{"id":3732,"date":"2014-11-14T10:38:08","date_gmt":"2014-11-14T17:38:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/?p=3732"},"modified":"2014-11-14T10:38:08","modified_gmt":"2014-11-14T17:38:08","slug":"shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2014\/11\/shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement.html","title":{"rendered":"Shawn Merithew’s 9Marks Review of Shrink: A Non-Engaged Engagement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

<\/iframe>\n<\/p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/0310515122\/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=desktop-1&pf_rd_r=1XMA8Z1C578CB6HREZQP&pf_rd_t=36701&pf_rd_p=1935651402&pf_rd_i=desktop\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">Shrink<\/a><\/em> is my third book, so I\u2019ve been through the review process a few times. I know what the author is supposed to say in response to a critical review. \u201cI enjoy the give and take. The dialogue is helpful. This conversation is why I wrote the book.\u201d Usually I can bring myself to say my lines and actually mean them. However, a recent review is so\u00a0careless\u00a0I couldn\u2019t pull it off. That\u2019s a first for me.<\/p>\nThe review appears on the <a href=\"http:\/\/9marks.org\/review\/book-review-shrink-by-tim-suttle\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">9Marks website<\/a>, and is written by\u00a0Shawn Merithew, senior pastor of Morningview Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama. He writes,<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cAs a young man, I was privileged to have a friend whose hobby was building and flying remote-controlled model airplanes\u2026 I shared his sense of exhilaration at seeing his creations rumble to life, take to the air, perform marvelous feats of aerial acrobatics, and return safely to earth. I had a similar feeling as I began reading Tim Suttle\u2019s book Shrink<\/em>. As his thesis rumbled to life and his diagnosis of the church lifted off the ground, I had high hopes for the marvelous truths he would bring forth. But shortly into the first theological turn, the propeller broke off and the entire project slammed into the ground in a ball of fire.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\nInteresting. Charitable. And to think I had to find out online.<\/p>\nOne of the issues I take on in Shrink<\/em> is the American obsession with pragmatism: the assumption that if one\u2019s methodology works, it must be right. When pragmatism finds its way into church leadership, we run the risk of engendering practices that are opposed to the gospel, while they appear to be successful according to the metrics of the culture.<\/p>\nAnother group that has been talking about this problem is the Neo-Reformed* camp, including the predominantly Baptist contingency that 9Marks seems to represent. When I heard that someone had reviewed Shrink<\/em> for 9Marks I was hopeful the reviewer might understand the impulse behind the book, and recognize in Shrink<\/em> a corresponding desire for the church to remain faithful to the gospel instead of accommodating itself to the pragmatism of the culture. Although I always anticipate differences in theological approach, I thought Shrink<\/em> would find a fair-minded reading. I was wrong.<\/p>\nMerithew reads Shrink<\/em> with a doctrinal checklist in hand, a theological grid replete with names of black listed theologians like N.T. Wright and Scot McKnight. As long as Shrink<\/em> was able to tick his boxes, Merithew was reading. At the mention of Wright and McKnight, however,\u00a0Merithew stopped engaging the book on its own terms.<\/p>\nWhen a reader comes to a book with a tightly constructed theological rubric in hand, they have several choices. A reader who is open to expanding the margins of their thinking can allow the book to challenge their assumptions in healthy ways. A reader can also engage the argument critically, questioning the author\u2019s assumptions and conclusions, assessing internal coherency, rhetoric, and style, while offering concrete reasons for disagreement and agreement. Or, the reader can reject the author\u2019s work the moment it deviates from the reader\u2019s script, and then lob hand grenades.<\/p>\nMerithew has chosen the latter option. That he has so chosen is made obvious by the fact that he misappropriates the role Wright and McKnight play in the book. He wrote:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cThe ecclesiology that Suttle espouses is derived from the writings of New Perspective and Emergent Church personalities like N.T. Wright and Scot McKnight, respectively.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\nMerithew is using an actual\u00a0logical fallacy, a specific derivative of ad hominem<\/em> called the association fallacy, or \u201cguilt by association.\u201d By throwing out phrases like \u201cNew Perspective,\u201d \u201cEmergent Church,\u201d and names like N.T. Wright and Scot McKnight, Merithew hopes to discredit my work with a certain demographic.