• Archive of "emerging church" Category

    The GOCN, Ecclesia, and the Missional Church

    January 28, 2011 // 3 Comments »

    I was tipped off by a tweet from @bobhyatt that Tony Jones had a post up on his blog titled, “Which Missional Church?” which intrigued me.

    He suggests that there are,

    …two movements of people within American Protestantism who claim the term ‘missional.’

    Specifically, he mentions The Gospel and Our Culture Network and the Ecclesia Network, two organizations that I have meaningful relational connections to and interest in.

    Tony describes the GOCN like this:

    These thought-leaders come from a mainline context, but they have evangelical leanings. They feel that the church has lost its missional impulse as the mainline church has been ultimately absorbed by American culture.  And they found a theological patron saint in Lesslie Newbigin, a twentieth century missionary to India who retired to his native England to find that Christianity was no longer a prophetic force.  Newbigin’s books, and those of missiologist David Bosch have guided thinking of this group.  Newbigin and Bosch, as well as the books and newsletters of the GOCN, were all highly influential on the genesis of the emerging church movement and of Emergent Village in particular.

    And Ecclesia like this:

    These are primarily evangelicals with moderate to liberal leanings. They agree with the ECM’s critique of evangelicalism: that the evangelical church in America has been corrupted by culture, is too consumeristic, and has lost the radical, prophetic nature of the gospel.  They are most influenced by the anabaptist theologies of John Howard Yoder and Stanley Hauerwas.

    While their are certainly theologians sympathetic to them, this missional movement is largely populated by pastors, church planters, and consultants: David Fitch, Alan Hirsch, Bob Hyatt, and Ed Stetzer among them.  The organization most closely aligned with this missional is the Ecclesia Network, begun in the mid-2000s.

    There’s already some good discussion happening over on Tony’s blog and I don’t want to take away from it so please head over there and join in if you are so inclined, but I also wanted to springboard off of this post in terms of some of my own interests.

    In a forthcoming (next?) post, I want to share more about the research project that is taking shape through the DMiss cohort I am a part of.  It will become ever clearer then, just how timely and poignant Tony’s post is.  For now, I’d like to make some observations about the commonalities of these two expressions of the missional conversation and see what thoughts others might have. Specifically, I see commonalities with regard to a cultural emphasis, a theological vision, and missional implications.

    Cultural Emphasis

    1) Post-Christendom. Both groups are seeking to engage a culture and context in which the Church no longer exists at the center of society and Christianity is forced to grapple with the advent of religious pluralism.

    Theological Vision

    2) Missional Theology. Both groups are trafficking in the world of missional theology – a way of knowing God, reading Scripture, and being the Church that is firmly rooted in the missio Dei.  I should add here that for this reason among others, I simply do not get how and why some (as Tony does in his post) draw a line between the theology of Barth and Yoder/Hauerwas which seems quite united at this point (see this new article by Stanley Hauerwas, ht: Andy Rowell, and this unpublished PDF by Yoder about Barth’s theology)

    Missional Implications

    3) Missiology & The Local Church. Both groups are wrestling with the missiological implications of a post-Christendom culture/context and a theological vision rooted in the missio Dei as they intersect at the level of the local church.  While the GOCN may have been (may continue to be?) focused on research and writing, if you take a look at their publications, in large measure they emerge from and seek to address life at the congregational level.  Ecclesia, likewise, exists as a network of missionally-minded church planters, pastors, and leaders.

    Wondering what others people see or have to say here.  Next time around, I’ll dig into some aspects of the research I hope to do and how it might contribute to the common aims of these groups and the spheres of influence they represent.

    Posted in anabaptist, bible, christendom, church, church planting, culture, Ecclesia Network, emerging church, missional, missional theology, networking, post-christendom, theology, western culture

    Reviewing Deep Church by Jim Belcher

    May 19, 2010 // 6 Comments »

    Jim Belcher, the author of Deep Church: A Third Way Beyond Emerging and Traditional, and I have much in common.

    We both did masters degrees at Fuller Theological Seminary.

    We both have a heart for church planting.

    I teach a class on the Emerging Church based on the intensive that he references in his book. (35)

    We get frustrated when people talk past one another, defaulting to caricatured stereotypes rather than embracing a posture of openness.

    And we both value looking for a “third way” to approach dichotomistic thinking.

