Emerging Church

Reggie McNeal's book is nothing but heretical. It makes an attempt to recognize the problems of the church and resolve them without including scripture. And when he does finally include scripture he makes a failed attempt to criticize how Paull handled things on Mars Hill. The church begins and ends with scripture. never are we to move outside of that.

 

Your statement here didn't include Scripture....does that make it heretical?? Of course not. McNeal, as many others from different perspectives, addresses problems and suggests solutions. It isn't heretical because you disagree.

 

I think you might as well give up dan e., 2 Timothy 2:1-4 is the only one who is right and has any clue of what is going on around here...

 

good idea.:thumbs:

 

This is a well articulated view of the current reality.

Some good observations there.

While I agree that the incredulity of metanarratives is a key part of postmodernism, I don't know if an epistemological shift would require that there be no acceptance of metanarratives. Simply tenuous holds on the metanarratives that are accepted and an openess to reshape those metanarratives. I would consider that to be descriptive of the current culture.

Agreed. Modernism separated folks into disagreeing camps that were hostile to one another with limited dialogue, especially in the realm of spirituality. Postmodernism has opened amazing opportunities of spiritual dialogue that Christians need to recognize and grab hold of to fulfill our call to share the Good News of Christ's redemption in this generation.

 

Sure I can give you scripture. 2 Tim 3:16,17. If we are to be equipped to do the work of God it must come form scripture alone. For scripture is the very words of God. we cannot be made complete or to be prepared for any good works outside of scripture. As far as disagreeing we now see that God does as well.

McNeal is rather arrogant to criticize Pauls handling of Mars Hill. And since he could not provide any criticism based on the word of God we can see his "perspective" has no value to the kingdom of God. And this is the crux of the EC. None of it is based on scripture. But is purley out of being anti-traditional.

 

timothy....you need to stop now. you are in no authority to call another believer a heretic because they write a book that probably smacks you in the mouth and makes you upset because it pushed you out of your comfort zone. there is no example from that book that you can show to be heretical.

get off your high horse.

 

Well that pretty much says it all.

 

I'll be waiting for a heretical example....otherwise I'm done. This has gotten silly.

 

My comment is meant to show you that often times we hear something from a FELLOW BELIEVER that makes us question....and even makes us feel uncomfortable. Many times, and I have read such books, or talked with such people, it makes us extremely upset because of the discomfort in the words they are saying. It is so because it is shining a light in an area of our life that we may have been getting wrong all this time. We may have been missing something. The conviction is like a "smack in the mouth". I think a lot of critics of whatever you want to call this "movement", if you want to call it anything, are critical because of this reason. I agree with you about many of the dangers; debating whether hell is real, authority of Scripture, and much more. But to suggest that a book like that, from an author like that (who is a leader in the SBC) is heretical???! It sounds like it pushed you a little bit. Stop reacting to it......we often learn when we get shoved out of our comfort zone. I'm speaking from experience.

 

Gold Dragon, thanks for the encouragement.

I think the big thing the Emergent Church is going through right now is an identity crisis. There are some radicial factions to it, and I don't give them much room. They are certainly vocal, but not the majority opinion.

To be honest, 2 Timothy is a prime example of why the Emergent Church exists. Many of the parishioners of the Emergent Church grew up in super-conservative churches where anti-intellectualism was rampant and route denial of any other method was practiced. They grew up in a, mostly, stale environment of piano and organ and the hymn book with a truncated three point and a poem deductive, predictable, sermon that never brought application of the text to their lives. The Emergent Church is the natural progression, and correction, of the height of modern church. They have been asking all the right questions, just some have come up with the wrong answers.

Contextualizing our mission to reach unchurched (aka lost) people is the highest priority we can undertake. As the contemporary way we know things changes, so too must our methods for reaching them. You can't hand people a tract in post-Christian America and expect the same response you got twenty years ago. Will you have some success, perhaps...depending on the movement of the Holy Spirit. How much more effective is developing relationships with the unchurched around us and showing them the love of Christ than passing them off with two diagnostic questions that don't really make sense to them? While I am all for evangelizing and am thankful for those who evangelize, the necessity of the changing how we say that evangelization (of course not what it is about) is of supreme importance. Most Emergents are supremely interested in being authentic and relational with the unchurched around us.

 

I think the Emergent Church has willingly been in a state of identity crisis since its inception. Hence the term conversation.

Regarding radical factions, I am probably one of the largest supporters on this board of Brian McLaren in previous threads. I personally don't think he is all that radical, but I understand why some people believe he is. But I do agree that radical factions in the EC do not represent the whole of the EC.

