This Lent, all of us “at the Vine” are gathering around this obstruction  you see carefully placed around the altar by one of our talented artists -Brian Christensen. It symbolizes everything that impedes the presence of Christ in our lives, that impedes our relationships with one another, our neighbors and God through Jesus Christ – It symbollizes  the things we hold onto, the defensiveness, the sin, the evil, the enslavements, the things slowly destroying our lives while we keep on managing it for another day. We cannot be a people who participate in God’s mission if indeed we are impeded from the renewing life in God through the Spirit ourselves. Lent gives us the time to walk through the process of examining, and then allowing the root sins in our lives – the desires that impede – to be crucified so that we can be open to newness of life. We are faced with this every Sunday as we sit around this wonderful yet imposing piece of art which blocks us from the altar and each other (we sit in a round). One of the four texts from last Sunday was Rom 7 v.15 I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but (in fact) I do the very thing that I hate. v 24 O wretched man that I am … who will rescue me from this body of death? This text reminds us (among other things) that we are not ready-made missional people. We are selfish, defensive souls. We are blinded and impeded from the incredible life God wants to birth among us. We need Lent.

Lent culminates in Good Friday of course where we participate in Christ’s dying (putting our own sin and flesh on the cross). Then comes the glorious resurrection. We do baptisms on Easter Sunday where we each get to renew our baptism into the death and the resuurection into newness of life in the Spirit for eternity. vs.25 Thanks be to God thru Jesus Christ our Lord! On Easter we shall tear this piece of art down. It will be great! Thanks to Brian Christensen for his handiwork. It has helped me get through Lent in a powerful way!

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A group of us have been playing tag off of Ed Stetzer’s Monday morning postings on Missional Theology. This week he asks an important question concerning Missio Dei and the almost cliche-ish Missional mantra – “God is working outside the church and we should join Him here.” He asks, How is God at work outside the church? Is God working savingly or salvifically outside the church? In other words, are believers (or “the church”) the only instrument for proclaiming the Gospel and bringing individuals, through the finished work of Jesus on the cross and the power of the Holy Spirit, into the Kingdom of God or are there other means? Or perhaps more broadly, how, then, is God at work outside the church?

Here again I think the answer to this question has too easily split between those who reject outright the idea that God is working outside the church and those who accept without qualificiation that the justice of God is being accomplished by God outside the church. In this second position the church is the cheerleader, the people helping out wherever justice is going on. It plays no essential role in God’s plan to bring redemption to the world. Ed outlines some of the history of this development within the Missio Dei developments.

I of course see a third position that undercuts the underlying epistemological assumptions of both positions. For as I see it, the church is the epistemological foundation from which we can see together the Kingdom coming into being ahead of time. Here we see it worked out under His Lordship. From this place, we are enabled to see God at work elsewhere and join in and in fact bring a certain completion to that salvation that God is already working in the world. This is the position of the Anabaptist John Howard Yoder.

In Stanley Hauerwas’ words, “I have no doubt that Jesus is present by His Spirit at work in the world outside the church, yet the church, the gathering around the Eucharist, is the one place where we know He is present. And so it is here where we learn to recognize Jesus and His work from whence we can move in the world and see Him clearly there as well.”

Some may worry this leads to a concentric form of the church’s relationship to the world. But Yoder helps us see that the church and world are two levels of the same Lordship of Christ. (Hauerwas is different from Yoder BTW although often related – like in this case). There is no dividing line between the church and the world. The church may precede the world today, yet it is only living today what the world itself is ultimately called to in the future. The church in essence bleeds into the world ever calling it to its true destiny. As a foretaste of the renewal of all creation, the church cannot be discontinuous with creation. It cannot be discontinuous with the world because the church is in the process of becoming that very world renewed in Christ. Neither can it merely blend into the world for then all Mission and renewal is lost. Its presence will be in, among and for the world even as it will be distinct from the world. This is what it means to take on the incarnational nature of Christ. It is this very incarnational nature that requires the church to be a discerning community which at times both refuses conformity with the world while at other times joining in (with what God is already at work doing).

There may be times when we can join in with what God is already doing (like say at the local P.A.D.S. group being organized by the Islamic mosque where we can enter, come along side and even bring the true end of things – salvation/reconciliation in Christ). There may be times when we bring to the world the redemption God is working among us as a sign of the Kingdom (like when Christians brought hospitals to the world in the 19th-20th century). There may be times when we discern a cultural center must be rejected because it has joined hands with the rebellious powers (a pornography theatre, a government when it has given itself over to war, or corporate powers etc.). We may even begin a counter act of God’s righteoussness, like the abolition of salvery movement in the 18th century, or the civil rights movement inaugurated by the black baptist churches of the south. In all of this, for me at least, salvation/reconciliation in Christ is inextricable from what we are actively involved in. It is the motivational force behind this activity for the Christian. It is the true end. It just should naturally lead there (there’s some Catholic theology as well as Barthianism in here).

