You can learn more by going to www.theJesusManifesto.com.

Endorsements by Rowan Williams, Matt Chandler, Calvin Miller, Ed Young, Jack Hayford, Shane Claiborne, Ed Stetzer, Reggie McNeal, Mark Batterson, Gregory Boyd, David Fitch, Steve Brown, Dan Kimball, Margaret Feinberg, Mark Chironna, Francis Frangipane, Todd Hunter, Alan Hirsch, Chris Seay, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Anne Jackson, Craig Keener, Ken Ulmer, Tommy Barnett, Sally Morgenthaler, and others.

I was contacted a few months ago to read and review a pre-release copy. Things have been so crazy that I couldn’t make the deadline for an official review, but will do so shortly. By in large I really liked this book. I am no the biggest fan of Viola’s stuff, but this particular book gripped my attention and my heart, especially in light of my previous frustrations with certain contemporary veins of Christianity as evidenced in my last set of posts.

In short, the book is a call for the Church, especially her leaders, to return to the centrality of Christ. It is a passionate, emboldened call for the 21st century American Church to peal away the American crap we’ve attached to the Cross and also return the vital elements of belief in Christ that we’ve taken away. While a fairly short, quick read, it offers a vision any pastor, church leader and Christian needs considering much of the hanky-panky coming out of evangelicalism.

I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”   

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

Over the last month I have begun reviewing Brian McLaren’s new book, A New Kind of Christianity. At this point it is no secret that I am at odds fundamentally with the foundation beneath the new Christianity Brian is constructing. As I and others believe, the version of Christianity that he is pushing scantily reflects the Holy Scriptures and actually subverts the historical Rule of Faith that believes Jesus Christ is exclusively Lord and Messiah.

As I wrote in my intro to the series:

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.

At every turn in Brian’s theological tour de force, Brian’s faith isn’t really about Jesus Christ, but about a vanilla, generalized pan-deity god that is no longer rooted in the historic Christian faith of Jesus Christ. Rather than faith in Jesus Christ, it is now faith in God, divorced from Jesus and pluralized to include room for other religious faiths, especially for the community of people who seek to be part of the tradition that flows from Abraham.

The theological foundation Brian has laid is made of the following beliefs:

1. He does not believe the biblical narrative is shaped by creation, fall, redemption, because according to him that’s platonic (35).
2. He rejects the historic understanding of original sin, insisting instead the the fall is actually 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 a fall what happens is an awakening.
3. His version of the biblical narrative is Christless, centering on the story of Abraham, thus reducing God to the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, instead of Jesus Christ. (65)
4. In the Bible itself, God does not actually reveal Himself to Humanity. Instead it is a cultural library that “preserves, presents, and inspires an ongoing vigorous conversation with and about God, a living and vital civil argument into which we are all invited and through which God is revealed.” (83)
5. He reduces the Holy Scriptures to human conversations about God, rather than God Himself revealing Himself to humanity. This is clear when he writes, “revelation occurs not in the words and statements of individuals, but in the conversation among individuals and God. It happens in conversations and arguments that take place within and among communities of people who share the same essential questions across generations. Revelation accumulates in the relationships, interactions, and interplay between statements.” (91-92)
6. According to Brian the Bible neither contains the real voice of God, but rather the voices of individuals speaking about God, nor is it a real, single authority for understanding God properly, since it is merely an evolving conversation about Him in which varying people give varying perspectives.
7. Like the Story, Brian believes the Bible is about a general, pan-deity God, rather than the God revealed through Jesus Christ. “It’s the library of a culture and community—the culture and community of people who trace their history back to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The biblical library is a carefully selected group of documents of paramount importance for people who want to understand and belong to the community of people who seek God and, in particular, the God of Abraham, Moses, David, the prophets, and Jesus.” (81)
8. For Brian the Bible is not God’s self-revelation, it “is an ongoing conversation about the character of God,” rather than the revelation of God Himself.”
9. The God presented in the Bible is not a single, complete, unified revelation, but a patchwork of evolved human concepts of God; it is a “record of a series of trade-ups, people courageously letting go of their state-of-the art understanding of God, when an even better understanding begins to emerge.” (111)
10. Consequently, Jesus Christ, unlike the historic Christian faith which says He Himself is God, is merely a “more mature and complete image” of God (114).
11. For Brian Jesus Himself is not God, but only like God, “bringing us to a new evolutionary level in our understanding of God.”
12. Even more damning: Jesus simply reveals the character of God, rather being God Himself (114,118) This is clear from his deliberate refusal to say this is the case, but also in that he willfully leaves out an incredibly key description of Jesus Christ when he quotes Col. 1:15-20: “the first born over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities: all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church, he is the beginning and the first born from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy.”
13. While Brian believes the gospel is entirely about the Kingdom of God, he divorces that kingdom and rule from Jesus Christ and Him alone. He audaciously asserts that Jesus came to announce a kingdom to all people of every religion, a kingdom that has “room for many religious traditions within it.” (139)
14. For Brian, anyone may embrace the Kingdom of God through faith. This faith is positively pluralized and never specifically invested exclusively in Jesus Christ as Lord and Messiah. Paul now points both Jews and Gentiles toward the way out: not a new doctrine, not a new religion, and not trying harder at the old religion either, but faith. Religious laws and practices are inherently exclusive; you’re either circumcised or not, and either you keep kosher or you don’t. But faith—having reverent confidence or dependence on God—is an option available to everyone.” (emphasis mine. 148)
15. Brian claims that “Paul is a ‘Jesus and the Kingdom of God’ guy from first to last.” Here Brian is preaching the Kingdom of God along side Jesus, rather than Jesus Christ alone.
    

