Category Archives: Evangelicalism

The Church Has Emerged . . . Deal with It!

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Postmodern Christians live with an uncomfortable tension between primitivism (going backward) and progressivism (moving forward). On the one hand, they are progressing, with the postmodern culture, out of the prison-like structures and strictures of modernism and the sometimes scientific approach to dogma that stripped the Christian life of its mystery. On the other hand, postmoderns sometimes see themselves as returning to the unity and diversity of the first century church, when the earliest Christians were joining together to find the right way to express their faith, hammering out Christian doctrine and practice in unique cultural contexts, and learning and teaching theology by doing and living theology. Those must have been exciting times as the church was emerging from the explosive event of the resurrection of Christ toward the rise of the worldwide body of Christ. Indeed, the first century church probably looked a bit more like the emerging church movement than do mainline churches, which probably look more like the churches of the second and third centuries.

But is this a good thing? Do we really want to retreat back to a first century, pre-catholic, pre-canon, pre-creedal Christianity?

No!

The Spirit led the church universal out of that period of infancy. Doctrinal standards were established. Scripture was collected and defined. The church has emerged. Paul wrote:

And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love. (Ephesians 4:11–16)

In Paul’s mind, the church was going to “grow up.” As in life, we learn from our childhood years and sometimes long for the innocence, nurture the naiveté, and wish we could relive some of the memories . . . but we cannot become infants or toddlers again. We must allow the youthful ingenuity and energy to continue to revive and revitalize us, but not to the detriment of maturity and wisdom.

The emerging church is not the only primitivist movement in Christianity. It is simply the latest. Every now and then we have groups of Christians that see themselves as direct heirs of the apostles, who want to plot themselves in the New Testament and stay there. They rewind the reels of history to around AD 100, chop off 1900 years of the Spirit’s recorded work, and try to splice their own strange version of Christianity at the end, hoping nobody will notice the inconsistency. In fact, they often re-interpret the early years of Christianity to support their new ideas.

But God sent the Spirit to lead the church into all truth. The Son did not leave us as orphans. He didn’t just throw us a thick book and tell us to keep struggling with the same conflicts as the Corinthians or to build on the same foundation as Peter and Paul. God has been building the body of Christ by the work of His Spirit for nearly 2000 years. Governed by the normative theology of the Bible, let’s continue to build on what has already been worked out in the history of the church.

And while we’re at it, let’s give up that strange idea of going back to the first century.

The church has emerged . . . deal with it!

Left Behind Computer Game

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From the Game Description at the official site.

· Lead the Tribulation Force from the book series , including Rayford, Chloe, Buck and Bruce against Nicolae Carpathia – the AntiChrist.

[NOTE: Of course, the Bible says in Revelation 13 that no one is able to make war against the Beast, and that he will be given authority to overpower the saints.]

· Conduct physical & spiritual warfare : using the power of prayer to strengthen your troops in combat and wield modern military weaponry throughout the game world.

[NOTE: Of course, believers will be martyred for their faith. They will not be fighting a holy war with physical weapons.]

· Recover ancient scriptures and witness spectacular Angelic and Demonic activity as a direct consequence of your choices.

[NOTE: Of course, there are no ancient scriptures to recover, and angelic and demonic activity is pretty much INVISIBLE.]

· Command your forces through intense battles across a breathtaking, authentic depiction of New York City .

[NOTE: See above.]

· Control more than 30 units types – from Prayer Warrior and Hellraiser to Spies, Special Forces and Battle Tanks!

[NOTE: This is ridiculous.]

· Enjoy a robust single player experience across dozens of New York City maps in Story Mode – fighting in China Town , SoHo , Uptown and more!

[NOTE: Ummm . . . where’s New York mentioned in the book of Revelation?]

· Play multiplayer games as Tribulation Force or the AntiChrist’s Global Community Peacekeepers with up to eight players via LAN or over the internet!

[NOTE: How Christian is it to actually pretend to control the Antichrist’s forces in a computer game?]