    He is right when he says,

    It seems that every time someone criticizes the emerging church, they pick the worst-case scenario or the most extreme statements. (49)

    He is also correct in noting,

    It seems the emerging church, for rhetorical purposes, uses sweeping generalizations about the traditional church that are unfair. (76)

    The larger Body of Christ would indeed be served well by discourse that is deeper, more specific, and marked by a sense of humble openness.  Belcher’s chapters on Deep: Truth, Evangelism, Gospel, Worship, Preaching, Ecclesiology, and Culture, are essentially his attempts  to facilitate just that – a worthwhile enterprise in my opinion.

    While Belcher’s book is truly helpful in this regard, I’m not sure he really hits the mark in terms of articulating a true “third way” as a means of engaging these topics.  Very often, his conclusions in these chapters are a combination of a chastened version of the EC position he articulates and an expanded version of the traditional position he articulates (usually w/ reference to Tim Keller and his church!).  I suppose this is a kind of “third way,” maybe even precisely the one Belcher desires, but I’m not certain it’s the most helpful kind of third way for the Church to pursue.

    The mistake, I believe, comes in the assumption that one can simply pit the positions of the EC against the positions of the traditional church.  The main problem here is that many in the EC camp are themselves trying to articulate and maneuver a “third way” between the modern categories of conservatism and liberalism, a feature that Belcher seems to either overlook or discount w/o comment.  An indication of this is his quick dismissal of the Anabaptist tradition from which many in the EC draw as one which is able to circumvent many of the dichotomies addressed in this book on account of its fundamentally, Christendom-rejecting, stance.  Belcher never seems to ask, “How might people in the EC camp already be searching for a third way in response to classic approaches to these issues?,” but assumes that their positions are simply reactions against the positions of traditional churches.

    Belcher sets himself on this course in stating,

    We need to define it [the emerging church] as a movement, particularly its theology.  The best way to do this is to look at what the emerging church movement is against – the things they are protesting and the rasons why they are calling for change. (38)

    For the life of me, I can’t grasp why someone would want to define a movement by what they are against (even it it is a protest movement) rather than what they are for.  We certainly regard what the classic reformers were for as far more more important than what they were against!  But more than this, Belcher fails to identify missiology as a core motif for the EC.  For many, if not most, in the global EC movement, it is an attempt to participate with God and God’s mission in the world that is reshaping how they understand the sorts of topics that Belcher raises in his book, not vice versa.

    These criticisms notwithstanding, I am glad that Jim wrote this book and don’t doubt for a second that it has an will continue to help many.

    **Jim has recently decided to resign from his position as lead pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach, CA.  You can read a letter he wrote to the congregation regarding this transition here and some additional discussion about this sort of trend here.

    Posted in bible, books, christendom, church, church planting, culture, doctrine, emergent, emerging church, evangelicalism, Fuller Seminary, gospel, kingdom, modernity, post-christendom, postmodernity, theology

    Letters to Brian McLaren from Emerging Church Students

    April 29, 2010 // 9 Comments »

    I am fortunate to get to instruct an online course entitled, “The Emerging Church in the 21st Century,” for Fuller Theological Seminary each year. Based on current discussions and publications, I try to make appropriate and helpful updates to the course each time around.  This year, I decided to make Brian McLaren’s newest book, A New Kind of Christianity: Ten Questions that are Transforming the Faith, an optional book choice (students have to read something by McLaren).

    After I made this decision, a flurry of reviews of the book were published all over the blogosphere.  I was disappointed that a great many of them paid no mind to the life and ministry of the author and were virtually completely devoid of charity, something which ought to mark all Christian discourse.  More than this, I was thwarted in my effort to find reviews that offered reflections that were practical in nature.

    Convinced that there is a better way to engage with the material of Christian authors, I created an alternative assignment, which about half of the class has chosen to participate in.  I created a blog, dearbrianmclaren.wordpress.com, and invited students to write a personal letter to Brian.  Here’s the criteria for the assignment and grading:

    1) Letter must be addressed to Brian as the author of the book and should be between 500-600 words.
    2) You must speak to the practical implications of Brian’s content for your own life and ministry – no abstract, hypothetical or theoretical speculation.  If taken seriously, what are the implications of Brian’s points and proposals for your church or how you live and minister?  Obviously, you will have to be selective and won’t be able to address everything in the book, that’s fine.
    3) The degree to which you write with Christian charity.  You are welcome, even encouraged, to disagree with anything (or everything!) Brian has to say, that’s not the point.  The point is showing that you can disagree and respond to an actual person with Christian charity.
    5) Included within the letter, or at the end, you should pose 2-3 questions to Brian that you are left with after reading the book.
    4) Provided enough people are reviewing the book in this manner, you must comment on at least three other peoples letters/posts within a week of their being posted on the blog.

