I love this post from my former co-worker and boss in ministry. He is working on his D.Min., and has begun to interact with Leonard Sweet. Lars, you are so right. Our confrontation with new thinking, or theology, comes from our own fear at times. Fear that we will lose control. Fear that we will be unstable. But ultimately, that interaction is good, if not lifegiving. I love that Aslan passage.

The previous post on perfect theology has reminded me of a few things. It has reminded me of the importance of humility in the task of doing theology. It has also reminded me of the importance of humility in the task of preaching. And it reminds me of the importance of humility, in a theologian, who hopes to go about these two tasks: And these things remind me of Karl Barth. Karl Barth, is considered by many to be one of the greatest theologians of all time, and certainly of the 20th century. His sheer theological output is stunning. If anyone, should somehow, approach the task of theology and preaching without humbleness, you think it would be someone with such an amazing resume. But that is not the case. Karl Barth, more than most people that I have read, approached the task of theology, or Dogmatics, and the task of preaching, or Proclamation, with great humility.

As we have been discussing the issue of preaching, teaching, dialogue, and perfect theology, I am reminded of his opening statements in Church Dogmatics, where he discusses the relation of dogmatics to preaching, and does so with great humbleness. He would say that in no way should we imagine that we have become masters of these things, otherwise we forget our position in relation to Jesus Christ. A theology of preaching will really begin to develop in the first 100 pages of this text as well.

Too many of us do not approach God, theology, or preaching with the humility that is necessary, and that was demonstated to us in the life of Jesus Christ (Phil. 2:5-11). We instead push for perfectionism, and believe with a lack of humility that we have the correct answer for everything. And with a lack of humility we believe that only if we, were given the chance to preach, we would change this church around. Humility is something that is often lacking in ministry, and we are all vulnerable to it. Barth reminds me of the importance of humility in our theology and preaching.

He says this, in:

Volume 1/1: The Word of God
A. On the relation of dogmatics to proclamation (pp, 85-87)
(underlinings are my emphasis)

Like the subject-matter of Christianity, Church proclamation must also remain free in the last resort, free to receive the command which it must always receive afresh from that free life of the subject-matter of Christianity. Church proclamation and not dogmatics is immediate to God in the Church. Proclamation is essential, dogmatics is needed only for the sake of it. Dogmatics lives by it to the extent that it lives only in the Church. In proclamation, and in God, revelation and faith only to the degree that these are its objects, dogmatics is to seek its material.

Thank you to my favorite professor, Ray Anderson, who instilled in me and many other students, a love for Karl Barth, Bonhoeffer, and many others. Like these theologians, Dr. Anderson is a professor who challenges his students to think through the tough issues, and who demands that one integrates theology into the life of ministry, and vice-versa.

Evangelical Outpost has a great post today on the blog, @ Large. Evangelical Outpost was especially taken by this comment:

Reformed theology is consistent, logical, and nearly irrefutable. True seekers find it attractive, even seductive in its intellectual beauty. And therein lies its biggest flaw: Perfection.

If Satan cannot discourage a man from believing the Scriptures, he will have him idolize them, to find them precious not as the breath of God, but as a system of logic, beautiful in itself. We might name this idol Bibliolatry.

Interesting thoughts. And something I see happening a lot, especially in college ministry. College ministry is done in a very academic context, and students are wanting to express themselves, and their faith, in very logical and philosophical ways. This is not a true statement across the board for every student I have in ministry, or for every college student. But there is a large majority who feel that their faith is unfulfilling, or incomplete because they cannot properly debate apologetics, formulate pristine confessions of their faith, etc. They take the ambition that they have acquired in life, and that has been magnified in college, and they often transpose that onto their spiritual lives, pushing, and pushing, and striving, and striving, hoping that their faith, and the expression of it can be displayed and practiced in very logical and perfected ways.

And after a while, it ends up sapping them dry, and they wonder what has happened. This is not only a problem in college ministry, but it is a problem for all ages. I just think that the academic context of college ministry makes it ripe for this to happen. Following God, reading the Bible, and meditating on His words, becomes more of a task that can be checked off, and more of a task that only requires more and more perfectionism. An A student tackles their spiritual lives in much the same ways that they tackle their academic lives.