What wrong answers do you think they have come up with?

I couldn't agree with you more. Amen!

 

that is an excellent point. Sometimes we forget that part of the Emergent thing is that this is a conversation. Spencer Burke is pretty keen on this. My issue is where the conversation is tending to take us. I love the conversation, but sooner or later you've got to leave the chair and get in the game.

thanks for letting me know your position. I appreciate that. I actually believe that McLaren is one things that is wrong with the Emergent Church. Particularly his recent writings and meananderings he is representing an unhealthy portion of the conversation.

One reason isI think he is just plainly disingenious. Read the intro for A Generous Orthodoxy, he flat out tells people who disagree with him that we shouldn't say anything. He also tries to sidestep his responsibility to help theologically guide people by saying his not a theologian, yet in his role as a pastor he assumes the mantel of a theologian for Christ called we pastors to be just that...pastor-theologians. Also his book The Secret Message of Jesus was a ploy to sell more books, I find that inauthentic. There are more issues but I'll start there. Honestly I just think he doesn't have a clue where he's going, because he has no bounds to tell how to get there.

frankly I think they're (and this is not a uniform thing mind you but that radical faction) wrong about their decisions on the place of the authority and inspiration of Scripture, the denial of a penal substitutionary atonement, denial existence and reality of a literal Hell, advocacy of inclucivism, endorsement of pro-homosexual readings of Scripture, and a host of other issues is just messed up. But that isn't what gets me.

What really gets at me is that in their attempt to offer a "postmodernly" understanding of Christianity the radical faction of the Emergent Church has embraced Cartesian Modernism and, specifically, the old liberalisms that their fathers and grandfather dispensed years ago. Instead of offering a "new" critique for the church, a new read for the church, which we could take into this century, the radical Emergents are giving us tired old answers that have been dealt away with years ago. That is what gets me on this whole thing.

I really appreciate a lot of what goes on in the Emegent Church, but there are some parts that have invalidated themselves. I'm all for readdressing the missional thrust of the Church, but let's readdress it using more contemporary tools than the discarded liberalism of days gone by.

Just my opinion.

Thanks, I really appreciate your voice here. Particularly that you would say you support certain people. Says something for you. Thanks for the convo!:laugh:

 

IMO, this is the best post on the entire thread! I could not agree more.

 

Excellent!!

 

I have listened to all, of these links and it is my opinion that this man is very dangerous in his views. He is very well spoken and very smooth in his delivery, but if you listen carefully you will hear views that contradict the biblical standards. In my opinion this is the type of theology that ushers in the Laodicean age and brings it to full swing.

That is not to suggest that all he says is in error, but rather that he holds enough truth with enough passion that swallows up many into his web of deceit. Also I am not suggesting that he does this with knowledge, but rather in self deception.

 

Can you give an example?

 

I found his intro to A Generous Orthodoxy to be brilliant and did not feel that he told people who disagree with him not to say anything. My understanding of that chapter was to encourage people who would read the book for the wrong reasons to stop reading because they would likely find the material offensive and his intent for writing it was not to offend and divide the body of Christ. I guess it probably didn't have its desired effect.

I don't remember his statement of not being a theologian and the context. But if he did make that statement, could it be to preface a book that will largely be theological in nature by saying that his job isn't as a "professional theologian" and to take his theological positions with grain of salt. Just like a nurse who is your neighbor giving you a spot diagnosis and recommending you take his/her advice with a grain of salt because he/she isn't a doctor. I don't see that as side stepping his responsibility to theologically guide people.

I haven't read this book or know the context it was written in. Is there a reason you believe it was a ploy to sell more books and not because he was burdened to write about the topic?

I think he has some ideas of where he is going and in the last few chapters of A New Kind of Christian he proposed some strategies for emergent church leaders going forward. But keeping an general openness of direction is almost mandatory to be conversational and Emergent.

The only one on that list I would consider is inclusivism which I have argued in the past on this board as a possibilty, but I wouldn't go to the wall for it. The others I hold to evangelical positions with an openness to hear opposing views because they exist within the Christian community while not really being convicted of their validity.

I also don't consider any of the above positions to be representative or even significant positions requisite for being emergent. There may be emergents that hold these positions just as there are baptists that hold these positions.

I believe this is a unique view that I haven't heard before. Do you mind elaborating and giving examples of this?

I do recognize that many consider the emergent church to be "post-liberal" and I consider one of the pros of the emergent church to be a forum for evangelicals and liberals to cast aside former battle lines and work together for God's kingdom. I am also one of the more pro-ecumenical posters on this board.

