Scot has a thread going with some amazing stories of faith and doubt in the midst of terrible personal suffering. It’s incredible to read about the things people go through and to hear of the grace they find even in the middle of terrible hurt.
In Matthew 4, Satan tempts Jesus with worldly power. Jesus refuses. Hauerwas notes in his commentary:
The devil is but another name for our impatience. We want bread, we want to force God’s hand to rescue us, we want peace — and we want all this now. But Jesus is our bread, he is our salvation, and he is our peace. That he is so requires that we learn to wait with him in a world of hunger, idolatry, and war to witness a kingdom that is God’s patience. The Father will have the kingdom present one small act at a time. That is what it means for us to be an apocalyptic people, that is, a people who believe that Jesus’s refusal to accept the devil’s terms for the world’s salvation has made it possible for a people to exist that offers an alternative time to a world that believes we have no time to be just.
Mike Gene posts this test of ambiguity tolerance. I fail!
Mark Noll’s book Between Faith and Criticism: Evangelicals, Scholarship, and the Bible in America, is must-reading for anyone who wants to engage as an evangelical with historical and critical methods in Biblical studies. Noll sketches the history of evangelical interaction with Biblical criticism and points towards a way forward (a “third way”?) for evangelical scholarship. Noll shows that Protestant evangelicals historically tried to develop theological frameworks, such as B.B. Warfield’s notion of “concursus,” that would allow them to interact with the broader world of scholarship. Here is a somewhat lengthy passage in which Noll splendidly makes his point:
Since the fundamentalist-modernist controversies, however, evangelicals have usually lacked this kind of theological anchorage. Evangelical voices on both sides of the Atlantic have increasingly drawn attention to the striking absence of a secure theological framework for the study of scripture. So Englishman David Wright: ‘One of our most urgent unfinished tasks is the elaboration of a satisfactory doctrine of Scripture for an era of biblical criticism. . . . In particular, we have to work out what it means to be faithful at one and the same time both to the doctrinal approach to Scritpure as the Word of God and to the historical treatment of Scripture as the words of men.
An even more striking appeal along the same lines has come from Bernard Ramm, one of the leaders with E.J. Carnell and Carl Henry in the postwar renewal of evangelical thought. Ramm’s 1983 book, After Fundamentalism, called upon his fellow evangelicals to learn from Karl Barth how to be both genuinely Christian and genuinely honest about the ‘humanity’ of Scripture. Ramm was especially distressed at the ‘obscurantism’ which he felt had beset evangelical efforts to incorporate modern Western learning into the study of Scritpure. Here was the primary problem, as Ramm saw it, complete with his own italics and an unflattering comparison to Barth:
there is no genuine, valid working hypothesis for most evangelicals to interact with the humanity of Scripture in general and biblical criticism in particular. There are only ad hoc or desultory attempts to resolve particular problems. Barth’s method of coming to terms with the humanity of the Scriptures and biblical criticism is at least a clearly stated program. . . . To date, evangelicals have not announced such a clear working program. If Barth’s paradigm does not please them, they are still under obligation to propose a program that does enable an evangelical to live creatively with evangelical theology and bibilical criticism.
The historical record, both evangelical and more broadly Christian, suggests two things about Ramm’s appeal. First, Christians certainly have often done what he proposed. Whether it was Augustine and Platonism, Thomas Aquinas and Aristotle, Luther and nominalism, Wesley and eighteenth-century sentimentalism, or Jonathan Edwards and Newtonianism, the history of the church is filled with orthodox thinkers who have baptized (and transformed) apparently alien world views for the use of the church. But history also reveals that the synthesis of any one era does not remain intellectually or spiritually satisfying indefinitely, at least without periodic readjustments requiring nearly as much creativity as the original formulation. Ramm’s appeal, therefore, does not seek the impossible or the unorthodox, but it does call for the exercise of creative theological energy on a very broad scale.
Scot McKnight has been blogging about a “Third Way” in evangelicalism. Donald Bloesch wrote a book in 1983 — yes, 25 years ago! — talking about many of the same ideas: The Future of Evangelical Christianity: A Call for Unity Amid Diversity. Among other things, Bloesch’s book (and others from that era like it) show that thinking about a “third way” is not just some kind of emergo-liberal babble. Bloesch resonates with me on scripture and epistemology. Here he is in “The Future of Evangelical Christianity” on scripture:
As I see it, there are three basic approaches to scriptural authority: the sacramental, the scholastic, and the liberal-modernist. In the first, the Bible is a divinely appointed channel, a mirror, or a visible sign of divine revelation. This was the general position of the church fathers, the doctors of the medieval church, and the Reformers. In the second, the Bible is the written or verbal revelation of God, a transcript of the very thoughts of God. This has been the viewpoint of Protestant fundamentalism, though it was anticipated in both Catholic and Protestant scholastic orthodoxy. in the third, the Bible is a record of the religious experience of a particular people in history; this refelects the general stance of liberalism, both Catholic and Protestant. Only the first position does justice to the dual origin of scripture — that it is both a product of divine inspiration and a human witness to divine truth. We need to recognize the full humanity of Scripture as well as its true divinity. Indeed, it should be impressed upon us that we can come to know its divinity only in and through its humanity. As Luther put it, the Scriptures are the swaddling clothes that contain the treasure of Christ.
