I am on a much needed vacation with my wife during my spring break, so we will pick up with the Brian McLaren review next week with 3-4 fresh posts. In the meantime enjoy and meditate upon this note that was written by a child and dropped in my church’s offering plate.

A child’s innocent, honest question silences the the prideful arrogance of adults.

May this be our prayer today.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Nearly 2 years ago I re-posted this article on the use of ‘faith’ in politics. I re-posted it nearly a year after the original just as things were heating up in the home stretch of the primary elections on the use of ‘faith’ in the political square, wondering if the term has become utterly meaningless. I re-post it in light of my series on Brian McLaren’s new book, A New Kind of Christianity and others—like Samir Selmanovic’s book It’s Really All About God—who write on Faith, capital ‘F.’ There is popular trend developing within Christianity thanks to these and other Emergent-type authors and thinkers to emphasize generalize and vanilla-ize ‘faith’ through such terms/phrases as: people of faith, having faith, faith community, being in faith, etc…

The emphasis falls on the effort of Faithing, rather on the “object” to which that faith is placed. In fact, in an effort to pluralize God and universalize faith itself, God—the overly generalized World-Spirit god of Schleiermacher—is the object to which that faith is directed, as if it’s really all about God. Cooinciding with their refusal to acknowledge and exalt Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah, the likes of Brian and Samir reduce Jesus to merely a revelation of the character of God who provides us a better moral example as a model citizen, rather than being God himself, and permit the other “Abrahamic faiths” to act as vehicles of God and modes of salvation. As I have contended elsewhere, it’s not really all about God, it’s about Jesus Christ. It’s not about “faith,” it’s about faith in Jesus, the author and perfector of our faith who alone provides rescue and re-creation for all who “faith” in Him.

I was reading todays New York Times this morning during my routine of a cup of coffee, a bagel slathered with cream cheese, yogurt and the Times, when I stumbled across an articled entitled, “Faith Intertwines With Political Life for Clinton.” It was an interesting article on the faith roots of Hillary Clinton and shed some light on her Methodism, beliefs and faith-politics integration.

Here were some things I thought were interesting about her own faith journey, beliefs, and spiritual practices: she was actively involved in the church growing up; she regularly reads the Bible and commentaries on Scripture, is actively involved in a weekly prayer gatherings in the Senate, and has experienced “the presence of the Holy Spirit on Many occasions;” Mrs. Clinton believes in the resurrection of Jesus, thought she is less sure of the doctrine of the exclusivity of Jesus Christ (or Christianity as the article puts it) for salvation; and she believes the Bible communicates God’s desire to have a personal relationship with people. In fact, as the article goes on to say, “Mrs. Clinton and others who have known her well as a church youth-group member or a Sunday school teacher or as a participant in weekly Senate prayer breakfasts, say [F]aith has helped define her, shaping everything from her commitments to public service to the most intimate of decisions.”

These admissions were really striking and encouraging, and while I admire her for her involvement in church activities, efforts in the lives of the marginalized and personal devotion to Faith, one question begs to be asked: In What Do You Place Your Faith, Mrs. Clinton?

The reason I chose this story and to ask the question isn’t because I am some rabid anti-Clintonite. I liked the story and learned some things about Mrs. Clinton’s own faith journey that struck and touched, me. Rather, I think this story on the personal faith-life of one of Election 2008’s front runners is an interesting social commentary on the religious life of postmodern America. Going strictly off her language and personal observations of the culture at large, it seems as thought the act of faith has been transformed into a larger, metaphysical object unto itself; Faith (with a big “f”) is now an entity on it’s own to be pursued and embraced.

Without getting all “in vs. out”, making a judgment on whether such talk is genuine or for political expediency, and especially without judging Mrs. Clinton’s salvation or eternal destination, here are two quotations to illustrate:

[Faith] has certainly been a huge part of who I am, and how I have seen the world and what I believe in, and what I have tried to do in my life.