Half-way through the book it is clear that for Brian, like many other leaders within the Emerging Church, it really is not about Jesus Christ, as exclusive Lord and Messiah. The theological foundation upon which Brian has built his faith is foreign to and inconsistent with the historic Rule of Faith, Holy Scriptures, and gospel of Jesus Christ entrusted to the apostles.

And here’s the thing: he wants to take the rest of us captive, clueless Christians down the rabbit hole with him. He is the liberator of the evangelical Gestapo and oppressive orthodoxy. He essentially frames his conversation on the foundation with his introduction to Book One. Here is what he writes:

You can’t go on a quest if you’re locked in a closet, cell, or concentration camp. And you wont go on a quest if your captivity is sufficiently comfortable. That’s where we find ourselves: in a real-life version of the classic movie The Truman Show. We live in a comfortable captivity. Everywhere we turn we are surrounded by padded chairs, nice broadcasts of music and teaching, pleasant lighting and polite neighbors, all designed and integrated to keep us content under the dome. Life inside the dome is so perfect that every day we feel little more afraid of the cold, unedited world outside.

The chains, locks, bars, and barbed wire that hold us are usually disguised so well that they have a homey feel to us. We see our guards not as guards at all, but as pleasant custodians in clerical robes or casual suits. They’ve been to graduate school where many of them mastered the techniques of friendly manipulation, always with a penetrating smile and a firm, heavy hand on the shoulder. We like them. They like us.

The high-tech security system that holds us inside the dome can be unlocked, should we ever wish to leave. The key is a question. When you ask it, something clicks. and you are free.

Unfortunately, freedom is not what Brian is bringing with his new kind of Christianity. Freedom comes from the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ alone. Brian’s Christianity is about god, not Jesus, which in the end really isn’t about Christianity at all.

In the interest of full disclosure, I did hear about this program from my wife who works in the Bible department at Zondervan, and I, being the lovely, supportive husband I am, thought it would be cool to sign up! A new blogger package is developing for this important new study Bible, and I jumped on board to sign up. But to make it clear, I am not being compensated for this giveaway, other than being married to greatest gal on the planet!