To me this a distinct and paradym-destroying third option. It is not as simple as the Reformed common grace notion for it takes a starting point where Jesus’ Lordship is spacially submitted to and lived out before the world. The danger of separating God’s grace from his work in Christ ontologically is avoided because all things are in the process of being reconciled to this one end. Personal and social salvation cannot be separated. Yet it recognizes that God is at work in the world in multitudinous ways that we must always discern so as to truly particpate in the remaking of all things. To me the “bounded sets within the centered set idea makes sense within this paradym. To me the mantra “missiology precedes eccelsiology” is a little more difficult to fit within this notion of God working in the world. (I prefer “missiology is ecclesiology”).

These are all thick ideas which need to be fleshed out in a book (mine is forthcoming). It’s all obviously much more complex than this. Stories need to be told to flesh out how this looks … Can someone chime in here and help flesh this out? This is a start but we need more. Thanks Ed for promoting this work.

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This discussion will continue this week on the blogs below as well as Ed’s. I invite you to follow along! and chime in! and thanks Ed Stetzer for provoking this discussion.

Rick Meigs: The Blind Beggar
Bill Kinnon: kinnon.tv
Brother Maynard: Subversive Influence
Tiffany Smith: Missional Mayhem
Jared Wilson: The Gospel-Driven Church
Jonathan Dodson: Creation Project

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There’s some great opportunities out there to learn about the life, theology and practice of missional church with great people. I thought I’d pass em on to you in case you’re near by.

1.)The Ecclesia Network Church Planting Training. May 17-21 in Richmond VA. This is a training week in the theology and practice of seeding a missional community. It’s a learning exercise that is uniquely missional with practicioners and thinkers who have all planted churches. I just don’t know of anything out there quite like it. I’ll be there to help lead a session, but I’m really looking forward to learning alot as well. If you’re interested, nearby? you can download the brochure here.

2.)John Franke teaches an online course in Missional Theology. John’s a friend and a great teacher. Rarely is there an opportunity to delve into the themes of Missional theology with one of its leaders.  The course is called “Theology for the Mission of God”( More here). I recommend it.

3.) The Evolving Church Conference on April 10 in Toronto is on Kingdom Economy. The subject is how do Christians join together to reorder their lives to better reflect the order of the kingdom of God. The way we think about and spend money, share possessions, and care for one another is singularly important to our witness before the world. Bill Cavanaugh, Brennan Manning are just some of the headline speakers. I’m going to be there (not speaking this year, just attending!). Check it out here.

4.) Cultivate in Hamilton Ontario. I don’t know if Pernell can handle any more attenders here. But I recommend this gathering every year. It’s plain old church planters – missional leaders gathering to encourage and learn from each other. It happens twice every year. It’s the kind of thing we need in many areas of the country. Thanks Pernell for your leadership in this every year! Wish I could be there!

5.) N.T. Wright is coming to Wheaton College Theology Conference. I think it’s sold out. Sorry. But if anyone has an extra ticket give me a call eh?

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I’ve been suggesting recently that there is a parting of the ways in the post evangelical landscape. This terrain, once dominated by the all encompassing rubric of “the emerging church” has parted into different ways, exacerbated most recently by the publishing of Brian McL’ New Kind of Christianity. This is all good because it enhances conversation as long as we do not demonize or casually dismiss those among us who disagree with us.

In a post last week, I was setting up how I think these three emerging ways play out in relation to two issues: the women in ministry question and the GLBT question. Some have contended, both in the comments on the blog post and off, that the word “missional” should encourage a wider inclusivity – that to define positions towards gay/lesbian sexuality is to exclude – to hijack the word “Missional.” Others suggest that doing any of this kind of parsing is polarizing. Over against these folk, I’d like to argue (put forth for discussion) that there are some inherent theological impulses in the Missional way that – if adhered to – lead not only to some unique positioning on these two questions but a new kind of inclusivity as well, one admittedly different than the one most associated with (what was) the emergent church as I articulated over here. So before I actually outline pos. 3 on these two questions, I’d like to show why Missional argues fr a new vision of inclusivity. Here goes.

This “new kind of inclusivity” is driven by the logic of Incarnation – one of three core ideas that drive Missional Life ( along with Missio Dei and embodied Witness). This logic of Incarnational implies four principles about the way disagreements/ disputed matters are engaged. In each, I contend there is a potential for a new kind of inclusivity.

