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?
Rap Beefs and the Word
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2 comments:
kris,
i love how you notice beauty, truth and reality around you. thanks for always bringing those to attention.
and i agree that much of what people call _emergent_ is just plain being a decent human being. :)
that said, i must say that i need to plesantly disagree with you. for me, and i admit that many moons from now i might realize that all of this is smoke and mirrors and a language game, i see this culture shift occuring especially around, but not limited to, media. media shapes how we give, receive and process information. because of that, we see the world differently.
i think that the conversations around "church" will continue to emerge or evolve. yes, in many ways there are many reactionary places. but i also think of the many folks i know who were not raised in a christian context who begin following jesus to whom this stuff makes sense.
thanks for your comments - i appreciate how you think!
peace,
the holly
Kris,
I think that your reflection is spot on. . . there is an adage that says that its not fair, when comparing, to take my best against your worst. I think that this is exactly what the emergent church movement (not particular churches) is doing. The difficulty with Biran McLaren et al is that they are confusing the medium with the message. There is nothing wrong with translating the Gospel into a new language as it were. . . but the message can not change. That is my only concern with these guys. I hear what "the holly" is saying about the infulence of media. . but all that is changing is the mode and method. . not the message.
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