More details will come next week Tuesday. What I can share right now is this: The Case for the Resurrection will be an “easier” prize to fetch, while The Case for Christ Study Bible will take a bit more effort to win this gem. I have appreciated Lee Strobel’s contribution to the Church and greater community for a while, and am pleased with his latest efforts to see people encounter our risen Savior Jesus Christ. Both the book and the Bible (full review on this to come next week) are great tools for Christians and non-Christians alike who want to better understand and investigate the claims of Scripture for themselves.

Stay tuned…

I hope it encourages you in your own journey through amazingly fearful events.

Friday begins my 11 post theological assessment of Brian McLaren’s new book, A New Kind of Christianity.

These posts will be my hyperlocal thoughts on the tension of spirituality and theology, politics and culture, belief and practice, existing and emerging forms of Church, the Kingdom of God and America, modern and postmodern thought, and the gritty drama that is our collective Grand Rapidian pilgrim story.

Bookmark the homepage, grab the feed, or subscribe to receive emails of my nifty posts straight in your inbox (no spam…promise!) Hope you join our local conversation.

PS—Next week will be a BOMBSHELL post drop. I’m planning to launch a controversial series of posts, so check back Monday for the announcement.

The year is 2020…you are 10 years older. WHERE DO YOU WANT TO BE?

A better question might be…WHO do you want to be?

Who do you want to be as a HUSBAND? A WIFE? Who do you want to be as a SON…or DAUGHTER? Who do you want to be as an EMPLOYEE? Who do you want to be as a FRIEND? Who do you want to be as GRANDPA or GRANDMA? How about as a CHRISTIAN, a follower of Christ?

May you run this years race with perseverance, throwing off your weights and entangling sins and fix your eyes on Jesus. May you also consider Jesus and what he endured for you, reminding yourself along the way that he is right there beside you so that you will not grow weary and loose heart.

PS—At the end I incorporated an Owl City song to end the message, so enjoy that, too

Here some of the text:

Right now, Christianity is seen as a set of beliefs. Believe the right stuff, and you are Christian. Step in this box with its bounded sides, and you are “in.” Step out of line, and you may be outside of the realm of what we consider “orthodox” or right belief. We live and work out of a bounded set constraint.

But there is another way.

A centered set paradigm places Jesus at the center and asks that we move toward him.

Your path may be different than my journey; your conclusions of what may be the best way to go may differ from mine, but that is really not a problem because I know you are headed toward God. I don’t assume you have to have the same set of beliefs as me to trust that you believe in Jesus.

In the case of the big three at Cornerstone, the truth is: All three are headed toward the Kingdom. I trust that. They need not be forced into making a stand or boxing one another in or out. In the centered set paradigm, a conciliatory mind-set replaces a dividing mind-set. As a Christian, I really don’t like seeing fights in the hall of my school. A new way of thinking can eliminate these troubling skirmishes.

I break bread frequently with the author and consider him a friend. I was slightly concerned, however, with a line of reasoning that has become endemic of the emerging church phenomenon, rhetoric a line of thinking which I find unusual within Christian Spirituality.

This line especially tweaked me: “I don’t assume you have to have the same set of beliefs as me to trust that you believe in Jesus.”

In starting a Th.M. class on the early church and beginning to read about men who were trying to hammer-out “a set of beliefs,” this rhetoric is becoming increasingly alarming for me. While i think there is room to talk about the nature of salvation, and while I understand the whole bounded/centered-set “thing” (landing somewhere between the two, myself…), without belief in “somethings” how do we know someone is really “heading toward God?” What does that even mean? As Roger Olson says, the story of Christian theology is a story about the reflection on salvation, and what it takes/means to be saved. In light of that realization, I’m beginning to understand how important the progression of belief really is to present day America.

Furthermore, why is it an either/or? Why cannot someone be bound by a set of beliefs while also pointing toward Christ? In other words, why can I not be a bounded-center oriented Christian? Someone who’s life and ambition is pointed toward Christ (centered-set), while being bound to some beliefs in order to call myself a Christian in the first place (bounded-set)? Isn’t it inevitable anyway, that we will be bound by “somethings?” If someone considers themselves a Christian or follower of Christ or Jesus-follower or whatever, there will inevitably be ideas and beliefs that bind us to that self-embraced title.