Principle 1 – On The Ground: Incarnational means that the gospel takes root on-the-ground in concrete real life. This is where truth is manifest. Just as orthodoxy has been worked out in the midst of historical contingencies in the past, it will always be worked out in pastoral situations involving real people and real issues in a people of Christ. DISAGREEMENTS THEREFORE WILL BE WORKED OUT IN THE CONTEXT OF OUR REAL LIVES, engaging one another in mutual listening, communal prayer, study of Scripture, submission to one another and the Spirit. This is the place where God works. This is where Jesus comes saying, “there am I in the midst … what ever you bind here is bound in heaven.” We don’t work our lives out through books/theology detached from real pastoral engagement. Books come after pastoral engagement.  If we do not meet with a resolution, we go an as before until the Holy Spirit works a new consensus. On the other hand, we can’t put off issues of injustice and pastoral care indefinitely for these are our real lives we are discerning. People are hurting!  This approach, I suggest, breeds “a new inclusivity.” Because we see all disagreement – not as the means to antagonize – but as the place where God is taking us further into places we have not yet figured out. This breeds a new openess to what God is doing. We must be open to what God is doing here to manifest Himself incarnationally into new territory.

Principle 2 – No Power. We enter the world with no power – at least power as seen in the flesh. We come to all disagreements as in Christ, weak, humble and vulnerable. God is the one who exalts (Phil 2). We submit one to another.  There can be no violence. There can be no presumption. Indeed we dialogue because we know “Jesus to be Lord.” This demands that we dialogue with an open mind to others believing we have stuff to learn. This is what it means to believe Jesus is Lord. Any other posture is Constantinian. This breeds “a new inclusivity,” an openness to the world. It is not an imposing of truth, not a rejection of the truth of our well-worn history in Christ either (orthodoxy). It is a diligent pursuit of the truth that extends Christ (and the historical work of Him in the church through orthodoxy) into new territory humbly inviting others to become partners with us in this.

Principle 3 – Open Discernment We enter the world not to reject the world but to be transforming agent of the Kingdom. We can neither reject all desire and culture nor embrace it all. We cannot be set off and apart from the world because the church is in the process of becoming that very world renewed in Christ. Neither can we merely blend into the world for then all Mission and renewal is lost. This is what it means to take on the incarnational nature of Christ. It is this very incarnational nature that requires the church to be a discerning community which at times both refuses conformity with the world while at other times joining in (with what God is already at work doing Missio Dei)). As Yoder puts it, loving the world as well as refusing conformity to it are “two sides of the same coin” of incarnational presence in the world. This breeds a new kind of inclusivity because we do not just blend with the world, nor do we merely reject/exclude the world, but as one of them in the world, we seek to participate in God’s transformation of the world in the Kingdom.

Principle 4 – Communal Enfleshment (Embodied Witness) Lastly truth and salvation is best communicated by being enfleshed in a community. We are His flesh – the body of Christ in the world. Through our own repentance, restoration, reconciliation, the renewal of all things begins in this social space of our communal life together. His reign has begun and through the visible reality taking shape here, His Lordship is extended in our lives and into where we live where God is already at work. This community however provides the hermeneutic for people to understand in embodied form what God is doing in the world.  This social embodiment is incarnating Christ in the world. Through the ministry of this gospel among our neighbors the Reign of God begins (but does not end). And so we always look at ourselves first, never making judgment on others, yet always inviting others “to come see.” This breeds a new inclusivity, one enfleshed in a community, not one enforced by procedural rules of democratic tolerance.

Admittedly this is a POSTURE OF INCLUSION as opposed to a CONCEPT OF INCLUSION. Nonetheless, I suggest that four elements of the logic of incarnation (and Missio Dei and Witness) lead to an approach to the women in ministry issue as well as GLBT relations that in essence amounts to a different kind of inclusivity and yet looks different than either the harsh exclusivity and/or bland democratic tolerance that we all have become tired of. I hope to post next week on Position No. 3 towards Women in Ministry/GLBT relations mentioned in this post.

Until then, do you buy this kind of inclusivity? It is admittedly Anabaptist. Does that turn off the Reformed among us? Why? Is it just a guise for another form of exclusion for “Emergent and friends”  thinkers? Is it too soft? Any suggestions for improving/clarifying this incarnational logic of Mission?

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Ed Stetzer is provoking (in a good way) a syncroblog discussion on the theological issues of Missional church. I appreciate that. I think it’s needed. Today’s question on his blog relates to the question of salvation. How does Missional church deal with the idea of salvation.

Ed argues that the idea of salvation in Christ took a turn in the Enlightenment.  He says:

“The response of church and mission to the challenge of modernism was generally twofold among Protestants. The first response was simply to disregard the challenges of the Enlightenment and carry on as if nothing had changed. The second response took the challenges of modernism more seriously, to the point of a fairly uncritical accommodation. Instead of maintaining Jesus as God-incarnate who fulfills all righteousness and satisfies divine wrath on behalf of sinners, in modernist Protestantism he became the ideal human being to imitate, the moral exemplar. The person and work of Jesus was no longer at the center of mission, but rather the example and cause of Jesus took stage. The teaching supplanted the Teacher; the kingdom of God obscured the King.”

