Each generation
I had coffee with Alan today. Great conversation and wonderful coffee!
We were talking about the distinctives of the emerging church. Is it, as Alan asked me, simply this post-modern generation working out what it means to live the gospel in this time and place?
Good question I reckon!
You know I really want to say that there is something different and unique with what is going on. Let me give it a go:
- The emerging church is unique because it is the first time the Church has attempted to respond to a post-modern and global society. Well, that is true – yet, hardly unique when you put it in the context of each generation responding to it’s own unique setting.
- The emerging church is unique because it is an attempt to return the institution of the Church to it’s New Testament origins. Hardly, when we look at Alexander Campbell and Barton Stone in my own tradition and the many other movements of this ilk in history.
- The emerging church is unique because its impact is being felt across the wider Church. Again, hardly when we think of the third world church who have probably never heard of the emerging church. And you know, I do wonder if we are really impacting the wider church when I look at the institutions of the Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican Churches.
- The emerging church is unique because it challenges the Sing Song and Sermon format. Nope.. The Jesus movement and the House Church movement have that pretty much covered.
The emerging church is unique because…. you have a go! Because I am coming to the realisation that my opinion that the emerging church is unique because I want it to be. Hardly a good enough reason.
There is power and strength in thinking you are unique. The revolution seems so much more sexy if you think you are ground breaking… Yet, perhaps this approach also breeds arrogance and a refusal to learn from any other Church history other than the church of the first three centuries.
May 30th, 2005 at 9:12 pm
I’m not sure I’ve ever thought - or wanted to think - of the emerging church as unique. Rather, I think of it (or dream of it) in terms like appropriate, authentic, and genuine. And I would hope that all expressions of church could be described like that for those people for whom that is true.
I firmly believe that all expressions of church have use-by dates. And so, I guess I would consider the emerging church to be unique in as much as it is the only church expression which is genuinely attempting to engage with the culture and subcultures which don’t fit within the established / existing church. Hardly unique in the grand scheme of things, and yet essential and desperately needed in contexts in which we find it. It is a local expression for those who otherwise would have no alternative but to sing the Lord’s song in a strange land - and today, that is unique.
May 30th, 2005 at 11:55 pm
Something I was thinking about when Alan talked in one of our ‘Emerging Church’ classes last year, was about how what is now being called the Emerging Church movement has actually been around for a while, just maybe in different forms and with different names. From the little I know of the Jesus movement and the House Church thing, they seemed to be asking very similar questions, and were striving for similar ideals. They too were seeking new ways to follow God, and new ways to connect with those who don’t yet.
But somebody else has said that they reckon the EC movement has a little more longevity, due to its more grounded incarnational approach, which seems to be the driving theology behind much of the movement.
June 1st, 2005 at 11:08 am
I think being “unique” is not a theological category worth falling after. How about is the emerging church faithful to the gospel?
June 3rd, 2005 at 12:11 pm
Ideas of “unique”, “the only church” worry me.Every generation struggles with what it means to be church:not sure it helps Anthony to say “to be true to the gospel”.Of course,but what gospel? I wonder if the ‘forces of darkness’ become so overwhelming that its easier to worry about whether or not in terms of ‘community’ people can refuse to eat.Where is the emerging church in the struggle to prevent workers - casual/women/young people/non english spaeaking - from being screwed by bosses. Those parts of the church I see desparately trying to do something to confront this evil, come from those churches which in Ross’s terms are not genuine.I’ve heard emerging church leaders tell me that there are 364 subcultures out there!!! and thats what we ‘re on about! Too much pop sociology will do little it seems to me to be faithful to the gospel.You dont think do you that the emerging church spends too much of its time taliking to each other and disecting its navel!
June 3rd, 2005 at 12:21 pm
Alan, you said: “Those parts of the church I see desparately trying to do something to confront this evil, come from those churches which in Ross’s terms are not genuine.”
I’m not sure what you mean - because what I was trying to express was that all churches, all expressions of church, probably _are_ genuine to where some people are at. I didn’t intend my comments to be a way by which some churches would be labeled ‘not genuine’. could you explain what you mean for me?
June 3rd, 2005 at 12:25 pm
“…the emerging church spends too much of its time taliking to each other and disecting its navel!”
And how.
I often wonder if the EC isn’t a very middle-class, educated, articulate response that is more concerned about discussing than doing. Harsh? Fair?
I sometimes feel that the disucssions we have on here, worthy as they are, aren’t a little bit like a group of bald men arguing over a comb.
June 3rd, 2005 at 4:52 pm
Ross, I thought you were suggesting that the EC is the “only church expression which is genuinely etc …..But your second comment makes me even more confused.Are you saying that only those who struggle to be faithful to the gospel(in Anthony’s terms)in the 365 subcultures are genuine.And the rest of us “are probably genuine” because somehow or other we havent made it to the EC, because “thats where some people are at”!!. The issues that burn me up and others who hang in, - the downright evil of the Howard IR legislation,sweatshops around the corner,the trade agenda that is going to screw many “of the children who would like to be comforted by the Christ” or wipe out half the ecoinomies of the Pacific etc etc; are the kind of issues which the “the probably genuine” church,their committees,their staff,their congregations provide cash,expertise(we’re yet to be convinced of the 365 subcultures!)strategies,etc in the struggle against the forces of darkness!
