emerging mosaic

I came across this recent in the The Christian Century. The description of Jacob’s web does not seem to fit the usual prescription of an emergent church. Which is supposed to be small and democratically led. (flat leadership model)

This neighborhood is also home to a thriving church called Jacobs Well, which attracts about 1,000 people each week to its various services. The church is led by Tim Keel, who, along with author Brian McLaren, is a founder of the Emergent movement. I went to JW hoping that it could help me understand a phenomenon that remains elusive—the Emergent church.

The innovative JW is housed, ironically, in a classic church building that Presbyterians erected in 1930. The building is the envy of the numerous congregations in the neighborhood, including two that have exchanged their denominational labels for more jazzy names and logos—one Southern Baptist now River City Church and one Evangelical Covenant now City Church.

So can a church be emergent and large, and led by a charismatic leader?

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I am preparing for a couple of worship messages based on Act 2:42-44Act 2:42-44
English: Contemporary English Version (1999) - CEV
42 They spent their time learning from the apostles, and they were like family to each other. They also broke bread g broke bread: They ate together and celebrated the Lord's Supper. and prayed together. Life among the Lord's Followers ⁴³ Everyone was amazed by the many miracles and wonders that the apostles worked. ⁴⁴ All the Lord's followers often met together, and they shared everything they had.

and while browsing the religion section of a local bookstore I came across a great book find. A couple of dusty feet caught my eye.  They were on the cover of a book called dust off their feet- lessons from the early church by Brian McLaren and Chris Seay. The title doesn’t fully describe this gem. I describe it as a postmodern reading and commentary of the book of acts. The back cover asks the question, “Did you know the first church in acts was the original emerging church?”

I’ve already  got some good insight from this retelling and commentary on Acts and I recommend to all of those seeking to reclaim the passion and purpose  early church and rebirth it into our emerging contexts.

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OK I must admit that the title of Brian Mclaren’s new book The Secret Message of Jesus made me wince a bit. Just a bit but a wince nonetheless. With the gospel of Judas coming on the heals of Brian’s new release a link between The Secret Message of Jesus, Gospel of Judas and gnostic heresy was sure to be made by evangelical fundamentalists. Brian saw it coming.

A number of people have asked about the title. Some people are concerned that it has “Gnostic connotations.” Obviously, I was aware that some might draw this conclusion, but my main audience for the book (and really, for most of my books) is not members of the Christian subculture who would even know what “Gnostic” means. Instead, my primary audience is the “spiritual but not religious” people who are interested in what Jesus was about, but are generally turned off by the Religious Right, institutional religion, etc. I felt that the title would connect with this audience, and I was willing to risk being misunderstood for that purpose. Jesus, I think, took similar risks again and again. As I worked on the book, I was repeatedly struck by how “strategically indirect” Jesus was – hiding his message in parable, sign, and wonder. I began to realize that this strategy of hiddenness was integral to Jesus’ whole message and ministry. I think people who read the book will be struck by this theme as well.

Well here is it Living Journey » The secret teachings of Brian McLaren  here’s his response to the idea that Jesus used parables strategically.

Let’s look at Matthew 13, and see if the above is in accordance with scripture.

Mat 13:9-14Mat 13:9-14
English: Contemporary English Version (1999) - CEV
9 If you have ears, pay attention! Why Jesus Used Stories ¹⁰ Jesus' disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you use nothing but stories when you speak to the people?” ¹¹ Jesus answered: I have explained the secrets about the kingdom of heaven to you, but not to others. ¹² ; ; . Everyone who has something will be given more. But people who don't have anything will lose even what little they have. ¹³ I use stories when I speak to them because when they look, they cannot see, and when they listen, they cannot hear or understand. ¹⁴ . So God's promise came true, just as the prophet Isaiah had said, “These people will listen and listen, but never understand. They will look and look, but never see.

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The one having ears to hear, let him hear. And coming near, the disciples said to Him, Why do You speak to them in parables? Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of Heaven, And answering, He said to them, but it has not been given to those. For whoever has, to him will be given, and he will have overabundance. But whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. Because of this, I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. And the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled on them, which says, "In hearing you will hear and in no way understand, and seeing you will see yet in no way perceive.

Ok, firstly the parables are not for them (the unsaved), but for us his disciples.

I haven’t gotten a copy of the book yet so I can’t rebut any of the comments on the book but the idea that the parables were only for the "saved" seems simplistic if not dead wrong. I expect even more of this kind of rhetoric to come. I’m looking for ward to this conversation in the blogosphere. What say you?

