It wasn't until yesterday around 9:30 AM that I realized how different my views on the preemininece of guilt are in the Reformed evangelism realm. What to do? Blog, of course. Here you go:
The Church has a fascination with guilt. Yes, its true. Tell me how you would go about telling someone about Christ? Think about it for a minute. Okay, minute's up. We've been addressing this issue this past week in my evangelism class. Most people would identify the "bridge" method as one of the best ways for presenting the gospel. If you're not familiar with this message, it points out the chasm that exists between human beings and God: a chasm that exists because of sin. In a triumphant soveriegn engineering feat, the cross gets lodged in the chasm and creates a bridge to walk across to where God is. Ha! If that's Reformed, Calvin just rolled over in his grave. My vision of Reformed theology is a lasso being sent across and Christ pulling us across kicking and screaming.
Okay, so maybe you don't subscribe to the bridge. Let's try something more familiar: the Heidelberg Catechism. If you paid attention in Catechism class, you know that the presentation of doctrine goes along these lines: Sin -->Salvation-->Service. Or, Q&A #2:What do we need to know to live and die in the comfort of God? "Three things:first, how great my sin and misery are; second, how I am set free from all my sins and misery; third, how I am to thank God for such deliverance." The commonality of these two presentations I've made is the fact that the gospel takes root in guilt, period.
On that front, I made the argument on Wednesday that we don't necessarily need to present the gospel by starting with guilt. [The crowd goes aghast.] What's more, its necessary to find other ways to seed in the gospel because our culture does not feel guilt! What did he just say? I'm not saying no one feels guilt, certainly I feel guilt and you do too, but the cultural emphasis on moral subjectivity has all but chased guilt into a shadowy corner. Like it or not, the generation we are currently raising does not identify with guilt the way the previous ones did. If we keep harping on guilt, we will find ourselves preaching to teddy bears.
Ron Martoria presents a helpful concept for this discussion. He argues that there are multiple themes in the Old Testament such as covenant, exodus, exile and priestly atonement. His point is that the Church has triumphed the idea of priestly atonement for years to the detriment of the other themes. And its worked! Think about how the prophets worked: Go to a city, tell them they are sinners, offer them a reward for repentence. Fastforward. Jonathan Edwards and his fire-and-brimstone sermons capitalized on the exact same principle: Go to the pulpit, tell people they're on the fasttrack to hell, tell them God will save them, but only barely so that people aren't tempted to step outside the lines for fear of burning off an extremity.
Go into any city in America, urban or rural, stand on a milk crate, and preach this at the top of your lungs. Go ahead, I dare you. Its foolish. Why is it so heretical for me to present the idea that there might be other ways to motivate people to God other than threatening them with hell! Hell might just be the greatest weapon the Church has had in its arsenal. Dan has some good thoughts on this here. Are you seriously telling me that we've been around for more than 2,000 years and the most convincing argument we can make for worshipping God is fear of hell? Bush administration anyone? Fear built basilicas in the 1500's, it brought people out in droves into Puritanism and Methodism during the Great Awakenings, and we've used it in the Reformed tradition to "scare the elect out of bushes". Sweet! Regardless of the focus on numbers, it spoke their language and was thus a useful evangelism tool. In Europe and North America today, its not. Perhaps if Jesus saved us from terrorism, Christianity would sell.
I don't like to present problems without some ideas about a solution....that simply makes me a rock-thrower. I'm working on it, but I think acknowledging the issue is half the problem. One idea I have is to repackage sin. Moral relativity has virtually eliminated a preoccupation with sin and guilt. Okay. Let's try that again. Brokenness is undeniable. What's happening in Iraq isn't okay, regardless of what your moral stance is. What's happening in Sudan isn't okay regardless of where you find yourself in the spectrum of moral relativity. Systematic poverty is a problem, unless you're a social Darwinian. Its a small start, but addressing brokenness is not only a better way to present sin to a sin-ignorant culture, but its also probably a better way to present Christ as a solution because it increases the scope of Christ's redemption. Focusing on individual sin as the only problem makes a person-focused Jesus the only Savior.
If we keep on our current path, the only thing we'll feel guilty for is losing a generation and boarding up our church windows.
Friday, December 15, 2006
Friday, December 08, 2006
Inbred Worship
A few friends of mine back at Dordt have a blog called What Grinds our Gears. If I had to write an entry about what grinds my gears, its problems with worship events in churches. This is particularly important to me now in my new job as Pastor of Worship at my church. We're starting to throw around a new term these days in our worship meetings: inbred worship. This is no slam on my wife or anybody from northern Michigan, its a term we use to stop ourselves from the temptation of making worship ours. This blog assumes Biblical worship categories and considerations....don't jump on my back unless you're attacking the actual text here.
There is a large temptation in the Christian worship arena that wants to make worship something that belongs to us. A current mission statement might look something like this: Worship is done by our congregation, with our congregation, and by our congregation for the benefit of our congregation in the context of our congregation. Ouch. The problem with this is, obviously, that it doesn't make room for God. Of course, we would all claim that our worship is for God, unless we're way out of line. But worship planning and practice quickly becomes a circle we enclose ourself within.
For example, as a worship planner, I'm in charge of reading our context. Then, I'm in charge of creating a relevant worship service. I pick songs I like (or I wrote) or that I think would "speak the congregation's language". After that, I go to worship and benefit greatly from the service. If its done right, my evaluation tells me we did a great job!