Well there you have it — all of the issues that are on the table today were being discussed by wise and eminent evangelical theologians such as Bloesch twenty-five years ago. And, as Bloesch notes, what we are calling the “third way” is really the ancient way of “faith seeking understanding.”
Similarly, Bloesch deals in “The Future of Evangelical Christianity” with how we define the inerrancy or infallibility of scripture. He says:
On the intractable problem of whether Scripture contains errors, e need to recognize that this conflict is rooted in disparate notions of truth. Truth in the Bible means conformity to the will and purpose of God. Truth in today’s empirical, scientific milieu means an exact correspondence between one’s ideas or perceptions and the phenomena of nature and history. Error in the Bible means a deviation from the will and purpose of God, unfaithfulness to the dicates of his law. Error in the empirical mind-set of a technological culture means inaccuracy or inconsistency in what is reported as objectively occurring in nature or history. Technical precision is the measure of truth in empiricism. Fidelity to God’s Word is the biblical criterion for truth. Empiricism narrows the field of investigation to objective sense data, and therefore to speak of revelation as superhistorical or hidden in history is to remove it from what can legitimately be considered as knowledge. The difference between the rational-empirical and the biblical understanding of truth is the difference between transparency to Eternity and literal facticity.
Again, here it is — a critique of modernist epistemology from an evangelical theologian who is not “post-modern” twenty-five years ago. The “third way” is not an effort to do something new. It’s an effort to correct something new and get back to something ancient.
Michael Bird at Euangelion (fast becoming one of my favorite lunchtime blog breaks!) offers a long post on Evangelicals, the Reformed, and evangelicalism inside and outside of North America.
On some folks in the Reformed wing of North American evangelicalism today, Bird says [correction: I realized after I posted this that it is offensive out of context. I myself am “Reformed” in theology, generally speaking. Bird is referring, I think, to a very narrow sub-set of folks who are probably better regarded as hyper-Calvinist rather than “Reformed”. Apologies for any offense]:
(1) They are more excited about all the things that they are against than anything that they are for; (2) They preach justification by faith, but in actuality practice justification by polemics; (3) They appear to believe in the inerrancy of a confession over the suffiency of the gospel; (4) They believe in the doctrines of grace, but do not treat others with grace; (5) They believe that unity is overrated; (6) They like doctrines about Jesus more than Jesus himself (and always defer to the Epistles over the Gospels); (7) mission means importing their debates and factions to other churches; and (8) The word “adiaphora” is considered an almost expletive.
Preach it Mike! Concerning North American evangelicals in general, he says:
my dear friends in North America have to learn that outside of North America the things that they regard as badges of evangelicalism may not necessarily be badges elsewhere. For example, nowhere outside of the USA is “inerrancy” the single defining issue for evangelicals. The UCCF statement of faith in the UK refers to the Scriptures as “infallible” not inerrant. At the GAFCON meeting in Jerusalem where an international group of Evangelical Anglicans met together, their statement of faith referred to the “sufficiency” of the Scriptures, but there was no reference to inerrancy or infallibility. Ironically, these are people who are besieged by real liberals (not N.T. Wright, Peter Enns, Norman Shepherd, or those Federal Vision chaps, I mean real liberals!) and they do not associate an orthodox view of Scripture with pledging one’s allegiance to the Chicago Statement or to B.B. Warfield.
And further he notes:
there are also some things about North American evangelicals that Christians outside of North American cannot comprehend: 1. Only north american evangelicals oppose measures to stem global warming, 2. Only north american evangelicals oppose universal health care, and 3. Only north american evangelicals support the Iraq War. Now, to Christians in the rest of the world this is somewhere between strange, funny, and frightening. Why is it that only north american evangelicals support these things? Are the rest of us stupid? It makes many of us suspicious that our North American evangelical friends have merged their theology with GOP economic policy, raised patriotism to an almost idolatrous level, and have a naive belief in the divinely given right of American hegemony. North Americans would do well to take the North-Americanism out of their evangelicalism and try to see Jesus through the eyes of Christians in other lands.