My questions to my friend this wednesday will be: “so what exactly are those ‘sets of belief?’ Why won’t we have a similar set of beliefs (or even the same ones) if we believe in Jesus? What does it mean to ‘head toward God?’ How do we know someone is ‘heading toward God?’ Is that the point? How different can our journeys look before we acknowledge that someone is on an African safari and someone an Amazon wilderness hike?”

This post isn’t meant to question my friend in particular, but to question the broader emerging church movement about its bounded/centered set belief dichotomy. How can we be centered on Christ without being bound be a certain set of beliefs? I don’t think it’s possible, and would question anyone who thinks that belief in Jesus precludes belief in somethings, even a set of beliefs.

The next few days is Christmas time for Ukraine, so John and I will be participating in their festivities. Friday I am meeting with a few young leaders to talk about ministry in Ukraine. Saturday I am preaching at the Fimiam youth service on Jesus the Prince of Peace, which will be fun! We are also visiting and teaching at a prision sometime in there and have some other meetings.

Our time here is quickly coming to an end. I am so greatful for this opportunity and have been greatly blessedd. My eyes have been open to some things regarding ministry in the US, too, which has been unexpected. Over all, this trip his been wildly ‘successful’ and can’t wait to see how it ends!

-jeremy

As I mentioned before, I am here with my mentor, friend, and colleague in ministry John Frye to do some teaching in Ukraine, but mostly just learn what it means and how it looks to do cross-cultural ministry. Because it is Chrismas time for the first 2 weeks of January (how would you like to celebrate Christmas for 15 days? move to Ukraine!) there isn’t as much planned for official gatherings for training as there might during other times of the year. What I do know is that John and I will most likely be teaching each sunday we are here in a few churches. I will be joining a larger church’s youth group/college age for their New Years eve all nighter (til like 4am!), while John is off on his own gathering with adults. We are almost set to get to a prison to teach. And we’ll have many smaller gatherings with pastors and families to chat during this Christmas time.

I think what I am most excited about despite these few opportunities is the chance to stay in the home of Sacha Savich. He is a 33 year old Ukrainian pastor of a 5 year old church in Lutsk, the town we are in. I am excited to learn from him and also talk with him about what it looks like to contextualize the gospel in Ukraine and how it looks to be the UKRAINIAN church, not the American Church in Ukraine. That last sentence might sound wierd, but an interaction has already got me thinking about how we the American Church export American Christianity into other lands. I’ve written about this elsewhere (see my posts on Post-Colonial Christianity) and being in another country where I’ve seen America everywhere (like Britney Spear’s “Oops I Did It Again” song sung by a Ukrainian in a Ukraine move on my van ride from Kiev to Lutsk!) I am trying to be aware of how the American Church exports herself. For instance, Sacha is using a study of DVD’s and workbook by Bill Gathered that was done in the 1980′s with 12 young adults in his church in Ukraine. It is a study on christian living and I’m sure it has some good things to say, but I really do wonder how an American pastor’s sermons on Christian living in America (1980′s America!) connect to 21st century living in Lutsk, Ukraine. Maybe they do, but thats the type of conversation I’m looking forward to having with Sacha, as well as myself as I consider cross-cultural teaching and ministry.

Well, there’s a quick note about my time in Ukraine. So happy I am able to be here to learn and so thankful for the safety God has provided so far. Thanks for your prayers and encouragement and look for some more updates daily or everyother day.

-jeremy

This series is based on a paper I wrote for my Systematic Theology class on Christocentric Universalism. It was called, “Assessing the Biblical, Theological, and Practical Implications of Christocentric Universalism and Exclusivism.” I’ll be posting the sections of the paper over the next 2 weeks. I hope it helps you wade through the weighty topics of the nature of salvation, the character of God, and final judgement. Also, please share your own thoughts to help me continue wrestling.

