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

Brian’s shift in perspective on the gospel happened during a lunch conversation with a “well-known evangelical theologian” who challenged Brian’s assumptions regarding the gospel by asking the question “What we the gospel according to Jesus?” The theologian replied, “For Jesus, the gospel was very clear: The Kingdom of God is at hand.” He later urged Brian to read Paul in light of Jesus, instead of the other way around. (138)

Before this moment, Brian approached the gospel in a typical evangelical manner, one with which I am all to familiar. As he puts it, “I had always assumed the ‘kingdom of God’ meant ‘kingdom of heaven,’ which meant ‘going to heaven after you die,’ which required believing the message of Paul’s Letter of the Romans, which I understood to teach a theory of atonement called ‘penal substitution,’ which was the basis for a formula for forgiveness of original sin called ‘justification by grace through faith.’” (138)

Instead, “[an] increasing number of us, when freed from the constraints of the six-line Greco Roman narrative and the associated constitutional reading of the Bible, gain courage to speak what has become joyfully clear to us in this fresh reading of the gospels: Jesus didn’t come to start a new religion to replace first Judaism and then all other religions, whether by pen, the pulpit, the sword, or the apocalypse…Instead, he came to announce a new Kingdom, a new way of life, a new way of peace that carried good news to all people of every religion.” (139)

On the point about Jesus coming to inaugurate God’s Kingdom presence, Brian is correct: Repent for “the Kingdom of Heaven has drawn near,” is the opening salvo that launched the teaching ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. “The term ‘Kingdom of God/Heaven’ signified God’s sovereign, dynamic and eschatological rule,”¹ both now and in a future epoch. Throughout three years of preaching, the message Jesus bore was eschatological in orientation; Jesus both established and anticipated the Kingdom of God. Through debates, discourses, and parables, this Nazarene teacher testified to the dawning eschatological reign of God and anticipated the eschatological “age to come” where that reign would be exhaustive and permanent.

I. Howard Marshall affirms that the Gospel writers regarded the Kingdom of Heaven as being central to the teachings of Jesus.² Through these teachings, Jesus declared that the Kingdom would come in the future, yet was also present in someway. Jesus never relegated God’s Kingdom reign simply to the future but instead explicitly announced its presence, while expecting its future; the Kingdom is present and future.³ This “already and not yet” descriptor is now a common place of scholarship, being described as “realized” and “future” eschatology.⁴

For Jesus—as well as the other disciples. including Paul—the euangelian, “good news,” gospel was intimately linked to the concept of the Kingdom of God/Heaven⁵. In fact, I much more prefer the term Reign of God, because the Greek basillea can be rendered Kingdom or Reign. What Jesus makes clear, and what Paul further develops, is that through Jesus Christ God’s sovereign, dynamic and eschatological rule was breaking into earth’s reality. It was happening “at hand,” in that moment, in our moments. The term Kingdom or Reign of God referred primarily to the sovereign activity of God as ruler and king, and only secondarily to the ream over which God ruled.⁶

David Flusser, in his book The Sage from Galilee, presents a convincing case that Jesus absolutely believed the Kingdom had come and was amongst the world. In fact, this idea would have been a fixture of rabbinical Judaism. “There should be no doubt that both for rabbinical Judaism and for Jesus the Kingdom of Heaven is a present reality.”⁷ Jesus’ main task was to be the center of a movement which realized God’s Kingdom reign among mankind, right now in this present age.⁸ “Consequently, when we talk about the [Kingdom of Heaven] we are talking about something that is actually happening here and now.”⁹ God’s Kingdom, the exercise of His kingship, and the manifestation of His sovereignty has dawn near.¹⁰ While its entire consummation awaits His return, Christ inaugurated the Kingdom of Heaven during his lifetime.¹¹ The parables themselves make this clear, beginning with an emphasis on the presence of the Kingdom and its explosive growth.

So in as much as he seeks to shift the gospel to center around God’s inbreaking rule through the Kingdom of Heaven, Brian is OK. The problem is when 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) While seemingly out of the ordinary, Brian is being incredibly consistent with his re-imagined Christian faith, on that is no longer about Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah, but simply about God, a generic pan-deity that is in no way wholly rooted in Jesus Christ. As Brian recentered the gospel around the Kingdom—a task I actually applaud at that level—he fails to root that Kingdom in Jesus Christ and exalt him as the catalyst for the Kingdom in the first place.

