic is that relationally John expressed his affection for

© Mollypix | Dreamstime.com

Tony and Doug, and theologically, Tony respects John’s favored theory of the atonement and even sees “seeds of it in Pauline writings.”⁸ But the two camps could not find a way of co-laboring.

Despite this tension, nevertheless, some of the emerging church leaders we interviewed saw positive value in some of the theological redefinition that has been occurring, specifically as it has resulted in a more multifaceted understanding of the Christian Gospel.  This broadened understanding of the Gospel occurred during the transition from the almost exclusive early focus on evangelism itself within the conversation.

Jordon Cooper noted that the discussion “moved from ‘church mechanics’ … into a larger discussion of ‘what is the Gospel?’ Brian McLaren commented that participants in the conversation “realized that you can’t just talk about the church without talking about its message – the gospel.  … The writings of Dallas Willard played a huge role in this for some of us….”  Scot McKnight expressed the transition this way.

Dan Kimball agrees with Scot that this development has been helpful to the broader church by expanding its understanding of the gospel.  He notes,

Brian McLaren also sees that the conversation has precipitated increased involvement in the areas of social justice and relief.  He notes, “The New Monasticism is playing a critical role in this, as are groups like CCDA [Christian Community Development Association] and others.”

But while several appreciated an expanded understanding of the Gospel, some emerging leaders with whom we spoke expressed two concerns.

The first was that as the emerging church has expanded the church’s understanding of the Gospel, it has not been sufficiently involved in the presentation of the Gospel.  Dan Kimball notes that “…as the emerging church has been a community of healing for many disillusioned Christians, I think we need to remember the urgency of need for those outside the church who aren’t Christians. There are so many people who have not placed faith in Jesus and we have a mission to be on.”   Scot McKnight echoed this sentiment stating that one of his greatest concerns with the conversation is “a lack of evangelism.”

The second concern is the nature of the theological conversation itself in some circles of the emerging church.  Scot McKnight commented,

In other words, there is a concern that some current theological discussion is insufficiently considerate of the labors of those thinkers who have come before us.

While the emerging church celebrates some of its theological advances in the midst of these tensions and concerns, it is an open question as to whether the conversation will have a significant long-term influence.  Indicative that it might has been the degree to which the emerging church conversation has been mediated online.  Andrew Jones sees this as one of the most significant developments in the movement’s history.  He refers to “the impact of the web and the revolution of online self-publishing through blogging, micro-blogging and social media websites” and favorably mentions Douglas Rushkoff comment “that the first Reformation turned hearers into readers but this Reformation is turning readers into writers.”  Because the conversation has occurred in new media, it has not needed to rely on institutions for self-perpetuation.  But this very feature may militate against the conversation’s longevity.  Historically, movements have passed from generation to generation by institutionalizing.  Institutions act as a means by which one generation recruits and informs subsequent generations.  Emergent Village, which had been the closest thing to an emerging church institution in the United States, recently stood down from any such role in their recent, A Letter from the Board to Friends of Emergent Village. Referencing a recent online survey of interested parties, the board wrote, “…nearly everyone agreed that emergent is a grass-roots relational network…and that it should not become another large nonprofit religious organization building a big budget and staff.  Institutionalization was consistently identified as the wrong way to go (emphasis mine).”  (It’s important to note that Emergent Village never claimed to be the definitive voice of the emerging church.  With this move, it is declaring itself to be a “network of networks.”)

It may be that the emerging church emphases will survive as portions of the conversation are picked up by other organizations.

©Kaz Sano | Dreamstime.com

In addition to many local churches, other inter-church organizations continue portions of the conversation, including Leadership Network’s Missional Renaissance Community and Friends of Missional.  And new organizations are forming.  Dan Kimball, Erwin McManus, Lead Pastor of Mosaic in Los Angeles, Scot McKnight and others have started an organization called The Origins Project.  The focus of the organization will be on mission and evangelism.  Dan Kimball comments,

Another very real possibility is that with the increasingly declining cost of information and communication precipitated by online media, institutionalization itself may become less necessary as a means by which messages survive from one generation to another.  Certainly online new media has helped to precipitate unprecedented cross-traditional and cross-denominational conversational threads.  The open question is the extent to which such conversations – including that of the emerging church – will be durable when conducted in this fashion.

And so the tenth anniversary of Next-Wave arrives at a critical moment for the emerging church conversation.  Theological differences indeed threaten the short-term cohesion and long-term viability of the emerging church and yet in the midst of those differences, many claim some genuine ecclesiological and theological advances that may yet prove to have long term significance.

Fortunately, followers of Jesus Christ are not ultimately reliant on their own brilliance, devices, and stratagems to co-labor with God in His Kingdom.  Submitted hearts can call on God for His wisdom and guidance and trust that the Spirit will lead. Human institutions, movements, and conversations come and go.  But surely sometimes God chooses the canvas of human efforts to paint beautiful portraits.