My worship class is attempting to teach us out of that idea. It said, lets not ask what worship can do for people, but how we can equip believers. Great idea. However, while we're equipping believers, here comes a non-believer. What are equipping them to do? Find Jesus, hopefully. But what kind of sermon equips believers and altar calls? I ain't got one of those on my computer.
In order to make worship that's not inbred, we should allow doors in our circle for entrance. These doors can be things like a gospel presentation in every service (not hoping for people to glean it off of our ritual). Another way is a highly accountable worship staff. I'm in the process of recruiting music people and non-music people to serve as service critiquers. Grandpa Frank who's plowed fields his whole life can be as good an evaluater of my service as Mrs. Jones who teaches music for a living. Why? Only asking music people about your music is back to the inbred. Its like one of those concerts where the choir does lots of really musically cool things, but the audience hates it because its completely irrelevant.
This isn't just music. Its preaching, its kids ministry, its offertories. Our prostrate nature in worship should limit our ultimate control over it.
There is a large temptation in the Christian worship arena that wants to make worship something that belongs to us. A current mission statement might look something like this: Worship is done by our congregation, with our congregation, and by our congregation for the benefit of our congregation in the context of our congregation. Ouch. The problem with this is, obviously, that it doesn't make room for God. Of course, we would all claim that our worship is for God, unless we're way out of line. But worship planning and practice quickly becomes a circle we enclose ourself within.
For example, as a worship planner, I'm in charge of reading our context. Then, I'm in charge of creating a relevant worship service. I pick songs I like (or I wrote) or that I think would "speak the congregation's language". After that, I go to worship and benefit greatly from the service. If its done right, my evaluation tells me we did a great job!
My worship class is attempting to teach us out of that idea. It said, lets not ask what worship can do for people, but how we can equip believers. Great idea. However, while we're equipping believers, here comes a non-believer. What are equipping them to do? Find Jesus, hopefully. But what kind of sermon equips believers and altar calls? I ain't got one of those on my computer.
In order to make worship that's not inbred, we should allow doors in our circle for entrance. These doors can be things like a gospel presentation in every service (not hoping for people to glean it off of our ritual). Another way is a highly accountable worship staff. I'm in the process of recruiting music people and non-music people to serve as service critiquers. Grandpa Frank who's plowed fields his whole life can be as good an evaluater of my service as Mrs. Jones who teaches music for a living. Why? Only asking music people about your music is back to the inbred. Its like one of those concerts where the choir does lots of really musically cool things, but the audience hates it because its completely irrelevant.
This isn't just music. Its preaching, its kids ministry, its offertories. Our prostrate nature in worship should limit our ultimate control over it.
Friday, December 01, 2006
Innovation in Theology?
I've been struggling with the idea of whether or not theology is allowed to be innovative. I'm not talking about the practice of theology, but theology itself. Are new ideas okay within the realm of orthodoxy or even a particular tradition?
Our gut reaction is yes. Of course we like new ideas, new approaches and new allegories for how God works. If theology is speaking about God, or prolegomena, then we certainly should allow for innovative theology. What happens when an innovative theology comes out, however, is that it is very rarely taken on within a tradition, but rather pushed to the outskirts or the creation of a new tradition in and of itself. Why do we let our fear of innovation drive us?
Innovations in theology can still be tested against truths. For instance, if you know my ideas on baptism, then you know that I favor adult baptism, but favor it within a Reformed context. Regardless of how you feel about believer baptism, could you accept this as a Reformed person within your church or would you point me to another denomination that fits that view better? One of my seminary profs did.
Take then, my previous posting about the nature of God's love for humanity and the need for escape. Hold it up against your theology. Is it Arminian? Is it Reformed? I don't think so. Does your view of God's sovereignty make logical sense? You tell me why there was a tree in the garden. I love church history, but what I love about it is the continuing innovation, much of which got people burned and then weaseled its way into our churches anyway.
Read Rob Bell's "Velvet Elvis". He argues for taking out the bricks and examining them without having the whole structure falling apart. Beautiful. Confessions, catechisms, creeds: imagine these as the walls on the gym you move in rather than the seat you're strapped into. Now what?
Our gut reaction is yes. Of course we like new ideas, new approaches and new allegories for how God works. If theology is speaking about God, or prolegomena, then we certainly should allow for innovative theology. What happens when an innovative theology comes out, however, is that it is very rarely taken on within a tradition, but rather pushed to the outskirts or the creation of a new tradition in and of itself. Why do we let our fear of innovation drive us?
Innovations in theology can still be tested against truths. For instance, if you know my ideas on baptism, then you know that I favor adult baptism, but favor it within a Reformed context. Regardless of how you feel about believer baptism, could you accept this as a Reformed person within your church or would you point me to another denomination that fits that view better? One of my seminary profs did.
Take then, my previous posting about the nature of God's love for humanity and the need for escape. Hold it up against your theology. Is it Arminian? Is it Reformed? I don't think so. Does your view of God's sovereignty make logical sense? You tell me why there was a tree in the garden. I love church history, but what I love about it is the continuing innovation, much of which got people burned and then weaseled its way into our churches anyway.
Read Rob Bell's "Velvet Elvis". He argues for taking out the bricks and examining them without having the whole structure falling apart. Beautiful. Confessions, catechisms, creeds: imagine these as the walls on the gym you move in rather than the seat you're strapped into. Now what?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
