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In December of 2007 Jenell and the kids and I had flown out from Columbus, Ohio to visit my parents in San Diego. One night they told us to go out and have fun, just the two of us, so we decided to drive up PCH and find a restaurant. We weren’t very familiar with the area, so we just headed north.

We soon found ourselves passing through Carlsbad village, a collection of beachside shops and restaurants, and Jenell said, “Oh, I think this is where my brother’s shop was!”

Over ten years before Jenell and I were living in Utah when she and her half-brother, Adrian, first made contact. They always knew of each other, but never met. Somehow Adrian’s wife tracked down Jenell and reached out, calling her one day. He was in his early twenties, newly married, and curious about the sister he’d never known. They formed a bit of a relationship over the phone and soon we were inviting them to come to Utah for a visit.

They spent a weekend with us. It was a amazing to see this person who in so many ways resembled Jenell – in appearance, mannerisms, and even sense of humor. More so for Jenell, who had been raised an only child. They connected instantly.

Adrian talked about the retail business he’d just started back in California, and we talked about our dreams for ministry. We talked about kids, about marriage, and, of course, about God. Adrian was an atheist and his wife Stephanie was dabbling in other kinds of spirituality, so they were a little unsettled to learn that we were in Christian ministry. It wasn’t long before we were chatting about religion and God, but the discussion remained friendly – even if it grew serious at times.

When the weekend ended we said our goodbyes and sent them back to California. Adrian and Jenell traded phone calls for the next year or so, but we both moved and changed numbers soon afterward and eventually lost contact. Jenell was always grateful for that visit, but sad about losing the relationship too.

All of these memories came flooding back ten years later as we drove through Carlsbad Village that night. We wondered aloud about Adrian and Stephanie: Did they still live in the area? Was Adrian’s business here? We talked about how nice it would be to reconnect.

We kept driving up PCH, looking for a decent restaurant, all the way to Camp Pendleton at the end of Oceanside. Nothing looked good, so we turned around and headed back to Carlsbad where we’d seen a Mexican food place that seemed promising. We parked, left our names at the crowded adobe-style restaurant, and were told it would be about 30 minutes.

So, we walked. And prayed.

We were in the throes of a big decision, pretty sure God was leading us to plant a church…but where? How? Our trip to San Diego was, in part, an excursion to see if God might be calling us back there. Was this the place? How would we know?

We walked around the Village, talking through it all and praying out loud, “God, show us what your will is? If this is where you want us, make it clear.” That’s when I saw it. Across the street.

A Starbucks.

“Let’s cross the street,” I said earnestly. “I think God is leading us over there.”

Jenell snickered.

As we made our way to the Starbucks we kept praying, “Show us Lord. Show us something.” We were so engrossed in our talking and praying we nearly ran into a small group of people walking the opposite direction. We managed to thread past each other without incident, until one of them turned back suddenly and said, “Jenell?”

We both turned and looked at the woman who’d called Jenell’s name. I didn’t recognize her. And I could tell by the look on Jenell’s face that she didn’t either. Slightly amused, I waited to see how she would handle it.

“Uhhh” Jenell mused, trying desperately to make the connection. Finally, she gave up, “do I know you?”

“I’m your sister-in-law!” The woman said.

Now I was confused. Sister-in-law? Was this woman crazy? My brother and his wife lived in Stockton, and she’s not…then it clicked. She did look familiar. I glanced to her left, and there, eyes wide and mouth agape, stood Jenell’s brother Adrian. They were older, but it was definitely them.

Everyone freaked a little – except the couple with Adrian and Stephanie who stood off to the side looking every bit as awkward as they felt. We invited them all to dinner with us, but the other couple had to get back home. Adrian and Stephanie joined us.

At dinner, Jenell said, “Wow, I can’t believe you guys still live in the area after all these years!”

“Oh, we don’t,” said Stephanie.

“We live about an hour away, in Temecula,” said Adrian.

“We haven’t been here for years,” added Stephanie. “We hardly get out these days with the kids. I don’t even know why we came here tonight. We never really come back this way anymore.”

“Don’t you have a business here?” Asked Jenell.

“Oh no,” laughed Adrian. “That didn’t last long.” He switched subjects quickly; something else was on his mind. “I have to tell you guys, that weekend in Utah changed our lives.”

We blinked. “What do you mean?” Jenell asked.

“Well, we became Christians because of you.”

We just stared, unbelieving.

“Oh, we’re like totally Christians” Stephanie emphasized. “Adrian even thought he wanted to be a pastor for a while.”

“It’s true” he said, chuckling a little. “I even went to bible college for a while.”

“But, you were an atheist,” I said. “How did that happen?”

“It was you guys,” he continued. “We just couldn’t get over how different you were. You didn’t judge us or pressure us, but you had this passion for God and life that we wanted for ourselves. It didn’t happen right away. We came back and time passed, but sooner or later we started looking for a church where we could find that same thing. Eventually we became Christians.”