<\/p>\nIn truth, the ecclesiology at work in Shrink<\/em> is not dependent upon New Perspective exegesis; and I\u2019m sorry, but calling N.T. Wright an \u201cEmergent Church personality\u201d is like calling Bubba Watson a \u201cPutt-Putt personality.\u201d Wright is arguably the greatest biblical scholar\u00a0of our time, not some break-out session host for Catalyst. A deep appreciation for N.T. Wright and Scot McKnight is hardly reason for dismissal, unless you can answer their theological claims (a challenge that, to date, no scholar from the Neo-Reformed or Baptist camp has been able to meet).<\/p>\nTo make matters worse, Merithew also critiques me for not being Jesus-y enough.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cThough Suttle makes use of some biblical stories, what is noticeably absent in these chapters is any significant mention of the person and redemptive work of Christ and any reference to sin and salvation. He imparts numerous reflections from Christian authors, liberal theologians, and secular texts; he shares personal anecdotes and gives grand exhortations to be virtuous. But after almost every page, I found myself asking, \u201cWhere is Christ? It is love for him, not love of the world, that is the biblical motive for obedience and true Christian virtue\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThis critique irritates\u00a0more for its immaturity than its substance. It\u2019s middle school church camp with rival youth groups yelling, \u201cWe\u2019ve got Jesus! Yes we do! We\u2019ve got Jesus! How about you?\u201d To engage on this level is to debase and humiliate oneself\u2026 so let me just get started:<\/p>\nMerithew says that I merely \u201cmake use of some biblical stories.\u201d First of all I don\u2019t make use of the bible; the bible makes use of me. The bible\u00a0sets the\u00a0terms, and my life, my writing bends to scripture. Secondly, Merithew\u2019s dramatic question, \u201cWhere is Christ?\u201d is misleading. The name Jesus<\/em> appears 270 times in the book, Christ<\/em> 263 times, and gospel<\/em> 112 times. The book only has 230 pages for heaven\u2019s sake. It seems like a legitimate ratio to me. See what I mean? Humiliating.<\/p>\nThe Lordship of Christ is the major preoccupation of Shrink<\/em>. The gospel is front and center throughout. As I say in Chapter Four, \u201cTo lose the heart of the gospel is to lose the heart of our Christian identity,\u201d (p.91). Jesus taught us that love of God is inseparable from love of neighbor. That God so loved the world<\/em> is the impetus for incarnation. His followers\u00a0love the world as Jesus did\u00a0because the love of God is alive in our own hearts\u00a0causing us to\u00a0\u201cbecome caught up in the love of God and become transformed into the kind of people who go out into the world and image God to all creation because we\u2019re image-bearing people.\u201d (p.86)<\/p>\nIf Merithew had accurately represented my views on ecclesiology, he would have noted:<\/p>\n1.<\/strong><\/p>\nIn Shrink<\/em>, the first step in building an ecclesiology involves a three-page exploration of the biblical use of the word ekkl\u0113sia<\/em>, and the metaphors of \u201cbody\u201d and \u201ctemple\u201d in the writings of Paul. The foundational ecclesiological paradigm is rooted in scripture. \u201cThis is where we start. The church is a visible assembly [ekkl\u0113sia<\/em>] expressing the lordship of Jesus in their common life. The church is the body of Christ, and it is the holy temple.\u201d (p.84) If one wishes to argue about the semantic field involved in\u00a0ekkl\u0113sia<\/em>, or biblical metaphors for church, I\u2019m in. But one cannot legitimately claim the ecclesiology in Shrink<\/em>\u00a0is not\u00a0biblical.<\/p>\n2.<\/strong><\/p>\nThe second step involves assessing the telos<\/em> of the church\u2014the end toward which the church is focused.\u00a0I make two moves in this section:<\/p>\nBreathing in<\/em>: \nI center the life of the church in the faithful worship of Christ \u2013 the glorification and enjoyment of God, through Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit. As we are breathed into God\u2019s lungs each week, we submit ourselves to Christ and to each other in the confession of sin, and the observance of word and sacrament.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cThe church bands together; we give ourselves to the Story of God [scripture and gospel]\u00a0and begin to organize our common life together in such a way that we can be faithful to that story. In my community we call it discipleship. Whatever you want to call it, it is the process through which God draws the church into his lungs and shapes us and forms us, enriches us and prunes us. This process is thoroughly corporate and yet always personal\u2026 And if we participate in this breathing, an amazing thing happens in a church. The Bible calls it redemption.\u201d (p.86)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nBreathing out:<\/em> \nWe are sent forth to bear witness to the Lordship of Jesus in the way that we live our lives.