The Series
1. Introduction
2. Biblical Assessment
3. Theological Assessment
4. Practical Assessment
5. Assessing the Polarities
6. Conclusion

At no other point in the world’s history has humanity been as interconnected and interdependent as it is at the start of the 21st century thanks to the phenomenon of globalization. This summer, bomb blasts in Nigeria brought Grand Rapids commuters to their knees with a spike in gas prices. Droughts in the South Pacific forced rice rationing in California. Chrysler cars are produced in The United Mexican States, while Honda cars roll off assembly lines in the State of Ohio. The world is more interconnected spiritually, too. People of Buddhist, Muslim, and Sikh faiths are no longer thought of (entirely) as a “them” across two oceans, but rather live just over privacy fences from Maine to Kansas to New Mexico. Furthermore, through internet social communities, like chat rooms and MySpace, these other “faith stories” have crowded out the Christian story, preventing any one faith from legitimately claiming to be the sine qua non of reality defining stories. Though immediate assumptions of globalization relate to world economic aland political interconnectedness, the Church is beginning to feel the full weight of global religious and spiritual connected, too. Consequently, it has become far more difficult to write-off people of differing religious faiths and is forcing conversations about the nature of salvation, the character of God, and ultimately God’s judgement of humans upon the return of Christ. Because Muslims are now neighbors to Catholics and Buddhists co-workers of Evangelicals, conversations about who is “in” and who is “out”—in other words, who is saved or not—are taking on new meaning, and taking interesting twists.

Brian McLaren, for instance, in The Secret Message of Jesus, wonders aloud if people of other faiths “get it” better than Christians do, leading him to suggest Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, and even former atheists will come from every corner of the earth “to enjoy the feast of the Kingdom in ways that those bearing the name Christian” will not. Similarly, Franciscan priest Brennan Manning suggests there will be a multitude at the feast of the Kingdom who wanted to be faithful, but were “defeated, soiled by life, and bested by trials.” He explains that because salvation is by grace through faith, a diverse crowd will stand before the Lamb, because they have had their robes washed by the blood of the Lamb, without explain how this is so:

I shall see the prostitute from the Kit-Kat Ranch in Carson City, Nevada, who tearfully told me she could find no other employment to support her two-year-old son. I shall see the woman who had an abortion and is haunted by guilt and remorse but did the best she could faced with grueling alternatives; the sexually-abused teen molested by his father and now selling his body on the street, who, as he falls asleep each night after his ‘trick,’ whispers the name of the unknown God he learned about in Sunday school; the deathbed convert who for decades had his cake and ate it, broke every law of God and man, wallowed in lust and raped the earth.

Both authors illustrate a contemporary trend within mostly evangelical discourse to re-think the nature of salvation, the character of God, and outcome of final judgement. This “re-thinking” effort has led to a resurgence of Christocentric Universalism. While this idea is not entirely innovative and new, it does come during a time of intense multiculturalism and sensitivities within the broader culture toward other faiths. Because the broader culture is hyper-sensitive to the belief and faith systems of “the other,” so too is the Church becoming as sensitive and accepting. This renewed form of universalism is countered by others, especially within evangelicalism, who insist that salvation comes through conscious faith in Christ, God clearly insists some will be saved and others not, and judgement and its consequence are real. I. Howard Marshall frames the response to Christocentric Universalists by Exclusivists by saying, “The New Testament does not teach nor imply universal salvation. It teaches the reality of final judgement on the impenitent and sadly it states that some will be lost. That is why there is such an urgency to proclaim the gospel to all the world.”

Christocentric Universalism and Exclusivism, then, bookend a broader conversation on the doctrines of salvation, final judgement, and to a lesser extent God Himself. While both claim to be theologically valid, how should we assess these two polarized positions in light of the broad narrative of the Holy Scriptures, historical discourse on doctrine, and existential encounter with the global other? Likewise, might there be a third way that affirms what is real from either positions? This paper will assess Christocentric Universalism and Exclusivism biblically, theologically, and practically, while providing a possible third way. While not exhaustively explored, these three categories will help assess what might be true from each to provide a framework for talking about the nature of salvation, the character of God, and results of final judgement upon the return of Jesus Christ within our twenty-first century global culture.