We talked for long time, catching up on each others families – nieces and nephews that had never met, jobs and careers, causes and passions. We talked of the joys of discovering God and fellowship, and the disappointments that come along with church too.

It was a real gift to us, in more ways than one. It turns out they’re amazing people who are doing amazing things. And we get to hang out now (see the pics above from Father’s Day this year). Not only was it a gift to hear – all those years later – that we’d made some kind of difference in their lives, but we took it to be a genuine sign that God was confirming our sense of being led back to California, and while we didn’t base our decision solely on that encounter (not even close), the truth is, it was a factor.

We asked God to show us something, and He gave us something instead; more than we could ever have imagined.

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Was it God or coincidence? How can we know the difference?

Technorati Tags: Coincidence, Free Will, sovereignty, Stories

But this next encounter made me wonder. (Yes, I’ve changed some of the names).

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One cool summer evening the phone on our bedside table rang late at night. Jenell and I both jerked straight up in bed, immediately gripped with anxiety: Was someone hurt? Had there been an accident?

I snatched the phone from its cradle, “Hello!”

“Hi, yes, uh this is Robert Smith an I need to talk to someone about my bill.”

It was man’s voice. Older. Unrecognizable to me but recognizably intoxicated. Lascivious music loitered in the background and voices crowded the middle distance.

“Excuse me?” I said, “your bill?”

He jumped on my question: “Yes! My bill. I need to talk to someone about my bill!”

“What bill?”

“What bill?” He mocked with disgust. “What do you think. My phone bill.” He lamented to someone over his shoulder, “Jesus, what the hell is wrong with this person?”

“I don’t know who you are and I have nothing to do with your phone bill.” I flirted with hanging up, but somehow I felt he needed to understand he’d called the wrong number. Mostly, I just didn’t want him to call back. “I’m afraid you’ve called the wrong -”

“I already told you, this is Robert Smith. Just look up my account. You guys fucked up my bill and I need to straighten it out. Right now!”

My wife could hear the yelling from the phone. She looked at me, questioning. I rolled my eyes helplessly and shook my head, letting her know it was nothing serious.

He was peppering his tirade with more profanity now. He was completely wasted, and emboldened by the alcohol to swing for the fences. Soon he would unleash all his phone-company-frustrations upon the uncooperative employee at the other end of the line. Me. I halfway sympathized, but also realized that it would continue to escalate. So I switched tactics.

“Alright Mr. Smith, my apologies, I’m going to take care of that bill for you.”

“It’s about fuckin’ time! Jesus…” he muttered.

“Can I have your phone number please? Starting with the area code?”

“Yeah, it’s 909-555-5151.”

909? I thought to myself. That’s from Riverside, California. What are the chances someone from my hometown would call a wrong number and get me in Utah? Weird.

“And where are you calling from?”

“Where am I calling from? What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

“I just need it for my records, sir.”

“Uh…okay. I’m calling from a payphone at a bar in Victorville.”

Victorville? I had lots of family in Victorville. This was getting suspicious.

“Okay,” I said, “give me a second to pull up your account on the computer.”

“Great.” He was calm now. Satisfied and vindicated. He started talking again to the man over his shoulder about a woman across the bar, and the things he’d like to do to her. They giggled wickedly. That’s when I realized he was with a friend. Maybe someone less drunk than himself?

“Okay Mr Smith, I have your account in front of me and I can definitely clear these erroneous charges, but I need one more thing from you first.

“Great, what’s that?”

“Are you there with someone?”

“Excuse me?”

“At the bar. Are you with a friend?”

“What the f-…what does that have to do with my phone bill?” He was ramping up again.”Yeah I’m here with a friend. I’m here with my buddy Terry. He just got out of jail tonight and we’re freaking celebrating! Is that alright with you? Goddamn…” he said away from the phone again, “You believe this guy?”

“Could you put him on the phone please?”

“What? Excuse me?”

“Sir, can I please talk to your friend Terry?” I was still being polite.

“I don’t know why the hell you need to talk to -”

“Mr Smith,” I became stern, “do you want me to take care of your phone bill or not?”

He demurred, “Well, yes.”

“All right then. If you let me talk to your friend Terry I can erase this bill for you. If you don’t, you’re going to be stuck with these charges.”

“All right,” he gave in, “Jeeez, fine.” Away from the phone I heard, “He wants to talk to you…” followed by muffled protests. Then, “I don’t know, he just does. I need this taken care of, I can’t afford this bill. Just talk to him!”

The phone shuffled for a second. Then another older man’s voice tentatively said, “Hello?”

I recognized this voice.

“Terry?” I ask.

“Uh, yeah.”

“Terry Jones?” I pressed. I already knew the answer.

“Uhhh, yes. Who’s this?”

“Terry, this is Jason Coker. Your nephew.”

“What the…Jason? What are you doing on Robert’s phone?”

“He called me Terry.”

“What? Why?”