Ultimately, of course, the criterion by which the long-term success of the emerging church conversation will be judged will be the degree to which it has precipitated a greater love of God and others.

Note:  The emerging church leaders Next-Wave interviewed touched on a number of topics as they shared their perspectives on the conversation’s history.  Since this article only deals with some of the subjects they discussed, a complete, lightly edited transcript of the interviews can be found in this issue.  Interviewees, by the way, did not review each other’s answers.

Return to Top | Table of Contents

Print PDF

[This article first appeared in the Apr08 issue of Next-Wave. You can click here to browse the other articles in that issue: http://www.the-next-wave.info/archives/issue112/index.cfm.html ]

This month we’re featuring two different interactions with Brian McLaren and his recent book Everything Must Change, this one and one by David Fitch, the author of The Great Giveaway. Enjoy!

Brian, I have 3 concerns from your book that linger:

The apparent absence of the CHURCH as God’s primary instrument in accomplishing his mission on earth – and the gaping hole in your book where the example of equality and justice in the early church of Acts 2-4 should have been, in my humble opinion. [i read recently that the love feast happened daily in homes and the poor could always find a meal with the believers - a justice element in the lords supper that has gone by the wayside]

Great point. Because I decided to limit my focus to Jesus, I didn’t bring in a lot of stuff from Acts and the Epistles that I could have (except one chapter to show that Paul is part of the revolution, so to speak, not a traitor to it as so many think) … Limiting my focus to Jesus kept me from bringing in much about the church per se, or from church history – or from the Old Testament, for that matter – each of which could be a book in itself. A church history written from this perspective would be powerful – kind of a 21st century re-write of Broadbent’s “The Pilgrim Church” (which I’ll bet you’ve read, but if not, it’s worth finding in a used book shop or seminary library).

One of the things that I hope the book does (by understatement, perhaps?) is help people think of “church” in broader ways. For example, I don’t think that the church per se is going to intentionally solve economic problems in Africa. But churches will inspire entrepreneurs and activists and politicians and health care workers and community organizers and film-makers, etc., to work together in ways that will bring more and more healing. In this way, “church work” is building up the church, but “the work of the church” is doing kingdom work in our daily lives and jobs, from business to art to government to education to agriculture to whatever.

. . . however, you have already written a great book (the church on the other side) where you affirm your faith in the body of Christ and you also are choosing to speak to the church in your Deep Shift tour which tells me you actually DO see the primacy of the church . . .

Yes. I was deeply impacted a few years ago by Alan Roxburgh at one of our events (you may have been there?) when he said, the church is like a person who gets invited to a party and only talks about himself. I’ve been thinking that we get into a syndrome of trying to save our lives denominationally, etc, which makes us lose them … when instead, our churches need to lose our lives, pour ourselves out for the sake of the world, become more interested in joining God in caring for the world than in getting God to join us in caring for ourselves, that sort of thing. But of course, at heart I’ll always be a pastor, and in the end, none of this matters unless it’s embedded in local churches of whatever form. My next book will lean back in that direction – it’s on spiritual formation and disciplines, etc.

The apparent absence of HOPE in your view of future things. Maybe I missed it but you don’t seem to acknowledge hope in the afterlife, resurrection of the dead, etc in your book and i had to guess whether you had walked away from these foundational orthodox doctrines or you were focusing exclusively on the immanence of the gospel in today’s world for effect.

Again, I set a pretty specific goal for myself in this book: to explore global crises and what the message of Jesus says to those crises. I did address life after death in Secret Message of Jesus, chapter 20. So I haven’t walked away from hope in the afterlife, etc. If anything, I see more than ever how hope in the afterlife is necessary to keep us going when progress in this life seems slow or nonexistent.

BTW – have you read Andrew Perriman’s books “The Coming of the Son of Man” or “Re:Mission”? He’s opened up a lot of new questions for me regarding eschatology. I’d love to know what you think of his work if you’ve had time to look at it. He takes NT Wright’s stuff and extends it a step farther, I think. Jay Gary’s work (he has a great website) also has been forcing me to rethink my eschatology along similar lines.

Yeah – I was with Andrew Perriman a few months ago in Amsterdam and I really like his books AND the questions he brings to the text. Similar questions as Wright, ie, “What were the disciples THINKING when Jesus said that?

Hey Brian, in your book you seem to embrace a non-spiritual understanding of structures and powers. The Africans would generally hold to the presence of angels and demons behind things, a supernatural view of structures as well as natural. Philip Jenkins seems to land on the western side also on this issue. I don’t think one could claim to represent African theology without addressing that issue.