I am very grateful that I had a grounding in [F]aith that gave me the courage and strength to do what I thought was right regardless of what the world thought.

Here’s the kicker: Faith is really not the key. Having Faith or being grounded in Faith does nothing for a person. What is important is the object to which that faith is placed.

When we fly we may “have faith” in the pilot of the plane, the mechanics, the plane itself, or even the science of flight, but that act of faith-ing does nothing for the actual operation of the plane and it’s ability to stay afloat; whether anyone “faiths” while flying is completely irrelevant and has no bearing on whether or not the plane flies or crashes.

The same is true for our spiritual lives. Read what Paul says in Romans 3:

Now a righteousness from God, apart from the law, has been made known to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.

As Paul says, our right standing before God, the forgiveness from sin we receive to gain that standing, and the restoration of the entire person to the way he or she was created pre-Rebellion comes through faith in Jesus, not faith in Faith. Faith is not the Savior or Healer or Restorer or Forgiver, Jesus is. Not Religion, not Methodism, not Buddha, not Mohammed, not your Priest. Jesus Christ is the Savior and Healer and Restorer and Forgiver of the world.

Having Faith or being in Faith or engaging in a Faith Tradition has become quite in vogue the past few years. My guess is because such talk is incredibly noncommittal. Anyone can “have Faith” and “be in Faith” without it interfering in there lives or the lives of those around them. That’s not the case with Jesus Christ, though. Jesus destabilizes, confronts, and makes exclusive claims that prevent a person from going on with life as is.

Furthermore, Faith itself is nothing without Jesus. I say it again: faith is nothing unless it is placed in Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ. As Paul insists, the righteousness from God comes not through Faith, but faith in Jesus. Finding rescue from our rebellious nature and being re-created to the way we were intended to be at creation happens only for those who believe through faith in Jesus Christ. As Luke writes in Acts 4, “Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved.”

As I said before, this post really isn’t meant to be about the former First Lady and her faith or where (or in whom) she places it. I was merely using her to illustrate this point: the act of “faithing” is not the point, Jesus is; Faith does not save or transform us, Jesus does. I hope that she and others do place there faith in Jesus Christ for healing, forgiveness. restoration, peace, transformation, and salvation, because outside of Him there is no hope.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Post Series
0: Intro
1: Narrative Question
2: Authority Question
3: God Question
4: Jesus Question
5: Gospel Question
6: Church Question
7: Sex Question
8: Future Question
9: Pluralism Question
10: What-Do-We-Do-Now Question
11: Final Thoughts

Brian’s first whipping boy is what he terms the “Greco-Roman six-line narrative.” Many of us are familiar with it’s story:

In Brian’s words, “To be a Christian has required one to believe that the Bible presents one very specific story line, a story line by which we assess all of history, all of human experience, all of our own experience.” (33) His quest for a new kind of Christianity begins by questioning this story line. How does he do this? By claiming that “it’s the shape of the Greek philosophical narrative that Plato taught!” (37)

In two conversations with two separate friends, “a suspicion began to grow in [him]” and he began to “realize it was also the social and political narrative of the Roman Empire.” According to Brian, the historical understanding of God’s Story of Rescue in terms of Creation, Rebellion, Rescue, Re-Creation (or Creation, Fall, Redemption, Consummation as it’s also known; this is my own re-framing) is Platonic.

According to Brian, this narrative framing mirrors the story line of Platonism: we start with a “Platonic Ideal,” which is a perfect Platonic paradise; from there we fall into darkness, which mirrors Plato’s famous parable, the Cave of Illusion; now our being has been transformed and the Greek blood-god Theos is furious because his perfect world is “spoiled and now decaying;” salvation occurs when the god of this Greco-Roman version of the biblical story finds a way to forgive this fallen, pathetic, detestable creation through justification, atonement, and redemption; those who are forgiven/saved are returned to an “eternal state in which they will be safe forever;” those who are not “are banished to hell-the Greek Hades” and the tainted universe is destroyed. (41-44)