“I don’t know Terry,” I said, using his name as a punctuation mark. Do you know why your friend would call me here in Utah? From a bar in Victorville? After midnight?”

“Oh shit…” He trailed off.

Jenell was sitting up fully now, staring at me, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. “Terry,” I called into the phone, trying to bring him back to the moment. “Did you give Robert my phone number?”

“No. No, no. Swear-to-God Jason, I didn’t give him your number. I don’t even have your number.” Off-phone Terry hissed at his friend, “Robert! You called my nephew. Jason. In Utah. He’s a PASTOR!” He let that last word sink in, as if he’d just unveiled the most dangerous secret in the universe.

“Then how did he get my number Terry?”

“Oh my God Jason,” he was back. “I know what this is.”

“Oh? What is it Terry?”

“This is GOD. Trying to tell me something.”

“Terry…”

“No, I’m serious Jason. Oh my God. I shouldn’t even be here Jason. I just got out of jail!”

“Terry, I don’t know if…”

“I get it Jason. Loud and clear. I get the message. I’m so sorry man, but I get the message.”

“Well, alright,” I said. “You take care of yourself.”

“I will. Seriously. I promise.”

“And tell your friend that I can’t help him with his phone bill.” With that, I hung up.

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So, God or coincidence? Is there a more likely explanation? Do you think Terry and Robert were telling the truth?

Technorati Tags: Coincidence, Free Will, sovereignty, Stories

I was in front of my home taking down twinkle lights one year just after Christmas when I saw a young girl walking down the street towards me. She was too young to be walking alone and I noticed tears streaming down her cheeks. I ask if she needed anything two times. And two times she turned me down. She paused at the end of my driveway and I asked a third time. This time she responded with a yes. She used my phone to call someone to come get her.  Over the next hour I learned that she had run away from home the night before. Then my door bell rang. A man stood desperate at my front door. He was singularly focused, “where is my daughter!” I invited him in and watched as the two were reunited. I stood in the kitchen, giving them space and trying to keep myself composed as I was invited into this very intimate event of a relationship being restored. It was beautiful and powerful.

A friend had an old piece of furniture. It was cracked, paint was peeling and it was literally falling apart at the hinges. He didn’t see the dilapidated mess which I saw, he saw what it was originally designed to be. Over the next few months he spent hours restoring this piece of furniture. He poured over it with love, sweat and patience. Then one day I got the call, he had finished. I stopped by his home and before me was a beautiful, masterpiece. The once old chest of drawers was fully restored to its original design and it was beautiful.

Both of these stories speak of Jesus. He restores broken relationships. He restores people, like my friend restored that chest of drawers, He restores us to our original design. He restores us in our misguided beliefs and He constantly is making old things new again. Jesus, He is the one who brings restoration to this planet and to all people everywhere and His restoration is perfect and we, you and I get to share in it. It is powerful and beautiful and it constantly invites others into restoration as well.

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Cari lives in downtown San Diego, Ca where she founded The 11:29 Project. An initiative that seeks to connect people to the rest and restoration found in Jesus and advocates for the marginalized. She blogs a carijenkins.wordpress.com.

Technorati Tags: 3 Questions About Jesus, Cari Jenkins, Gospel, Jesus Christ, Stories

I kicked off the series with last week’s installment. This week’s guest is Jesse Schroeder.
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Jesus is a person I know. If I tried to describe him, I would fail to capture what I know. Instead, I’m going to share some events in which I’ve connected with Jesus. My hunch is that maybe you’ve connected with Jesus too.

In high school, I was really angry. My questions were bigger than any proposed solutions. But “something” from “somewhere” compelled me to “believe” that Jesus is real, and that he loves me.

Later in life, when I became a teacher, I would talk with my students about their lives, and sometimes I would pray for them. Jesus was with us, and in fact some of the words I would say were actually coming from him, not me.

Sometimes my students and I would spend a Saturday cooking breakfast and playing games with neighborhood kids. If I would step back and look around the room at the smiling faces and the running feet – I could see and hear Jesus.

Before she turned 18, one my students became pregnant. She decided to keep the baby, and I was at the hospital when Landon was born. Jesus was there too.

I visit Guatemala every year. I meet children, parents, pastors and workers. We mix concrete, build homes, sing songs, and share meals. Jesus is definitely there with us too.

Most weeks, I meet with a small group of friends and we talk about life, share questions about God, and ways we can try to help each other. I definitely feel Jesus when we get together.

I’ve had many experiences with Jesus, but I will tell you about only one more. One night in college, I told Jesus that he had to show me that he was real. The next evening, I went to church, and for an hour Jesus and I talked about life. There was never another doubt that Jesus is a real person who is sharing life with me.

That’s just a few. Maybe some of those stories sounded familiar to you. I can’t describe him very well, but I know I’ve lived my life with Jesus.

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Jesse Schroeder is a teacher who lives in the Columbus, Ohio area with his wife Kel. He has been involved with the Central Ohio Emergent Cohort since 2007 and blogs at Moving Away From the Mirrors.