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Here is a link to a video of the CBS news piece about the emergent church including a brief piece with McLaren

see here

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Thanks to Elizabeth Potter for a heads up on this

MCLAREN ON CBS EVENING NEWS. Emergent-church leader and The Secret Message of Jesus (W Publishing/Nelson) author Brian McLaren will be
featured in a series on faith this week on CBS Evening News. The Emergent story is on Thursday night.

And there’ll be an article in the Wall Street Journal on Friday, as well.

Brian has a new home on the web http://www.brianmclaren.net/

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This morning I opened up my email inbox and there was this article about Driscoll defining emergent/emerging churches is a way "we can all understand" Monday Morning Insight Weblog: It has link to a PDF of an article by Mark in the Criswell Journal (which also has an interview with Brian McLaren giving his perspective that the good people over at Monday Morning Inisght don’t link to) and a previous article by Ed Stetzer using the same categories as Driscoll.

After staking his claim to being of founder of the emerging church in the US Driscoll goes on to categorize the emerging church (based on Stetzer’s categories) into three groups as follows.

Relevants are theologically conservative evangelicals who are not as interested in reshaping theology as much as updating such things as worship styles, preaching styles, and church leadership structures. Their goal is to be more relevant; thus, appealing to postmodernminded people. Relevants commonly begin alternative worship services within evangelical churches to keep generally younger Christians from leaving their churches. They also plant new churches to reach emerging people. Relevant leaders look to people such as Dan Kimball, Donald Miller, and Rob Bell as like-minded leaders. The common critique of Relevants is that they are doing little more than conducting “cool church” for hip young Christians and are not seeing significant conversion growth. Within the Relevants there is also a growing group of outreach-minded Reformed Relevants, which look to men like John Piper, Tim Keller, and D. A. Carson for theological direction.

Reconstructionists are generally theologically evangelical and dissatisfied with the current forms of church (e.g. seeker, purpose, contemporary). They bolster their critique by noting that our nation is becoming less Christian and that those who profess faith are not living lives markedly different than non-Christians; thereby, proving that current church forms have failed to create life transformation. Subsequently, they propose more informal, incarnational, and organic church forms such as house churches. Reconstructionists, who are more influenced by mainline Christian traditions, will also use terms like “new monastic communities” and “abbess.” Reconstructionist
leaders look to such people as Neil Cole and Australians Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch. The common critique of Reconstructionists is that they are collecting disgruntled Christians who are overreacting to the megachurch trend but are not seeing significant conversion growth.

Revisionists are theologically liberal and question key evangelical doctrines, critiquing their appropriateness for the emerging postmodern world. Reconstructionists look to such leaders as Brian McLaren and Doug Pagitt as well as other Emerging Christians. The common critique of Revisionists is that they are recycling the doctrinal debates of a previous generation and also not seeing significant conversion growth.

A couple of observations  

Why is it that we are so eager to put each other in boxes and define groups? Is driscoll’s true modernism showing through. He is just adding to the fodder for those who want to quiet prophetic or more radical voices in the conversation by labeling them. While I may disagree with the theological direction some of folks are going in I defend their right to go there. But I guess this is the consequence and they need to be prepared for that.

The article is called a pastoral perspective on the emerging church I guest hat is in contrast to the non-pastoral perspective of Driscoll’s recent Christianity Today rant.

There is no mention of the missional church folks. I think they are another stream in the conversation unless he covers that in mentioning Hirsch.

It is strange that he feels compelled to mention as a critique that these streams don’t see any significant conversion growth.  I do feel sometimes there isn’t enough attention paid to being evangelistic conversion growth isn’t the only paradigm. How about transformational growth?

There are several other things in the article that I explore at a later date but for now let me look at Driscoll’s attempts to define. Driscoll interestingly enough doesn’t put himself in any of the categories but the inferences are clear in the article.  Relevants good. Revisionists bad! Recontructionists eh?

BTW no people of color mentioned

Brian Mclaren’s definition of emerging church in his interview in Criswell

"the emerging church" (a term I don’t particularly like because it can sound divisive) is really "the church that is engaging with the emerging culture."

Read the interview Brian is as articulate, gracious and thoughtful as ever despite some loaded questions.

My favorite definition of the emerging church comes form Kester Brewin om The Complex Christ

we need to become wombs of the divine and completely rebirth the church into a host culture.

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Mark Driscoll has issued a public apology for the pretty ugly comments he made about Brian Mclaren and Doug Pagitt on leadership journal blog. Here’s a clip of the apology

I have come to see that my comments were sinful and in poor taste. Therefore, I am publicly asking for forgiveness from both Brian and Doug because I was wrong for attacking them personally and I was wrong for the way in which I confronted positions with which I still disagree. I also ask forgiveness from those who were justifiably offended at the way I chose to address the disagreement. I pray that you will accept this posting as a genuine act of repentance for my sin.