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cThen God exhales. He blows us out of his lungs and into the world. As little transformed agents of redemption, we are sent out into the places we always go\u2014our homes, our schools, our work- places, our neighborhoods, our families, and so on. We go there as salt and light. We go there as people who do not walk by sight but by faith. We are transformed vessels of God\u2019s redemption sent to season all of creation. We image God.\u201d (p.86)<\/p><\/blockquote>\nThe church is dependent upon God to draw us in and breathe us out. We are not self-sustaining, nor can we determine our own effectiveness. We are completely dependent upon cross, resurrection, and the ongoing presence of Christ with his people. The church does not need to engineer results or success. The church must simply be faithful to Christ.<\/p>\nExcept for the introductory paragraph\u2019s mention of the phrase, \u201cputting the world to rights,\u201d Wright or McKnight do not heavily influence the section\u00a0on ecclesiology. The major influence\u00a0is\u00a0obvious. The section is titled \u201cFor the Life of the World\u201d after the title of\u00a0Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann\u2019s great ecclesiological work. A careful reader would also have discerned the foundational\u00a0influence of Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Confessing Church, as well as Hauerwas and Willimon\u2019s Resident Aliens<\/em>.<\/p>\nWhat Merithew was really reacting to was the use of N.T. Wright and McKnight\u2019s work in the section titled, \u201cWhat Vanishing Cultures Do,\u201d in which I\u2019m critical of those who subsume ecclesiology into soteriology. It\u2019s a question of how we understand the word gospel<\/em>, which has implications in terms of whether we finally focus on ecclesiology, or on church models: Does gospel mean conversion of individual souls? Or does it mean redemption of all things through Christ, beginning with the conversion of individual souls? Here I do commend you to Wright and McKnight\u2019s work (How God Became King<\/em>, and King Jesus Gospel<\/em>). I\u2019ve copied\u00a0more of the section\u00a0from which Merithew quoted:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\u201cBoth Wright and McKnight stress the reality that the New Testament is devoted to a gospel characterized by the story of Jesus\u2014his life, teaching, death, resurrection, and ascension. This gospel is about the climax and fulfillment of the story of Israel in and through Jesus Christ, who is Israel\u2019s Messiah, the Son of God, and the world\u2019s true Lord. This gospel is not merely concerned with personal conversion, but with how Jesus became King and how he is redeeming all things starting with those who follow him and call him Lord.<\/p>\nMost importantly, the gospel Wright and McKnight recommend is not concerned primarily with the perpetuation of evangelical culture but with the holistic stewardship of all of life, the land, the people, the animals, the environment, and the world in which we live. Their work stands in stark contrast to the typical evangelical pursuit, too often fixated on a soterian gospel derived not from the Scriptures but from evangelical culture itself\u2026 any robust ecclesiology must include a full-bodied soteriology. Part of why we are so enamored with models that produce predictable growth is that we have been shaped by a soterian gospel. Evangelicals have been convinced that they exist for the salvation of individual people but not for the life of the world. That portrays an incomplete soteriology and a distortion of the gospel.\u201d (Shrink<\/em>, 93).<\/p><\/blockquote>\nEven if I were to grant Merithew\u2019s point, and embrace the\u00a0soterian<\/em>\u00a0gospel<\/em>. The central\u00a0point of the entire\u00a0chapter\u00a0is still valid:<\/p>\n<div class=\"page\" title=\"Page 94\">\n<div class=\"layoutArea\">\n<div class=\"column\">\n<blockquote>\u201cIf you have gotten nothing else from this chapter, I hope you got this: a church model is not the same as an ecclesiology. It\u2019s time for pastors and church leaders to jettison our endless devotion to church models and to grab hold of an ecclesiology rich enough to fund our devotion to the gospel that is concerned with every aspect of our lives, society, and culture.\u201d (p.94)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nThe most disquieting problem with Merithew\u2019s review is that it represents a different kind of cultural accommodation than those challenged by Shrink<\/em>: a pseudo-engagement that purports to engage, while really just mining for reasons to write off anything outside their system. This subscriptionist approach to doctrine, coupled with the inability to question one\u2019s own point of view is precisely what we see on 24-hour cable news, the least common denominator of public discourse\u2014non-engaged engagement\u2014and it renders Merithew\u2019s review of Shrink<\/em> similarly biased and ineffective.