I’ve talked with lots of Africans about this. It’s really complex. I’ve had a couple of personal experiences with “dark powers,” so I certainly don’t write them off. But I also think that the language used in Africa (and in a lot of Pentecostalism elsewhere) thinks it grasps these unseen realities more than it really does. So I probably lean more toward Walter Wink than either John Spong or Benny Hinn … these forces are real, deadly real. But I think that the language of devils, etc., which I think may have been borrowed by the Jews from the Zoroastrians during the exile, is no more precise than our language of waves and particles in trying to grasp light … which is truly real but which eludes our ability to define very well. So I wouldn’t call my understanding “non-spiritual.” It’s just that I think the spirituality of evil is non-dualistic, meaning it gets embodied in people and organizations etc., in their “spirit” … but I would be the first to say I have a lot to learn on this. Sometime when we’re together, I’ll tell you about some of the fascinating conversations I’ve had with Africans … from common people to theologians – on the subject of demons and tribal cosmology in general.

Fair enough. And I know that you appreciated “Colossians Remixed”. And finally . . . Number 3. An uncritical appraisal of the liberation theology movement from Latin America – there are libraries full of writings on this. I am sure you have read the criticisms (David Bosch in ‘Transforming Mission’ is good) and have your own but your book appears almost giddy and accepting without reservation -

Wow, this is really interesting … I honestly can’t imagine why you’d say this. I quote Leonardo Boff several times – but I don’t think I quote any other liberation theologians (maybe Jon Sobrino, whom I’ve tried to read in Spanish, but didn’t succeed very well!), and I think I agree with David Bosch 100% – on just about everything! (BTW – I got to know his beautiful widow in Praetoria. She’s planning to join us in Rwanda in May – maybe you could come? Let me know if you think you could swing it – it’s May 20-27)

Boff is neither Marxist nor violent by any stretch of the imagination … I think you could say he got into trouble with the pope not for his economics but for being too Protestant in advocating the priesthood of all believers! Maybe you saw something I don’t remember writing. Can you give me a specific where you think I am giddy about liberation theologians? Also, which are you critical of, and what ideas of theirs? It’s commonly said in Evangelical settings in the US that liberation theologians are Marxists, advocating violent revolution, etc., but it’s interesting: in Latin America or Africa, I’ve never heard anyone say anything like this – I think they abandoned that thinking in the 80′s or maybe even the 70′s. Everyone I met in Latin America would consider anyone advocating violence as crazy … I did quote Rene Padilla’s good insight about Marxism. He said that in Latin America, people say Capitalism is very good at production but bad at distribution. Marxism is good at distribution but terrible at production – which means the best they can do is distribute poverty evenly! The hope, clearly, is with finding ways to make capitalism more humane, compassionate, collaborative and sustainable – at least, that’s how I see it.

Ahhhh. Forgive me for misjudging. I really like Padilla’s thinking. I must have just reacted badly and assumed things that were not accurate.
Brian, your view on the last things has a few of us guessing. How does your eschatological position compare with . . say . . an evangelical post-millenial view? And do you believe in life after death?

Just to be super clear … YES! I believe in life after death! I find it hard to line up my views with conventional pre, post, or amillenial views because I think they are all based on an assumption I don’t share, i.e. that the book of Revelation is intended to tell us how the world will end. This view presupposes a deterministic view of history, which I don’t share. I suppose I’m more Wesleyan and Anabaptist in this regard than Calvinist. Anyway, I talk about this in detail in SMJ, and refer to it briefly in EMC – I believe the Book of Revelation is an example of Jewish Apocalyptic which, although it may be concerned with the end of the age, is not really talking about the end of the world at all. In this, I follow NT Wright’s general line of thought, so if I’m off the ranch, so is he. I see Biblical prophecy in terms of warnings and promises, which are different from prognostications. If I had to put a name on my eschatology, I suppose I would call it “Participatory” – meaning that God invites us to participate in God’s ongoing work in the world, leading to the ultimate victory of all that is good and the ultimate defeat of evil. Beyond that, there are a lot of eschatological details I was much surer about twenty years ago when I read the Bible less and popular end-times books more!

You seem to be calling the American church to a new level of repentance, one that is deeper and more connected with structures. How has the response been?

My loyal critics are by and large ignoring this book (so far), or if they pay attention to it – this is very sad to me – they generally ignore everything about poverty, war, and environmental destruction, and focus on doctrinal issues they disagree with me about. Sheesh. I can only hope that someone they agree with theologically will get them thinking more seriously about global crises. Apart from these loyal critics, though, response is really encouraging. People are telling me they are coming to faith or back to faith through the book … and they are feeling more confident to call themselves followers of Jesus when Jesus is presented not just as a fire escape and savior from the world, but as a liberating king and savior of the world. I am also hearing privately from some “big names” who can’t afford to associate with me publicly because of all the nastiness in the American religious world, but who are thankful for the book and affirming of its message.

I’m really grateful that you wrote, Andrew, and I hope we can go go-karting or something equally fun and good together before too long. I always meet people for whom you and your website are an oasis in the desert and a source of hope … I really appreciate your friendship. Warmly, in Christ – Brian

Go-Karting again would be great. Here is a photo of us and our wives at the 2002 Go-Kart race in Prague. Thanks for your helpful responses to my crass questions. Look forward to our next chat. Glad to be your friend, Andrew.

Print PDF