Technorati Tags: 3 Questions About Jesus, Jesse Schroeder, Jesus Christ

• Who is Jesus the Christ?
• What has he done?
• Why does it matter?

I’m of the opinion that most presentations of the gospel tend to answer only one or two of these questions, or answer all of them in a way that reduces the scope of the gospel drastically. The challenge of this series will be to try answering these questions in a way that does justice to the depth and breadth of the gospel without trying to give people a pocket-sized systematic theology (because nobody would sit and listen to that).

Every Monday for the next few months I’ll host a different person who will attempt to answer those questions in 300 words or less. I’ve encouraged people to be as creative as they like. And, of course, we’d love your interaction and feedback.

I’ll go first with, “The Parable of the Apple Tree.”

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Jesus is like the story of an apple tree.

Once there was a farmer who gave his three sons an apple orchard, saying, “This is my gift to you. The orchard will care for you all your days if you will care for it.” But the sons despised their father’s gift and neglected it. Soon the trees died and the sons grew hungry. They called their father for help, who came and said, ”I will feed you.” Then, he knelt on the cracked earth and planted a seed.

Every day the sons begged their father for food, and every day they watched him water the seed and pull the weeds, saying, “I will feed you.”

Every day they watched him prune and tend the tender branches, and every day they begged for food. “I will feed you,” their father said.

Finally the tree grew strong and apples hung heavy from its branches. “This is my gift to you,” the father said. But the sons were bitter that they had been neglected for a tree. In a rage they cut it down and tore its limbs apart until their evil was exhausted.

As they sat ashamed at the foot of the desecrated tree their father brought apples plucked from its branches, saying, “This is my gift to you. Take and eat.”

The first son did not trust him. He refused the food and cursed his father, rejecting the gift. The second son bit into an apple but despised its flavor and cursed his father, rejecting the gift.

But the third son found the apples sweet and gratefully ate his fill. The father dug out the seeds and placed them in his son’s hands, saying, “This is my gift to you,” and beckoning toward the other sons, who were still hungry and ashamed, he added, “Now feed my sons.”

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Jason Coker is the host of Pastoralia.org. You can read more about him at the About page.

Technorati Tags: 3 Questions About Jesus, Jesus Christ, Parable of the Apple Tree, Parables, Stories, The Gospel

I just finished reading your book, A New Kind of Christianity and I wanted to accept your invitation (in the prelude) to reply.

I really appreciated this book. First, I found your proposal that we shift our scripture-reading paradigm from a “constitutional” approach to that of a “portable library” of ancient Jewish sources to be both a compelling and accurate way of characterizing a key hermeneutical difference. As I’ve worked in recent months to birth a fresh expression of church in my area, I’ve become convinced this is one of the most important shifts I need to model for others.

I also appreciated your perspective of Christ as the lens through which we read scripture. Of course, lots of folks from a diversity of traditions have affirmed this, but I think you’ve articulated it in a way that presents Christ as more than just the atoning incarnation of God, but also as God’s powerful and practical means of bringing peace-making and justice to the world. That, to me, seems like a high Christology and a much needed correction to foundationalist reductions.

I do have a few questions. Have you seen “The Answer Man” (originally titled “Arlen Faber” in 2009)? I loved this film and your book reminded me of a particular scene. The main character, Arlen Faber (played superbly by Jeff Daniels) is considered the world’s leading authority on God. But he bears a terrible secret: He hasn’t “heard” from God in twenty years. One of his only joys in life is old classic Hollywood monster films (like The Wolfman, Dracula, and Frankenstein) and he collects model figures of these monsters. Anyway, there’s a scene where Arlen is talking to a troubled younger man named Kris, who is asking him about God:

Kris: So what’s the deal with heaven and hell anyway?

Arlen: I’ve seen hell, and it’s name is Reno, Nevada.

Kris: I can’t believe God would punish people for not believing in him.

Arlen: Ah, the rapture.

Kris: What’s that?

Arlen: Well, I like to think of it as a monster movie. The monster destroys some people and spares others.

Kris: So who is the monster?

Arlen: God. God is the monster.

While Arlen is clearly mocking the very “soul sort” narrative you condemn, Jeff Daniels plays it more beautifully nuanced than that. He also seems to have a deeply ambivalent frustration and affection for God as “the monster” that echoes his affection for those classic monster films. It immediately made me think of the refrain in The Chronicles of Narnia that Aslan is “not a tame lion.” Likewise, I think there is a sense in which God is the “monster” for us. Much is made these days of our intimacy with God, particularly as an inevitable consequence of God’s own internal Trinitarian intimacy and his subsequent mission to reach out to the “other” – and I agree with that characterization wholeheartedly. However it also seems to me that there must remain, for eternity, an ontological “otherness” to God that keeps Godself at an inscrutable distance.

In other words, Arlen was right. God is the monster.