There are parts of this statement I agree with. The characterization of how protestant mainline Christianity (as it later became described) has some merit to it. Yet we must not ignore the part of the protestant wing that carried forensic atonement to new individualistic  heights primarily under the influence of the Enlightenment. I don’t think either Luther or Calvin imagined what modernity would eventually do in isolating and reducing the atonement to a forensic transaction between each individual and God. This view of salvation became fully flowered in American revivalistic evangelicalism. This view of salvation, I would argue, has done as much damage to the furtherance of Mission in the world as the protestant mainline development. Do you agree? So I see Ed’s point, and I agree that the Missio Dei as it became used by the Ecumenical mainliner councils erred in this way. Today, as a result of both developments, we are left with a monstrous problem of a over hyped, individualized salvation that takes the shape of either people individually promoting a Kingdom enlightenment agenda for justice (de void of the actual power of God’s reign manifest in Jesus as Lord), or people promoting a version of a ticket out of hell for individuals. To me this is now almost old news and now we need to explore where God is leading us theologically and in practice. This is one the strengths of the Missional movement as led by leaders such as Ed Stetzer.

So Ed asks the question:

So what is your understanding of salvation and how it is mediated? Do you agree that missiology is closely connected soteriology– that one’s take on the “reach” of salvation determines the range of one’s missionary enterprise? Do you have any concerns that within the missional conversation some emphasize the example of Jesus over the salvific work of Jesus? Or that the vertical dimension of the God incarnate, Jesus Christ, saving men and women unto Himself is under-emphasized by some and rather a horizontal “conversion” towards one another is the primary focus?

To these questions I reply that salvation – to paraphrase N T Wright – is the working of God in the world to make all things right. In Jesus Christ, God is fulfilling his promise to the world – in the covenant of Israel – to make all things right. This is the work God has begun in Jesus Christ, of reconciling the whole world to Himself (2 Cor 5:17-22).  This salvation is inextricable from the sacrificial atonement in Christ to bring us into a justified relationship with God thru Jesus Christ. But this new relationship with God is inextrricable from the horizontal reconciliation God is working every where in the world. The personal and social are so inseparable that to even talk as if they are two (like I just did) is to do violence to God’s work. We move therefore from asking people “have you made a decision to accept Christ as your personal Lord and savior?” to inviting others to join us in entering the salvation begun in Jesus Christ that God is working for the sake of the whole world. This to me is what it looks like to be saved witjin the Mission of God. This includes, and cannot be brought to fruition, apart from a conversion to the dying with Christ and resurrection with Him into the new life with Christ. I think theologians like N T Wright, Michael Gorman and even John Milbank help us see how this salvation has been birthed in a people through Christ’s life, sacrificial atonement and resuurection and his ascension to the right hand. They show how His Kingdom has been inaugurated in His rule, and that we can enter it now and by so doing invite the world into it. This births a peoiple, in communities, to live and witness to this life engaging the world in the New Kingdom life God is doing. (this is how this salvation is mediated).

I don’t want to be labor this post (I’m finishing up an entire book reframing the evangelcial doctrines and practice for participation in God’s mission). There is much more that could be said. But this approach I believe avoids the problems Ed talks about.

Does anyone else want to fill this out? Push back? Answer more of Ed’s questions in this regard? Chime in please.

This discussion will continue this week on the blogs below as well as Ed’s. I invite you to follow along! and chime in! and thanks Ed Stetzer for provoking this discussion.

Rick Meigs: The Blind Beggar
Bill Kinnon: kinnon.tv
Brother Maynard: Subversive Influence
Tiffany Smith: Missional Mayhem
Jared Wilson: The Gospel-Driven Church
Jonathan Dodson: Creation Project

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Within post-evangelicalism, no two issues divide the terrain more than the issues of women in ministry and the gay/lesbian question.  I think how they relate to each other is telling as to what theological currents drive the various “streams” ‘emerging’ out of evangelicalism.  In a continuation of my effort to sort out the streams of post-evangelism in N America, I lay out the tenets of the three positions (Neo-Reformed – Emergent – NeoAnabaptist Missional) on these two issues and some comments on the theological currents that drive each one. I HAVE GROSSLY OVER-SIMPLIFIED – THIS IS A BLOG POST REMEMBER – SO CUT ME SOME SLACK . In this post I treat Neo-Reformed and Emergent which leads to my second post on the Neo-Anabaptist  Missional position. I hope to clarify the issues better so we can all discuss some day what drives us to the conclusions we have come to and why we come off certain ways to each other. In each position, I treat the position’s view on Scripture, authority in the community, sanctification, and desire. I hope this helps!

Position No. 1 – No Women in Ministry/ Not Affirming to Gay/Lesbian Sexual Relationships(The Neo-Reformed)

In this view – a.) women are hierarchically subordinate to men in ministry and b.) all gay/lesbian sexuality is against the norms of God-ordered creation.