On the one hand this is very courageous of him. ON the other hand he seems to have done it in response to some self interest. (He does have a new book coming out)

He kindly said that my reputation was growing as a guy with good theology, a bad temper, and a foul mouth. This is not what I want to be known for. And after listening to the concerns of the board members of the Acts 29 Church Planting Network

Read the rant, then head over to his blog and read the apology then decide for yourself.

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I remember learning the song soon and very soon when I was a little kid coming up in the church. I remember discovering the sentiment in it was used by white Christians to placate blacks during slavery telling them that their reward, their release from oppression,  would come soon, in the next life, at the end of eternity.

Now I hear it again from the emergent conversation. Scott McKnight has an interesting post about conversations he is having with emergent leaders types (all white and male with the exception of a spouse) at the National Pastors Conference. He reports from his conversation that they are serious about theology and the intersection of

All this group of folks care about is theology …..They’re really into the intersection of theology, culture, and praxis.

When someone (Rick of new life emerging) commented as I have that the conversation was lacking

“conversation” from minority voices– like African Americans or the feminist perspective. (Yes, I know how white dudes roll their eyes when confronted with this reality) This seems mainly like an evangelical group who is “high” on the next best thing.

He was tagged as griping. Can you say "shut down the conversation." Another commenter said this

I can understand the frustration with the seeming fruitlessness, the overemphasis on talking, the lack of diversity, etc. But things take time.

I remember hearing this just wait two years ago when I first started raising these questions. Soon and very soon. Now I’m not trying to take on Scott or any of the other emergent leaders he mentioned. They are clearly more theologically sophisticated than me. But as person of color trying to emerge into Christian practice beyond the modern and postmodern hoopla I am stuck with these questions:

How long before it isn’t griping to call the emergent conversation to account for its stated values?
How long before we see real evidence of the intersection between theology and praxis? I mean beyond candles and worship stuff.
How long before it is time to expect something more than talk?

I hear a rising chorus of Soon and very soon and I say

How long emergent? How long?

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Is the emergent conversation coming apart and drifting into neophilia? Kester Brewin introduced the concept of neophilia in a series of posts on his blog

‘Neophilia’ -being in love with newness for newness’ sake. Neophilia is a revolutionary mode. It tries to effect quick change, but fails to settle on sustainable, deep-rooted solutions as it flits from one ’saviour’ to the next.

I wonder if Doug Pagitt decision to no longer  share ideas on this blog, and Mark Driscoll ripping into Brian Mclaren A Prologue and Rant by Mark Driscoll, are signs that the emergent church conversation is moving through the stages described in the book Brewin referenced on the subject of Neophilia ‘The neophiliacs: A study of the revolution in English life in the fifties and sixties. I think we may be seeing the beginning of the EC conversation moving into the Stage 3:The Frustration Stage.

As usual Kester has brought his practical insight and useful resources to bear on the global emerging church conversation.

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Last week I got to hear Brian McLaren in a conversation with two other folks who are not embedded in the emerging church conversation discuss what’s emerging in the emerging church?

When pressed to say what the Emergent folks think the Emerging church should stand for I was gratified that Brian said the following are issues on which the emerging church should take a stand

• poverty
• racism
• the distortion of sexuality prevalent in NA culture
• violence in it may forms
• materialism

In describing the emerging church McLaren used these words

missional
integral
conversational
Evangelical
catholic
monastic
global
flawed
immature

a couple other snippets McLaren says 
He expects more conversation in Europe and england

NT wright not Brian mclaren

sharing the gospel with gentleness

check out the talks from Brian and other here.

Now the commentary

Many people in the emerging church conversation are satisfied to talk about theology, worship styles and flat leadership models without dealing with the dagger in the heart of establishing real community, classism and racism. I had a renewed hope for this conversation when Brian made it clear that all people but especially Anglo people need to explore and understand the significant role that colonialism, racism and class have played the church’s practice of the faith in history. He described it as "the history that the rest of the world know that we don’t want to talk about." It created the impression that "White Christians think they have right to do anything they want to do."

This was very important for me to hear as it affirmed the discomfort I have felt with a "Negroes welcome" (thanks to Maurice for lending me the language to describe this) attitude from some in this conversation.  It looks like this You all can come talk if you want to, on our terms, but we aren’t going to make room for you or include your historical contributions, or recognize your voice or hear your story. If you want that then go form your own sacred circle!

How is that different from the modern church? Hmm… let me think  its not!

So hope renewed and with some Anglo folks who get (EWM)  it and a couple other folks of color now in the conversation I press on.

Thanks Brian for taking the time to tackle a tough but critical issue.

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