A Response to "i am emergent, i am not Emergent"

i am emergent, i am not Emergent

This post gets at the heart of much of my struggle to really engage at the emergent convention at asbury this month. I agree with everything he says about being "emergent." The thing is that, aside from the "post-"whatevers, it is simply a description of what Christ calls everyone in his church to be.

I had a good conversation over dinner the other day with the pastor of a reformed presbyterian church in ipswich, mass. named David. Those he leads would not consider themselves "emerging" from what I can tell. I doubt many of them have ever even heard the term (or post-protestant, or post-anything), but David has a beautiful understanding of the gospel and it is exactly what john describes. The result of our conversation is that I have come to feel that much of the emergent conversation is reactionary, not emergent. While we are emerging into a new culture and state of the world, it does not seem like the basics of the gospel are changing. It does not even seem like the interpretations that people have are all that new. I am afraid it is more that we have all seen really bad examples of being church and have met a lot of people who have been burned (many of us included) and we are reacting to that.

I have spent a meal with a very "modern" pastor and it has convinced me that if every church for the past 50 years had been led by a man (or woman) with similar convictions there would be no emerging conversation today. At least no term "emergent" as john has described here. David has art shows at his church and contemporary services and he would probably never label himself as "emergent;" he would simply call himself a Christian.

No matter how much our culture changes, the love of God will be relevant and true. It will not take fancy ways of communicating that love, just authenticity. It is true, we should spend a lot of time talking about what that means and what that looks like and if that is what the emerging conversation is about then bring it on, but if not, lets spend our time doing something else.

I would love to hear people's comments on this because I have spent the last three years in this conversation and planting an "emergent" church, so these new thoughts are quite a lot for me. Any thoughts?

A Response to "Whose On First"

Whose On First

First, I cant help but be distracted by the use of "whose" instead of "who's," but I recognize that is not the issue...

I think that John and Andrew are right in their discussion about the church eating itself alive. Why do we need to fight incessantly about these issues? I hope that all of us are constantly looking at the fruits of our lives. If something we are doing or something we are saying is bearing bad fruit, I hope that we are changing our approaches. Why can we not trust each other to be seeking truth and the love of God? Why can we not all have a higher opinion of the holy spirit? If we did, we wouldnt worry about any of this becuase we would trust that God is in control and that he will see his people through. If we think someone has a bad theology, let God handle it. What are we really going to do? Has yelling at the street preacher who is yelling at those around him ever accomplished anything? I will stop there before I venture too close to "cant we all just get along."

I do want to note my support of Andrew's comment about feeling that the gospel is never about pissing someone off (a bit paraphrased). Everytime I have said this there is the inevitable response of "But the Gospel is offensive..." Yes, I agree that the gospel is offensive, but it is not our job to offend people with it. Our call is to always be able to give a defense for the reason we believe (note the word 'defense') and to do it with "gentleness and respect." The church would have less people pissed at it if we held this as a value with any kind of seriousness.

Playing Catch Up

It has been a bit too long since my last post. However, not long enough to merit a full account of my recent thoughts since I need to go to bed and I am exhausted. I have been here at the Emergent Worship, Art, Liturgy, Preaching conference and it has been interesting. I must say that I am still a bit surprised that worship was included in the list as opposed to being an overarching concept (i had thought the name was worship: art, liturgy, Preaching, but there is a comma, not a colon).

The main sessions have been excellent thus far. Brian McLaren always has good things to say and tonight a woman named Maggie Dawn spoke and it was spectacular. I hope I can find a recording of it somewhere becuase she spoke to my heart and affirmed a lot of the thoughts I have been having about scripture lately. In fact, she poetically spoke on a topic that Kathryn and I had in the car on the way to Boston last week and explained it much better than I did. She was attempting to clarify the understanding that all scripture is inspired. She believes that the inspiration of the scriptures is not about the precision of the words, but about the power of the poetic to speak into particular human situations. I really like that statement. She also commented, "The Word of God is the second person of the Trinity, not the fourth and it should be treated as such." It was good stuff.

The seminars have been so so. I think I have just not gone to the right ones for where I am at currently. They were the ones that I wanted to go to, but they were not what I had hoped they would be. It has been to no fault of the speakers, everyone has done a good job so far, I have just not resonated with them as much.