This is grounded in a view of Scripture that sees it as propositional and perspicuous. Scripture as propositional truth is clear and absolute. What we need therefore is good study, someone with certain gifts, expertise and wisdom to make it clear. This understanding of Scripture lends itself to an autocratic view of authority.  I mean this not in a disparaging way. Rather, because of this view of truth and Scripture, church authority in decision-making and leadership must be exercised in top-down fashion. Afterall, if we can’t all agree in church, who will make the final decision? All of this serves to argue for men to be over women in ministry because Scripture is clear on it and authority is autocratic. In this world, authority must carry itself in the same way within marriage. Men must be heads of their homes because – afterall – if a husband and wife disagree, who is going to make the decision? I am fully aware that various forms of soft complementarianism has “softened” how these principles are carried out within this group.

Within this view, sanctification is an individualistic pursuit. Sin is recognized, forgiveness received and then one seeks to follow (Scripture) in dependence upon the Spirit. Desire is, to grossly exaggerate, inherently depraved (some post Calvinist influence here). One must measure all desires against the Scripture, and all that doesn’t jive must be suppressed, or in effect denied. This is oft prone to a strange subtle legalism. “You are free, you are graced with forgiveness not of anything you’ve done, it’s all up to the Spirit now, but hey, you’re not doing it – the Scripture says ______ , so stop doing it!” I call this a Cartesianist view of sanctification. There is little appreciation here that cognitive knowledge does not lead to sanctification, that all desire must be reoriented in the spiritual disciplines of walking into the Spirit corporately as well as personally. This approach is oft prone to a harsh, dispassionate judgmentalism especially when it comes to the gay/lesbian question. The Scripture says “such and such” so for goodness sake, go and do “such and such. You will be blessed.”

It is out of this approach to sanctification, that this group speaks to the gay/lesbian issues. Because of what I see as lacks in this approach to sanctification, it comes off as lacking compassion and hopeless.

Of course this is the caricature of evangelicalism that so many people disavow these days. The Neo-Reformed carries much of this same theology yet softens it quite a bit with compassion and holistic mission. I see Mark Driscoll, Tim Keller and most Neo-Reformed bloggers coming down in this camp and attempting to reshape its theology away from the lacks mentioned above. 

Position No. 2 – Yes to Women in Ministry/ Affirming of Gay/Lesbian Sexual Relationships (Emergent)

In this view – a.) women and men are equal to each other in the exercise of authority and roles within the church and marriage, and  b.) gay/lesbian relations are affirmed as inherently life-giving, loving and God honoring when monogamous in some way.
The view of authority here is derived from the political understandings of Western political democracy, – liberalism as a political philosophy (which drives evangelicals and prot mainliner alike). Authority is best exercised in democratic fashion by a charismatic leadership within a tolerant inclusivist community. The singular concern here is the ultimate value of each individual to flourish into the person God created him/her to be. Each person is equal to the other and should be judged on skills and merits for the job or role in life, ministry and marriage. Women therefore should be considered equals with men in ministry and marriage. They should have equal access to the authority structures of the church. Scripture is interpreted via these values.  Gay/lesbian peoples should not only be tolerated but also blessed in the ways God has created them. Scripture is interpreted via these insights.

Often the narrative of women and gay/lesbian relations is constructed via the historical progression of the liberation of the individual from oppression. The story goes, the African slave was once oppressed via Scripture. Today the slaves are free. Women likewise were once oppressed and today are emerging free. Now the same liberation needs to be set loose for the gay and lesbian peoples among us and welcomed and affirmed into full participation in the Kingdom. Scriptural hermeneutic is an evolving exercise and should be interpreted with this history in mind. This makes sense of the key value that drives this group, the liberation of the individual as seen and understood via a Western individualist romanticist liberal (read liberating here) understanding of the world.

Sanctification in the Christian life is the daily walk of following the way of Jesus. Desire is seen (mostly) as inherently good as created (versus inherently depraved in group one). The calling out of one’s sanctification is in challenging each one to live into the love, grace and renewal of all things inaugurated and exemplified in Christ. This is often understood in terms of “following the way” of Jesus. He taught the Kingdom of God, a new way of forgiveness, love, living for the other. Let us live into and work for these great ideals in the world. This is the Kingdom of God. Yet there is also an edge against “religion” that seeks to oppress individuals and maintain its ideology. Some deconstruction is in order to help us see how various power interests/religious structures are at work to hold us back from life with Jesus. (Derridian Messianic Democracy fits well with these values). It is this aspect of their critique which moves this group beyond the bland protestant liberalism of the past.

Of course, herein lies the ideas most associated with Emergent and the emerging churches that aligned with this group. Brian McLaren, Doug Pagitt, Tony Jones and friends most often come down in this direction.

Have I been fair here? Have I overly generalized? Again, I am not trying to make enemies here – just get the lay of the land. I am sure people on both sides disagree, can you show me why, point me to some quotes? I am merely trying to delineate the issues in what is emerging in the three streams of post evangelicalism. In the next post, I hope to argue for a Neo-Anabaptist Missional position no. 3 which says: Yes to women in ministry, but is Non Affirming to Gay/Lesbian relationships as normative for the Christian life. I hope to show how this position is most adequate to the tasks of Mission/Witness in post Christendom, post modern contexts.

