Ron's view of emergent

Ron emailed his thoughts on "What does emergent mean to me?" Feel free to comment on Ron's post or add your comments to the prior post.

Hi Larry and all,

As you requested I am offering some of my thoughts regarding emergent. I hope you can find something in the following that will help you add to the scheduling of future topics for our Cohort Group discussion. In trying to offer a reasoned response to your question "what emergent means to me", I have come to realize that it will be necessary for me to distinguish between Emergent and emergent.

In my thinking and discussions of Emergent (with a capital "E"), I am usually referring to a rather nebulas Spiritual movement that was started by Protestant Christians but is currently made up of people from various faith traditions throughout the world; no one is directing, controlling or limiting this movement. I have found it to be a convergence of people who are focused on hopeful and liberating themes. It can also sometimes be a refuge for disillusioned individuals who have found the customary & traditional orthodoxy and dogma of their particular denomination is lacking in the creditability, nourishment, and support needed to practice their personal beliefs in the material world in which they find themselves. For example: The exclusion of women, the politicization of religion, the
iconization of a God who is all spirit, the exclusionist tendency of truth claims, a religion of scarcity instead of a spirituality of abundance, etc.

Some see the Emergent Church movement as yet another expression of a great shift or dramatic transition from one stage to another that seems to happen in Western culture every 500 years or so. (See: Phyllis Tickle's "Great Emergence") A historical look at the Christian church in Western cultures would certainly support the idea that "the church" has always been emerging.

Emergent people have a lot to talk about and realize they have even more to learn from one another. We seek to sit side by side at Cohort meetings and in other independent communities, listening to the hard questions that come from other's perspective. We usually leave these gatherings more informed in our own beliefs as well as more respectful of one another's views. Maybe even more shocking, we deal with real questions. Not pious platitudes. Not political drivel.

Emergent people are engaged in understanding the puzzle we must put together if we want to see our visions of peace and justice for people everywhere, of all religious and spiritual traditions, become reality. We represent the important ways of integrating personal and communal journeys into an ongoing commitment to make a difference in the world. Emergent people are intent on discovering the world we live in and our responsibility to it.

Because the Emergent Church movement is relativity new, definitions and concepts used within the language of the movement are still being discerned and refined. Therefore, Emergents often find it easier to say what the movement is NOT; a new church, a new religion, etc. The Emergent Church movement is clearly not a gathering designed to create or to discover new religious documents, dogma, or to teach parochial truths. Because the Movement is so new and continuing to develop within primarily Christian groups, it is still difficult to say exactly what will eventually evolve. Religion continues to be a vital force in contemporary society. For me, the Emergent Church movement is a promising new component within the religious perspective.

When I think about emergent (with a small "e"), I think more in terms of a process; a new, more holistic philosophy informed by what we are learning about the patterns of creation, life, death, and resurrection that we observe and experience in the Kosmos* - in other words, how the Creator seems to go about fashioning His on-going creation. We can learn from patterns like the evolvement toward more complexity, sophistication, and diversity that we recognize in the vast spectrum between the astronomical and quantum levels of this manifest material reality. When I think about
emergent in this way, I include spirituality of course, but I try to look beyond specific religious faith traditions and movements - I try to incorporate a more integral perspective. I consider what I think being emergent may mean as we try to make our lives square with what we say we believe about God. I also think about what it means to be a person living in God's ongoing and evolving creation, on this small planet, in a vast Kosmos. I also think about my responsibilities & obligations as conscious co-creators of the future.

A radically inclusive/integral consciousness seems to be developing around the world - not just in spiritual realms but across the entire human spectrum - politics, economics, the natural environment, social systems, etc. In developmental psychology terms, one might say that we are seeing individuals in our species appear to be moving from one level of consciousness to a higher level. (Using the Graves/Beck Spiral Dynamic development model, one would say from Magic/Mythic through Rational to
Integral/Holistic or said another way, from Egocentric through Ethnocentric to World/Kosmocentric) Our species has certainly not reached a critical mass in this movement toward a more holistic/inclusive perspective, but there is growing evidence that more and more people are recognizing the failings and inadequacies of their current world view.

As a person who received a formal education in the natural sciences, and as a citizen who lives in a society that habitually honors scientific truth (empirical evidence, reductionist methodology) above everything else, I find this ongoing and developing study of the evolution of human consciousness, often expressed in the Emergent Church movement to be both challenging and rewarding. I am coming to believe that our individual and collective emergence to a higher level of consciousness (however it is labeled and expressed in our space/time limited reality) is the next step in the continued evolution of the Kingdom. I feel it is being driven by a creative evolutionary impulse (Holy Spirit); it is part of our species' continued development toward a greater realization of our unity with our Creator God, the Original Source, the Transpersonal Consciousness, and The Ground of Being.