Amen brother!
This stone pomegranate might be the only surviving artifact from Solomon’s Temple. Pretty cool.
This is from the newsletter of Dave Dunbar, President of Biblical Seminary. I think it’s great.
Following Jesus into the World
A recent issue of Leadership magazine carries a brief article by Alan Hirsch that cuts through some of the fog surrounding the term “missional.” He first clarifies what missional does not mean. It is not synonymous with emerging, or evangelistic, or seeker-sensitive. It is not simply another way to talk about church growth or social justice programs.[1]
The need for such clarification, fully a decade after the publication of the landmark book Missional Church, is symptomatic of at least two problems.
First is the linguistic fact that the meaning of words is fluid over time. As more people incorporate a word into their vocabulary, its meaning changes depending on the context. Think back to what happened to the words “born again” after the election of Jimmy Carter. This is happening with “missional”–more people are hearing it and using it, and this creates some ambiguity. While it is encouraging that more folks are getting comfortable with the word and using it positively, I share Hirsch’s concern with the loss of precision.
The second problem troubles me more. I fear that those of us in the missional movement have not communicated clearly and concretely. In other words, we must take some ownership for the confusion that exists. My purpose here is to take another run at a simple definition.
At the end of a recent conversation on this very topic, one of the trustees of Biblical Seminary observed, “Isn’t this whole missional thing really just about following Jesus into the world?” Now summarizing a decade of scholarly and popular discussion with one sentence could seem dismissive or belittling of what some of us feel is an incredibly important set of issues. However, the comment was not made with any negative intent and, as I have reflected on it, I’ve become convinced that it may be a very valuable handle for grasping the missional concern.
Following Jesus into the WorldThese words provide a concrete image of the church’s call to mission. The disciple is to be like the teacher. As the Father sent the Son into the world, the resurrected Jesus now sends his followers (John 20:21). The death and resurrection of Jesus is the life-transforming and world-transforming event that empowers the disciples to go, and insures that their going will not be in vain. Like their master, the disciples go forth with word and deed–they announce the good news and they do good works (the works of the kingdom).
Now if you are on board with this, you may be tempted to say, “What’s new about that? This is what I’ve always thought!” Or perhaps, “This is what our church has always done!” Yes, well . . . maybe, but not so fast. The fact is that most of the churches I know are not missional in the sense I have just described. So perhaps your church is different . . . perhaps!
Let me point out some differences between this vision of the church’s mission and what I most frequently observe.
1. The missional vision is outward-facing rather than inward-facing. My experience of church has been of groups that were largely inwardly focused. The primary concern and expenditure of energy was for the internal community of believers. We gave our attention to questions like: How can we improve the worship experience? How can we better care for the congregation? How can we increase the number of people in small groups? How can we provide discipleship for our children and young people? How can we increase attendance and grow the membership?
I am not suggesting that most churches have no concern for non-Christians or strangers–many do. But even where such concern exists, it often appears as an after-thought or as something important that we will get to after we take care of what is really important–edifying the congregation and performing church in a particular place. Is this one of the reasons most churches see very little conversion growth?By contrast, the missional congregation follows Jesus outside of the church. It walks with him through the community. It visits with people who no longer feel comfortable coming to church, either because they feel unwelcome, unacceptable, or unsure. The missional congregation recognizes that some of its most important ministry will take place outside the church. It asks, “How is the Holy Spirit moving in our community and how might we be “workers together” with God?”
2. The missional vision is confident rather than fearful. Following Jesus into the world means we travel with the One who has authority over wind and waves and evil spirits, who heals the sick, feeds the hungry, speaks forgiveness to sinners, and raises the dead.
But much of Western Christianity today is fearful. Our churches have become places of retreat, bastions of intellectual and spiritual timidity. Sundays are times to convince ourselves that what we believe is true even though it seems to have little bearing on the other six days of life in the big bad world.
I am not suggesting that retreat is always wrong or that the world is not a dangerous place. It’s just that hunkering down in a foxhole is not a good tactic if we are serious about following Jesus. He best understood the dangers for himself and for us. “I am sending you out like lambs among wolves!” (Luke 10:3). The church that follows Jesus into the world will chose confident vulnerability over fortressed security.
3. The missional vision is incarnational. I have written about this in earlier articles, but it bears repeating. Following Jesus means that we are disciples of the God who became flesh and walked among us, who combined words and deeds in announcing the good news that God’s Kingdom was at hand. The Kingdom is the coming reign of God who is now setting the world to rights (to borrow N.T. Wright’s fine phrase). All is to be restored, and the ministry of Jesus is the sign and foretaste of what the new creation will ultimately be.