    These letters have been posted and Brian has even been gracious enough to give some time to reading and responding to them. Though this is primarily a class assignment, the blog is public and I’d encourage you to read the letters and offerer comments if you choose.

    Even better, if you’ve read the book, I’d invite to you respond along the lines of the guidelines above and leave a link to your letter in the comments below.

    Posted in blogging, emerging church, Fuller Seminary

    NT Wright and the Emerging Church

    April 21, 2010 // 14 Comments »

    I had the opportunity to catch some of The 19th Annual Wheaton Theology Conference this past weekend.

    N.T. Wright was the keynote speaker and the name of the conference this year was, “Jesus, Paul, and and the People of God.”

    Bishop Wright was spectacluar as usual, but one of my favorite talks was given by Jeremy Begbie, Research Professor of Theology at Duke Divinity School.

    The title of his talk was, “The Shape of Things to Come: Wright Amongst Emerging Ecclesiologies.”  I offer this (40 min) talk to you here, but you can also go here to download or watch the rest of the excellent talks from the weekend.

    Begbie - Wright Amongst Emerging Ecclesiologies [ 0:01 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

    Begbie begins by noting 5 features of Wright’s theology and ecclesiology that have immediate resonance with those who identify with the Emerging Church.

    1. Intrinsic – The Church is intrinsic to the vision of the purposes of God and the fabric of salvation.  God’s vision of putting the world to rights involves, at its heart, God forming a community.

    2. Eschatological – Thinking from God’s future to the present, providing a pneumatological vision of worship and mission.

    3. Cosmically Situated – God’s putting the world to rights involves creation-wide, Christological, reconciliation.

    4. Material – Shunning the ideas of the Church as a disembodied ideal and all the material/spiritual dichotomies of modernity.

    5. Improvisatory – Combining obedient responsibility to Scripture with flexibility to cultural and contextual circumstances.

    After offering these, Begbie suggests 3 features of Wright’s theology and ecclesiology that many Emerging Churches would do well to pay more attention to.

    1. Ascension – Christ is not localizible, but is universally accesible through the Spirit.  Failure to recognize Christ as universally reigning over the Church can lead to strident triumphalism on the one hand or painful disillusionment on the other.

    2. Israel – Gounding of Trinitarian enthusiasm in the history of God’s mission in and through Israel.

    3. Catholicity – Refusing to allow consumer choice to become the defacto foundation of church unity by rallying around the cross as the focal point of unity in God’s Kingdom.

    This was an insightful talk that I would commend to anyone seeking to get a better handle on the Emerging Church and its resonance with the theology of a professor and church leader who lives and ministers in a context where the Church is all but extinct.  Here, emergence, far from being a fad, is the only choice the Church has if it wishes to participate in God’s mission.

    Posted in church, conference, emerging church, theology

    What is the Emergent Church?

    March 13, 2010 // 38 Comments »

    Last night Amy and I joined a friend for a presentation at Harvest Bible Chapel on the topic of, “What is the Emergent Church?”1 as part of an ongoing apologetics series they are doing.

    As someone who gets to teach the course, The Emerging Church in the 21st Century, once a year, I was looking forward to attending and seeing what was said and discussed; especially considering the speaker for the evening was Dr. David Finkbeiner, a professor at Moody Bible Institute.

    I mean, if you want to get a balanced understanding of what the “Emergent Church” is all about, who better to ask than a professor of systematic theology at a school that officially, “does not endorse the emerging/emergent church” right?!

    Harvest would have done well (though from what I could tell – would never so much as have considered it) to have invited at least one person who could have spoken as an insider to the EC discussion.

    It was clear from the get-go that the tenor of the evening was going to be critical, bordering on condemnatory.  And this, even after Dr. Finkbeiner admitted that there is no simple way to define the EC as a whole.