As @ Large mentions above, we then begin to worship the idol of bibliolatry. To be a follower of Jesus Christ is not simply about following His words, but it’s about following Him. The two are interconnected, yet they are also distinct. I know of Jesus Christ, and how to follow Him, because of His words, the Scriptures. But Jesus Christ is also revealed to me in Scripture, and in the working of the Holy Spirit. There is then, both an adherence to words, and to the Word. To only follow the words, leaves one to begin to worship only that…..But to follow the Word as well, is intimate, and breathes life into one. It is not always logical, it is not something we can always wrap our minds and hearts around.

To follow the Word keeps us from being simply worshippers of words, and keeps us from idolizing the wrong things.

I have been perusing over at Think Tank: Generous Orthodoxy in the Academy, and am very, very impressed. They have got quite a line up of thinkers and writers, many of whom were former professors of mine at Fuller Theological Seminary. They are definitely going to be a force to be reckoned with, and as Smart Christian stated earlier, some people will probably be crying over it.

It will be interesting to watch their blog develop over time.

There are many reasons why I appreciate reading the blog Smart Christian, but this is one of them:

Again, while some bloggers will be crying the “theological devil incarnate,” I say, “bring them on.” In my opinion, a variety is crucial for the conversational health of the Christian blogoshpere.

Thanks for your work Steve. Although I’m sure I won’t agree with everything, for one, I appreciate your efforts.

This comment was made in reference to this, and this.

While some bloggers continue to point fingers, attack, and even list other Christian blogging sites as ones to stay away from or “heretical”, Smart Christian continues to encourage the dialogue and discussion in the Christian arena, though he may not agree with everything. While some sites devote their entire time to discrediting, Smart Christian devotes time to building up, and pointing people towards hope in the midst of a lot of theological discussion and transition. Thanks for your work at Smart Christian.

George Barna has a new book coming out, The Revolution, and it has been causing quite a stir from what I can gather in the advanced readings of it. Smart Christian has been blogging about it, and has pointed us to two of the reviewers so far.

Jason Clark
and
Andrew Jones

Both happen to be “emergent friendly”, but that in no way skews with the data that Barna has presented, but rather instead, probably allows them to enjoy what Barna is presenting.

Andrew Jones does a pretty good break down of Barna’s research, but let me give you a few statistics:

In 2000, roughly 70% of people go to a local congregation as their main avenue of expressing themselves spiritually, and as a means of growth. But by 2025, that number will drop to 30%. Only 30% of people will attend a traditional, local church, while the other 70% attend more homechurch, small group, emergent movements, as Barna states it. By 2025, the majority of Christians will be on a more fringe movement of Christian church, than what we currently experience.

Now I am only reproducing a bit of what others have read. I have no advance copy of this book. I find some of these things very insteresting though. And as Andrew Jones says, we will have to see what the final copy of the book says on these numbers.

Whether you define yourself as traditional, modern, postmodern, emergent, homechurch, seeker, etc….doesn’t seem to matter. What matters is that the Church is needing (and I know many are), to think through new ways of doing church, whether they be slight, or drastic. So while some argue over postmodernity, or emergent, others I think will continue to ask the tough questions, and push the church into the future (Rob Bell for instance), rather than walling up the fort, and hoping to fight off the attack of the impending future.

The Church can be the last place of change, and sometimes that can be good, and other times that can be bad. But I wonder as Christians if we are more concerned with maintaining the status-quo, and our position in the pie, than we are about following Jesus Christ, and asking questions about Church.

Because if Barna’s research ends up being correct, that means a lot of things for us, especially those of us in the ministry, and those of us who are wanting to live out the rest of our lives in traditional church ministry.

What will Church look like in 20 years?

What if how we do Church, no longer exists in 20 years? What will that mean for Church work, vocations, etc?

Do we maintain the status-quo out of an attempt to protect our own jobs, rather than asking questions that may risk them?

So while the Church sits around and debates modernity, postmodernity post-postmodernity (yes this is already out there), people are finding Christianity on their own, because we can’t seem to get our act together, and we appear to rather spend our time criticizing each other, rather than thinking about Church.

If you look down my left column, I have a group that I call postmodern/emergent thinkers. Now I sometimes get some criticisms from others for having those bloggers on my blog. But it seems that those who criticize me on this issue, are those who would rather spend their time searching the blogs for someone to attack, rather than thinking, praying, writing, etc., and attributing to the Church. And these bloggers to the left, they are the ones asking the questions, and attributing to what I think what will be many of the findings that Barna is going to present.

It will be interesting to see how many of those churches that lauded his findings in earlier years, now disagree with new findings, since it will obviously put them on the outs.

PLOP. That was me getting off my soapbox.