* Kosmos (with a "K") is the word the ancient Greeks used to denote a universe that includes not just the physical reality of stars, planets, black holes (which Cosmos usually means), but also the realms of conscious mind, soul, society, art, Spirit - in other words, everything.

What does emergent mean to you?

We started a discussion at the last meeting about what it means to be an emergent follower of Jesus? Take a few minutes to think about what being emergent means to you and post a comment below. This could be the basis of our January conversation.

November Meeting Recap

The November meeting featured good fellowship and conversation. Lance, JD and Ron reported on the Justice Revival, Ron talked about the workshop featuring Brian McLaren and Richard Rohr, and Lance discussed Rob Bell's recent visit to the Metroplex. We spent the rest of the evening discussing what it means to be emergent. That was an interesting conversation that we can continue here on the Cohort's blog.

Click on the comments link below this post and tell us what being emergent means to you.

We'll be back on our normal schedule in December. See you on Thursday, December 10th.

November meeting moved to 19th

Ron reminded me that the Justice Revival is scheduled for Nov 10th – 12th at Market Hall and there's an Emerging Church event on Nov 13th and 14th at the Church of the Incarnation in Dallas. So the second week of November will be pretty full for some of our members. Thanks for the reminder, Ron! Let's try to keep life simple for as many of us as possible by moving the November Cohort meeting back one week to Thursday, November 19th. Those who get to attend the Justice Revival and/or Emerging Church events can fill us in. JD will start the Liberation Theology discussion in December.

Justice Revival coming in November

Check out this link for information on the Justice Revival and Help the Homeless Walk-a-thon, two events happening in Dallas in November.

October Recap

We had Lance, Rex and Brett join us for the first time earlier this month, so we spent some time getting acquainted and reviewing the history of the cohort. There was enough interest in liberation theology that JD agreed to start our November 12 conversation along those lines. If you'd like to get a head start, try browsing through the posts on this blog from the summer and fall of 2008.

Hope you can join us in November.

Cohort meeting this Thursday (10/8)

We'll meet at Escape at 7:00 PM. We'll see if there is any interest in continuing our discussion of kingdom ethics versus empire politics, and then we'll move to another topic. Hope you can join us.

How Can We Leave the World a Better Place?

Hey everyone. Was invited to preach at our church again. You can check out the sermon here.

September Meeting Recap

We had a good discussion of the way kingdom ethics intersect with the politics of the empire. Using health care reform as a proxy for similar ethical dilemmas, we discussed why some Christians on both sides of the issue adopt un-Christ-like attitudes toward brothers and sisters on the other side of the issue. We pondered why Christians are so quick to assume that "their position" on an empire issue is the "correct" position and how emergent believers might act to change Christian culture...

Here is a thought-provoking article about health care reform, that goes beyond the current political debate. It is long, but worth reading.

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/print/200909/health-care

At the end of the meeting we discussed the possibility of changing the date of our meetings from the last Thursday of the month to the second Thursday of the month. We hope this change will allow some additional people to join our conversation.

Starting in October, We'll meet on the 2nd Thursday

Starting in October we're going to try meeting on the second Thursday of the month. We hope the change will allow some additional people to participate. Go ahead and mark your calendar for October 8, November 12 and December 10. Hope to see you soon.

Next Meeting Thursday, Sept 24

We'll meet at Escape at 7:00 PM. Check out the links in JD's post dated August 27 and we'll continue our discussion of kingdom ethics versus empire politics.

Health Care Article Links

Here is the David Gushee editorial we discussed.

And here is Brian McLaren's response.

Here is McLaren's response to the questions of an opponent of proposed health care reforms.

And then McLaren's explanation for supporting Obama despite his pro-choice stance.

Next Meeting Thursday August 27

We'll meet at Escape at 7:00 PM. Get an early start on the fall by catching us up with what you've been doing! Hope to see you there.

Final Jesus and Empire Post

You can find it here.

The Show Me Kingdom

I have posted my sermon from this week here.

A Book Review and a Sermon

Hey, everyone. I've posted my sermon from this past Sunday and an ongoing book review of Jesus and Empire here. To anyone who is interested, I'm preaching again this Sunday at First United Methodist Church in The Colony.