For Brian, the Kingdom is “about God’s will being done on earth as in heave for all people…God’s faithful solidarity with all humanity in our suffering, oppression, and evil…God’s compassion and call to be reconciled with God and with one another—before death…a summons to rethink everything and enter a life of retraining as disciples or learners of a new way of life, citizens of a new kingdom.” (139) Elsewhere he writes that Paul himself “preaches the Kingdom of God,” that Paul still carried “the same gospel message he received from Jesus Christ in a vision, the gospel of the Kingdom of God. Whether in person or by letter, he calls people everywhere to be reconciled in the Kingdom of God—reconciled to God by grace through faith, reconciled within themselves, reconciled with others whatever their class, ethnic, cultural, or religious background…This is the gospel of Jesus Christ and of his servant/apostle Paul: the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the good news. Be reconciled.” (157)

While I agree with all of this on the surface, here is my problem: Brian has successfully divorced the Kingdom of God from Jesus Christ! The reconciliation of which Paul proclaims happens ONLY though Jesus Christ. No one else. We are not simply called to “be reconciled.” Every person is called to be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. Paul explicitly teaches this in 2 Cor. 5. Romans 8 makes clear that there is no more condemnation for those who are “in Christ.” The righteousness that we all require, the righteousness of God displayed in his reign and kingdom, is given through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe in Him. (Rom. 3)

No Brian, the Kingdom does NOT make room for all faiths, because all other faiths outside of faith in Jesus Christ are false. The Holy Scriptures make clear that God’s Kingdom was inaugurated through Jesus Christ and is available to all because of His life, death, resurrection, and ascension. Peter himself makes this plain in Acts 2 when he roots the eschatological expectations of the Hebrew people in Jesus Christ, declaring that all who call on His name will be saved. Peter does not say, “Repent and believe in the Kingdom of God.” Not at all! He implores his fellow Jews to “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.” (Acts 2) In fact, he proclaims that, “God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” (Acts 2) He is the one in whom salvation is found, “for there is no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved.” (Acts 4)

As I have maintained in my assessment all along, for Brian it’s not really all about Jesus Christ, it’s about God, a pluralized God that accommodates to all faiths and religious systems. Not only is this incredibly clear in this section as he never roots the Kingdom in Christ alone, it is also clear in his horrible exegesis of the book of Romans. On the one hand, Brian’s methodology throughout this book is pitiful and nonsensical, because he rarely quotes primary sources to establish his claims, leading to absurd conclusions, like claiming the primary audience were fellow Jews (Most modern scholarship is unified in agreement that most of the audience are Gentiles, in addition to some Jewish converts)¹² On the other hand, his conclusions are reckless, dangerous to the Christian faith, and devastating to the gospel itself.

His conclusions are crystalized in his continued pluralization of God and Christianity itself in his analysis of Romans 3 and 5. First, Brian argues that Paul is announcing a new way forward for all: the way of faith. (148) This is mystifying because Paul actually maintains the exact opposite: faith has ALWAYS been the means through which one is made right with God! This is the entire point of chapter 4 and the example of Abraham. Ethnicity, food laws, and nationalism in no way bring salvation. Faith does and always has from the beginning. Brian seems to think otherwise because he writes, “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)

But faith in what? Or better whom? This is where Brian’s color’s shine: God. For Brian Faith is the point. And actually faith in God, as a generic pan-deity. Brian completely ignores the clear teachings of Romans 3 which root that faith in Jesus Christ. Brian completely refuses to exclusivity embrace Jesus as Lord and Messiah. Furthermore, Brian implies that all of our at least the religious systems of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are, in the end, actually unified under Jesus Abraham. After butchering Romans 3, he bludgeons Romans 5. (I realize these words are dramatic, but they are appropriate for the manner in which Brian handles the Text)

Without giving any sources, Brian clams that Paul, in his discussion on Adam, implies “Our diverse religious systems…have many points of departure that separate us, but if we follow any path back to its source to the genesis of our common humanity, we come to the creation story of Adam, where we are united. After unifying us in the story of our common ancestor Adam, Paul presents Jesus as a new Adam, a second Adam, the last Adam…Adam brought death and condemnation to all humanity; Jesus now brings life and justification to all humanity. So we’re all part o the story of the original Adam, and now, of the new Adam, Jesus.”