Comments, anyone?

Capturing and Caging Traditions

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Many corners of the twenty-first century church are drawing on traditional modes of worship, including the use of incense, candles, sacraments, images, creeds, and liturgical prayers. In this respect they’ve sometimes been accused of a “return to Catholicism.” But for most, they have simply gotten fed up with the overly-intellectual worship of evangelicalism. To some believers of my generation, the rigid propositional truths and daunting dogmatism seem to have suppressed authentic spirituality, a vibrant relationship with God, and dynamic, loving relationships with other believers. So, they want a genuine Christian faith free from an oppressive Tradition, but incorporating a variety of “traditions.” This means drawing on non-propositional narratives and symbols that often have an ancient pedigree.

But this is extremely difficult to do well. And to date, I’ve not seen it rise above the level of mediocre.

I find the buffet-style traditionalism characteristic of many new churches to be a little, well, silly . . . or at least juvenile. I have nothing against incense and candles. But picking and choosing which “traditions” from two thousand years of church history to use in today’s worship seems a little ridiculous if we detach them from the history, culture, and theology in which they originally developed. Some things just don’t fit. If I bought a high-end piece of antique furniture from an estate sale and placed it in my living room, it would look silly. In the same way, I’ve seen evangelicals try to incorporate ancient rites and rituals into their worship in ways that make me cringe.

Labyrinths, prayers of the saints, stations of the cross, and other practices associated with Roman Catholicism or eastern catholic mysticism enjoy a new audience among some Christians seeking a different type of spiritual devotion—a deep, authentic, meaningful Christian experience. But I see very little sense of theological coherence, a clear notion of what is central, how these things fit together, the stories they try to tell. Let’s set aside the whole question of epistemology and propositional truth for a moment. When Christians try to weave together premodern practices like these, they often apply very modernistic anthropocentric criteria of individual preference. However, the new drive for community authenticity is not much different than the by-gone quest for personal certainty: in the end my personal reason or emotions reign.

The result of harvesting “traditions” from church history is not much more appealing to me than the old-style zoo that zoological societies have tried to replace over the last several decades. Remember when we used to rip God’s creatures from their natural habitats and cram them into rows and rows of jail cells for spectators to “enjoy.” In many ways today’s rip-off of ancient traditions is worse. Some have gone on a “Bring ’Em Back Alive” safari, snared a handful of appealing practices from the jungles of church history, killed them, and now display them in their two-year-old churches like disparate plush toys spread over a toddler’s bed.

I like tradition. I like it a lot.

But I don’t like watching people mishandle it.

Please stop.

The Center and the Source

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Think for a moment before you answer this question: What is the center of your theology?

The instant response from those of us firmly footed in the Bible church movement might be “the Bible.” After all, the Bible is the written word of God, the only inerrant and infallible source of truth, the treasure house of spiritual wisdom and divine revelation. What else could stand as the center of our theology?

Nevertheless, back in 1883 C. I. Scofield declared, “Jesus of Nazareth is the center and source of my theology.” And he accepted the divine origin and authority of Scripture “because Jesus did” (Records of the First Congregational Church of Dallas, page 35).

Even if your answer matched Scofield’s, is Jesus Christ really the center of your theology?

Discerning the Center

The doctrinal statement of Scofield Memorial Church reads: “We believe that all the Scriptures center about the Lord Jesus Christ in His person and work in His first and second coming, and hence that no portion, even of the Old Testament, is properly read, or understood, until it leads to Him.” Our Bible church tradition has long strived to place the person and work of Jesus Christ at the center of the Bible and therefore at the center of our theology and practice. This Christ-centered tradition goes back further than C. I. Scofield. In fact, its origins are found with Jesus and the apostles.

