Category: Authentically Emergent Posts

For Brian McLaren, the point of orthodoxy is orthopraxis. So, he wants to know why it was easy for many modern-era Christians to participate in a host of unethical activities and mindsets, such as racism, colonialism, environmental irresponsibility, mistreatment of women, carelessness toward the poor, etc. To him, we have inherited a version of the gospel story that has been filtered through the lens of a different framing story, one that predates and helped shape modernity’s own overarching story and subplots.

In this inherited version, first, there is a shift from a view of creation as good to its being a perfect, unchanging, Platonic ideal, or state. Second, the fall is not merely about disobedience. Rather, it’s a change from Platonic perfection to Aristotelian change and becoming.

Third, God’s character is like a perfect, Platonic god, who loves spirit and perfection, but hates matter and becoming, which is imperfect. As such, God wants to destroy creation. Fourth, original sin implies God is hostile toward us. He must “punish all imperfect beings with eternal conscious torment in hell…. God’s response to anything that is less than absolutely perfect must be absolute and infinite hostility” (McLaren, Why Did Jesus … Cross the Road? 106).

Fifth, salvation means being forgiven. Souls are restored to perfection, so that there is no more “becoming” or stories. Thus, God can love them again. But, sixth, hell also is an ongoing state. Taken together, McLaren sarcastically describes this story as the “good news” taught by much of western Christianity (A New Kind of Christianity, 41–44). And, he is not alone; Doug Pagitt sees a similar influence from Greek and Roman sources.

This “version” of the gospel includes many dualisms, such as God and creation, heaven and hell, body and soul, and natural and supernatural. Instead of embracing such dualisms, McLaren embraces a holistic approach, in which there is a deep interrelationship between God, matter, and life. Sin involves disintegration and disharmony in this interrelatedness, but not separation, for as Pagitt says, we are “In God” (see his Flipped). Moreover, Pagitt thinks we are made of matter (i.e., energy packets). Rob Bell also picks up this theme of holistic integration, describing God as energy and creation as energy and made of matter. For Tony Jones, too, we are not embodied souls; rather, we are physical beings. It seems all four authors have embraced a kind of physicalism about humans and creation.

These holist views suggest they have moved away from theism to panentheism, in which creation is embedded in God (and not pantheism, in which all is God). As such, we are not separated from God; rather, we already are in relationship with Him. But sin has disrupted that relationship, and human ones too. Since we are not separated from Him due to our sin, we need to work on practical, ethical living in these relationships.

Thus, we do not need a penal, substitutionary, atoning sacrifice for our sins. Jesus’ death on the cross, therefore, was not to atone for our sins. Rather, His work can be described in terms of imitation, such as on René Girard’s mimetic, scapegoat theory, or perhaps as a moral example for us to follow.

Pagitt describes the received view of God as removed, distant, and not intimate with us; loving us conditionally; and unmovable. We have to be perfect for this God. But, that will not happen until after our deaths, which leaves us with a faith that focuses on the afterlife, and not living for Christ now.

In contrast, as a bedrock assumption, McLaren holds that God is good and just, yet He cannot be violent. God works to liberate us from oppression, but He never acts directly to do that. God is not a dictator, as would be the case, McLaren thinks, if God exhaustively determines the future. McLaren is an open theist, so history is unscripted. Bell also claims that while God judges, it always is to restore people to relationship with Him. In the end, God’s love will win.

In the next post, I will explore more aspects of McLaren’s, Pagitt’s, Bell’s, and Jones’s newer views.

For many evangelicals, the views of emergents, like Brian McLaren, Tony Jones, Rob Bell, and Doug Pagitt, have been written off as heretical. Evangelicals have identified and classified them as “yesterday’s news,” as opposed to when the “emerging church” was making a “splash” in the late 90s until about 2010. So, they have been off many evangelicals’ “radar screens.”

Yet, I have found that their influences have morphed and actually increased over time. Now writing as “progressives,” they have developed a full-orbed theology. They also are raising questions that are on lots of younger Christians’ minds these days, ones who are prone to leaving church and maybe the faith altogether. And, they are giving answers that are attractive to many such people. These kinds of questions are ones Barna (and David Kinnaman) has reported on in You Lost Me; e.g.,

1. How could a loving God send people to hell? How could the God of the Old Testament (apparently) commit genocide?
2. How could a loving God blow up in rage and violently kill His Son? How can we trust such a God?
3. How can we not be imperialistic and colonialist as Christians (including with the good news)? Is the good news mainly about going to heaven when we die?
4. How could good Christians be so concerned about salvation of peoples’ souls, and yet seem to not really care about crucial issues of extreme, widespread poverty, oppression, colonialism, racism, sexism, global warming, and more – social justice and ethical issues?
5. How can we condemn people in other religions for not believing as we do?
6. So, are Christians, and Christianity, really good, or do they actually foster a lot of evil?
7. How can we be wise and learn from science, rather than have a default mindset of skepticism and antagonism?