I can’t help but wonder if you’ve dismissed this aspect of God. For example, when you discuss the long questioning of Job by God toward the end of the central poem in the book, you interpret this to be a demonstration of God’s openness, but you ignore the dramatic climax of those very questions:

“Will the one who contends with the Almighty correct him? Let him who accuses God answer him!” (Job 40:2)

In other words, God’s answer to Job is exactly the “might makes right” argument you later condemn in your book (p178). Furthermore, this interpretation doesn’t come from a “constitutional” reading; rather, it respects the very dramatic literary reading of the poem and even echoes the central conclusion of Job’s Babylonian predecessor, “The Poem of the Righteous Sufferer.” Frankly, I don’t see how this harsh, “might makes right” argument can be dismissed as an evolutionary vestigial tail (so to speak) from the Old Testament because it is also the exact argument Paul uses in his very disconcerting “vessels of wrath” illustration from Romans 9:

“But who are you, O man, to talk back to God?” (Rom 9:20)

This represents my main concern with your book, and, specifically, with your proposal that we embrace an evolutionary reading of scripture. I have no problem with an evolutionary paradigm per sé, but you seem to apply it selectively and without any specific method – other than to use Jesus as the plumb line. Yet, even then, you remain silent on the difficult, and even violent, elements of judgment in many of Jesus’ own parables. The overall affect of this silence is that it really does appear you’ve merely used this evolutionary approach to dismiss the distasteful characteristics of God in accordance with contemporary tastes and sensibilities.

As I survey the biblical characterizations of God I find God’s mercy right alongside a willingness to judge with violence (be that hardship, exile, physical death, or the eternal judgment of being discarded in a cosmic trash heap). This appears from the first book to the last and everywhere in between, with no apparent evolutionary pattern. Moreover, Jesus seems to be the chief expositor of both characteristics. Personally, I don’t think we need to turn theological cartwheels in order to abstain from human appropriations of God’s own violence (this is clearly your motivation, and, as a pacifist myself, it’s a motivation I sympathize with). In fact, I think Jesus demonstrates that we can embrace God as the monster while abdicating violence ourselves.

I hate to toss around the word “orthodoxy” – which is often used as a blunt rhetorical object – but it seems to me that a defining feature of orthodoxy is the refusal to resolve the tension of seemingly opposing concepts. The irony of your theology, which strives to be thoroughly postmodern (and I mean that as a sincere compliment), is that you seem fall into the thoroughly Modern trap of attempting to resolve the biblical tension between God as lover and God as monster.

What do you think?

Some questions for you (or anyone else who cares to pitch in):

1. If God is God and I am not, shouldn’t I expect to find some of God’s attributes to be personally objectionable?
2. Closely related to #1: Isn’t there some sense in which God must always be “the monster” or else cease to be God?
3. Is there room in your theology for God as “the monster” alongside God as the merciful liberator? If so, how?

Post Script: This letter – in a much shorter form – was part of an assignment for my Fuller Seminary class “MC 535: Emerging Churches.” You can read my classmates letters to Brian by visiting dearbrianmclaren.wordpress.com.

Technorati Tags: A New Kind of Christianity, Brian McLaren, God as monster, peace-making, Violence

That was essentially the question asked by JR Woodward last year of 50 missional church practitioners, including myself. What would you write about the good news in your local paper if given the opportunity?

The 50 responses have now been collected and published in a wonderful little book called ViralHope: Good News From The Urbs to the Burbs and Everything In Between. It was humbling to contribute my small chapter to this book as many of the other men and women featured on the pages are people I have admired and emulated for years. Others I’m just discovering and getting to know. As Alan Hirsch writes in his endorsement of the book:

“ViralHope is a unique and enticing collection of postcards from a veritable who’s who of the missional church from across the Western world. It provides us with articulate and varied perspectives on how missionaries to the West are conceiving the good news in and for their various contexts. A worthy read.”

ViralHope would make a fantastic 50-day personal devotion, small group study reflection, or church-wide reading series. You can click here to get your own copy from Amazon.

Technorati Tags: Books, Christianity, Good News, Gospel, JR Woodward, missional, Missional Church, ViralHope

(During the month of April I’m blogging through Alan and Deb Hirsch’s latest book, Untamed. Previous posts: Chapter 1)

Your sincerity is not enough. Everyone is sincere, but there is a real-live God, with real-live thoughts, values, and expectations that exclude other thoughts, values, and expectations as possibilities of goodness.

If the first chapter of Deb and Alan Hirsch’s latest book, Untamed, concerned the re-affirmation of a personally accessible God, then the second Chapter wants us to know that God is dangerous. Moreover, as history’s slew of cult leaders and televangelists attest, it is also dangerous to miss the truth about that God. Such false prophets are very sincere about their faith, as Martin Buber has noted:

“False prophets are not godless. Rather, they adore the god “success.” They themselves are in constant need of success and achieve it by promising it to the people. But they do honestly want success for the people. The craving for success governs their hearts and determines what rises from them. That is what Jeremiah called the “deceit of their own hearts.” They do not deceive; they are deceived, and can only breathe in the air of deceit.”