Christ said, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; it is these that testify about Me” (John 5:39). And Luke gives this account of Christ’s instruction after His resurrection: “Then beginning with Moses and with all the prophets, He explained to them the things concerning Himself in all the Scriptures” (Luke 24:27). Paul used the same Old Testament to convince people that Jesus was the Messiah who died and rose again (Acts 17:2–3). And he declared in his letters that the gospel of the person and work of Christ was foreshadowed in Old Testament Scripture (Romans 1:1–4; 1 Corinthians 15:1–5). Clearly, the center of Scripture is Jesus Christ.

The generation following the disciples also saw Jesus Christ as the center. Around the year AD 110, while being transported by soldiers to Rome for execution, Ignatius, pastor of Antioch, passed through the city of Philadelphia in Asia Minor. During his brief visit there, he had a run-in with some Judaizers who refused to accept the Christian teachings about Jesus unless they could find them clearly spelled out in the Old Testament (Ignatius, Philadelphians 8.2). The very issue was whether or not Jesus Christ stood at the center of revealed truth. The exchange went something like this:

JUDAIZERS: If we can’t see it plainly written in the Old Testament, we won’t believe it in the gospel.

IGNATIUS: Well, then, let’s just look at what the Old Testament says. If you look at this passage here, you’ll see what’s written about Christ. . . .

JUDAIZERS: Hah! That’s precisely the question! You’re reading Jesus into the Bible! The Scriptures alone must be the standard of truth.

IGNATIUS: No! For me the standard is Jesus Christ. The unbreakable standard is His cross, death, resurrection, and the faith which comes through Him. These are the things by which we are justified.

For Ignatius, the question was not whether Scripture was authoritative, inerrant, and the source of inviolable truth. All true Christians believed that. The issue was how to read Scripture correctly. Ignatius’s response reveals that the person and work of Jesus Christ stood at the center of his theology.

Keeping the Center in the Source

Of course, the Bible is the only inerrant source of information about Jesus Christ available to us today. The Bible is the reliable source for the person and work of Christ. However, just because we accept the supreme doctrinal authority of Scripture as the source, this doesn’t guarantee that we always interpret it correctly. Like the Jews in the days of Jesus and the Judaizers in the days of Ignatius, we will misinterpret the Bible if Jesus Christ does not stand at the center. If we read the Bible in isolation from the person and work of Christ, we’ve handled it wrongly.

How does this affect us practically? What does it mean to us today that Jesus Christ is the center of Scripture and theology? How does it change the way we read the Bible? Or the way we live our lives?

Frankly, sometimes I get the feeling that we evangelicals have forgotten that Jesus Christ is the center of Scripture and theology. Sometimes I feel we’ve crossed the line and placed the Bible at the center while banishing Jesus to the corner. While we’ve honed our skills in exegesis, we’ve inadvertently committed “exe-Jesus.” While we’ve mined gems of practical principles from Scripture, we’ve lost sight of Jesus—the pearl of great price. And sometimes our doctrinal schemes have become doctrinal scandals because they’ve made the person and work of Christ merely one numbered article among a dozen unrelated creedal planks. And preachers have been bullied so much by our “How-to” culture demanding practical advice that they’re sometimes forced to treat the Christ-centered Bible like a Me-centered instruction manual.

What’s the solution? Bible studies on how to have a healthy marriage must stop if they don’t point to Jesus Christ as the model of love and fidelity. Workshops on handling finances are worthless if they don’t lead us to the priceless payment of Christ and canceled debt of His cross. Lessons on how to overcome sin amount to Christ-less psycho-babble if Jesus doesn’t stand as the source of new life and resurrection power. All these things may be helpful, but without Christ they are not uniquely Christian.

The Bible is not a book about dos, don’ts, rules, regulations, financial advice, marriage pointers, or frame-friendly words of inspiration. The Bible is about the eternal, divine Son of God. He revealed the Father’s will, became incarnate as a man to die for our sins, and rose from the dead. He works through the Spirit and the written word of God to accomplish His will in us and in His church. He will return to transform all creation under His perfect rule.

C. I. Scofield was right: Jesus Christ is the center. He always has been. Therefore, we must all be careful in our devotions, study, teaching, and worship not to relegate Him to a footnote.