<\/p>\nIf Merithew\u2019s issue is that there\u2019s not enough Jesus or gospel in the book, then he didn\u2019t read the book very well. If his problem is with the way the theology is conceived of or explained, then that is a good conversation to have. For now, I\u2019m still waiting to have it.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n* The need for descriptors such as Reformed or Neo-Reformed here is indicative of the challenge involved in this kind of response. I have to denote Neo-Reformed or I start receiving emails from those in the Reformed camp who wish to remind me that the Neo-Reformed are out of step with the history of their tradition precisely because of this subscriptionist impulse, and the refusal to keep on reforming.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shrink is my third book, so I\u2019ve been through the review process a few times. I know what the author is supposed to say in response to a critical review. \u201cI enjoy the give and take. The dialogue is helpful. This conversation is why I wrote the book.\u201d Usually I can bring myself to say […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1118,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1202,32,31,296,1203,615,6],"class_list":["post-3732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-9-marks","tag-alexander-schmemann","tag-n-t-wright","tag-scot-mcknight","tag-shawn-merithew","tag-shrink","tag-tim-suttle"],"yoast_head":"\n<title>Shawn Merithew's 9Marks Review of Shrink: A Non-Engaged Engagement<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Shrink is my third book, so I\u2019ve been through the review process a few times. I know what the author is supposed to say in response to a critical review.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2014\/11\/shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Shawn Merithew's 9Marks Review of Shrink: A Non-Engaged Engagement\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Shrink is my third book, so I\u2019ve been through the review process a few times. 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He is the author of several books including his most recent - Shrink: Faithful Ministry in a Church Growth Culture (Zondervan 2014), Public Jesus (The House Studio, 2012), & An Evangelical Social Gospel? (Cascade, 2011). Tim's work has been featured at The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, Sojourners, and other magazines and journals. Tim is also the founder and front-man of the popular Christian band Satellite Soul, with whom he toured for nearly a decade. The band's most recent album is \\\"Straight Back to Kansas.\\\" He helped to plant three thriving churches over the past 13 years and is the Senior Pastor of Redemption Church in Olathe, Kan. 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I know what the author is supposed to say in response to a critical review.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2014\/11\/shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2014\/11\/shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/2014\/11\/shawn-merithews-9marks-review-of-shrink-a-non-engaged-engagement.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Shawn Merithew’s 9Marks Review of Shrink: A Non-Engaged Engagement"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/","name":"Paperback Theology","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/#\/schema\/person\/63a7ffe567a014f809abae15ebfc44a6","name":"Tim Suttle","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ce6d230b7d3a7d50e5fc4b6c265691fb?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ce6d230b7d3a7d50e5fc4b6c265691fb?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Tim Suttle"},"description":"Find out more about Tim at TimSuttle.com Tim Suttle is the senior pastor of RedemptionChurchkc.com. He is the author of several books including his most recent - Shrink: Faithful Ministry in a Church Growth Culture (Zondervan 2014), Public Jesus (The House Studio, 2012), & An Evangelical Social Gospel? (Cascade, 2011). Tim's work has been featured at The Huffington Post, The Washington Post, Sojourners, and other magazines and journals. Tim is also the founder and front-man of the popular Christian band Satellite Soul, with whom he toured for nearly a decade. The band's most recent album is \"Straight Back to Kansas.\" He helped to plant three thriving churches over the past 13 years and is the Senior Pastor of Redemption Church in Olathe, Kan. Tim's blog, Paperback Theology, is hosted at Patheos.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/profile.php?id=654515438","https:\/\/twitter.com\/@Tim_Suttle"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/author\/timsuttle"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3732","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1118"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3732"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3732\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3732"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3732"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/paperbacktheology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3732"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}