At this point in the reading I almost put the book down and walked away. Brian’s assertion that all of our religious systems are somehow united in Adam is far from any sound, sane, serious biblical exegesis. I wrote elsewhere on Romans 5:12-21 and will summarize those thoughts here:

Interestingly, the phrase from Romans 5 that is of interest “through one man” is the first time it appears in biblical literature. In classical literature, this idea that someone suffers something because of another (for instance, “I have suffered injustices by a single wicked person…”)((Dinarchus In Demosthenem, 49:4; see also Hippocrates Epistulae)) does appear, but Paul now uses it in accordance with Adam.¹³ Like much of these intertestamental examples, Paul believes that death came as a result of Adam’s sin and now our nature is affected in the way Adam was.

Clearly during the time of Paul, there are signs influential Jewish literature and the 1st century Jewish tradition viewed Adam as a “head” of humanity and that humanity participates in the sin of Adam, enduring the same consequences: death. Paul’s notions in Romans 5:18 that Adam’s trespass results in the condemnation for all people and in v. 19 that all are made sinners through his disobedience are not entirely unique and mirror the same Jewish perspective of his day.

Regardless, though, our Christian understanding of human nature and sin flows from Jesus Christ’s and Paul’s teachings. The historical background must only enhance our understanding of the two without dictating it. 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).

Adam acts as humanity’s representative not in a religious sense, but a rebellious one. And in the broader context which must include 5:1-11, Paul is explaining how BELIEVERS now have peace and hope with God, because of their faith in Christ blood, death, and life. This is not a passage universalism, which Brian attempts to argue. It is clear that those who “reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ” are “those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness.” (Rom. 5) In other words, those who “declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’ and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead,” (Rom. 10) those who are “saved” and “in Christ” (Rom 10 and And in regards to the seemingly universalistic “all” in v. 18 Jewett reveals:

In the context of Romans the concern is not so much whether salvation is universal in a theoretical sense…but whether all believers stand within its scope. This verse strong suggests that Adamic damnation has been overturned by Christ’s righteous act and that the scope of righteousness in Christ includes all believers without exception, both now and at the parousia.¹⁴

In the end, Brian continues his journey away from Jesus Christ as exclusive Lord and Messiah toward a pluralized, pan-deity God. Like his friend Samir Selmanovic, Brian clearly describes the kingdom of God in terms that are utterly disconnected from Jesus Christ alone. Further, he has also joined with Samir by selecting the feature of the kingdom of God as a revelatory ground of “divine immanence,” instead of Jesus Christ alone. Selmanovic affirms this devastating indictment by claiming the Kingdom is not exclusively limited to Jesus Christ:

Many Christians believe that the Kingdom of God that Jesus spoke about is inseparable from knowing the person of Jesus. If so, the question begs to be asked: Is the Kingdom of God present in all of life, among all people, throughout history, or is the Kingdom of God limited to the historical person of Jesus and thus absent from most of life, most people, and most history? The answer to this question depends greatly on whether Christians are willing to make their religion take a backseat to something larger than itself. (It’s Really All About God. 76-77)

Like Samir, Brian believes that God is reveal to the world outside of Jesus Christ and that the gospel itself is more than Jesus. In closing this question, 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. Brian, you are wrong to do this; there is a massive difference between the Kingdom of God and Jesus vs. the Kingdom of God through Jesus.

Karl Barth makes it clear such people as Brian are “oblivious of the fact that [divine] immanence both as a whole and in its parts has Christian truth and reality only in so far as it is founded in Jesus Christ and summed up in Him, so that if, as a whole and in its parts, it is affirmed, preached and believed as a centre in itself and alongside Christ, the Church will inevitably be led back into heathendom and its worship of the elements.” (CD II,1:319). More importantly, he goes on to say that God’s Kingdom is not known at all apart from Jesus Christ, and doing otherwise establishes a Christian heresy. As he warns, “Christian heresies spring from the fact that man does not take seriously the known ground of divine immanence in Jesus Christ, so that from its revelation, instead of apprehending Jesus Christ and the totality in Him, he arbitrarily selects this or that feature and sets it up as a subordinate centre: perhaps the idea of creation…or even the kingdom of God.” (CD II,1:319)

Paul was not about Jesus and the Kingdom of God, but Jesus Christ and Him alone who inaugurated God’s reign through His life, death, resurrection, and ascension. This is clear from his words in Philippians 3:10-11:

I want to know Christ—yes to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection of the dead.

This was the prayer and cry of Paul the apostle: Jesus Christ and the forgiveness, salvation, and resurrection provided through Him. Why is this also not the prayer and cry of Brian, too? At this point, it is clear they are not. How sad, indeed.

Popularity: 1% [?]

