Darryl's Blog
Recently in Emerging Church Category
In Why We're Not Emerging, Kevin DeYoung writes:
If the emerging church struggles to find a theological center, it struggles even more to define theological boundaries - not just what they are, but whether any exist...
The question is whether the emerging church has the ability to correct its own abuses and challenge the massive theological errors coming from fellow conversation partners. More importantly, the question is whether the emerging church even has the category of theological error. Some do, but many, I fear, do not. As long as we try to live out justice as Jesus modeled and love in community as Jesus taught, that's all that really matters - if the emerging church refuses to stand for more than this, it will quickly lose any semblance of being evangelical, any semblance of being historically orthodox, and eventually any sense of being decidedly Christian.
What do you think of DeYoung's question? Does the emerging church have a category of theological error? This is an honest question. I don't want an attack on the emerging church here; I'd prefer to get an answer from someone who considers themselves to be emerging.
Tony Jones, coordinator of Emergent Village, and Colin Hansen, author of Young, Restless, and Reformed, have begun an online exchange. Says Jones:
Where we probably differ is not so much on theology, but on epistemology. That is, it seems the difference between the people you profile in Young, Restless, Reformed seem pretty darn sure that they've got the gospel right, whereas the Emergents that I hang out with are less sure of their right-ness. In fact, they're less sure that we, as finite human beings, can get anything all that right.
Here's another way I'd explain the differences. An American Christian today is beset by globalization, pluralism, and postmodernism (three terms that I use interchangeably). In other words, the world is a confusing mess. I think that conservative, evangelical, Reformed theology offers sure answers spoken in tones of certainty by authority figures. Emergent Christianity, for better and worse, offers more ambiguous answers (and even more questions!) in tones of less certainty - but, hopefully, at least with what Lesslie Newbigin called 'proper confidence.'
If you're interested in an old white Reformed guy talking to Tony Jones, national coordinator for Emergent Village, then you'll be interested in this interview that took place yesterday. Steve Brown offers some appreciation, but things get a little heated part way through. I found it to be fascinating and a little frustrating at times.
You can listen online or download the interview here.
I hope to review the book they discuss, The New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier, sometime in the next few months.
After reading Young, Restless, Reformed, Al Hsu comments on what emergents and Calvinists have in common:
What's interesting to me about Collin's book is that despite the fact that the new Calvinists and emergent folks might seem poles apart in many ways, they do share a common concern - that contemporary evangelicalism is not what it ought to be. Both critique evangelical Christianity for being shallow, ahistorical, more focused on pragmatic issues than authentic spirituality and transformation. Both communities are calling the church to recover its heritage, the depth and breadth of Christian theology and worship, with a keen eye to missional ministry in this postmodern world, to the glory of God.
Of course, John Piper and Doug Pagitt, while both Minnesotan pastors, have somewhat different visions for the church. And Mars Hill (Seattle, Mark Driscoll) is a different kind of church from Mars Hill (Grand Rapids, Rob Bell). But for all the differences, I think folks on all sides can charitably affirm that everybody wants Christianity to be more faithful, more vibrant, more missional than it currently is...
I have to think that there are others like me that would like to see more fruitful collaboration and dialogue on all sides.
more (via Steve McCoy's shared items)
There are some significant differences between the two, but as we see more missional Calvinists and more orthodox emergents, I wonder if we'll also see more interaction between the two groups.
Dan Kimball is interacting with Why We're Not Emergent. I'm pleased to learn I'm not the only one who feels this book is a better critique than others that have come out:
...out of all the critical books so far written on the emerging or emergent church, this seems to be the more readable and overall balanced. Their tone is somewhat more gentle than others and they didn't just focusing on only one or two people for all of their conclusions. They do say some negative, or maybe a better word is cautionary things about me in it and things I have written.
Kimball also shares some concerns he has with the book. He's been in touch with Kevin DeYoung, one of the authors, and says, "I can't imagine that this type of correspondence to me, isn't what would please Jesus. We have had some very wonderful back and forth dialogue."
Found via Bill Kinnon's link blog.
A recent column at Christian Week:
A couple of years ago I became disappointed with books critiquing the emerging church. The emerging church has been an easy target for some time, but most of the critiques seemed to be focused on one or two writers, simplistic, and sometimes even mean.
The emerging church's influence has grown, and it may have even gone mainstream. Even grandmothers are watching Rob Bell's Nooma videos and reading Blue Like Jazz or A New Kind of Christian. This year I've started to read predictions that the emerging church is beginning to recede. Yet I've never found a critique that fit. A good critique would need to be provocative yet respectful, conversational and funny, thoughtful and yet accessible. I've never found one like this - until now.
A couple of weeks ago I had a chance to talk to Kevin DeYoung and Ted Kluck, authors of the upcoming book Why We're Not Emergent. You can read my review of this book here.
I decided to turn this interview into a podcast, which you can download below as an MP3:
From Why We're Not Emergent, a book that I reviewed yesterday:
I'm convinced there are just as many of us - Christian and not - in our postmodern world who are tired of endless uncertainties and doctrinal repaintings. We are tired of indecision and inconsistency reheated and served to us as paradox and mystery. Some of us long for teaching that has authority, ethics rooted in dogma, and something unique in this world of banal diversity. We long for Jesus - not a shapeless, formless, goodhearted ethical teacher Jesus, but the Jesus of the New Testament, the Jesus of the church, the Jesus of faith, the Jesus of two millennia of Christian witness with all of its unchanging and edgy doctrinal propositions.
A couple of years ago, I found myself disappointed with many of the critiques of the emerging church. Some were nasty, and some did a poor job of capturing the movement (or whatever you call it).
But something's changed. For one thing, I have. I can relate to what Trevin Wax has said: "Many who initially intrigued by the Emerging conversation are now distancing themselves from Emerging theology." (See Trevin's entire post.) Something else has changed as well: the quality of the critique. A case in point is Why We're Not Emergent: By Two Guys Who Should Be.
What do I like about this book?
Westminster Books has a funny post about Keller's new book The Reason for God:
WTS student Art Boulet actually stood outside our doors in freezing rain to be the first customer to get a copy. After making sure he understood that this was not an eighth Harry Potter book, we gladly sold Art four copies. He says one is for his room, one for his car, one to give to his girlfriend…and even one for his bathroom!
Totally ridiculous. It's just a book. Almost as ridiculous as me finding out last night that Indigo has some copies in stock a few days early and actually dreaming about the book in my sleep last night. Not that it happened. I'm denying everything. I'm just saying.
In any case, I picked up a copy today and I'm loving it. It got me thinking: Keller is an effective apologist not only in the traditional sense. It seems that he has succeeded in showing many who belong to a skeptical Christian generation that the questions that led to the rise of the emerging church can be answered by a robust faith that blends humble, solid orthodoxy with social action and praxis.
In other words, I wonder if Keller has been as much of an apologist within the church as he has outside of it.