This means getting the “fundamentals” about God right, but before you make the mistake of hearing a re-hashing of fundamentalism here, you must understand what the Hirsch’ mean by this term; for them, the fundamentals refer to being like Christ:

“We easily lose focus on what is essential. We miss the fact that discipleship has to do with becoming like Jesus, living the Shema, and not forgetting that the “more important matters of the law,” namely love, mercy, forgiveness, justice (Matt. 23:23–24), are nonnegotiables in the equation.”

This is in sharp contrast to the fundamentals of fundamentalism, which are unquestionable, universally certain  doctrinal propositions of truth that must be consciously affirmed. For the Hirsch’s this is too abstract, and this places them squarely in postmodern territory (though, not lost in its wilderness). Indeed, it’s likely that many sectors of Christendom will dismiss the these ideas as legalistic because some of the focus is being shifted to include what we do (what they call, “living the Shema”), as well as what we believe (i.e. “believing in Jesus”).

The authors indirectly reject fundamentalist conceptions of legalism as a false dichotomy, instead seeing legalism as too much emphasis on doctrinal purity. They affirm that, “The reality is that what we believe about God does have consequences. History is full of people who have wreaked enormous damage and even killed for what they believe in.”Our theology dictates our conception of what it means to be good and right, and how it will look to build a just society.

For the authors, this is where the Shema – the core Jewish prayer, taken from Deut 6 – comes in. For the Hirsch’s, Jesus’ placement of the Shema (or what Scot McNight calls “The Jesus Creed“) in Mark 12:29-31 as the central explication of faith is his remarkable distillation of right theology and praxis in one simple statement, a statemnt which holds the two concepts of belief and action firmly together – making his “way” into a concrete, bodily faith:

“The follower of Jesus broadens his or her knowledge of God through living truth, not just believing in it. True knowledge of God must be expressed in practice or action—that’s why the Bible is one-third ethics. Obedience— body and soul—is part of the condition of God’s covenant (for example, Exod. 24:7; Jer. 11:3) as well as the momentous parting words of commission under which we live (Matt. 28:18–20). As C. S. Lewis says, “Obedience is the ‘holy courtesy’ required for entering into the divine relationship.”

This is how we truly come to know God: by faith, which means believing Jesus’ teachings to the extent that we put them into bodily practice and learn how, through trial and error, to become like him through the enabling grace of God given by the indwelling Holy Spirit. The teachings and actions of Christ, including the Shema, are not only the starting point for our theological conception of God, but also our guide for whether we’re getting it right or wrong.

Another distinctively postmodern aspect of this chapter is the Hirsch’s insistence that such a life simply cannot be lived individually. While we all can know God, no one individual can know God completely. Rather, because everyone is wired differently with a variety of temperaments, strengths, and weaknesses, we must pursue the knowing of God in community. That is the place of proper theology.

The rest of the Chapter explores some of the ways that people are derailed in their discipleship – with emphasis on the big three of sex, money, and power – but the core message remains the same: we recapitulate what we worship, therefore we must endeavor to know God as God really is. For the authors, this means that the first order of Christianity is a full-orbed, holistic worship (not just singing), which they call “dangerous” because it has the capacity to put us in contact with an untamed God who transforms us beyond our meager lusts.

Some Questions For Reflection:

1. Do you agree that we imitate that which we worship? Can you think of examples from non-religious life?
2. What is your concept of worship? What are the most effective ways you engage in worship?
3. What are you thought on the proposition that we can only know God in community?

Technorati Tags: Alan Hirsch, Christianity, Deb Hirsch, discipleship, God, missional, Postmodernism, Scot McNight, The Shema, Untamed, worship

Matt Croasmun: “The Cross, Eucharist, and Imitation in the Gospel of John”

Abstract
This paper consists of two parts. The first is an exegetical exploration of the “missing Eucharist” narrative and peculiar chronology of the passion narrative in the Gospel of John in a literary-canonical mode. Here, it is shown that the Gospel of John indeed includes a Eucharistic narrative and that this event takes when it does in the Synoptic accounts, though, in John’s chronology, Eucharist happens on the cross, as Jesus eats his food (bringing to completion the work of the One who sent Him) and drinks the cup which He obediently receives at Gethsemane. Using the foot-washing narrative as a lens through which to interpret this displaced Eucharist, the mimetic significance of Jesus’ death and His Eucharist is contrasted with the mnemonic function of Eucharist in the Lucan-Pauline tradition. The second part of the paper considers the systematic coherence afforded Vineyard theology as a whole in emphasizing the mimetic function of Jesus’ death. Here, it is noted that Johannine texts have long served as the source for the Vineyard’s basic mimetic stance towards the ministry of Jesus: that is, the Vineyard reading of the gospels has been a call to Johannine imitation of the Synoptic Jesus. The exclusion of the Cross from this exegetical program is a result of a confusion regarding the inimitable nature of Jesus’ death, understood exclusively as once-for-all atoning sacrifice. Receiving from John a Eucharistic theology that regularly invites us into imitation of Jesus’ obedience to the will of the Father and self-lowering love of others exhibited on the Cross promises to bring greater systematic unity to the Vineyard’s hermeneutical strategy in the gospels and to provide the Cross a more central place in the movement’s theology as a whole.

