Conversation about why emergent church under attack
Hi, I just wanted to let folks know that there is a pretty important (I think) conversation going on at
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/mike.clawson1?v=wall&story_fbid=136324719720287
It started as a discussion about homosexuality and morphed into at first an attack on the emergent church and now a defense of it. The guy doing the attacking is a graduate of Liberty Univ. seminary (and other things at Liberty as well). He's a smart guy, knows a lot of stuff, yet he seems to be having difficulty when we get down into the nuts and bolts of the issues. At least I think so. It's been surprising to me how little substance seems to be behind the bombastic attacks on the emergent church and I think we should do more to inform people of this and really simply to focus on the bible, all of it.
The bottom line for me is I think the emergent church generally is MORE biblical than the churches that generally are attacking it. This is an important message to deliver to help those of us who want to start up emergent type communities but struggle mightily because so many thing there is something terrible about the emergent church -- they don't know what, but they hear these terrible things from their leaders. so, it makes it really tough to get the new, tender sprouts of emergence to grow...
Anyway, check out the conversation and join in if you'd like.
Thanks
mo
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/mike.clawson1?v=wall&story_fbid=136324719720287
It started as a discussion about homosexuality and morphed into at first an attack on the emergent church and now a defense of it. The guy doing the attacking is a graduate of Liberty Univ. seminary (and other things at Liberty as well). He's a smart guy, knows a lot of stuff, yet he seems to be having difficulty when we get down into the nuts and bolts of the issues. At least I think so. It's been surprising to me how little substance seems to be behind the bombastic attacks on the emergent church and I think we should do more to inform people of this and really simply to focus on the bible, all of it.
The bottom line for me is I think the emergent church generally is MORE biblical than the churches that generally are attacking it. This is an important message to deliver to help those of us who want to start up emergent type communities but struggle mightily because so many thing there is something terrible about the emergent church -- they don't know what, but they hear these terrible things from their leaders. so, it makes it really tough to get the new, tender sprouts of emergence to grow...
Anyway, check out the conversation and join in if you'd like.
Thanks
mo
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Amy Moffitt on -
What Steve said. Good to see you on here, bro!
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Permalink Reply by Drew Downs on -
Mo, I read most of the conversation. Here are some thoughts that I might have said to Derick.
Derick seemed locked into clarity of Scripture. It seems like walking back to that concept and walking through the interpretive process might be useful. If we are to treat the passage from Leviticus 18 honestly, we can ONLY say that G-d did not want the Hebrew [men] to “lie with mankind, as with womankind”. That is all it says on the matter. It takes an intuitive leap on the interpreter’s part to move from “lie with…as with” to refer to “homosexual acts,” a second leap to say that it refers to a non-Hewbrew, and a third leap that it would refer to homosexuality as it is understood in 21st Century America. This is why I and many others are reluctant to say that either there is one interpretation or that a clear interpretation won't necessarily lead to many applications. One has to make THREE interpretive leaps to get to condemnation of LGBT Americans in 2010; perhaps this is why one’s embrace of complexity can find many truths.
This does make it difficult to declare right and wrong. Absolutely. That is the primary reason we have so much discord. For some, clarity comes only in precise arguments and thoroughly constructed philosophies. For others, clarity comes only in messy and contradictory pictures. For some, Vietnam was a mistake going in based on philosophical beliefs. For others, it was the wounded and maimed returning to their communities. For others, it was photographs in the newspaper depicted the devastation and destruction—the use of napalm, the burning of villages, etc. And some rebel from categorizing any military decision as a "mistake". Each of these pieces contributed to a narrative that changed the way millions of Americans saw the way we needed to behave. Similarly, if you can forgive another war example, arguably the most formative moment in Christian history since the Reformation was World War II. Many Christians found biblical truth in supporting the Nazis before and during the Holocaust. Many Christians found biblical truth in staying out of armed conflict. Many Christians found biblical truth in mounting a military campaign against Germany and Japan. And many Christians, including Bonheoffer, saw biblical truth in assassinating Hitler. I take great pride in knowing that in each case, Christians tested their faith against the circumstances they were in, against Scripture, and against Tradition. When it was over, we learned more about faith then can be known by assenting to a creed or a well-reasoned argument about G-d, or even, dare I say, a straight-reading of Scripture.
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