Lots of good stuff from Tim Keel and Doug Pagitt’s Critical Concerns Course today. They allowed for a lot of dialogue, made us all pair up into iBuddies who we met with a few times throughout the afternoon. I met 2 very nice women who were there with their husbands. They are in their mid-20s and are looking at planting a church in Pennsylvania, so I’m hoping to keep in touch with them, as I head out to New Jersey.
Aside from Doug’s beautiful use of the f-bomb (multiple times), the afternoon was filled with a tremendous amount of theology, and a few somewhat heated discussions. Both Tim and Doug said something to this effect: “We’re not just saying that the methods need to change – the message needs to change as well!” I think this is going to be a theme for this week (at least I know that Tim, Doug, Tony Jones, & others) will be talking more and more about this (esp. at Doug & Tony’s “A New Theology for a New World” seminar later this week). After last year’s Emergent convention, and everyone went home and bought all the emergentYS resources and got their blogs, and starting drinking coffee, and listening to Chant and all that (myself included), emergent has all of a sudden gotten “hip” / “cool” / “trendy.” People feel that by adding the candles & coffee, all of a sudden they are an “emerging church.” Yet today was filled with theological conversations. The emerging church movement is NOT simply a movement about changing the form of worship – it is not simply about changing the order of service from linear to organic/fluid (which is what many THINK emergent is about). Forms. Methods. Etc.
But it is clear that this is NOT all that emergent is. Emergent is very much a rethinking of not only church, but theology – the message. The message doesn’t in fact stay the same. And…THAT is what is scary. THAT is what causes people in the seminars (and not just the ones wearing the NPC nametags) to squirm in their seats. When Doug talked about how the doctrine of the Trinity may not necessarily be needed in today’s 21st century, people squirmed. When Tim talked about our clearly UNDERdeveloped theology of salvation (getting individual butts into heaven before earth burns), people were uncomfortable with that (not all, but some). When Doug talks about, as a pastor, being able to truly say, “I truly feel led by the people of our community” – that goes against what we are taught a “pastor” or a “leader” should be about. When Tim talked about how we need to be talking and thinking more about a theology of creation (which deals with ALL of the important theological questions people are asking today: anthropology, nanotechnology, ecology, gender issues, sexual issues) – some people are still thinking, “But isn’t soteriology (theology of salvation) still the MOST important?”
And this is where we are at. We are at the point of discussion, we are at conversation. And we are now not just talking about the way in which we worship – but we are getting theological. We are venturing into the land of theology, and are asking ourselves, “What is *truly* biblical? What is important to Jesus? What is more a product of modernity, or an interpretation by a community of people who lived in a time that is drastically different than the era we are finding ourselves in?” Again, these are not amazingly prophetic utterances – but important questions nonetheless.
I think there are some people interested in the emerging church movement who do not even want to begin to think about the message changing. I’m not exactly sure what the message is changing TO – but I don’t think that change is bad. I don’t think that God necessarily wanted God’s followers in the 1500, 1890s (as Doug likes to mention is the time of the most DRAMATIC changes, 1890-1910) and 2020s to be thinking the exact same things about the world, humanity and about God. Where is this taking us? Where is this leading?
I’m not sure.
Maybe that’s why this year’s theme is The Road Ahead.