If you've been a part of the emerging church conversation at any length, recent posts across the blogosphere might serve as fresh thought provocation. I wrote last week about the blog-and-forth between Andrew Jones and Tony Jones. Others have chimed in. The most entertaining of them has to be Rick Bennett's Obituary for the Emerging Church. All of it has led me to consider, all the more, the emerging label. I'll plan to spill out some thoughts in a few posts. For starters:
It was somewhere in the early '00s when I was asked by one of our music team leaders, "Is Christ's Church an emerging church?" I answered that question with a question (seemed like something Brian McLaren gets in trouble for, so why not?): "Why do you ask that?" The answer was that she had heard our congregation mentioned in the local church community as being "caught up in the emergent heresy."
To that point, I had read a couple of Brian McLaren books. Did this make me/us emergent? I had begun reading Tall Skinny Kiwi's blog regularly and even linked to it from my own blog. Did this make me/us emergent? I was becoming more aware of our particular setting as a local expression of the body of Christ, and a growing discomfort with apologetic evangelism while also sensing more openness to genuine conversation and relationship. Did this make me/us emergent? As I read McLaren's More Ready Than You Realize, I realized that I was engaged in a couple of generative conversations myself. Did that make me/us emergent? I became intentional about trying to augment my preaching and teaching ministry with more dialogue and conversation. Did this make me/us emergent? I instigated a reading and discussion group over the McLaren book Generous Orthodoxy. Did this make me/us emergent? What labelled us?
And heresy?
There has not been any change in our doctrinal statement. There have been no changes in my personal theology, that I am aware of. To my standard Reformed sense of humor--I'm still among the elite of the elect.
But there have been changes. As a congregation, we've moved decidedly in the direction of embracing an incarnational evangelism. Is that heretical? We've welcomed people to "belong before they believe." Is that it? We've encouraged questions, dialogue and searching in matters of life and faith, rather than enforcing a standard of religious certitude. Did that cross the line? We've looked at ourselves and admitted that, at times, we've practiced more like Pharisees than followers of Jesus Christ--and we've determined to change that. Was that it? Heresy?
We've wanted to see sharing the gospel become more "who we are" than an "outreach program"; to see discipleship happen along life's way rather than in a classroom; to partner effectively with other followers of Christ--and those of difference and distance, too, not just those who look and think exactly like we do.
Funny thing is, these are all things we've been learning from the Bible, and seen in Jesus--not in a McLaren book or a Tall Skinny Kiwi blog post (although I've seen some of those themes repeated in those places for sure).
I don't guess I've ever thought of it as emergent. I've thought of it as being a follower of Jesus Christ. And these are the things that I believe will outlast the label.
More to come...
Comments