My overall impression compared to three years ago (my last emergent experience) is interesting. Three years ago we were all still searching, I felt we were all very new to the conversation and the bookstore only had about 10 books and half of them did not even address the "emergent church" specifically (like Dallas Willard's Divine Conspiracy). However, now there are 75 books and 30 videos and 20 gurus...it is a different scene. I am still hearing, "we don't have any answers, just questions," but I believe it a little less this time around. So far this is not really a criticism, I need to think some more about it. We will see how the rest of the conference goes and I will probably comment more.

Eyes, Stomach, and Heart

I think my body is shutting down. My eyes and stomach hurt. I haven't been at the computer too much today or straining my eyes on anything and as for my stomach, I ate a little while ago...long enough that it can't be my meal that is upsetting my stomach, but recently enought that it cannot be a lack of food that is putting me off. My heart on the other hand has good reason to be a little tender.

Today, my father had a catheterization done and in two weeks he will go under the knife for a double bypass and an aortic valve replacement. I have generally written this off rationally as no big deal. I tell myself that if it is his time to go, I would rather be able to prepare and spend some extra time with my dad, than to have him die in a sudden car crash out of the blue. However, this overlooks the stark reality that my mind has never really allowed myself to consider the reality that my dad will some day go away. Now I am...I have to.

I do not know if my dad loves the God I have devoted my life to, but I have never met a man who better exemplifies the redeemed life. The root of who my dad is creates better fruit than anyone I know. There is more grace and love and charity and respect and integrity flowing naturally out of him than anyone else I know.

Now I am faced with considering life without him and it makes me want to vomit. It does not make me want to simply throw up and get rid of that nasty upset stomach. It makes me want to hurl up all that is inside of me until I have nothing left. Then I will weep. Not cry, but weep...sob. The kind of sob that carries my entire body with it into sorrow. The kind of weeping that once I am finished I can do nothing but lie still and fall asleep. The sleep will be brief, but painless.

My dad and I don't talk much. I hope that one day that changes, but everytime the opportunity to talk emerges a lump forms in my throat and I am speechless. I have nothing to say and if that does not change, I will one day lose the chance to hear some of the most fruitful and wise words I might ever have the opportunity to hear. I hope that day is not April 15.

Tax day...he told the doctor that his taxes were filed so that wouldn't be a problem...He was laying there in a bed and wasn't allowed to sit up. He just laid there for the afternoon...Helpless. The surgeon is one of the best (from what I hear), he does this every week. He is usually successful, but sometimes he loses a patient. What if that patient is my dad. Dr. Park will go home and so will I, but I won't have a dad anymore.

Who knows...maybe its all bullshit and I am just coming down with something.

A Response to "And They Claim Love :)"

I do not know the particular arguments that make up the mohler/mclaren debate, but something that John says strikes a chord.

"For me, I am of the mind that for the conversation to move forward, and to truly be emerging we need to truly and openly be able to question everything, and the "mohler camp" would rather we just accept their views and never question" (Spelling correction added).

I have the opportunity to go to another emergent conference this month. It has been over three years since I have attended one, but from that first one I was freed from the bondage of simply accepting the views I had (that I had been given) and never questioning. I was allowed to ask tough questions. Questions that my heart had been asking all along. Questions I had simply quelled becuase of course I had the answers somewhere...I just hadn't found them yet.

Over the past few years I have realized that God is not afraid of my questions. They are child's play to him. He is real and he is truth. No amount of questioning and doubting and heresy will ever change that fact. However, what that questioning and doubting and heresy has changed is me. It has allowed me to break out of the know-it-all legalism of my youth and into a (sometimes) humble place of realization...that I only understand a small portion of truth. Truth is so much bigger than me that I can never hope to box it up and mass produce it and ship it off. I tried for much of my life and it doesn't work.

The truth of God is big and it is beautiful and left alone from our meddling it can speak volumes to the broken and battered souls that we encounter everyday (including our own). The truth of God is real and it will redeem this world, but we will not be a part of that if we insist on being able to fully know it.

I don't ever want to have all the answers again. I don't ever want to have more answers than questions. I say ask the questions and join the dance.