Q: How did you become interested in your topic?

A: Several years ago, before I started Divinity School, I sat in on Harry Attridge’s course on the exegesis of the Fourth Gospel. Harry has substantial interest in the sacramental theology of this text. And, of course, the key problem with thinking about sacraments—especially Eucharist—in John is that there is no institution narrative. So we puzzled over this problem quite a lot in that course and I remember continuing to puzzle over it long after.

Around the same time, I was reading Bill Jackson’s history of the Vineyard church and noted there that the Vineyard had taken some flack for not teaching the Cross as much as the critics would have liked. I suppose it’s a sign of the times, but I’m really interested in the ways that larger narratives frame and in some sense control our theological reflection. So, in thinking about the problem Bill Jackson had highlighted, it occurred to me that perhaps integral to this problem was the Vineyard’s narrative of the Kingdom. Was there something about the way the Vineyard was understanding the Kingdom that left the cross on the sideline? When I went and read the Vineyard Statement of Faith, my suspicions only grew. Eventually, I stumbled upon the possibility that it is the radical imitation of Jesus (which is really the heart of Wimber’s hermeneutic of the gospels) that could provide the “hook” in the Vineyard’s meta-narrative on which to hang a distinctively Vineyard—distinctively “Kingdom”—theology of the cross.

The last piece of the puzzle for me is the methodological approach I’m trying to take in the paper. A mentor and friend of mine gave me Stephen Moore’s God’s Gym to read when I was in Divinity School. Of course, Moore’s conclusions are profoundly troubling—though, I think worth wrestling with. But I found his method of interpretation absolutely exhilarating. It was playful, it was deadly serious at times. It broke down the walls of historical criticism that have always seemed fundamentally out of touch with the ways that actual people of faith read the biblical text and encounter God there. So, I guess I wanted to try my hand at something that might skew toward the “literary” in approach. Interestingly, I was surprised at how little push back I got on this at the SVS conference. I thought for sure some large number of folks would want to skewer me for going right at the fissures in the biblical text, making much of them, and playing out their tensions exclusively in a stubbornly non-historical, literary way. Does this count as “exegesis”? Is “exegesis” a good description of what people of faith are actually after in their encounter with God in the biblical text to begin with?

Q: How do you think your paper is relevant to the Vineyard movement at large?

A: First, on the meta-level, I think the paper is relevant inasmuch as it might serve as a invitation to further reflection on the Kingdom and the Cross. How does the Cross fit into the Vineyard’s narrative of the Kingdom? I think I’ve offered a textual way into something like an answer to this question, but, presumably, there are others.

Second, in terms of the specific answer I offer, I really do think that it’s crucial when we talk about “doing the stuff” to consider Jesus’ death as an integral part of “the stuff” that Jesus was doing. We need to anticipate that imitation of Christ’s rejection, humiliation, and death is an integral part of imitatio Christi. I suggested in broad strokes in my paper that this mostly looks like self-lowering love of others; obviously, there’s so much more to explore there. A necessary caveat to that—the response I should have given to the excellent question posed from the feminist point of view—is that, of course, Jesus’ death is precisely also His exaltation—John uses the pun on Jesus being “lifted up.” So our imitation of Christ in his death is not fundamentally self-destructive; it is our salvation and access to true power and authority.

Q: What do you think might be the practical implications of what you’re exploring?

A: In our church, we’ve changed some of the ways we do communion. First of all, we take communion every week—partly because we want to make sure that the cross is shaping everything we do and are becoming. We receive communion right after the sermon, which has given us the discipline of having to have every talk land us back at the foot of the cross. At the same time, because we do communion every week, we have freedom to let the invitation to the table look radically different from week to week. That’s been a great practice for us. And, certainly, a fair number of communion invitations in our church are invitations to imitate, rather than simply “remember.”

Matt will be available for questions and interaction in the comments below

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Matt Croasmun lives in New Haven, Connecticut and is a PhD student in the Religious Studies Department at Yale University. He is studying New Testament, focusing on mythological language in the Pauline epistles. He has been in the Vineyard for 12 years, serving in worship and youth ministry, and helped to plant the Elm City Vineyard in New Haven where he and his wife Hannah provide senior leadership.