    Dr. Finkbeiner’s focus for the evening was theological method.  His premise was that what undergirds the “Emergent Church” movement is a post-conservative theological method.  His aim was to critique this theological method overagainst a more traditional conservative evangelical one.

    Essentially, here’s what that meant…

    1) Post-Conservatives err in their non-foundationalist approach to epistemoplogy which takes things like history, context, and culture seriously, where as conservatives rightfully embrace Scripture as the objective and sole foundation to all knowledge.

    2) Post-Conservatives err in asserting that absolute truth, while real, may often times be beyond our ability to fully grasp.  Conservatives rightfully assert not only the reality of absolute truth, but affirm our ability to, “with a little hard work,” objectively know it.

    3) Post-conservatives err in not championing the inerrancy of Scripture.  Conservatives rightly hinge all their hopes on Scripture having been verbally and inerrantly inspired.

    So, here we have a guy who is doing a masterful job of towing the line of modern conservative evangelicalism, lambasting those who dare to think, “There might be some stuff we’re missing here.”

    As I listened to him describe some of the perspectives and viewpoints of post-conservative evangelicals I found it hard to believe that he wasn’t converting himself!

    He quickly and coyly dismissed a broad range of the most helpful aspects of post-conservative theology…

    – The idea that we need one another in the pursuit of truth because all of our perspectives are bound by a host of factors

    – The notion that theology loses its character when not born out of an embodied witness

    – The view that the authority of Scripture lies not primarily in its abstract character, but in its function in the life of the Church

    – The insight that biblical propositional truth derives its meaning and significance from the narratives in which they’re embedded

    – That post-conservative theology is, at its core, a prophetic call to revisit some of our modernistic assumptions

    In each and every instance, the speaker noted that these are the hallmarks of post-conservative theology and then attempted to show why they ought to be rejected.

    OK, so that was the presentation and as enlightening as it was, the Q & A time was even better.  I quote.

    “Is Willowcreek an Emergent Church?  I heard they sell Brian McLaren books.”2

    “Is the Emergent Church a cult?”

    “I’ve heard that Urbana and InterVarsity are becoming more Emergent.  Should I keep my kids away from those groups?”

    I actually had the opportunity to ask the last question of the evening…

    With a little trepidation, but in the spirit of full disclosure, I teach a course on the Emerging Church at the seminary level and I need to say that I think there have been some pretty unfair characterizations of the movement here tonight.  I was hoping that before we go you might offer a positive comment about the role the EC has had in the recovery of the importance of the Missio Dei or incarnational approaches to ecclesiology.

    Dr. Finkbeiner commented that, “Yes, there has been some focus in those areas, but they still are wrong in how they do theology.”  So, no, he didn’t have one positive thing to say the entire evening about the EC.

    Left completely aside from the discussion of the evening was the historical evolution of the EC movement, its place in the scope of the collapse of Christendom, and the most relevant bit of information given the scope of the talk, namely, that theological method simply isn’t at the center for 90% of the people who are in any way affiliated with the movement.  For the vast majority, what is central is joining God in his mission in the world and finding ways to make the church, not culturally relevant (as too many assume), but incarnationally faithful in the pattern of Jesus.

    Between the tenor of the presentation and the questions and comments of the audience, it’s little wonder that conservative evangelicals are so often characterized by fear and close-mindedness.  There are many in the EC community who are trying to carve out a way of being the church and doing theology that doesn’t fell prey to these charges.  I was really hoping to come away pleasantly surprised by the event.  Sadly, I didn’t.

    1. There is no such thing as the Emergent Church. This is a classic conflation of the terms Emergent Village and Emerging Church offered by those who aren’t all that familiar with the topic [↩]
    2. Someone from Harvest was quick to announce that Harvest doesn’t! [↩]

    Posted in christendom, church, emergent, emerging church, evangelicalism, postmodernity, theology

    Forerunners of The Great Emergence

    December 5, 2008 // 2 Comments »

    2 quick observations about the day…

    1) The Emergent conversation is providing an opportunity to those whom no one else will listen (because they just don’t fit) to be heard and embraced.

    2) A unifying characteristic of Emergent type people is their distrust of any version of Christian faith that leaves little or no room for complexity and paradox. They would rather be shunned than forced to conform.

    Posted in conference, emergent, emerging church

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