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Can the Church/World dichotomy be removed?

Craig Carter, in a book where he attempts to integrate the thought of J.H. Yoder, claims that, “Yoder believes that the church-world distinction is essential in order of the gospel to be experienced as good news” (Carter, Craig. The Politics of the Cross, 186). But I wonder if this distinction or split between church and world is necessary. Are there ways of conceiving of ‘evangelical’ ecclesiology that don’t require such a distinction – that in fact see the essentially worldliness of the church, and churchliness of the world?

The problem with trying to envision this kind of difference is that it requires either an outright rejection, or at least a significant re-reading of the New Testament (e.g. John 1), and certain portions of the Old (e.g. all this stuff about being called to be different from the surrounding nations). It would seem that within the Biblical tradition, the separation between the people of God and the world are foundational.  But, is this the only way to read the tradition?  Or, have we become too accustomed to one way of reading the text without being open to different voices?

But, I’m not questioning whether religious people or communities should be in some ways distinct or different. Instead, I wonder if Christians need to see themselves as different and distinct over and against the world? Are there other ways in which to form group identity?

I know that if I were to move in this direction I would have to radically reformulate how I preach, teach and encourage the church to be the church.  But, in a polarized world, I feel draw to move away from a posture that posits a stark church/world separation to a more generous appreciation for the good in the world.  I wonder if I am being led to a form of Augustinian realism?  Maybe!  That would be a be odd for an avowed Anabaptist, now wouldn't it?

Contractarianism and Church Membership

Jeffrey Stout engages in a critique of Rawls’s contractarian social ethics (Stout, Jeffrey, Democracy and Tradition, 64-85). In it he claims that it is impossible to base political dialogue on premises or principles that no reasonable person could reject. Stout argues that we cannot expect to reach the level of holding common premises or principles in common while at the same time maintaining freedom of expression. In order to create consensus, we would have to resort to oppressive forms of social control.

The MB church operates in exactly this framework. The denomination has created a document – the confession of faith – that has been granted status as those principles and approaches that demarcate the boundaries of belonging. The content of the confession is what establishes the terms and limits of acceptable dialogue and beliefs in our denomination. People are disciplined (i.e. excluded from the discourse) when they are at variance with the confession. 

The problem with this system is twofold. First, to place the confession of faith on an authoritative plane is to deny that it is a human document, arrived at by a process of political compromise. In other words, it is a human document, created out of flawed human systems. Therefore, we must insist that it is subject to the same flaws as humans and therefore must be open to critique. (As an aside – the Bible functions in much the same way – only by appealing to divine authorship can it be placed on a plane above the human. But, this divinization of The Book seems to violate the principle of the Incarnation). 

Second, this elevation of the confession denies the reality that as individuals and persons we are all on a different continuum when it comes to theological beliefs and opinions. In a Hegelian sense, our theological norms and commitments are always in the process of being simultaneously held, simultaneously deconstructed and simultaneously innovated upon. An attempt to fix the conversational aspects of our theological beliefs violates their true nature.

Because of these two problems, I believe that a concept of membership and belonging to a particular church or tradition cannot be based on a contractarian understanding. We must find a more supple way to speak about belonging and what constitutes membership in a particular church or denomination.  I am still trying to formulate what exactly that looks like.

Stout on Pacifism

Here's a quote that hits me between the eyes:

Mere pacifism - in which the memory of distant martyrs and the vision of the peaceable kingdom are divorced from a practice of social justice - is 'like the combatant who, in the conflict, is only concerned with keeping his sword bright" (Stout, Jeffrey, Democracy and Tradition. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 161).

Maureen Dowd on Iran and the President's Visit

A good read in follow-up to my earlier post.

Maureen Dowd on Iran and the President's Visit

A good read in follow-up to my earlier post.

exclusion and belief

Recently, I was speaking with a friend who is a leader in an evangelical church, we'll call him Joe.  Anyway, Joe was talking about the strange place he inhabits as a leader in this particular community.  Here's a snippet of our dialog for your reflection:

Think about this for a moment.  If I were to reveal in the foyer that I believed that two women in a committed monogamous(sic!) relationship do not constitute a moral contradiction with the Bible and Evangelical Christian Faith, I would lose my job, faith community, and credentials as a leader. I would be blacklisted, "prayed for," and people would seek to bring me back into "the fold."