Join the Conversation on July 30th

We'll meet at Escape at 7:00 PM. JD will have just finished preaching twice, so he will be pumped! He'll make certain the conversation starts well. Hope to see you there.

Join us Thursday, June 25 at 7:00 PM

We will meet at Escape at 7:00 PM and kick off our conversation by talking about your summer reading. Susan and Joseph agreed at the last meeting to get the ball rolling. Haven't had time to read anything? Just show up and chime in.

May 28, 2009

We've got so much to talk about Thursday night. Hope you can join us. We want to hear from JD about the meeting at SMU in April. We can continue our discussion of Tickle's book, The Great Emergence (see the post from April 13th, below, for details and links to resources.) Then J.D. has two interesting posts we can discuss - see his posts from May 9, Faith and Torture, and May 18, Worrying about Tomorrow. Finally, Emergent Village is undergoing change and we can share what we know/think about that.

That's more than we can cover in a couple of hours, but it is a good way to get started on the summer. Bring your calendars and we'll set our summer schedule for June, July and August.

We'll meet at 7:00 PM at Escape. Directions are listed in the right hand column of this blog.

Worrying About Tomorrow

Here's something that has given me angst for some time but which I have never shared with anyone. At the end of Matthew 6, we have Jesus' teaching about not worrying about tomorrow because today has enough worries of its own.

We often read this in an individualistic fashion. I suggest we need to read more of Scripture in a collective fashion. To me, this saying points to the fact that there is not just so much in my own life to worry about today but there is enough to worry about in my community today so that my concerns about tomorrow on the backburner.

This becomes more evident when we see the preceding verses include teachings on treasures and wealth. We do not store up treasures on earth by hoarding what we've got but by using it to help others. Love of God and love of neighbor go hand in hand.

So what gives me angst is the concept of saving for retirement. I've been taught it's important so you are not a burden on anyone. I have been unable to save for it up to now, but as my children outgrow daycare and I get further cost of living wage increases there will be money available. The question is do I do what I've been told my entire life or do I view this as the ultimate tomorrow?

I wonder what would happen if churches lived for today. What we would save for retirement we go to help people in need today. Kids going to college. People needing healthcare. People unable to pay mortgages. I tend to think this would live rather close to the picture of the church in the first chapters of Acts.

The challenge is vulnerability. It's a scary thing. By committing to other people's todays we are risking our tomorrow hoping our needs will be met when our tomorrows become our todays. It also looks weak to our dominant cultural ethos to not provide for oneself.

Extremely curious to know your thoughts.

Faith and Torture

So I saw the Pew Report on people's acceptance of torture and was dismayed. Some of the debate resulting from this report has led to theological considerations about why white evangelical Americans stand more in favor of torture than white mainline Christians.

It's an important and insightful discussion, but the more troubling numbers are those that point to the fact that non-religious Americans are less likely than Christian Americans to support torture. It's even more disturbing when you read this post by Brian McLaren.

Interested to hear your thoughts.

April 2009 meeting change

JD has suggested that we postpone our discussion of The Great Emergence for a month and that we head down to SMU for a discussion of The Employee Free Choice Act. A majority of our regulars agreed and so we'll enjoy a change of pace in April. Here is an excerpt from the "Perkins News" with more about the program, including the room number:


Human Rights Violations in the United States:
The Employee Free Choice Act
April 30, from 6-8 p.m., The Perk

Unlike most industrialized countries, the United States imposes severe limitations on the rights of workers, including the right to organize freely. Some of our current laws and regulations on this matter are in clear violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that supports the freedom of workers to join trade unions in order to make their voices heard (article 23). Many faith traditions also support the freedom of workers to organize. The Social Creed of the United Methodist Church, for instance, explicitly supports the right of collective bargaining. This matter affects all of us, as injuries to some quickly tend to become injuries to all.

The current situation in the U.S. could be improved through the passage of the “Employee Free Choice Act” that is now before Congress. We invite you to join us in discussing this bill from various perspectives, including the perspectives of workers, organizers, community leaders, people of faith and theologians, and human rights activists. Co-sponsors include Dallas Jobs with Justice, the Progressive Christian Center in the South, the Dallas Area Christian Progressive Alliance the SMU Human Rights Program, and the Wendland-Cook Professorship at Perkins School of Theology, SMU.

The event will be held on April 30, from 6-8 p.m., at Perkins School of Theology, in 106 Selecman Hall. Refreshments will be served. For further information, please contact Dr. Joerg Rieger, Wendland-Cook Professor of Constructive Theology, at jrieger@smu.edu.
***************

We'll plan to pick up our continuing conversation about emergence in May...

