In spite of a cold that is only getting worse and making it harder and harder to think, I did finally come to the astounding knowledge that Mark Driscoll is joining us over on the evangelical channel, which must be an impressive distinction, and means that either Patheos or Driscoll have finally reached the big time. I wonder which it is? Oh, and Tullian is blogging too. Because of course.
I mean, you might remember that in the last many months we’ve had some discussions about authority in the blogosphere. Or rather, Tish set the conversational ball rolling, but instead of anybody really talking about it, the wide world retired to Twitter where it flapped and moaned like a toddler being refused a sugar encrusted chocolate. After much desultory shouting, everyone backed off without really addressing the questions at hand, resuming the usual tribal affiliations.
I mean, the question is interesting when you ask it about women. Can Women Speak On The Internet? (Yes) But, in some ways, its a different and more irritating question when you apply it to male pastors who, one might venture to wish, shouldn’t insist So Much on being pastors or being in the limelight so continually. Obscurity is what you desire for them, but they can’t countenance the thought. And so here we all are.
It is an authority problem. (Maybe Lifeway could buy Beliefnet and Patheos, bringing its authoritative publishing discernment into the mix–just kidding). We can ask all the day long who ought to be allowed to speak about which matters concerning the church and doctrine and right living but I doubt our fractured landscape really allows any real way to an answer. But I think another way in, my Favorite Way, is the aesthetic angle.
I mean, one reason we’re kind of in a pickle as evangelicals is that we don’t have the best, hmmmmm, how can I say it…..taste. If anyone finds out you’re an evangelical, one of your immediate and most pressing concerns (if you’re me) is explaining in rather too loud a voice that No, You Haven’t Seen Fireproof, and No, You Didn’t Vote For Anyone, And No, You May Have Said You’re Hearts Desire Was To Visit The Precious Moments Cathedral But You Swear You Were Joking. I mean, part of the problem that we have about authority is that so many of us like and listen to subpar teaching, we like to watch shiny sparkly video clips that let us know that if we just tune in everything will be fed easily on a plastic spoon, straight down the spiritual gullet, without any chewing or discernment required. We don’t wander up to the massive stadiums, the light glinting off the blazing white teeth, the perfectly arranged hair and think, ‘Wait A Minute, this doesn’t look like a church with a bible in it anywhere.’
Of course, when I say ‘we’ I really mean you, or at least Other People. Not all evangelicals have discernment problems. Not all of them lack taste. You can still go to church in this century and sing beautiful hymns and hear solid, intellectually stimulating teaching. In some places you can even partake of the Lord’s Supper and see church discipline enacted. But sometimes you have to wander around in the dusty highways and byways, opening every single shape of door looking for that experience. Meanwhile, pastors and teachers who have already lost all credibility are ready to fill your ears and minds with what they think they know.
Color me bemused. And, of course, unwilling to blame the average evangelical. Jesus compares us, rather too strongly I think, to sheep, whose property is always to go astray, to fall into error and sin, to prefer the chocolate frosted sugar bomb to the drudgery of actual protein and substantive calories. We may want the wrong thing, but our leaders and teachers and preachers shouldn’t be so willing to give it to us.
But nary a platform takes off in thirty seconds with good teaching and sound doctrine conjoined irrevocably with a godly manner of life. That just isn’t a thing.
It is in this spirit that I will now issue a hearty welcome to Mr. Driscoll. It’s going to be fantastic.
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