On the other hand, if I revealed that I believed that my child could, as a Bible believing Christian, go off to Afghanistan and kill Taleban soldiers, there would be a entirely different reaction.  People would say that on the matter of whether it is appropriate to use violence to solve conflicts there are a variety of Christian opinions.

He continues,

Look at the irony of this situation.  On the first issue, the Old Testament has some murky references, embedded in complex laws regarding religious purity, about lesbian behaviours.  Jesus is silent on the issue, only Paul makes a somewhat direct reference to the issue, but again, what exactly he said and how it is to be applied today is an open question.

But, on the issue of killing, consider this.  Even though the Old Testament contains stories of God sanctioning violence, we can't forget that one of the 10 Commandments is "you shall not kill."   Jesus says, "love your enemies," which presumably means that you can't shoot them.  The New Testament as a whole is clear about the immorality of the use of violence to solve conflict.

This issue reinforces for me the simple fact that evangelicals do not, as they presume, have the market cornered on appropriate morality and ethics.  Our ears are deaf to the voice of God and the path of Jesus (but I'm getting carried away!).

And here's where what he said was most personally challenging: 

What would it take to re-order our moral hierarchies such that central human issues, like those of the appropriate use of violence, be moved to the "top" (yes, I know this language is problematic) and issues such as whether women and men are allowed to live in committed same sex relationships be moved down a rung or two. 

I yearn to be a part of a community that can make this moral shift. But, alas, the context I inhabit simple will not allow me this freedom.  Even as I think these thoughts, I hear the crowds hungering for blood.

remixing pentecostalism

This strange video came to me via the Wittenburg Door blog.  It shows an old time Pentecostal worship service turned into a Swedish? rave.  Odd, but strangely interesting.

Free Speech?

Lee Bollinger, President of Columbia University, opened the speech by Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, with a series of critical and inflamatory remarks directed towards the president.  You can read his remarks here.

Apparently, as a compromise with many who violently opposed Ahmadinejad's coming to Columbia, Bollinger agreed to open the speech by asking these hard questions.  But, his remarks go beyond simply asking hard questions, and degenerate to the point of name calling.  He in fact succumbs to several tactics (unqualified, inflamatory statements made for attention-grabbing purposes) that he accuses his opponent of using.

Ahmadinejad responded quite eloquently to Bollinger's opening tirade by asking:

In Iran, tradition requires when you invite a person to be a speaker, we actually respect our students enough to allow them to make their own judgment, and don’t think it’s necessary before the speech is even given to come in with a series of complaints to provide vaccination to the students and faculty.

He has a good point.  Bollinger says that the invitation to Columbia was done as an expression of the American ideal of free speech.  But, in his opening remarks he displays a remarkable attempt to subvert the principles of free, open, respectful debate.

For the President of a preeminent American University to make these kinds of remarks is for me a sad commentary on the loss of the University's goal of shaping and forming disciplined minds.  It speaks of the need to de-politicize the role of University.  Here the words of Bollinger are relevant:

In universities, we have a deep and almost single-minded commitment to pursue the truth.  We do not have access to the levers of power.  We cannot make war or peace.  We can only make minds.  And to do this we must have the most full freedom of inquiry.   

I couldn't agree more.  I just wish that you would have displayed this same kind of commitment to discovering the truth through spirited dialogue, rather than resorting to politicized, rhetoric aimed at your opponent's character rather than the larger issues facing human civilization.

Elijah and the Public Presence of God

Here is a recent communion sermon that I thought my spur some interesting thoughts.

Elijah and the Public Presence of God
1 Kings 17-20
Sermon Preached August 12th, 2007 at Saanich Community Church
David Eagle
© 2007 David Eagle. This work may be reproduced and redistributed, in whole or in part, without alteration and without prior written permission, solely for personal, educational, or other nonprofit purposes.

Good morning.  This week, we continue in the book of 1 Kings, today exploring the life of arguably Israel’s most famous prophet, Elijah.  To set the stage, Solomon is dead, and Israel has become divided into two nations: the nation of Israel in the North and Judah in the South.  1 Kings now occupies itself almost exclusively with the Northern Kingdom, and tells about its quick and sad decent into ruin.  The kings of Israel provide terrible leadership – all succumb to the worship of foreign gods, and all are troubled by threats from foreign powers. 
Ahab, has the honour of being one of the most notorious kings of Israel.  In 1 Kings 21.25 we read that, “No one else so completely sold himself to what was evil in the LORD's sight as did Ahab, urged on by his wife, Jezebel.” 