June 3rd, 2005 at 5:40 pm
ok, there’s two aspects to this as I see it. firstly there is the idea of expressions of church within, or accessible to, a given culture. I see that the EC is (or should be) an expression of church in a culture or amongst generations for whom the existing or established church is an alien construct using foreign and unintelligable (or unacceptable) constructs. I think that is unique in as much as the EC movement is the only one I’ve witnessed which is actually taking seriously the paradigm and epistemological shifts which I see as being typical of (some of) those who don’t fit into the established church. For that reason, I see that the EC is attempting to be a genuine and authentic community of people, who are trying to live out their faith as best as they can understand it.
That doesn’t make the EC the only unique or genuine church: in the present context I am talking about genuine in the sense of people being able to “be themselves”, to be able to express their faith and worship in a framework that makes sense to them, not one which they have to artificially introduce into their world view in order to call themselves christian. So it is a measure of “can I be myself in this place”, not in a consumerist way but in a ‘does this express what I truly believe about my faith and my world’ sort of way. Thus I suggest (and hope) that in fact the established church is equally genuine and authentic, not for those who are in the EC, but for those who think naturally in the frameworks which so characterise mainline christian thought. I don’t think that the EC is better than the established church: I think that they both serve a purpose, struggling to understand their faith as best they can within the constraints of how they see and understand the world.
But expression of church, and genuine or authentic frameworks are only part of the equation. Churches need to exist within cultures, but they need to challenge those cultures too. And in as much as any church is an expression of church within a culture or culture(s) then the church itself needs to be challenged by the gospel: redeeming a culture and conforming to a culture are two very different things. In this I think that, largely, we are all uniformly failing. The established church (in my opinion) has bought into certain individualistic / private enterprise / gospel of middle-class social niceness in which we can preach against sex outside of marriage and do nothing about rampant social injustice and other evils. The emerging church (in my opinion and _very limited_ exposire) is often characterised by a sense of disenfranchisement with the established church, and an ability to talk at length about how different we are, how we are genuine and authentic, and do nothing about rampant social injustice and other evils.
So in summary:
a) the emerging church is attempting / succeeding to be an expression which is genuine to a subgroup of people who do not feel represented in the established church
b) in this endeavour, I think it is unique
c) however in terms of maturity of vision and mission, and of realising and taking its place in Jesus’ kingdom agenda for redeeming his creation, I think that the EC is little different to any other church, except that in some circles it is at least talking the talk, and naming as evil some things which hitherto have been marginalised by christian thinking.
Hope that at least clarifies what I was trying to say, so that folks can push back against what I mean rather than what I have accidentally said.
June 12th, 2005 at 11:50 pm
The “Emerging Church” has got it wrong. It should be The “Emerging New Creatures in Christ”.
The agenda is not to go back to the early church, or agonize over cultural formats of church in this day and age.
If ‘church” is your focus, you’ll only create the closed cycle of re-interpretation all over again. Why? Because there are religious spirits who control it and you’ve got to get past them.
“Er….isn’t this being a bit OTT, Boltono?”.
No, not at all. I hope many get away from mindsets that will not let them get away! Love me or hate me, I blog at http://boltono.typepad.com
June 15th, 2005 at 10:29 pm
Ross
Appreciated the further clarification of where you are coming from;really dont think we’re very far apart.
A couple of things: first in terms of words - why the use of “subgroups” arent they just another “group”, or do you use “subgroups” in some other technical way?
Secondly agree with your characterisation of the Est Church re the privatisation of faith,prosperity theology,preoccupation with sex ( but even with sex pretty selective - nothing about the way the church has used and continues to use women in “service”) etc.
Buts heres the bind I have with the EC as I see it; where is its voice in “challenging the rampant social justice”?
Where was the EC on 12/6 - world day against child slavery(250 million kids - 3000 in Aust)?Its the Est Church working with Georgiou to change the brutality of the prison system for asylum seekers?Where is the voice of the EC as the market, forces 330,000 full time workers into partime work every 3 months?Where is it as nearly 50 millionaires are created in Aust each day? Where is the EC debating and judging the attack on workers and unions? Its St Vinnies which shows Aust increasingly screwing the poor(and is attacked by right wing think tanks as Marxist!)….and the voice of the EC - well and not to be too unkind arent they still debating inerrancy!!
I guess my plea is that both parts of the church - EC and Est Ch -need each other - but somehow or other from where I sit its the Est Church which is leading the prophetic attack on the rampant social injustices, and the EC gathers to comfort itself!
Alan