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I am intensely interested in how “being the church” – in terms of a set of certain practices – enables the church to participate in God’s Mission in the world. I’m worried (probably too much) that in the process of de-institutionizing the church, we lose the wherewithal in Christ to be shaped for and into His Mission. So, for me, I believe we need conversations around the many key ideas that form the missional conversation in our day.

This is why I am glad to participate in Ed Stetzer’s new effort at creating a conversation around the core issues of “Missional Church.” Starting next Monday, and then for several Mondays thereafter, Ed Stetzer will be addressing a “big idea” in the missional conversation. The bloggers below (inlcuding myself) will be addressing it as well. A syncronized conversation will then hopefully unfold across blogland leading to significant input inthe Missional Manifesto to be rolled out at the Mission Shift conference this summer.

Today’s post kicks this new syncroblog off (See below). I’m priviledged to be quoted in the opening post (just so you know I am not quoting myself eh?). I’m priviledged to be among this fine company of bloggers as well. I’m looking forward to where this goes. I invite you to chime in every Monday. Join us and Ed in this endeavor.

NOW TO THAT KICK OFF POST – HERE WE GO ….

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David Fitch once said that most missional thought leaders “emphasize incarnational forms of church over attractional; the church as Missio Dei over mission as program; organic forms of missionary living in neighborhoods over ministry set in a building.” Yet many others seem to add the term to the current program they are attempting to promote or make cool sounding. As Ed Stetzer noted, “The word missional is used to bludgeon legalism and antinomianism alike. To some it is a sign of freedom from all established forms of the church and to others it is a degeneration into syncretism with the world.”

So, do we abandon the term and move on? Not yet, because the concept behind missional is really big and words help us when we can agree on their definitions— or at least we can agree what we mean when we use a word.

Over the next few weeks, we want to discuss how “missional” happens in our lives and in the life of the church. It will be discussed here as well as at other places including the blogs listed below. As the conversation moves forward, we hope you will move from blog to blog and offer insights from the scriptures and how you see missional happening in your local community.

By doing this, we can all be a part of a specific missional conversation. As many of you know, there are several working toward a “Missional Manifesto” that will be rolled out as a part of the missionSHIFT conference on July 12-15. The intent with the manifesto is to say, “This is what we mean when we talk about being missional.” It is not the manifesto’s intent (or within its ability) to say this is what everyone should think or say about the term, but reflects a hope that it will help us all be clearer and more mission-shaped in our own thinking and practice.

Conversation on the grassroots level is important, so be sure to join in here and at the other blogs and let’s see where God take us. Here is the team that will be leading the conversation:

Rick Meigs: The Blind Beggar
Bill Kinnon: kinnon.tv
Brent Toderash (Brother Maynard): Subversive Influence
David Fitch: Reclaiming the Mission
Tiffany Smith
Jared Wilson: The Gospel-Driven Church
Jonathan Dodson: Creation Project

So for the sake of conversation today, leave a comment about with your own 1-sentence definition of “missional.” And, in the weeks to come, we will be addressing certain points or issues in the missional conversation that need consideration and perhaps clarity.

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Here’s a couple of “heads-up.” Ecclesia Network has a church planters training gathering May 17. I’ll be participating along with many other veterans of missional church planting. I think this gathering is a really needed alternative to other “boot camps” which may focus extensively on doctrinal issues and matters of pragmatics. Here we’re focusing on the many issues surrounding preparing people to land teams and engage a context missionally (and of course there are theological issues here). If God so provides, I encourage you to join us. Go to the web site and contact Chris for more info.

I also want to let you know that we have a few openings still to fill in a scholarship program at Northern Seminary. We;’ve been working hard to develop a set of prepatory Masters degrees for missional ministry. If you’re 27 and under, had a 3.25 or better in undergrad, you would qualify for full funding in this particular program. Want to know more? E-mail me at dfitch@seminary.edu .

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It feels a bit ominous to read the blog reviews of Brian McLaren’s latest – A New Kind of Christianity. The book is raising quite a stink. No surprise eh? One gets the sense there is something different going on this time versus the last couple book releases of Brian’s: The Secret Message and Everything Must Change. One gets the impression we are at a pivot point, a moment that upsets the whole terrain of theological allegiances having to do with the post evangelical emerging church developments of the last ten-fifteen years. It’s like Brian is shaking up the foundations of post evangelical theology. I read the book on my flight home from the ecclesia network national gathering last week and here are some initial observations.

The first chapter was a highlight. Brian outlines all the developments that led to his emergence as a writer and the questions he has been motivated to ask and write about. He tells us about his own development in relation to the various problems with the church in N American evangelicalism. This is insightful. It reveals the basis of his appeal to all of us who have grown up with the same doubts, problems and issues with American church life, particularly American evangelical church. In this brief introduction is why we love McLaren and his influence endures. The question in the back of my mind is: Would Brian McLaren have had anywhere near the attention he’s had if he was writing his books out of the protestant liberal context?