Ahab, like Solomon, married a foreign princess, in this case a princess from the coastal city of Tyre.  She was a devoted follower of the Phonecian Storm God, Ba’al. Ahab allowed her to continue to worship her god.  But, Jezebel was not content to privately worship her deity while the Israelites worshipped their god, Yahweh.  No, she wanted to bring Ba’al worship into all of Israel.

It’s helpful also to have a bit of a background for understanding the worship of Ba’al.  Ba’al as the storm god was the one who brought much needed rain to water crops.  Each year, as the dry season began, Ba’al would die and the rains would stop.  Then, at the beginning of rainy season Ba’al would rise again and bring water to the land so the farmers could produce crops.

So, enter into this setting, Elijah, the prophet. 

Elijah is an interesting character.  No less suddenly than he is whisked away into heaven on a chariot; he appears at the beginning of 1 Kings Chapter 17.  The Bible introduces to us to Elijah with the words: “Now Elijah the Tishbite, of Tishbe in Gilead, said to Ahab, ‘As the LORD the God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall be neither dew nor rain these years, except by my word’.”

Elijah, a devoted follower of Yahweh, hails from the North Eastern part of Israel.  He made it his life’s goal to rid the land of Israel of Ba’al worship.  And he storms on the scene, announcing to the king that it will not rain again until the prophet says it will rain. 
With this bit of background about Ba’al worship, I think you can see why this announcement is so significant.  Elijah is proclaiming that “No, it is not through the living and dying of the god Ba’al that the rains come, but rather through the power and word of the Lord.”

This proclamation makes Elijah a rather unpopular fellow in Israel, particularly with the King’s wife Jezebel, and he flees, ironically, to Phonecia, the hub of Ba’al worship.  There he settles down to live with a widow and her son, sustained for three years by a single jar of flour and a little bit of oil that miraculously keeps on replenishing. 

At the conclusion of his sojourn with the widow, God calls Elijah to confront Ahab.  And Elijah challenges Ahab to a contest.  He asks Ahab to assemble the priests of Baal and Asherah.  These prophets will sacrifice a bull and place it on an altar.  Elijah will do the same.  He has the priests agree that the one who can call fire down from heaven to burn up the offering, will obviously be the follower of the true god. 

And, to make a long story short, try as they might, the prophets of Ba’al cannot make the offering catch fire.  But Yahweh, after a short prayer by Elijah, brings down fire and consumes the offering, in spite of the fact that Elijah has soaked the altar with water. 

The people bow down before Elijah and say, “The Lord is God, the Lord is God.”  Then, Elijah has the priests of the false gods taken away and slaughtered.

At this point in the story that Elijah swaggers with confidence: he’s sure that he’s won the battle against Ba’al worship in Israel.  He’s proven that Yahweh is the true God.  Now, the ways has been cleared for the proper worship of Yahweh to be restored in Israel.  He has won a great and decisive victory.

But, as King Ahab returns home and reports all what happened to Jezebel, his wife and Elijah’s main adversary, she sends a less and complimentary message: “May the gods also kill me if by this time tomorrow I have failed to take your life like those whom you killed.”
Elijah, scared for his life, and dejected that his adversary Jezebel has not fallen from power, runs away, fleeing south into the desert.

Out in the wilderness, he finds a solitary broom tree, and curls up beneath it to die.
***
As I talk with people and attend church conferences, I notice how common it is to talk about how pagan, heathen and/or non-Christian our nation has become.  People decry that secular values dominate our schools, family systems and laws.   Dismay is often expressed that Christians have been chased to the margins of society. Many people are worried that our culture is increasingly eroding away any sense of healthy standards and values.
And, of course, much of this is true.  Our society has become increasingly fragmented and toxic to human well being.  I don’t think I need prove this to you.  But the question remains, how do we, as people of faith, respond?  And, interestingly, these stories about Elijah provide us a very helpful way into this question.

Elijah occupies a similar space.  The country and people he loves have allowed false gods and misguided priorities to dominate them.  He has a burning desire to restore wholeness and health to the people and, ultimately, the nation. 

But, early in his career as prophet, he succumbs to two perennial temptations, pitfalls that people of faith often slip into when faced with a crumbling moral and spiritual climate.  These are the same temptations that we face when we think about the unhealthy drift in our own culture.

