Trends

I am usually well behind the times on church "trends". The church my wife and I belong to is fairly insular in one respect. We don't spend too much time worrying about what other churches are doing. Because we study line by line, chapter by chapter through books of the Bible, we do spend time talking about cults when we read passages that are related to the subject. We certainly talk about how church should be done when we are studying passages related to that. Basically, we let the Bible guide what we do and how we do it.

One of the semi-recent and I might add building, "trends" of post-modernism in Christianity is the emergent church movement, or "conversation". From what I have observed, this is a movement that has, depending on one's point of view, grown out, or grown away from the fundamentalist church movement over the past few decades. They have identified things which in their view were defective in the church and have caused them to ask why church was done the way it was being done. They moved away from what they saw as defective, and are in an ongoing, self-monitored emergence from the old way of doing and being a church, morphing slowly into something they view as a better, more Biblical way of being a church.

One of the aspects that those in the emergent movement seem to concentrate on is their serious commitment to what they view as their responsibility to the culture at large. On the one hand, some of the inroads they have made into connecting with the larger culture of the world could be viewed as small indications of success with their thinking. On the other hand, one has to wonder, in their pursuit of ways to enter into a meaningful relationship with the culture, has the culture of the world spread into the emergent church movement?

I think the question is worth asking in view of the inroads that the emergent church movement has made into evangelicalism. Those in the movement seem to be very deeply motivated with an interest in impacting the culture for Christ through social justice. From what I have seen however, it looks as though the world culture has had more impact on the emergent church movement than they have had on the culture they are trying to reach. For all intents and purposes, it really seems to me as though the emergent church is actually following the world culture, acting in ways like culture instead of impacting it. There is an old story about the hunter who chased the tiger until the tiger caught him.

I think that the whole reason this sort of thing happens has to be with this movement's general understanding of the kingdom of God. The emergent church movement is kind of hard to nail down though, because it is fairly casually connected within itself. It has a lot of younger pastors who want the body to live "missionally" and take the gospel of Jesus Christ to the culture at large. That in itself sounds just fine, but there are problems. Whatever the motivations and best intentions were of those who founded the conversation, I see it as having degraded from something that could have been promising into something that threatens the faith.

Somewhere around ten years or so old, the emergent community's way of thinking has bled into Bible colleges, parachurch organizations, seminaries and churches. I read stuff from all over the world that is peppered with the "lingo". Like I said, it is a movement that is about as easy to nail down as fastening Jell-O to a wall, but there does seem to be two evident branches of this denomination, for lack of a better term. The "emerging" branch would admit to having acquired methods which are harmonious with a postmodern cultural mindset while retaining a sound theological pedigree. The "emergent" branch is comprised of people who while, they have may also have adopted a similar, harmonious approach to culture, may be attacking essential doctrines. That is a very real concern. It has even brought some raised eyebrows from the emerging branch.

I don't mean to say that there aren't things within Christianity that couldn't be corrected, but it seems to me that usually, when someone within Christianity cries out, "I've got something new! I have a better way!" one is better off distancing one's self from it. Liberalism in theology past wanted to appease and accommodate moderns to gain converts. Liberalism today seems to want to appease and accommodate postmoderns. I think that the way that either branch approaches their view of the kingdom of God is a bit off. It has led them to misunderstand the role of the church. That misunderstanding in my view has given them a distorted grasp of the gospel itself.

As I stated before, nailing down a position in the emergence can be difficult, but the one doctrine that the two branches largely agree upon is that as they put it is, "the kingdom of God is here now". I say largely, because even at that, there are some who will say that they aren't always certain of what is meant by the term when it is used.

Emergent authors Geoff and Sherry Maddock have said that, "Our principle desire is to see God’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. We believe this happens when God’s people are renewed around God’s mission of love and justice in the world." Wanting to see God's kingdom come on earth, as in heaven is fine, but how that gets accomplished is another matter altogether. It looks for all the world like what they are saying is that although the kingdom is here presently, that is in a progressive state of growth. What facilitates that growth in their view is Christians living "missionally" on earth. But some key words are, "on earth as it is in heaven." When Jesus told His disciples to pray as He did, I believe that part of the prayer was prophetic. It certainly hasn't happened yet, and it will not happen until Jesus has returned to the earth.

The emerging view of the kingdom of God would likely be in contrast to say, a premillenialist view of the kingdom for example. In; "Adventures in Missing the Point", Tony Campolo wrote of dispensationalism, "This is a theology that – with its implicit threat of being left behind, of time running out – is used by Dispensational preachers to great evangelistic effect. It has been a very effective goad to conversion… To the contrary, the history of the world is infused with the presence of God, who is guiding the world toward becoming the kind of world God willed for it to be when it was created. Human history is going somewhere wonderful."

He sort of misses the point. It has certainly been used to goad to conversion, but just because a theology might be improperly used doesn't lessen its validity. As someone who agrees with the premillennial position, I see it as information that the understanding believer will not use as a club, but instead see as further motivation to spread God's word in as profitable a way as possible, given that time is indeed, "running out."

N. T. Wright claims that the church has had a basic misunderstanding of the teachings of Paul since the church was founded. Wright's stance is that Paul was relating a message to the unsaved world that Jesus had overcome evil, and "was creating a new world in which justice and peace would reign supreme." I have said before that Wright is the unofficial father of the emergent church movement, and nothing has changed my mind about that. His errant notions of hell and his tendency toward universalistic thinking are reflected more and more in the emergence as well. It all depends though on which pastor one is talking to. Some are universalist and some are not.

According to the emergent's most prolific author, Brian McLaren, the ultimate goal of the Godhead is to establish His kingdom here on earth, and He will do that through the good works of His followers. Another popular emergent is Rob Bell. He wrote, "For Jesus, the question wasn’t how do I get into Heaven? but how do I bring heaven here?... The goal isn’t escaping this world but making this world the kind of place God can come to. And God is remaking us into the kind of people who can do this kind of work." Ignoring certain passages about end times events can allow someone to think in such a euphoric fashion, but thing truly, will get a ton worse on this planet before they get better, and they simply will not get better until Jesus returns.

With their emphasis on building a progressively better kingdom, the theology of emergence places a strong emphasis on the restoration of justice, the environment, overcoming poverty and the like. Those things are fine, and they should not be lost on the church, but are they necessarily where the focus of the church should be? While the emergence sees them as a means to an end, I see them as a side-issue. Taking care of those issues will not usher in more quickly, the kingdom of God. Neither of those teachings are to be found in the Bible.

With no silly time of great tribulation to distract them, or a notion that Jesus is coming to judge the wicked, the emergence can concentrate on improving the world. While those efforts again, are okay, it is not a great idea to walk around in quiet optimism when the truth of the word should be jutting out from the pages of the Bible. His kingdom coming will be by His work, and His alone. There will be no prelude to it. It will just happen when He comes, and not through any cumulative efforts of our own. While it is good and right to try to eliminate human depravity and injustice, our actions do nothing to usher in the kingdom of God.