In almost every chapter, Brian rehearses the familiar critiques against the evangelical church in America: its narrow forensic view of the atonement and the gospel, its duplicitous judgmentalism towards the gay/lesbian community, its fascination with the Bible as a fact book to be used as a propositional weapon, the church as a survival exclusivist institution, I could go on and on. This is another source of Brian’s appeal. It is safe to say many of us were looking for someone to say a lot of these things way back when during the times we were all struggling. Thanks to Brian for all this. He has been a gift. The question in the back of my mind in reading all of this was: Have we saturated this subject and indeed isn’t it time to move on from these well-worn critiques? It sure seems like even the most fundamentalist of evangelicals gets these concerns. If not why make more enemies?

Brian spends quite a bit of time developing a version of what he calls “the Greco-Roman six-line narrative,” its dualism, its separation of the next life in heaven from life on earth and its multiple negative effects on traditional Western theology (and evangelical theology) and the way we think about salvation. For many of us this critique goes way back – all the way to Harnack – the godfather of protestant liberalism. There’s some good stuff here but of course there is some overplay (as all popular books tend to do for the sake of the audience). The question in the back of my mind in reading all of this was: Has Brian himself fallen captive to the same modernizing and Platonizing tendencies in his own constructive proposals. In other words, in McLaren’s opened ended theological proposals, is not the incarnate (non-dualized) Christ – the coming of the infinite into the finite, the universal into the concrete – in danger of being conceptualized into some “ideals” which de-incarnate, de-particularize His coming into the world as the Christ/Messiah of the New Kingdom. (this was Yoder’s critique of Niebuhr). Isn’t this Western Greco-Platonic?

For instance, in the chapter on “Jesus and the Kingdom” (ch. 15)  there seems to be a missing component in his exposition of Romans – the need for conversion. There seems to be a glossing over that this great reconciliation and renewal in the Kingdom comes only in the individual actually getting down and dirty and dying to his/her own flesh and participating in the renewal of all things in the life in Christ (Rom 6-8). This “entrance” into reconciliation/renewal is incarnational. Without it, the kingdom can become a gnosticized ideal. To me, this is the danger of reading N T Wright too casually (who never renounces the personal justification by faith as entry into God’s greater justice working in the world “to make all things right”).

For instance – there seems to be a missing component in his chapter on eschatology (ch. 18). He sees the end of time as open ended, as “at every moment, creation continues to unfold, liberation continues to unshackle us, and the peaceable kingdom continues to expand with new hope and promise (p. 194).” The “second coming” seems to be missing from Brian’s account. He seems to lack appreciation that God is working in Christ “to reconcile all things to Himself” (2 Cor 5:17-22) and this is leading us somewhere in time. This definitive end – the culmination of history in the second coming – is incarnational to me. i.e in history. Without it, the kingdom can be pushed into an ideal which has little to do with Christ’s reign in history. Many of us are on board with McLaren (have been for a longtime eh?) that the overly pessimistic dispensationalist eschatologies turned us inward and negative towards the justice God was bringing into the world. But in rightfully rejecting these things, has McLaren idealized the future into an ideal/a value that can be carried out apart from Christ and His comsummation of it? In diminishing the physical second coming of Christ to culminate his Kingdom (p. 197) does not McLaren do the ultimate move of Greek mythology – propose that Jesus’s redemption has nothing to do with the physical consummation of the Kingdom here on earth? Is this perhaps a reversion to the Enlightenment myth of eternal progress and the de-incarnationalizing of God’s work in Christ for the justice of the world into a wider societal progress?

I think similar questions could be asked about his positions on the gay/lesbian question, the grounding of the authority if Scripture, etc. In each chapter there’s a lot to agree with. But I’m left asking has he de-incarnationalized Christ into a set of conceptualizations/ideals to be sought after as individuals carrying the Christian banner?

A Parting of the Ways is a Good Thing

This all gets to my final point: Brian’s NKoC, for better or worse, articulates the theology of a specific coalescence of emerging church people – that group most associated with the former Emergent Village. Right? It seems that the same people who regularly defend Emergent (as part of Emerging) and a lot of the positions therein are also doing the legwork here in defending Brian? To me this is a good thing. Help me out here but why should anyone at Emergent have a problem with that? It signifies a clarifying coalescence around Brian and all those who were what once was Emergent. Meanwhile, as TSK or Jeremy Bouma or the several others announce they are leaving associations with Emergent previously, it appears a realigning is happening. I see this as a grand clarification. I see NKoC as aiding and developing this clarification.