His first temptation is to use aggressive, head on confrontation, in order to “prove” to his adversaries that they are wrong.  He uses this approach with the prophets of Ba’al on Mount Carmel, with his little contest.  And, even though he ends up winning the battle, his approach doesn’t win the war, if you’ll forgive the military image.  Jezebel continues to exert her influence and control. 

When Parliament was debating bill C-38, which legalized same-sex marriage, many Christians, myself included, were opposed to it, because religious people, particularly conservative religious people, were completely ignored as the bill was drafted. 

Many of the opponents to the bill advocated an aggressive approach to countering it.  They argued that if we could keep this bill from passing, then the Christian heritage of our country would be preserved. 

Well, the bill was passed, so the point is somewhat moot.  But, even if the bill hadn’t passed, even if Christians and others were able to rally support to defeat the bill, we still would not have addressed the larger, underlying confusion surrounding marriage, gender roles and sexuality in our society.

Head on confrontation and aggressive tactics rarely end up solving the deeper problems in our world.  They might work in Hollywood, but not in real life.

The second approach that Elijah attempts is to run away and bury his head in the sand.  He simply gives up, saying, “this is too hard. Israel will never change.”

I think we all from time to time are tempted to throw our hands in the air when faced with the daunting task of trying to bring positive change into our world – including our families, workplaces, and neighbourhoods.  We wonder if we really can make a difference, and we give up.

It is fascinating to read the story of God’s encounter with Elijah in the wilderness.  Elijah has given up – he just wants to die under a tree in the desert.  Notice that what God does is first of all to provide food for him. He then has Elijah journey to Mt. Sinai, where God gave Moses the 10 commandments.  And it is there that God speaks to Elijah, not in an earthquake, not in a windstorm, not in a fire, but in a quiet, gentle whisper.

And listen to what God whispers to Elijah:

"Go back the way you came, and travel to the wilderness of Damascus. When you arrive there, anoint Hazael to be king of Aram. Then anoint Jehu son of Nimshi to be king of Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel-meholah to replace you as my prophet…Yet I will preserve seven thousand others in Israel who have never bowed to Baal or kissed him!" 1 Kings 19.15-18

God subtly and quietly reminds Elijah of one very important fact: God is at work in all situations, no matter how difficult and hopeless they may seem.  We often feel the urge to flee from difficult situations – especially in places that feel hostile to our faith – but God is at work, bring hope and healing.  And he calls us to partner with him, even in difficult places.

At the beginning of the gospel of Mark, in chapter 1 verses 16-20, we read this story about Jesus:

One day as Jesus was walking along the shores of the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother, Andrew, fishing with a net, for they were commercial fishermen. Jesus called out to them, "Come, be my disciples, and I will show you how to fish for people!" And they left their nets at once and went with him. A little farther up the shore Jesus saw Zebedee's sons, James and John, in a boat mending their nets. He called them, too, and immediately they left their father, Zebedee, in the boat with the hired men and went with him.

The world during Jesus’ day was just as dark and misguided as Elijah’s world, just and dark and misguided as today’s world.  And faced with this reality, God did not simply throw his hands in the air and argue that there’s nothing he can do for these people.  Rather, he decided to become one of us, to live with us, and significantly to suffer the consequences of our godlessness for us.

God also did not come as a mighty warrior ready to do battle with the forces of evil.  Rather he came as a humble carpenter, calling simple fisher folk to join him in the task of confronting the evil powers of his day through the preaching of Good News to the poor and brokenhearted.

As we celebrate this meal, let us learn from Elijah’s response to the evil in his world. May we avoid the temptation to try and do battle with the forces of immorality.  May we also resist the temptation to run away and bury our heads in the sand. And, first and foremost, let us remember God’s response in Jesus Christ, and seek to follow him in his gentle way of redeeming the world.

Sabbatical Reseach Question

For those interested, I'm including a description of my sabbatical research proposal. I will be working on this project until Christmas.  And BTW, sabbatical is wonderful!  No pressures of congregational life, a quiet space in which to work, and being wonderfully free when I get home from work!  I just have to figure out how to do this all the time!

Project Proposal

I am interested in the contemporary dialogue about how churches engage and influence the society they occupy. My main interest is in Protestant congregations influenced by North American evangelicalism.

