Some students (current and former)\u00a0and I have been reading and discussing a new book entitled Church in the Present Tense: A Candid Look at What\u2019s Emerging by Scot McKnight, Peter Rollins, Kevin Corcoran (editor) and Jason Clark (Brazos Press).\u00a0 It\u2019s an enlightening and stimulating volume of essays related to the concept of \u201cemerging church.\u201d<\/p>\n
My favorite essay so far is by Jason Clark who is coordinator of the Emergent UK online resource network, pastor of Vineyard Church Sutton (UK) and adjunct professor at George Fox Evangelical Seminary in Oregon.\u00a0 It\u2019s title is \u201cConsumer liturgies and their corrosive effects on Christian identity.\u201d<\/p>\n
It could just be called \u201cDeep church.\u201d\u00a0 The essay is about the problem of consumer religion: \u201cConsumer culture relates to beliefs as commodities to be used and marketed.\u201d\u00a0 Clark asks \u201cwhat kind of church leads to cruciform identity, to the unmasking, and undoing of the myth of individualism that consumer liturgical formation produces; what kind of church leads instead to an exchange of stories, replacing fictions of self-creation with the true story of life lived in Jesus with others?\u201d (53)<\/p>\n
Clark\u2019s answer is \u201cdeep church\u201d\u2013one that fights against the radical individualism and consumerism of contemporary culture, especially their influence in the church, and develops an idea of the church as \u201cthe public of the Holy Spirit, a way of life together, where the church is mission, within Christ for the world.\u201d (57)<\/p>\n
I wish Clark had filled it in with more detail.\u00a0 We (the students and I) speculated about his proposal and tried to fill in the missing details.\u00a0 It\u2019s clearer what Clark is against (and we are all against it, too) than what he\u2019s for.\u00a0 Terms such as \u201ccruciform and canonical church\u201d that goes beyond the \u201chydroponic ecclesiologies of consumerism\u201d are intriguing but hardly helpful.<\/p>\n
I find Clark\u2019s diagnosis of contemporary church life, especially in America, insightful.\u00a0 It is caught up in the consumer mentality EVEN WHEN it claims to go against that.\u00a0 As one of the students pointed out, all the alternatives to \u201chydroponic churches\u201d that seek authenticity are also products of a consumer mentality insofar as they make church up as they go along.\u00a0 PERHAPS, one student suggested, the only alternative to this consumer church mentality is the road to Rome!\u00a0 I happen to disagree as I think the Anabaptist approach to ecclesiology is better able to overcome consumerism without falling into tyranny.<\/p>\n
One thing is clear.\u00a0 Many thoughtful Christian people are seeking a \u201cbetter way to do church.\u201d\u00a0 Some are jumping to the church of Rome or to Eastern Orthodoxy in reaction to the rootless, consumer-driven churches they grew up in.\u00a0 I understand that impulse, but I don\u2019t think it\u2019s the right solution.\u00a0 It\u2019s an over reaction.<\/p>\n
I think we can find a path out and forward in the Radical Reformation\u2013not necessarily any specific existing Anabaptist denomination but the ecclesiological pattern of the original Anabaptists that, I believe, was a model of \u201cdeep church.\u201d\u00a0 Such contemporary theological luminaries as John Howard Yoder, James McClendon, Thomas Finger, Dennis Weaver, Stanley Hauerwas and many more have rediscovered this heritage and explored it as a possible resource for developing what Clark calls \u201cdeep church.\u201d<\/p>\n
So what might that look like?\u00a0 I grew up in a church I call \u201curban Amish.\u201d\u00a0 I wouldn\u2019t necessarily want to return to it or use it as a model EXCEPT that it had a certain ethos that I can only describe as deep community.\u00a0 The church was a democracy without individualism.\u00a0 When people joined they knew they were making a commitment to walk with this community in availability, vulnerability and accountability.\u00a0 When someone grew too distant from the community, elders or deacons would \u201ccall on\u201d them and ask about their spiritual lives and commitment to the church.\u00a0 Shame was not used to keep people in line, but there was a high expectation of involvement and commitment and agreement with the mission and purpose of the church which was to be the salt and light of Christ in the city.<\/p>\n
I think of the Church of the Savior in Washington, D.C., made famous by the book Journey Inward, Journey Outward a few decades ago.\u00a0 Membership required a certain number of hours of involvement per week.\u00a0 Both there and in the church of my youth nobody was beating anyone over the head except with reminders that \u201cthis is what you agreed to.\u201d\u00a0 But there was room for people to dissent; these were not cults.<\/p>\n
I see a trend among disillusioned evangelicals toward Rome.\u00a0 A few years ago it was toward Constantinople (Eastern Orthodoxy).\u00a0 I don\u2019t see that as the solution.\u00a0 I propose disillusioned evangelicals explore the Anabaptist tradition or what James McClendon called the \u201cbaptist\u201d (with a little \u201cb\u201d) tradition.\u00a0 Even \u201cbig B\u201d Baptists could benefit from it!\u00a0 It\u2019s an ecclesiology that focuses on community, history, tradition (without traditionalism!), accountability, ecclesial practices, counter-cultural witness, etc.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Clark\u2019s chapter provides an excellent description of the problem.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know that anyone has yet provided an equally profound description of the solution I\u2019m talking about.\u00a0 If I find it, I\u2019ll definitely let you know.\u00a0 Maybe you\u2019ve found it and would like to mention it here?<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Some students (current and former)\u00a0and I have been reading and discussing a new book entitled Church in the Present Tense: A Candid Look at What\u2019s Emerging by Scot McKnight, Peter Rollins, Kevin Corcoran (editor) and Jason Clark (Brazos Press).\u00a0 It\u2019s an enlightening and stimulating volume of essays related to the concept of \u201cemerging church.\u201d My […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":58,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n