The churches I have experienced focused primarily on words. We stressed the importance of teaching and preaching the gospel clearly–most of it within the church and for the church. Good works were encouraged as a response to the gospel and as a way of saying “thank you” to God for his mercy.
What this perspective lacks is an incarnational understanding of discipleship. The power of the Lord’s ministry is that he not only proclaimed the kingdom, he enacted it. And this is what the missional church has understood: the gospel not only needs to be announced, it needs to be performed. Where? In church? Well, yes, that’s important (though most of our congregations aren’t doing too well on this, right?).
If we are serious about following Jesus into the world, isn’t it equally important for us to “perform the gospel” in the world? When Paul tells the Ephesian Christians that “we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works” (Eph. 2:10) he is not speaking about private spirituality but about the signs of the new creation that God has prepared for us to enact as witnesses to the gospel.What specific good works are in view? A local congregation can only answer this question by prayerfully following Jesus into the “world” (i.e. their local neighborhood). Such a congregation might ask the question, “How would this community be different if the Kingdom arrived in power today?” The answer would offer a helpful clue to the kind of good works God has prepared for them.
So there you have it. A simple idea but, like many simple ideas, profound. The missional church movement is an attempt by Western Christians to reclaim our identity as disciples–people learning to be like Jesus and ready to follow him into our world.
Scot McKnight is writing about a “third way” between “conservative” and “liberal” Christian faith. Today’s post is on the nature of scripture — something I’ve been studying and thinking about quite a bit lately. I think I’ve read most of the recent books on the nature of scripture. Here are my thoughts:
(a) any Christian formulation of what scripture is must acknowledge that all scripture is inspired by God; (b) any Christian formulation of what scripture is must be consistent with the completely truthful, loving, and gracious character of God as the one who inspired scripture; (c) if the God who inspired scripture is a God of truth, then any Chrisitan formulation of what scritpure is must be completely truthful and honest about the phenomena of scripture (meaning it must take scripture as we find it, with all of its marks of humanity, and not as we ideally would like it to be); (d) if the God who inspired scripture is a God of truth, then any Christian formulation of what scripture is must not stifle or react defensively to the search for truth in any discipline of study and must not cause Christians to fear any truth wherever it is found; (e) any Christian formulation of what scripture is must locate scripture in relation to God’s revelation in Christ and in connection with scripture’s overarching purposes in God’s plan of redemption (this implies the role of the Holy Spirit); and (f) and Christian formulation of what scripture is must locate scripture within a coherent and satisfying Christian epistemology. As an addendum to all this, I think we need to remember that any creedal / doctrinal statement about the nature of scripture is not scripture itself; scripture might be infallible, but our statements about scripture are never infallible. Also, we need to say something about the canon.
Taking all these things into consideration, in my very humble opinion, the “conservative” evangelical approach to scripture, rooted in Warfield and summed up in the Chicago Statement on Inerrancy, misses the mark. However, “progressive” evangelical approaches to scritpure, in my view, sometimes seem weak on (b) and (e) — if “conservative” approaches can seem docetic, “progressive” approaches can seem adoptionist.
So as a very tentative first cut at a summary: “Scripture is the true and trustworthy record of God’s plan of redemption in Christ. It is to be cherished, studied, and heard with reverent humility in the community of God’s people through the ages and under the direction of the Holy Spirit. Each follower of Jesus is responsible before God to seek to understand and live out the story of redemption revealed in the scriptures and summarized in the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus.”
I picked up A Faith and Culture Devotional: Daily Readings on Art, Science and Life, by Kelly Monroe Kullberg and Lael Arrington, with high expectations. Unfortunately, it’s mostly the same old evangelical-fundamental half-baked stuff.
Take this from Kullberg’s introdution: “How did [the Bible’s] ancient writers know that electromagnetic energy preceded visible light (Genesis), or that “darkness” resided somewhere (Job) as physicists are now pondering….” Um, earth to Kelly: they didn’t know anything at all about electromagnetic energy or dark energy / matter, and its just silly to read the Bible as if they did.
And so, on and on go the rationalistic arguments, such as Walter Kaiser’s eye-popping “if Sodom was not razed, could it be that our faith is also in vain?” (P. 44). Well, historical referent in the OT narratives is a tricky and interesting question, but if you’re stuck asking this kind of question, and if this is your idea of what belongs in a “faith and culture devotional,” I’d submit you have some big problems on your hands.
Can we get an evangelical-oriented devotional on faith and culture that isn’t just mostly a thinly veiled apologia for inerrancy as it was understood by Francis Schaeffer? Please?