In the contemporary dialogue, the work of theologian Stanley Hauerwas occupies a key role. Hauerwas combines the work of Mennonite theologian John Howard Yoder and philosopher Alistair MacIntyre. His position on this topic can be summarized as follows:

First, he argues that the only way for the church to have credibility is for the character of the church’s members as well as the quality of the church’s shared life to bear direct relationship to the narratives of

Israel

and Jesus. People within the church community must display Christian virtues in order for their belief to be credible. He argues that the church is primarily about shaping people into a distinct community through the great narratives of the Bible. As such, he proposes that the church recover its place as a "counter-cultural” community.

Second, in contrast to the social gospel and liberal Protestantism, he argues that rather than proposing a universal ethic for a society, the church ought to remain a witness to the “trueness” of their foundational narratives through the character of their life. They ought to separate themselves from the “liberal” values of society and expose its inner problems.

Third, Hauerwas tries to distinguish his approach from sectarianism. He argue that the church should resist the urge to withdraw, but instead through the character of its life be a witnessing community that offers an alternative to those alienated by the forces within contemporary society.

In summary, Hauerwas argues that only through the recovery of a counter-cultural ethic, shaped by the narratives of the Bible and divorced from the values of modern society, can the church present a faithful and credible witness and in fact be a valuable contributor to society.

Personal Engagment with the Research Topic

I would characterize my own theological approach as similar to that of Hauerwas. However, increasingly I am experiencing dissonance between my theological commitments and the realities of pastoral ministry and congregational life. I would characterize three main points of tension:

First, in the face of Hauerwas’ desire to have the church to be a community shaped by the narrative of

Israel

and Jesus, I am acutely aware that people cannot be primarily shaped by only one narrative (even the so-called Christian one). People in congregations are shaped by a multiplicity of different and sometimes competing forces. I wonder if it is even a useful project to try and shape a people with a common identity and character.

Second, I can characterize the most difficult aspect of my job as negotiating the vastly different definitions that individual church members have of “the Christian story” and what Christian character and virtue looks like. In my congregation there is no consensus on what Christian characters and virtues are.

Third, my own reading of the New Testament reveals that the heart of Christianity is not a question of developing character or certain virtues. Nor is it identifying right and wrong belief. Rather, in my opinion, the New Testament is a redemptive story that reveals the underlying problems with the human condition and offers a way to deal with those problems. Thus, Hauerwas’ emphasis on character and virtue seems to ignore the more foundational themes of the New Testament.

Fourth, I have observed that speaking of the church as counter-culture can lead to people withdrawing from real social engagement, and instead merely decrying all the ways in which the culture is no longer “Christian.” My desire as a pastor is to help the church promote critical societal engagement and responsible citizenship. I worry that Hauerwas’ view moves in the opposite direction.

Method

I am proposing a three-pronged approach to exploring these questions. First, I will read a representative sample of Hauerwas’ work to gain a better sense of how the church ought to engage and influence the society it occupies. Second, I will evaluate the work of people who are trying to apply Hauerwas’ views to concrete, pastoral and congregational settings. I will then evaluate those applications and see if they have a reasonable chance of success if carefully applied. Really, I am interested to discover if Hauerwas’ theories are able to be applied in congregational settings. And finally, I would like to gain an appreciation for the major critiques of Hauerwas’ views and see if they match my own.

Reading List

Carter, Craig A. Rethinking Christ and Culture: A Post-Christendom Perspective.

Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2006.

Rodney Clapp, A Peculiar People: The Church as Culture in a Post-Christian Society.

Downers Grove: Intervarsity Press, 1996.

Hauerwas, Stanley. A Community of Character. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1981.

Hauerwas, Stanley. The Peaceable Kingdom. Notre Dame:University of Notre Dame Press, 1991.

Hauerwas, Stanley. After Christendom. .Notre Dame: Abingdon Press, 1991.

Hauerwas, Stanley and William Williom. Resident Aliens. Nashville: Abingdon, 1989.

Hauerwas, Stanley. The Hauerwas Reader. Durham: Duke University Press, 2001.

Huebner, Chris. A Precarious Peace: Yoderian Explorations on Theology, Knowledge and Identity. Scottsdale: Herald Press, 2006.

Kennison, Phil. Life on the Vine: Cultivating the Fruit of the Spirit in Christian Community. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, October 1999.

Stout, Jeffrey. Democracy and Tradition. Princeton:Princeton University Press, 2004.