On the one hand Brian’s explanation is barely coherent and fraught with inconsistencies (He also brings in Aristotle and links him to Plato to explain this Greco-Roman narrative. I’m pretty sure that Aristotle would take issue with being so tightly bound to Plato as an extension rather than a replacement!) On the other hand, from the start you are required to agree with this framing, a framing Brian supports with ZERO scholarship and ZERO supporting voices. In fact, another blogger more familiar with the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle insists Brian’s reading of Plato is naive and just plain bad. “McLaren does nobody any favors (especially those of us who love teaching Plato) by inventing a syncretic thought-system that simply does not exist in classical texts.” His imposition of Plato onto the historic orthodox telling God’s Story of Rescue is at best inventive nonsense and worst a bald-face lie. Furthermore, not only is his foundational argument inventive and disingenuous, it is so innovative that he could find no one to support his conclusions! From an argumentative standpoint, it’s not looking too good for Brian. The foundational argument on which the rest of the book hinges (Creation, Rebellion, Rescue, Re-Creation is not the true shape of the biblical narrative [35]) is indefensible.

Brian ends his explanation of the “Greco-Roman six-line narrative” by claiming, “This is—more or less, and put baldly—the “good news” taught by much of the Western Christian religion…Its true defenders will quarrel with various details here or there, because their version, no doubt, tries to avoid being this starkly dismal.” (44) He claims “this version…keeps popping up in church history.” I’d really like to know where, Brian? I want everyone to see what he has done here: Brian has created a gross, unfair, patently false caricature of both the Story and the God behind the Story. Theos IS NOT REAL. It is a rhetorical device designed to get you to say, “Yeah, that’s a disgusting way to tell the Story. I don’t want to serve that God!” The Straw Man Brian constructs here finds no representation within evangelicalism by neither scholars nor practitioners. Romans Road, 4 Spiritual Laws, Evangelism Explosion, (models which I myself take great issue with) and the Kyperian narrative itself are not this gross caricature.

Instead, what we find is one consistent Story that God has been telling from the beginning:

First, Creation is never presented biblically or theologically as a “perfect state.” It was “good” and the way God intended it to be, which in no way discounts forward motion and progress. In fact, we understand that from the beginning God was taking Creation “somewhere” into the future, where he would ultimately make his dwelling on earth. Furthermore, Rick Warren is biblically and theologically WRONG to suggest that “life on earth is a temporary assignment” and simply “dress rehearsal before the end.”¹ The world really is our home; we are earthlings.

Second, “the Fall,” or as I like to frame it Rebellion, is NOT an ontological change in being as Brian and others wrongly suggest, but an ethical shift. We understand the Story to maintain that we are still Images of God (we do not share the sentiments of the 16th century Lutheran, Matthias Flacius, who argued our sin changes us into an Image of Satan!), but we are ethically morally rebellious. The shift is ethical, not ontological, but with ontological consequences: death and disease (and perhaps others at the DNA level); the change is in our will, not being, with massive “being” repercussions. In the words of Cornelius Plantinga, we and the whole of creation are “not the way it’s supposed it be.” How on earth could you argue otherwise?

But as the Story maintains, we are not without hope. Rescue came when the One True God came to earth in the person of Jesus Christ. The Father sent the Son to live as a human was intended to live when Adam did not through his sinless life, provide the final sacrifice by entering into the Most Holy place by his own blood as a substitute offering in death, and defeat the dark, evil powers through his triumphal bodily resurrection where he has ascended to the right hand of the Father.

Through Jesus Christ and the church (who is the continuing presence of Christ on earth), by the Holy Spirit, God is progressively re-creating the world to the way he originally intended it to be at the beginning. This Story is not Platonic. It is Scripture. Brian tells a very different story, however.

