What is the emerging church anyway
An article we wrote has been posted to Spero News. It is an attempt to briefly highlight some of the characteristics of the “emerging church”, particularly for those that are not familiar with the concepts. Welcome to any visitors who have found us through the article.
September 21st, 2005 at 4:11 pm
This isn’t really a comment about this post, but about the blog itself.
I’m not sure if you guys are aware of this or not - it seems that all the comments are displaying with the timestamp of the posted entry, not the timestamp of the comment itself (i.e. this comment will display with a timestamp of “Wednesday, September 21, 2005 at 2:42 pm”, but I posted it at “Wednesday, September 21, 2005 at 3:40 pm”-ish).
See the “Homosexuality - Again” post for more examples.
September 21st, 2005 at 4:17 pm
Thanks Ben, it was an existing quirk in the template that we imported from somewhere else. We are looking to fix it, but have gotten to the stage of diagnosing the fault but not yet fixing it. The times of the comments have been recorded and will be revealed when we ferret out the relevant bit of code and change it.
September 25th, 2005 at 9:46 pm
As someone struggling to understand the emerging church I very much appreciated the article.What challenges me is the starting point of the discussion and exploration.
Reading what increasingly appears to be the bible of the EC (”the shaping of things to come” Frost and Hirsch)I am left in a quandry and wondering whos having who on!
First comes the attack on the institutional church(no problem with that have been doing that on and off for the best part of forty years).I appreciated particularly the points you raise in the linkage and relationship between “local” and “institutional”.
But what appears to be the common attack and analysis on the institutional church seems to suggest that the holy Spirit was active in the first century church , dropped their/his/her game or dissappeared for the next 2000 years (bit like collingwood) and is now alive and well in the emerging church.
Then comes the claim that the emerging church is revolutionary(sense you are little more humble!).It is sugested by frost and hirsch that revolution and renewal is integrally related to the poor.
Yet in more that 200 pages there are but some half dozen brief references to the poor (one even suggests that missioners should help the poor dream!!!).
In the epic struggle against the principalities and powers of sin and darkness - sweatshops that produce our shirts and skirts, industrial policies which will further screw workers,welfare policies which will put the fear of god into disabled workers,prison policies which produce a 1000 suicide attempts,multinationals which scourge the world,so called wars against terrorism etc etc it is the institutional church which provides the resources,the leadership,the solidarity,the comradeship.
Sorry for all that; appreciated the article, but if the emerging church is caught up in going back or forward with the bible(hope that doesnt start another 100 responses on errancy!!)and the starting point was the “poor” would it be different? If the struggle was with the poor,workers at the bottom of the barrel,disabled and single parents being exploited,capaigning to get oil companies,defence contractors and politicians out of Iraq - would we see more emerging church members as union members and a solidarity with those in the so-called institutional church.
The article helped me to see the “congregation” the “local” end of the people of god ,but where and how and when does it connect in the mobilising,resourcing,campaigning,solidarity with the rest of the kingdom - whether institutional church,trade union,mosque,single parents or Black justice movement?
September 26th, 2005 at 10:03 am
Alan, I agree with this critique and believe that it is a valid critique of many expressions of church, not just the emerging church.
I think that there are certainly some expressions of church which have this focus on mission right - whether it be on the single parents, mosque or whatever. However, a danger in the conversation about the “emerging” is that we get all excited about what we do when we meet together and don’t do enough to be ministering to the “least of these”.
September 27th, 2005 at 4:23 pm
What puzzles me with the whole ‘emerging church’ thing …is the idea that Christians need to get out in the community more….live among and with not-yet Christians, and incarnate Christ within different sub-groupings within the community.
But how do you get people more into the community than they already are?
Every Christian who goes to an attractional church interacts with the community for the rest of the week, in the workplace, at the corner store, at the play-group, or where-ever.
This idea that Christians need to get ‘more out there’ in the community is a myth of both the emerging and traditional church.
The REAL question that needs to be asked, is why people in the community don’t recognise Christians as being followers of Christ.
Why it’s the norm for someone to be working alongside a colleague for 20 years, and not knowing that colleague is a Christian until it comes to light for some reason or another in a conversation….like they say they were at church on Sunday.
How many times have we heard the line …”oh…all this time and I didn’t know you were a Christian!”
What we need is less talk about changing structures to encourage missional ventures…and more talk about what are the positive and negative traits that Christians exhibit when they are at work, mingling with friends and acquaintances, and involved in public life.
I think many emerging church people believe that because they are intending to be missional, that others will perceive their ‘Christian-ness’, when experience up to now, shows that’s not the case…
Unless you’re wearing a Salvation Army uniform, and standing at the railway station holding a collection tin, or you’re badgering people in the Murray Street Mall with signs or confrontational evangelism, or you’re lobbying for ‘family values’ in politics, how does a regular person recognise a Christian, if they’re just wearing normal street clothes and acting normally?
Or if they’re wearing an AFL guernsey?
Who knew the Fremantle Dockers’ Shane Parker was a Christian…until Fraser Gehrig called him a ‘bible bashing cunt’?
September 27th, 2005 at 4:29 pm
And do we really want Homer, and people like him…out in the community, representing Christianity?
September 27th, 2005 at 4:50 pm
Lance the part that may be missing is the idea that our faith is compell us to be like Jesus amidst the surrounding culture. What I see is that people have a dichotomy of life, they are their chruch selves on Sunday and their secular selves the rest of the time. What the emerging church is trying to do is not only get them to look at their time in the culture as mission work, but to stop the sacred, profane dichotomy of life. To live as Jesus would live amidst the world, loving, caring for, and blessing.
It works very well in my context, my faith is my life and therefore wherever I go, it goes with me.
But you are right, I don’t want Homer representing me anywhere.
the rev
December 7th, 2005 at 4:35 pm
I am addressing this to Geoff Bullock.
Geoff
You were at Hillsong as it was developing its present leadership structure and philosophies.
What would be 5 areas of current Leadership you would address if you spoke at a conference to Pastors of Large churches?
December 7th, 2005 at 4:51 pm
Ned, I will elevate your question to its own thread. Hope you don’t mind others putting their two cents in!!
December 7th, 2005 at 4:54 pm
[…] er 7, 2005 at 4:54 pm by dan under challenges for the church Ned asks in a comment to this thread: Geoff You were at Hillsong as it was […]
December 13th, 2005 at 4:54 am
Brian McLaren and Tony Jones named ‘Stupid Church People of the Year 2005′.
http://www.stupidchurchpeople.com/2005/12/emerging-irrelevancy.html
Lance.
February 18th, 2006 at 1:13 am
I would be interested in subscribing to this blogs rss feed but am kinda new to this. Is it possible to get it via email? Peter in Tacoma