But I don't feel your beef is with the ecumenical views of the EC but with actual theological answers you percieve they have provided. What are those answers that are Cartesian and same old liberalism? Are they the positions you stated above because I see them as issues that are being discussed because historical Christianity, has divided over them. I don't see those things as issues the EC has provided any answers for.

I agree that we need to be missional.

And while I agree liberalism isn't the answer, I don't think discarding them is the answer either. I think liberal Christians have made valuable contributions to the Christian understanding of God and the bible and their tools have uses. Evangelicals and conservatives have been slower to adopt many of them because they are too easily offended by some of the "conclusions" of liberalism.

For instance, it was liberal Christians who started us on textual or "lower" biblical criticism which conservatives reacted negatively to because of certain implications for biblical inspiration. Yet now we see a thread where nobody has a problem with "lower" criticism and recognize its valuable contribution to biblical versions and our understanding of the bible. But "higher" criticism evil because conservatives don't like the implications for inspiration and inerrancy?

At the same time, liberalism has a lot to learn from conservatives and evangelicals, and the postmodern ethos is a forum for that learning and cooperating.

I consider the postmodern ethos to be a part of Christ's prayer for those who beleive in Jesus through his disciple's word:

My hope is that Christians will be united like the Father is to the Son so that the world will know him.

Thanks!

 

Hello guitarpreacher,
Over and over in the videos he used comparisons. He tried to justify things by using what I assume he felt was logic in other areas that had no correlation to what he holds. For instance. He stated that we need to be in the bars witnessing. He used others but this will do for now. The way he justified this was that he claimed that Jesus hung out with sinners. Scripture never suggests such. It says that Jesus was the friend of sinners. There is no evidence that the Lord was hanging around bars, or other places of open sin to be buddies with the masses. We are told to come out from among them not go to where they do their sin. I would agree that we need to see these people as they are, sinners, in the need of grace, but we do not need to justify going top their places of sin to tell them.
Also if a missionary goes to another land and the people run around naked we do not follow in kind. So we take the good news, but we do not conform to their evil ways.
He also gave an example of a porn star who he led to the Lord. Well praise God! However he did not go to the porn studio and hang out while she was making porn and neither should we. The same with going to the place where these people are engaged in their sins.
I am not suggesting that we shut ourselves off from the world, but that these people are not our buddies in life so that we attend their sinful places. We need to be kind and loving always ready to share the gospel by being the lights that draw them but, not go to the places of darkness and bring dishonor on the Lord.

This guy in my opinion is very dangerous in his belief systemand will lead many into sin, and just because he has a church that has grown in numbers does not mean that he is the next one to follow. We need to set the standards, not jump into the worlds thinking and claiming that we are doing God's work. If the Lord never did this and there is no hint that He did, then we need not to either.

 

This is a false as the day is long. The methods that have come and gone through the years would fill 1000 pages.

Stale to folks who look to bring the world into the church. Stale to those who are more concerend for their personal experience then they are of the worship of God. This focus on modernism and postmodernism is a distraction from worship and mans excuse to worship himself. It has nothing to do with worship of God or the mission of the church. And the preaching of the Word is what is commanded in scripture (1 Cor 1:21, 2 Tim 4:2)

And this is the power and method by which the church should depend. "The movement of the Holy Spirit". People can not be won to Christ by knowledge. It is by faith and faith alone.

"And my speach and my preaching was not with enticing word's of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God"

"For I determined not to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified"


Contextualization has come to mean serving alcohol in church. Holding church services in bars. Denying a literal judgement of God. Denying that the authors intent can be understood in scripture. In short making the gospel more palatable. Jesus never took part in such heresy.

"For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness"

In all of our authentication we need to remember to be separate.

"Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; "

"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. "

"For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. "

And this is the premise of the whole EC. To make the gospel more palatable. Therefore it is heresy. There is one to to heaven and that is through the cross of Jesus Christ. Men like McLaren & Pageatte would call that blood thirsty. God calls it grace. The world doesn't want to hear about the cross and the EC is much abliged to accomodate them. Now you can call me names, treat me like the libs treat Dr. Patterson for so many years. Like they treated Paul Pressler. But men of God are called to preach on sin, hell, and Satan. Those who do not like that are described in scripture:

"For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved"

And for those few that associate with this heresy and do not hold to these heresies being espoused they should separate themselves form such foolishness.

" Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. "

Now let the hate begin.