According to Brian, Scene 1 opens with God telling Adam and Eve that they are free with one exception: “If they eat one specific tree, on the day they eat they will die. Notice, the text does not say they will be condemned to hell, be ‘spiritually separated from God,’ be pronounced ‘fallen’ or ‘condemned,’ or be tainted with something called ‘original sin’ that will be passed to their children. There is only one consequence: they will die…not eventually die, but on the day they eat.” (49-50)

Notice what Brian does here: 1) he rejects the historic doctrine of original sin, which places him outside the historic Rule of Faith on this point; 2) he completely misrepresents and misinterprets the text in order to call into question the foundation of the “Greco-Roman six-line narrative,” which rests on the presupposition that human nature is ethically morally rebellious.

Either Brian is ignorant or patently lying when he says the text says ON THAT DAY THEY WOULD DIE. Mainstream commentators agree that the narrative “is concerned not with immediate execution but with ultimate death.”² Robert Alter—Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at the University of California, Berkley—in his masterful translation of The Five Books of Moses translates 2:17 thus: “But from the tree of knowledge, good and evil, you shall not eat , for on the day you eat from it, you are doomed to die.”³. Alter makes it clear that the verbal construction is consistent with other patterns in the Bible used for issuing of death sentences for the future. Brian’s explanation of Genesis 2 is just plain false.

In scene 2, Adam and Eve abuse their freedom and eat of the one forbidden tree in Genesis 3. According to Brian, this is not a Fall in the orthodox sense, it is a “classic coming-of-age story,” (51) in which “God pushes them out of the nest.” Rather than a fall, it is “the first stage of ascent as human beings progress from the life of hunter-gatherers to the life of agriculturalists and beyond.” Instead of punishing them, God “makes clothes for them, mercifully shielding them from their shame at being naked in one another’s presence.” (50)

Rather than being a Christian reading, Brian is actually making a purely Kantian reading of Genesis 3. Similarly to Brian who paints Gen. 3 in a good light, Kant praises Adam for his willingness to make his own moral judgements, rather than blindly follow the instructions of another, even from God⁴ In “Conjectural Beginning of Human History,” Kant makes clear the Gen. 3 account is, “transition from an uncultured, merely animal condition to the state of humanity, from bondage to instinct to rational control—in a word, from tutelage of nature to state of freedom.”⁵. Though Brian doesn’t celebrate their rebellion against God, it is clear it is not an episode of mourning. Instead he absolutely mirrors J. Baker’s declaration: “What happens there is not a ‘Fall,’ but an awakening.”⁶ In fact, Brian doesn’t even frame this and other acts of rebellion as “against God.”

What Brian does not explain here, is that both Adam and Eve aspired to be “as gods,” which was the temptation from the Serpent in the garden to begin with. The ability to “become as gods, knowing good and evil,” was “as lusts to the eyes.”⁷ The narrative is not about fruit, it’s about power; the story isn’t about a tree, it’s about autonomy, self rule. The promise of the Serpent was “unlimited privileges, unheard-of-acquisitions and gifts⁸ Ultimately, though, they lost “unsullied fellowship with God.”⁹ God is not a mother birdie sending Mama Eve and Papa Adam off to better adventures outside the “nest” of the Garden. No, this is expulsion! They aren’t gently “pushed” out of the Garden; they are thrown out! “Sin separates from God. Intimacy with God is replaced with alienation from God.” This is not the story told by Brian, however.

“Since Adam was the only human being who could have resisted temptation, his failure implies that humanity cannot keep covenant with God…humanity at its best rebels in the prefect environment.”¹⁰ And rather than celebrating this rebellion, the narrative makes it clear this is a bad thing. A very bad thing indeed. Shame, naked, afraid, expulsion are all terms given to heighten the sense of rupture. Something has ‘happened’ to humanity in Adam’s and Eve’s desire to “become as gods,” not least of which are physical death and separation from God. Romans 5 picks up this theme, a conversation I have already had here. Romans 5:18, 19 in particular make clear that “in Adam” we are condemned (vs. “in Christ” we receive justification and life); “in Adam” we are made sinners (vs. “in Christ” we are made righteous).