1. Caragounis, “Eschatology,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 417. [↩]
2. I. Howard Marshall, Jesus the Saviour. Studies in New Testament Theology (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1990), 213. [↩]
3. McKnight, “Gospel of Matthew,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 535. [↩]
4. Allison, “Eschatology,” Dictionary on Jesus and the Gospels, 206. [↩]
5. Matthew favors Kingdom of Heaven language, while Luke/Mark favor Kingdom of God [↩]
6. Marshall, Jesus the Saviour, 231. [↩]
7. Flusser, Sage from Galilee, 87. [↩]
8. Flusser, Sage from Galilee, 88. [↩]
9. Marshall, Jesus the Saviour, 231. [↩]
10. James Dunn, Jesus Remembered, 408. [↩]
11. Craig Blomberg, Interpreting the Parables, 297. [↩]
12. Jewett, Romans, 70. [↩]
13. Jewett, Romans, 373 [↩]
14. Jewett, Romans, 385. [↩]

A 4 week series based on a paper called “DIGGING UP THE PAST: KARL BARTH AS FOE TO THE EMERGING CHURCH ON THE DOCTRINE OF REVELATION.” Non-identified citations relate to Rollin’s It’s Really All About God CD equals Barth’s Church Dogmatics.

Series Posts
1—Introduction
2—“God Speaks”
3—“God’s Revelation is Jesus Christ”
3—Conclusion

CONCLUSION

Thanks to these emerging leaders, there is now growing confusion within the Church over both the extent to which we may know God and the manner in which He has revealed Himself. It is clear that Rollins understands God as hyper-transcendent and Wholly Other, believing He is far more hidden and concealed than Christianity acknowledges. For Rollins we can neither truly name God nor actually describe Him, because He is not really, genuinely revealed. Practically, this cashes out as what Rollins calls an “a/theistic Christianity.”

An a/theistic Christian can be said to operate with a discourse that makes claims about God while simultaneously acknowledging that these claims are provisional, uncertain, and insufficient; our questioning of God isn’t really questioning of God Himself but only a means of questioning our understanding of God. (98) By implication this would mean the revelation we have of God is not complete or real enough to understand, question, and know Him. This is why Rollins ultimately insists that speaking of God is really only speaking about our understanding of God, not God himself. (32)

Selmanovic, while acknowledging a real revelation of God that can be experienced by humans, believes that revelation is neither exclusively tied to Jesus Christ nor contained within Christianity. For Him, it’s really all about “God.” God is a vapid, generalized World-Spirit (This is the same language Fredrick Schleiermacher uses in his book, On Religion.) that is encased in all religions, rather than exclusively revealed through Jesus Christ, on the one hand, and the Church, on the other. He is unsatisfied with the assertion that Christianity testifies to God’s Story of Rescue and that rescue is exclusively found in Jesus Christ. In fact, the grace of God to which the Holy Scriptures and Church has testified to for generations isn’t even unique to the Christ Event or Christianity. Instead, it is independent from both and common in the world’s histories, stories, and religions. God is present everywhere and in every person and the Christian faith cannot insist on an exclusive revelation in Jesus Christ or the Church. In the end, it is the kingdom of God that reveals God to the world, a thing that is trans-religious and separate from even Jesus Christ Himself. It is a revelation in-and-of-itself which is the gospel, a thing uncontrolled by Christianity and Jesus.

Upon surveying the writings of both Rollins and Selmanovic, one wonders why they are self-described Christians and committed to Christianity at all. If God doesn’t really speak, why posture one’s self as a listener? If God is not wholly and exclusively revealed in Jesus Christ, why commit one’s self to Him and His Story? In response to both religious thinkers, Barth asserts God does speak and He is revealed in Jesus Christ. For Barth, there is real, genuine knowledge of God because God has chosen to reveal Himself to humanity. This divine self-disclosure is in such away that humans can really, genuinely know Him. Barth declares that there is a readiness of God to be known, a knowledge that is “clear and certain.” While the knowledge that humans have is not through their own ingenuity and gumption, but through grace, God is so made up that He can be known by us.

Though apprehending revelation does not happen through our own power and command, it does happen and has happened. Barth makes clear that ultimately Jesus Christ is the point at which the world truly knows God. While others may suggest God is best defined by Jesus Christ, Barth insists He is only defined by Jesus. God is utterly and wholly revealed in Jesus Christ; to know Jesus is to know God. In fact, the only way to know God in intimate relationship is through the grace found in and through Jesus Christ. Barth maintains that God’s grace is only and intimately connected to Christ, rather than other sources and other religious faiths. Finally, Barth warns of the danger of selecting competing centers of revelation apart from Jesus Christ, like the kingdom of God.

