For Your Information - Gone Campin'

I will be traveling to western Pennsylvania for a family camp. My wife and I will be leading a music team from OCU. So, while there I will not have cell signal nor internet access. Needless to say, I will not be posting for a while.

Check back Saturday evening! Pray for us!

Sympathetic with the "Emerging"

Below is testimonial of a 20something sent to Scot Mcknight. Scot was recently interviewed by a master’s student at a local university in the Chicago area. During some post interview dialogue via email Scot simply asked him: “Where are you theologically?” This article is posted with Scot’s written permission.

Good question… hard to answer. I grew up in a small rural “community” church … with Holiness and Arminian tendencies (but didn’t know that then… it was short on theological education) with definite hints of fundamentalism (but I learned my Bible!); I went to Wheaton in the late 1990s, so that broadened me but also esrulted in some faith crises of various sorts. I spent most of college at Lyle Dorsett’s new wave Anglican church in Wheaton and its parent church in Glen Ellyn, very much Robert Webberian ancient-future types of places…

I’ve always had my bouts with doubt/agnosticism, but I am still hanging my hat in the Christian fold broadly… Apostles’ Creed stuff is about as specific as I can get, although I am - for better and worse - Protestant by heritage and not attracted enough to convert to Catholicism or Eastern Orthodoxy soon. I read Tomlinson’s The Post Evangelical in 2002 during a time of deep searching (while working at a Buddhist restaurant …) when I had dropped out of church participation (not taking communion, etc.), and it all resonated with me and was helpful.

The emerging stuff by that name is more recent on my radar (since Jan 06), and overall, I am very sympathetic to what they are saying since I am very “pomo” about truth and Bible stuff (like I don’t believe it is inerrant, infallible, etc.). I’ve also more recently been exposed to liberation theology (which I generally like), and as a sociologist, I am deeply interested in the church’s encounter with the poor. Actually, I am moving to DC next year and I may end up in Ph.D. policy work and/or as a sociologist concerned with poverty & inequality stuff (although I remain interested in the role of faith in all of this and hope to keep that edge as well).

Theologically, I can still find myself everywhere from a veiled universalism to a pretty orthodox faith… very schizophrenic, and I tend to play devil’s advocate with most people I meet. Depending on the issue, you might see my heretical side or my funny side… it’s all a garbled mess sometimes. I do often find myself more akin to non-believers, but I also know somehow that Christianity is my home.

Church-wise, I’ve been everywhere from the aforementioned Anglican to Baptist (… [name] Baptist) to super-crazy charismatic. I am also very familiar with Willow Creek, including their various efforts in Chicago proper… I know many of those guys involved. I eventually landed at a really small Church of Christ in [Chicago]. Funny fit for me in that the C of C is historically rather sectarian and conservative (no instruments in worship even still), but they are surprisingly progressive in other ways and have an interesting history I have been able to learn. I started going there for a girl, and it was hard to leave after my community was established, even though the girl is ancient history.

When I read this post, it struck a chord or resonated with me as Scot put it. This story is similar to many I’ve heard on our campus (OCU), and to stories I’ve heard in the local churches I’ve served. I’m sure, some of you reading this, could sign your name at the bottom of this story, because elements of this story relates with your own story.

It seems that more and more, the younger (emerging) generations are becoming increasingly disillusioned and disenchanted with the local church and “denominations.” So what are we to do? How are we to reach young men like this for Jesus? And to pose the question that Scot asked: Do we listen long enough, love deeply enough, and think with them enough to be the presence of Jesus in such lives?

Scot McKnight is a widely-recognized authority on the New Testament, early Christianity, and the historical Jesus. He is the Karl A. Olsson Professor in Religious Studies at North Park University (Chicago, Illinois), where he is also the Department Chair and the Director of the College of Christian Life and Thought.

Morning Prayer

A Prayer Attributed to St. Francis:

Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.