As I wrote elsewhere, “Ethically we are morally rebellious because of the ethical violation of Adam: disobeying God; ontologically we receive the consequences for Adam’s disobedience and our sinful nature: condemnation and death. Theologically this cashes out as “original sin,” though the “total depravity” variation is not completely necessary. You can hold a lighter view of depravity (i.e. semi-Augustinian or even semi-Pelagian) and still hold to the orthodox view of original sin. You cannot deny original sin, however, and still be orthodox. That doesn’t make sense with Paul and that’s simply not Christian.”

Next, scenes 3-4 represent the struggles between two forms of life outside the garden: Abel’s simpler/nomadic herder life (which seems more acceptable to God because perhaps nomadic life is not as morally compromised as settled farm life [whatever that means...]) and Cain’s agriculturalist life as a settled farmer, which leads to murder. (51) According to Brian, this represents a descent from primal innocence as much as it represents an ascent.

In scenes 5-6, humanity is distanced from both garden and farm and now congregate in cities. Humanity has become “urbanized,” which fosters systemic injustices. God responds by destroying the earth, because He refuses to let evil go unpunished. He uses Noah in an act of surprising mercy and later repents for destroying the earth. Post-flood, humanity continues its paradoxical ascent-descent by building a massive tower and becoming “empire builders.” Apparently all of this human ingenuity and technological advancement is itself a bad thing, rather than the ethical manner in which said humans use that technology to try and do what Mama Eve and Papa Adam had tried at the beginning: “to become as gods.”

After 11 chapters “this repeated pattern of human stupidity and divine fidelity opens into something new: God calls Abraham and Sarah and imbues them with a new identity as the father and mother of a nation who will be blessed in order to bring blessing to all nations.” (53) First, I would argue that “human stupidity” and “divine fidelity” are misnomers: it isn’t human “stupidity” it’s about individual human sin and rebellion against God in an attempt to “become as gods;” Second, while the Genesis narrative and, more broadly, the Israelites story does revolved around chapter 12 with the calling of Abraham, it seems as though Brian is attempting to pivot God’s entire story around Abraham in order to reduce the Christian faith to be one among three options of reaching God. As I previously mentioned, Brian sits on the Board of Directors for a nonprofit called Abrahamic Alliance, an organization that “exists to unite faithful Jews, Christians, and Muslims who are deeply committed to loving the God of our father Abraham,” “where children of Abraham…enjoy peaceful coexistence and mutual appreciation of our faith is deepened by meaningful encounters with one another…” This association is incredibly key.

This is important for this entire blog post series because I maintain for Brian it really isn’t about Jesus Christ, it’s about God, which is very different than the biblical narrative and historic Rule of Faith. Amazingly, Brian’s retelling of the biblical narrative is Christless. Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah is missing. He exclaims, “you cannot serve two masters, Theos and Elohim, the god of the Greco-Roman philosophers and Caesars and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob…” (65) On the one hand, his Theos rhetorical device is patently false and intentionally misleading. On the other hand, the god of Muslims is not the same as the One True God incarnated in Jesus Christ. I would even suggest that unless Jews serve Yahshua Mashiach (Jesus Christ) as Lord and Messiah they aren’t really worshiping the same God, because the Holy Scriptures equate Jesus Christ with the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I will assert Karl Barth, yet again: “God is Jesus Christ and Jesus Christ alone is God…We cannot be sufficiently eager to insist, nor can it be sufficiently emphasized in the Church and through the Church in the world, that we know God in Jesus Christ alone, and that in Jesus Christ we know the one God.”