In His Church Dogmatics volume on The Doctrine of God, Barth makes clear, “Theology guides the language of the Church, so far as it concretely reminds her that in all circumstances it is fallible human work, which in the matter of relevance or irrelevance lies in the balance, and must obedience to grace, if it is to be well done.” (CD I,1:2) Here Barth acknowledges the difficult task of “theologizing,” of speaking of God and His acts. While that speech is fallible and vacillates between relevance or irrelevance, requiring a healthy dose of grace along the way, it needs to happen nonetheless. Every generation needs to cherish, protect, and contend for the Rule of Faith given by our Lord once to the Church. If not, there is a real danger of precipitating into darkness and confusion. It is clear from the writings of these two theologians and thinkers that a shift is occurring within the Church regarding an important piece of that Rule, revelation.

Though historic Christian orthodoxy has consistently held to the real, genuine knowability of God and that knowledge being fully and exclusively revealed (outside of creation) in Jesus Christ, there are some who insist otherwise. There is a growing number who shove God so far into the clouds that nothing can be concretely said of Him. Others still, and perhaps more dangerously so, find God outside Jesus Christ, insisting God is in every person, every community, every religion. God and His grace is no longer exclusively revealed in Jesus Christ, but possessed by other faiths, too. It is worth ending with Barth’s warning as a reminder for these and other theologians: “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) May this not be the end of these or others who claim Jesus Christ as Lord.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Barth, Karl. Church Dogmatics, vol I, 1: The Doctrine of the Word of God. Translated by G.T. Thomson. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1955.

________. Church Dogmatics, vol II, 1: The Doctrine of God. Edited by G.W. Bromiley and T.F. Torrance. Translated by T.H.L Parker, W.B. Johnson, Harold Knight, and J.L.M. Haire. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1957.

Erdman, Chris. “Digging Up the Past: Karl Barth (the Reformed Giant) as Friend to the Emerging Church,” Pages 236-243 in An Emergent Manifesto of Hope. Edited by Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2007.

Jones, Tony. “Introduction: Friendship, Faith, and Going Somewhere Together.” Pages 11-15 in An Emergent Manifesto of Hope. Edited by Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2007.

Rollins, Pete. How (Not) To Speak of God. Brewster, MA: Paraclete Press, 2006.

Selmanovic, Samir. “The Sweet Problem of Inclusivism.” Pages 11-15 in An Emergent Manifesto of Hope. Edited by Doug Pagitt and Tony Jones. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2007.

________. It’s Really All About God: Reflections of a Muslim Atheist Jewish Christian. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009.

Popularity: 4% [?]

This Friday series is based on a paper I wrote for my Systematic Theology 2 class earlier in the year. It was a reaction piece to the book The Good of Affluence , by John R. Schneider and represents my own personal wrestling with the contemporary expression of capitalism: consumer capitalism. In light of the current economic crises and meltdown, I thought I would post this each Friday for the next 6 weeks. Enjoy the repost and I hope it helps challenge you in your thoughts and conclusions on capitalism.

The Series
1. Introduction
2. Is Affluence The Point
3. Consumerism: The End Result of Sin Marked-Capitalism
4. Globalization and the Brown Man’s Burden
5. Globalization and Moral Proximity
6. Conclusion

CONCLUSION

As I said at the beginning, I affirm the basics of capitalism and believe it is the best economic model for providing an abundant life that mirrors God’s original abundant intentions for Creation. What many fail to consider, however, is that capitalism is marked by the affects of Rebellion, like all human systems. Considering that modern day capitalism is rooted in Enlightenment classical liberal ideology, an ideology that stresses the absolute freedom, rationality, and self-interest of the autonomous self, Christians should not be surprised consumerism and the pursuit of profuse abundance (affluence) is the logical extension of such an economic system. If consumerism, then, is the final manifestation of capitalism, to what economic system should Christians turn? While we should not necessarily embrace socialism or like forms, Christians need to be sober-minded about the realities and risks of capitalism. Furthermore, we need to be honest about how we contribute to and perpetuate the injustice and oppression of the global poor through our consumption. In the end, may Christians fight for abundant living for all on earth, regardless of national origin. May we Christians take more responsibility for the ways in which we partner with the sin of consumerism that affects the world. And may we be more concerned about the vision of restoration–spiritual, social, and economic–that arrives through the Kingdom of Heaven, a true vision of abundance and shalom capitalism cannot provide.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Barbario, Michael and Uchitelle, Louis. 2008. “Americans Cutback Sharply On Spending.” The
New York Times 14 January, C1.