In the meantime NKoC is promoting a similar clarification among the other streams. For better or worse, three major streams have emerged in the Emerging meltdown of the past few years. They are Neo Reformed stream, the Emergent/Emerging Stream and the Missional (often Anabaptist) Stream.
1.) The Neo-Reformed is armed with a host of great blogs as well as a theological “coalition.”
2.) The post-Emergent Village Emerging stream is certainly being carried on by the Christianity 21, the Transform group, the Ooze and the Emergent Village website itself.
3.)The Missional stream is the most scattered , from the missional blogs of the Great White North (upon which Mike Morrell has labelled – and gotten a lot of heat for it – the Missional Right), to Len and Forge to Alan Hirsch/Shapevine to the old GOCN to many others. In my opinion this last group needs some theological coalescence (the group I most associate with). Much like “the Gospel Coalition” has done for the Neo-Reformed and the McLaren, Jones and Pagit trio and their edited book series (along with others like John Franke) has done for the emergent stream.  We need to work on what our commitments are theologically (especially ecclessiology, soteriology and the prolegomena)

My point is however that I see Brian’s book polarizing the coalescing of these three streams in a positive way. (Is this what Trevin Wax is already saying over here.) At the very least it will coalesce the group that is around McLaren, polarize the Neo-Reformed stream and push us Missional folk to articulate more what our theological commitments are. This is crucial for the next step in post evangelical N. America because it is only by clarifying our differences and having on-the-ground rooted communities working out this stuff that a post-evangelical faithfulness can be demarcated in N America. The ideal would be to see all three streams (after clarification) come together in submission to Christ in a kind of mini-post evangelical Nicaea for the future of the missional church. But if we don’t clarify each others commitments, all we’ll ever do is be in a heresy-hunting, defensive posture, protecting our own turf. It won’t be productive if you ask me. As I said once before, all these differences can only be worked out ON THE GROUND, in real life communities led by the Holy Spirit in the same way it always has. Perhaps then, out of this fertile ground, these three clarified streams can lead to a sort of Nicaean like development for the post evangelical crowd in North America. This kind of unifying is impossible however without the prior clarifying that is being forced on us by McLaren. I contend this is a good thing, even if some claim Nicaea was a bloody mess.

So, thank-you Brian McLaren.

If there are any comments on all this, I’ll be grateful for feedback, although I can only respond as best I can. I’m busy carrying on a back log of pastoral, professor and personal writing work. So please grant me patience?

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One more “Dallas Willard note” from the Ecclesia Network National Gathering. The Gathering this past week proved to be a special time for the many of us gathered there to learn more how to lead our communities into Mission. Dallas Willard offered challenge after challenge. You can see highlights by going to the Tweet Twub right here. In a Q&A on Wednesday morning Dallas offered some comments on preaching that I suggest should be taken special note of. He said he used to preach like a machine gun, rolling sentence after sentence in an attempt to barrage the congregation with powerful communication. A wise friend said innocently to him one day, “Dallas, why don’t you talk more slowly so people can think about what you’re saying?” Dallas said “hmm I never thought of that.” (People laughed).  He pointed out that once you do this – talk slowly … more matter of factly … in a sense have a conversation with people  – “this means I had to release people into the hands of God.”  Instead of my own performance, I now had to depend upon God. In doing this, preaching changes from a finely tuned engineered performance to allowing the Spirit to work in what we are doing.

I suggest this little snippet from Willard is essential to understanding the role of preaching in the Missional Church. For here in the missional church gathering preaching is not a.) for the purpose of distributing information and self help points on how to improve your Christian life, b.) not an inspirational talk done by a convincing and charismatic speaker. Neither is it  c.)someone speaking as an expert from above – although the preacher will be gifted in teaching/preaching and have studied the Scriptures well.  Instead preaching for the missional church is a preaching among the church, out of the community, interpreting what God is doing among us and calling us living into the reality of that. It is a clarion call to live into the reality that “Jesus is Lord ” and all that that might mean for us in our lives and context. We preach like this relying on the Scriptures unfurling the reality of God at work in the world all under the work of the Holy Spirit. The preacher must speak authentically, he/she must be known in and among the congregation (by at least some people everyday in the congregation). He/she must be involved in the lives of people in everyday life. He /she must proclaim the gospel reality of Jesus Kingdom breaking in, the transforming power of God’s forgiveness, defeat of the powers and his working for the renewal of all things INTO THE SITUATIONS WE ARE LIVING. (I strongly suggest this can’t be done via a video screen).

Some of the ways this takes shape at our church is a.) we speak from among on the ground floor in the middle of the circle, not from a platform above, b.) we speak out of Scripture explaining some things, but the emphasis of the sermon is on the simple proclamation of the reality of the text over our lives – we avoid excessive lexicography, grammar, c.) we emphasize to the preacher “be present” with yourself and your life, take the performance of out of it, yet point to Christ (we wear a cross and black to symbolize this points to Christ, not our own personality), D.) we have a 9 a.m. bible study immediately preceding the worship gathering. This hour of study together as a community guides and shapes directly into the preacher’s preaching for that morning. Preachers are interpretive leaders guiding the people via the Scriptures into seeing what God is doing and calling us into in terms of the life in Christ and His Mission.

Thanks to Dallas Willard and the Ecclesia Net Conference.  Rarely have I ever been to a conference that fed missional leaders like this one. And from now on I shall try to speak more slowly.

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