In the end, for Brian “if we were looking for some kind of short hand for this narrative…we would refer to the peaceable kingdom of God, the marriage of God and creation, the family of God, or the embodiment of God…the story of the peace-making kingdom ignites our faith with a sacred vision of the future, a vision of hope, a vision of love.” (64-65) While I agree with Brian that God is establishing His Kingdom here on earth now, He will also do so with the future. In pushing his new approach, the peacable-kingdom, this narrative “becomes the desired future toward which the people of God orient themselves, the constellation they set course and sail by, the dream or goal or vision or imagination they pursue.” (63) Unfortunately for Brian’s story, Jesus Christ is not the catalyst for this Kingdom, Jesus Christ is not it’s center, and the “people of God” are not distinguished as the Church of Jesus Christ. (in fact, the word “church” appears only in one chapter…which I find odd and disturbing.) Because for Brian, it’s really all about god, not Jesus Christ.

Now that we’ve explored how Brian tells God’s Story of Rescue, Wednesday we will explore how Brian views the Holy Scriptures. Stay tuned.

Popularity: 1% [?]

1. Rick Warren, Purpose Driven Life, 36, 47. [↩]
2. Oswalt, Genesis 1-17, 172. [↩]
3. Alter, Five Books of Moses, 21. [↩]
4. Oswald, Genesis, 211. [↩]
5. Kant, Kant on History, 60 [↩]
6. J. Baker, “The Myth of Man’s ‘Fall’—A Reappraisal,” ExpTime 92 (1980/1981) 235-37, p. 236. [↩]
7. Alter, Five Books of Moses, 24. [↩]
8. Oswald, Genesis, 208. [↩]
9. Oswald, Genesis, 208. [↩]
10. Waltke, Genesis, 100. [↩]

In light of the new discussion on Brian McLaren’s new book, A New Kind of Christianity, I thought these words from the Archbishop were timely and important. Thoughts?

—————————————–

In an address exploring the finality of Christ in a pluralist world on Tuesday, Dr Rowan Williams said people who believed in absolute truth were liable to be branded bigots or intolerant by those who felt that what was right for some was not necessarily right for others.

“Belief in the uniqueness or finality of Christ is something that sits very badly indeed, not just with a plural society but with a society that regards itself as liberal or democratic,” he said.

“This is a world where the ideal is simply to be presented with the choice that makes you comfortable and the question of truth or finality isn’t really allowed to arise.”

The Archbishop admitted that accepting the uniqueness of Christ was “problematic” for many people and that Christians faced the challenge of communicating what they believe.

He added, however, that giving up on the uniqueness of Christ was not “sensible”.

“Christians have claimed and will still claim that when you realise God calls you simply as a human being into that relationship of intimacy with Jesus, then you understand something about God which cannot be replaced or supplemented,” he said.

“The finality lies in the recognition that now there is something you cannot forget about God and humanity and which you cannot correct as if it were simply an interesting theory about God and humanity.”

The Archbishop said that affirming the uniqueness and finality of Christ, rather than being unfair to those who had not heard of Him, made possible the universal reconcilability and fellowship of human beings.

He warned that there was a danger of “treating others as if they know nothing, and we have nothing to learn” if Christians simply believed there was no hope for people outside of the Christian faith.

A belief in the uniqueness and finality of Christ, he said, gave Christians a “generous desire to share” and a “humble desire to learn”.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Post Series
0: Intro
1: Narrative Question
2: Authority Question
3: God Question
4: Jesus Question
5: Gospel Question
6: Church Question
7: Sex Question
8: Future Question
9: Pluralism Question
10: What-Do-We-Do-Now Question
11: Final Thoughts

This is my second attempt at writing the intro to my introduction to the series on Brian McLaren’s new book, A New Kind of Christianity. My first was heavy on the snicker and snark with little sensitivity to the man behind the curtain. I’ve struggled with how to introduce this series because of how much I’ve struggled with the book. Yes, I’ve struggled with the ideas and theology and writing itself. For me it’s more than that:

I don’t get it.

I don’t understand what happened. How did Brian get from THERE <——-to——-> HERE? The Brian of ANKofXianity doesn’t seem like the same guy who launched this whole Emergent journey nearly a decade ago. The man behind this book just doesn’t seem like the guy I encountered in his first-ever book, The Church on the Other Side, the man who was as generous in his orthodoxy as he was genuinely appreciative toward orthodoxy itself, and the wandering, yet tethered, theo-explorer I found in his mythic characters Neo or Pastor Dan.

Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t know Brian McLaren. I’ve had a few encounters and conversations with him, like at some sessions at the National Pastors Conference a year ago. But I also attended his church for half a year and was involved in a social justice project he helped coordinate while in Washington D.C. Here’s the thing: I leapt into his church and into this social activism because I trusted Brian and his voice. While wading through my own spiritual deconstruction process five years ago, I gravitated to the only person I knew who was asking the questions I was asking, but seemed tethered to the “pieces” that still mattered to the Christian faith. I respected him for his prophetic voice and when people bleated and bellowed on and on about his so-called “heresy,” I defended. I went to the mat with my boss in ministry, skeptical friends, and mortified parents.

So when I ask, “what happened?” I ask the question as one who was, to some extent, personally invested. Sure I man-crushed on the guy a bit to hard, but I sought his wisdom and insight and church community to help me navigate the terra nova at the intersection of postmodernity and Christian spirituality. I saw in Brian a desire to peal away the crap the USAmerican Church attached to Jesus and the Cross, while not cashing in the farm completely.

That, however, has changed.

While I know I have shifted in my own spiritual/theological journey, it is clear Brian has progressively shifted, too. I highly doubt Brian would have guessed 28 years ago at the beginning of his pastoral Christian ministry that he would push a new kind of Christianity that scantily reflects the Holy Scriptures and subverts the historical Rule of Faith that believes Jesus Christ is exclusively Lord and Messiah. Unfortunately, this seems to be the case.

Though Brian wonders aloud “How did a mild-manner guy like me get into so much trouble” (2) and insists he “never planned to become a ‘controversial religious leader,’” (3) he is the one to blame. He is the one who has shifted and engaged in this current theological endeavor. This theological enterprise is not accidentally garnering unwarranted criticism because there is nothing accidental about Brian’s theological endeavor: Brian’s book is a bold, intentional rhetorical tour de force that strikes at the very heart of the historic Christian faith, parodying the faith that both the Communion of Saints and the Spirit of God has given the 21st Century Church;  his work pushes a version of Christianity that falls far outside the witness of the Holy Scriptures to Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Savior.

I realize these are bold, strong claims, ones I will exegetically and theologically unpack over the course of the next month in 10 posts that address the 10 questions Brian himself believes “have a special power to stimulate the conversations we (Christians? People of faith?) need to have.” (18) Many of us are tired of people being hoodwinked by the “different” theology being pushed and the hoodwinkers getting a pass. That’s why I want to seriously engage McLaren’s theological offering.

Before then, however, here are 10 observations I have over 200 pages into the book:

1. His portrayal of conservative evangelicalism is a gross caricature and unworthy of any serious thinker. He deliberately exaggerates and distorts the theology and exegesis of those with whom he disagrees in order to create an easy rhetorical jab called a Straw Man. As you probably know, a Straw Man is a logical fallacy that intentionally misrepresents an opponents position in order to easily strike it down in order to give the illusion that said opponent is defeated. Such rhetorical devices litter this book, making it an unworthy conversational partner.
2. Brian makes grand, sweeping claims with skimpy-to-no scholarly support. Perhaps this is why he insists over and over and over again that he had no formal seminary training? This is one of the most frustrating aspects of a book that asks us to take it seriously. For instance, his Greco-Roman narrative claims came to him not through research and scholarly reading, but through two conversations with two separate friends. (37)
3. Brian’s interaction with the Holy Scriptures has no exegetical methodology. Instead he simply asks the reader to take his word for it. For example, his exegesis of John 14:6 is so innovative that he could find no commentary support for it. His presupposition re: the audience of The Book of Romans is just flat out wrong; the consensus among commentators is that Paul wrote the letter to converted Gentile Christians, not Jews.
4. While Brian claims otherwise, the new version of Christianity he pushes bears little to no resemblance to historic Christian orthodoxy, especially Nicene Christianity. In fact, he claims the creeds were mandated by the emperor to promote unity in the church and bring about imperial control. (12) Furthermore, by shoving Christian orthodoxy into his “Christian religion” rhetorical device, he is able to transcend the Christian faith entirely with a generalized “Kingdom of God” motif.
5. His portrayal of the Biblical narrative is Christless, centering squarely on Abraham and the Kingdom of God (which fits nicely with his view of the Abrahamic faiths as encapsulated in the nonprofit http://www.abrahamicalliance.org/ on which he sits as Board member).
6. His view of Jesus Christ in no way affirms that He is God. Instead Brian reduces Him to a revelation of the “character of God.” Jesus is no more than a model citizen.
7. His view of the Holy Scripture is not divine revelation, but purely human conversations in which people simple talk about their understanding of God and progressively, courageously “trade-up’ (his words not mine) their understanding of God for even better images. Brian follows Pete Rollins’ suggestion that our understanding of God is not actually the knowledge of God, but simply our understanding of God, begging several questions: Does God present Himself to us in the Text? Is He even saying anything to us in it? Can we really possess the knowledge of God? These questions seem to have a negative answer, though it isn’t clear.
8. He rarely uses Jesus’ messianic designation (Christ), which reflects his refusal to acknowledge Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah. (So far he uses “Jesus” 204 times, “Jesus Christ” 3 time, and “Christ” 11 times.)
9. He consistently preemptively belittles those who will push against his innovative, new Christianity through gross ad hominems by reducing us to “gatekeepers” (103) anxious and paranoid (212-213), “religious thought police” (85), brainwashers (48), and people who are vulnerable to repeating yesterday’s atrocities in the future (including anti-Semitism, genocide, and witch burning) (85), among many others charges.
10. While Brian feigns theological innocence by merely offering a “new way of believing,” rather than a new set of beliefs (18), make no mistake about it: Brian is absolutely, unambiguously offering new beliefs. Though he may insist he is merely offering questions to inspire new conversations in the interest of a new quest, (18) he knows exactly what he is doing. He is disingenuous when he insists he is merely offering responses to his questions, rather than answers.

In the end, Brian’s McLarenism faith isn’t really about Jesus Christ, but about a vanilla, generalized World-Spirit god that has visited all other religions outside the Christian faith. Like his good buddy, Samir Selmanovic, Brian believes that Jesus and the reconciliation God offers to the world is not found only in the Christian faith (or “religion” as he puts it). In Selmonvic’s book (a book Brian endorsed), Samir says, “We do believe that God is best defined by the historical revelation in Jesus Christ, but to believe that God is limited to it would be an attempt to manage God. If one holds that Christ is confined to Christianity, one has chosen a god that is not sovereign.” (It’s Really All About God, 129) Brian agrees.

In fact, it is clear his entire theological endeavor is a concerted effort to “pluralize” reconciliation to God and His Kingdom by divorcing it from Jesus Christ entirely, rather than insisting that reconciliation to both comes through Jesus Christ alone. While Brian uses the “Christian religion” as a rhetorical device to argue against “theo-containment,” the One True God described in the Holy Scriptures is exclusively revealed in the very human, very divine Jesus Christ. It’s really NOT all about God. It’s really all about Jesus Christ.

As Karl Barth reminds us, “Any deviation, any attempt to evade Jesus Christ in favour of another supposed revelation of God, or any denial of the fulness of God’s presence in Him, will precipitate us into darkness and confusion.”(CD II,1:319) There is little evidence Brian believes that the fulness of God’s presence is exclusively in Jesus Christ, that salvation and rescue and reconciliation is found in no other name under heaven besides His.

After Jesus, there is nothing left. And after Brian’s new kind of Christianity, neither is Jesus Christ.

Popularity: 1% [?]