D’Souza, Dinesh. The Virtue of Prosperity: Finding Values in an Age of Techno-Affluence. New
York: Free Press, 2000.

Fuentes, Federico. “Evo Morales Speaks.” Adbusters 75 (2008): 57-58.

Jhally, Sut. “The Dreamland of American Consumerism.” Adbusters 76 (2008): 23-24.

Mills, John Stuart, “On the Definition of Political Economy; and on the Method of Investigation
Proper to It,” London and Westminster Review, October 1836. Essays on Some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy, 2nd ed. London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, 1874, essay 5, paragraphs 38 and 48.

Poutain, Dick and Robins, David. “Cool: The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of An Attitude.” Adbusters 76 (2008): 1-14.

Schneider, John R. The Good of Affluence. Grand Rapids: Wm. B Eerdmans Publishing Co, 2002.

Timmons, Heather. 2007. “New York Manhole Covers, Forged Barefoot in India.” The New York Times 26 November, A1.

White, Micah, “Redemption.” Adbusters 76 (2008): 41-42.
WordNet 3.0, Princeton University 2006. http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/

Popularity: 3% [?]

So my Systematic Theology professor, Dr. Mike Wittmer, started a blog a few weeks ago. He finally took the plunge after some of us had been pestering him about it for a year. He is generally fair-minded and has a new book coming out next month with as equally fair of a look at the emerging church. Check both out!

Last week he wrote an interesting post that I thought I would post here for discussion. I responded twice, and those responses are below. Any thoughts?

Targeting Your Base

My traditional, conservative church rightly warns against the rising tide of liberalism in evangelical churches and reminds us that we must believe something to be saved. Across town, there is a left-leaning church (determined by the fact that “Yes, We Can” bumper stickers outnumber the Christian fish symbol on cars in the parking lot) that rightly speaks about the dangers of legalism, hypocrisy, and the need for Christians to put their beliefs into practice with acts of sacrificial love. Both churches are preaching to the choir.

Recently it occurred to me that churches are like political parties in that each has a distinct base. There is a certain type of person with a distinctive set of beliefs that attends each church. Even its visitors tend to look the same. And if I was a pastor, I think it would be part of my job to regularly offend this person.

C.S. Lewis reportedly said “remember the resistant material” (I heard this from Os Guinness, and though I haven’t found where Lewis said it, the statement is so good that I’m going to assume he did). Lewis’ point was that there is some aspect of the gospel that will offend every person and culture. Our job as ministers of the Word is to determine what part of the gospel offends our culture and then preach that part. If we proclaim only the part of the gospel that our culture already agrees with, then we are being redundant, merely cultural Christians who are not yet proclaiming a transcendent Word from God.

So here are two questions which each pastor and teacher should regularly ask themselves:

1. When was the last time I was offended by the Word of God? How long has it been since I heard a Word from the Lord which convicted me that I was a sinner and needed to change? If it’s been awhile, we may be trying to control the voice of God, only seeing in Scripture what we already believe.

2. Think of the person in your congregation who represents your base. How long has it been since you delivered a Word from God that challenged this person? Has he heard anything in the last month that would make him uncomfortable? If not, then despite your orthodox theology, you may be a cultural Christian, saying only what your base wants to hear rather than what they need—a transcendent Word from the living God.

Anyone can talk about the sins of the other side, but to target yourself and your base, that requires courage and faithfulness. God didn’t call us to preach the Word in general, but to preach the Word to this particular person in this particular congregation. Let them hear it.

Here were my responses:

Read more

Popularity: 1% [?]

…and a friend of mine said I should start blogging again.

Now that a HUGE writing project has been completed and printed, I think it’s time again to start pecking out some “new understandings,” a “fresh clearness” (the rough meaning of novus•lumen) on a range of things within Christian Spirituality.

Here is what I’d like to blog about:

Trinitarian/Christian/Evangelical Universalism

Pelagianism/Semi-Pelagianism/Augustinianism

Predestination

The profession of the pastorate

The Christian sub-culture, especially as it relates to books and publishing

Politics and the Kingdom of God

Is that enough weighty stuff for ya? It is for me! Most of it revolves around my semester as a graduate student studying theology and studying to “be a pastor.” I think these should set this blog sailin again.

Any one interested in goin sailin?

-jeremy

Popularity: 2% [?]