Technorati Tags: Jesus, John, Matt Croasmun, Society of Vineyard Scholars, SVS, Vineyard Community of Churches

Doug Erickson: “Advice to Vineyard Theologians (and Philosophers, and Scholars…)”

Abstract
Due to the diversity of interests and shall we say, the “complexity” of the short Vineyard history, there is some variety of opinion as to just what the “center” of our center-set movement is. For some, the center is our commitment to social justice issues: caring for the poor, and bringing the kingdom of God to the last, the least, and the lost. Other options could be a renewal movement, a signs and wonders movement, a power evangelism movement, a church planting movement or a pneumatologically orientated movement. I argue in my paper that while these elements are all important as to what it means to be a Vineyard, the true “center” is our enacted, inaugurated, eschatological vision of the kingdom of God. I really like the way people like Derek Morphew and Don Williams have expounded on this. We say enacted because we are committed to not only talking about the kingdom, but doing the works of the kingdom which includes things like social justice and evangelism, but much more: praying for the sick and demonized, bringing hope and restoration to hurting people, and doing our best to tend the garden- that is, taking care of this amazing creation that has been entrusted to us. We say inaugurated because this kingdom mission is established, inaugurated and primarily understood through the life, ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus. This picture of the kingdom is Eschatological because we see in the inauguration, the in-breaking of the powers of the future, into the present. When we pray for a sick person, and the Holy Spirit comes to heal, that is a prolepsis event: a “down payment” if you will, on the future age when there will be no sickness or suffering. This kingdom ideal can be loosely defined as the effective range of God’s rule, that is, it is encompassed by those places where God’s will is done on earth, as it is perfectly expressed in heaven.

This theological self-identification is important for a young movement like the Vineyard as we, more and more often, are engaging in dialogue with Christians from other theological traditions. As Christ’s prayer “that they shall be one” calls us to ecumenical dialogue, we must, and can, enter into this dialogue from our decidedly Vineyard presuppositions and commitments. I contend that we have a unique and significant contribution to the larger body of Christ, but we are just beginning to discover what those contributions may be.

Interview with Doug:

Q: How did you become interested in your topic?

A: I became interested in this topic because although I haven’t been in the Vineyard that long, less than 17 years, even in that time that have been several twists and turns as we have struggled to identity ourselves. The question of “what does it mean to be a Vineyard” has been answered many different ways. To some extent, there are different answers to this related to the issues of theological commitments or praxis, although the two are obviously related. So in this paper, I wanted to re-establish what I, and many others, consider to be the central theological distinctive of the Vineyard: our commitment to the practice and proclamation of the already-not yet conception of the kingdom of God. In my view, our eschatology drives other theological commitments, so rather than being a pneumatologically driven movement, I see that eschatology conditions our pneumatology, especially the work of the Spirit.

Q: How do you think your paper is relevant to the Vineyard movement at large

A: I think this paper has some import on the movement especially as pastors and structural leaders are increasingly moving into discussions and dialogue with Christians from other traditions. A base element of ecumenical dialogue is answering the question, “what makes you tick?” or, what theological doctrines do you ground yourself in? How do these grounding beliefs affect other areas of theological reflection, such as the doctrine of God, anthropology, soteriology, or ecclesiology? At the conference, I was quite amazed and encouraged by the breadth and depth of theological reflection ongoing in the movement. We are just now probably entering into a stage where we can began some significant constructive theological development, so understanding our central theological distinctive is absolutely crucial as we move into this type of work.

Q: What do you think might be the practical implications of what you’re exploring?

A: It’s a tautology that theological commitment influences praxis and visa versa. So there is an obvious connection between what we teach, train and preach and what we practice. For those of us in the academic community, understanding our theological grounding should assist us in dialogue with believers from other traditions. Practically as a movement, we can think about how the various areas of  cultural engagement intersect with kingdom grounding. We are a movement known for caring for the poor and seeking justice, and that should continue. We are not however, primarily a social justice movement; we are a kingdom movement, who sees caring for the poor as an essential feature of the kingdom message. We embrace evangelism and power ministry, but again, centrally we are not just an evangelistic movement; we do evangelism because we see that a central feature of the kingdom conscription is to “go and make disciples”. Many of our churches and structural leaders have embraced the challenge to creation care, but we are not primarily an ecological movement, we are a kingdom movement that sees the call to tend the garden as an element of the kingdom message. So as we enter in to all of those areas, our engagement should reflect our central belief in the enacted, inaugurated eschatological kingdom of God.

Doug will be available for questions and interaction in the comments below

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Doug Erickson is from the Duluth Vineyard in Duluth, Minnesota, where he makes constant supplications to St. Columbanus, the patron saint of motorcyclists. He is currently writing his Ph.D. dissertation from Marquette University on the relationship between eschatology and pneumatology in the Vineyard movement. He teaches for the Vineyard Biblical Institute in the U.S. Doug is married to Sandi, they have three kids and the entire family enjoys the outdoor lifestyle that Duluth offers.

Technorati Tags: Doug Erickson, Society of Vineyard Scholars, SVS, Vineyard Community of Churches