I wonder if the choice to ignore their more updated views has led to an unexpected result. That is, I think their voices are giving a “Christian” lens to many such issues at work in broader society. Moreover, along with the influence of professors at Christian colleges and universities, who were trained in secular PhD programs, I think they are influencing many students with their progressive ideas about diversity, social justice, etc., on conservative Christian colleges. The emergents also are deepening their criticisms of conservative, evangelicals and their churches, and they were more on target with them in 2005 than I realized when I wrote Truth and the New Kind of Christian.

So, what should we think of their updated, newer views? Like in Truth, I try to be irenic, gracious, listen to them, and carefully describe their views. Then, I try to assess their views, looking at both strengths and concerns, whether that be ethically, philosophically, or theologically.

Importantly, I think they miss the mark in two subtle, yet deeply important ways: first, I think they do not realize a root problem in all too many conservative churches. I think that these churches have been unwittingly, yet deeply, shaped by naturalism, in the sense that, practically, God has become irrelevant for their lives in various ways and to various, yet significant, extents. That means that in those regards, they live in the “flesh” – their own sinful propensities. This can be described as a practical atheism.

So, one thing I do is show how many historical, cultural, philosophical, scientific, and other factors have shaped Christians in the west, and the US In particular, so that in various ways many Christians don’t really expect God to show up in their lives – in many ways, such faith has been de-supernaturalized. But, second, and ironically, I think that McLaren, et al. don’t realize that they are advocating a kind of Christianity that also has been deeply naturalized.

Instead, I argue that that the real solution both groups need is to embrace the fullness of Christ, in fullness of Spirit and truth, as Paul describes in Ephesians. That way, Jesus Himself can be powerfully manifested in Christians’ lives, which is so desperately needed today.

Next, I will survey some of the emergents’ newer views.

In 2005, Crossway published my book, Truth and the New Kind of Christian: The Emerging Effects of Postmodernism in the Church. It was the second book on the emerging church, and it was specifically on Brian McLaren’s and Tony Jones’s views. There was a surging interest in the emerging church & Emergent then. There was lots of discussion, and Zondervan was publishing many such books.

While strong criticisms were developing, around 2010, McLaren’s A New Kind of Christianity came out, and things changed significantly. Evangelical academics and publishers at places like the Evangelical Theological Society national meetings saw the emerging church as “yesterday’s news.”[1] I noticed a marked decrease in willingness to really listen to and carefully assess their views. Like someone at one of my presentations blurted out (paraphrasing), “Can’t we just call them heretics and move on?!”

Even emergentvillage.com ceased to exist. But, that did not mean the end of the conversations that had been generated. Contrary to the attitude I observed amongst many evangelicals, I began to observe that the influence of McLaren, Jones, and others, such as Doug Pagitt and Rob Bell, had morphed and actually increased. Instead of publishing with companies like Zondervan, now they write for some of the largest presses, such as HarperCollins and Random House. They have their own ministries, which for Pagitt and Jones host training conferences, and Jones earned his PhD in practical theology and teaches as a professor. Bell and his views have become widely publicized, now extended through his podcast, an e-course available through Oprah.com, and a television show on her network. And McLaren writes prolifically. Moreover, they now write under the broader umbrella of “progressive” Christianity.

When I wrote Truth, I tried to balance some criticism with some important things they had to say to evangelicals. Then, in fall 2006, I taught a class at Biola for our MA Christian Apologetics program. I was learning more, and Jones offered to do an interview by phone.

I had asked the Lord if there was something specific he wanted me to ask Tony, and I believe He gave me a specific answer, yet which seemed unusual. It wasn’t about anything that as of then I had written or studied. I am glad I asked Tony. I was blown away by what I learned. I realized there was much more I needed to research and study.

So, I started to read more broadly, including works of Pagitt, Bell, Stan Grenz, John Franke, and more. I started to see more connections than their epistemological concerns, which was my focus in Truth. There also were ethical ones about patterns they noticed amongst evangelicals. They also were making shifts regarding the nature of humans and the relationship of creation with God.

At the same time, I too started to become aware of some patterns amongst evangelicals, ones that seemed to explain why I think, all too often, we are not seeing the biblically-promised power and presence of the Lord. As I investigated this, I came to realize that McLaren, Jones, Pagitt, and Bell actually were much more on target about what has gone wrong with the church than I understood when I wrote Truth.

So, in my new book, Authentically Emergent: In Search of a Truly Progressive Christianity, I reconsider my earlier work, as well as carefully assess, pro and con, their updated thoughts. Yet, I think there is a much deeper set of factors at work in both these emergents’ more recent views and amongst all too many evangelicals. In summary, I think both have been deeply deeply influenced by naturalism. I hope to offer a compelling analysis and a better way forward for both groups, one that will be truly “progressive” and “emergent” in the biblical sense that we will see the fullness of the power and presence of the Lord manifested in our midst, which we desperately need.

I am writing to both evangelicals, my emergent friends, and those influenced by them. So, why read this? There are many reasons, and I will look at some of them in my next post.

[1] Scott Burson explains several reasons in his fine book, Brian McLaren in Focus (Abilene Christian University Press, 2016), 164.