April 30, 2009 Meeting

At our next meeting we'll continue our discussion of Phyllis Tickle's The Great Emergence. Check out this link for a free download of part of the book, a free discussion guide and some video clips of Phyllis discussing the major points of her book.

You don't need to run out and get the book before the meeting just to participate in our conversation. You can download and read the excerpt (it is on "The Book" tab at the bottom of the page) and/or listen to the videos.

I am running behind in getting a summary of the last meeting posted to the blog, but may be able to get that done this week.

Hope everyone had a blessed Easter (or for our Orthodox friends, will have a blessed Easter) and I hope you'll be able to join us on the 30th!

Next Meeting March 26

Next time we'll begin a discussion of Phyllis Tickle's The Great Emergence. Check out this link for a free download of part of the book, a free discussion guide and some video clips of Phyllis discussing the major points of her book.

You don't need to run out and get the book before Thursday in order to participate in our conversation. You can download and read the excerpt (it is on "The Book" tab at the bottom of the page) and/or listen to the videos. See you Thursday!

Paul and Women

I took part in a Bible study on Paul and women last week and the discussion took an interesting shape. We began by locating points in those letters that are undisputed as to their being authentically written by Paul. We asked what these women's roles were in the church.

We noticed that these women were identified with their household and discussed how some think that is because the household was seen as the woman's domain. We weren't totally convinced because men were often identified with their households as their head, specifically in Acts where they speak of baptizing households.

So then we discussed the possibility that Paul was addressing women as the heads of their households. That would be truly revolutionary. It was clear these women had active roles in these churches and were identified as leaders of at least portions of the churches in their cities.

The other interesting thing is these women are mentioned with no reference to a husband almost all of the time. Were they unmarried? Were they married but to non-believers who had no role in the church? Were they married but addressed singularly because the kingdom of God was a different kind of place where women were valuable in and of themselves and not due to the men they served? Were they addressed singularly because of Paul's seeming belief in the imminent return of Christ resulting in his deemphasis of marriage because of all the kingdom work that needed to be done?

Now, it doesn't seem the letters let us know what the reason is but if it is Paul's intentional kingdom effort to give linguistic and symbolic dignity to women who had been otherwise subjected, then that flies in the face of the submission language in Paul's disputed letters. You could say that Paul's language regarding there being no male or female in Christ makes this case clear but that borders on the proof texting we hope to avoid in hopes of wholistic biblical interpretation.

Anyway, I'd be interested in your thoughts.

Recap of February 26th conversation

We had eight at the cohort conversation on February 26. After agreeing that we had pretty much finished discussing The Shack at our January meeting, at least for the being, we turned to a discussion of JD’s post on Talking and Walking (see the second January 30th post, below).

There are so many attractional churches today, what’s an emergent-minded person to do? Should one try to work from within to make attractional churches more missional? Should we leave our attractional churches and start new missional fellowships? Should we stay at our attractional churches and just try to be missional on an individual basis? If you know our group, you won’t be surprised that the consensus answer was “yes” to each question. Each of us will find different ways to be missional, and we need to remember that God uses all churches in different ways. It is too easy to be smug about your current church, without remembering that (hopefully) we are on a journey and that we’ll all be in a different, more mature place tomorrow than we are today.

If you were at the meeting, please feel free to add your comments, and if you weren’t there, please feel free to add your comments – this way the conversation will continue…

Next time we’ll take up our discussion of Phyllis Tickle’s new book, The Great Emergence. See the February 23rd post below for more information…

The Great Emergence

This week, if we wrap up our discussion from last month, we'll begin a discussion of Phyllis Tickle's The Great Emergence. Check out this link for a free download of part of the book, a free discussion guide and some video clips of Phyllis discussing the major points of her book.

You don't need to run out and get the book before Thursday in order to participate in our conversation. You can download and read the excerpt (it is on "The Book" tab at the bottom of the page) and/or listen to the videos. See you Thursday!

Next Meeting February 26

We will meet next Thursday, February 26, at ESCAPE, 600 E Bethany, in Allen, at 7:00 PM. We will continue our discussion from last month and if time permits we'll discuss Phyllis Tickle's new book The Great Emergence. You do not have to read the book in order to participate in our discussions. Just come and share in the conversation.

The Temptation of Jesus

I’ve come across a couple of readings of the temptation of Jesus recently that have intrigued me. I thought I’d share them:

Unmasking the Powers by Walter Wink (I mistakenly called this Engaging the Powers last night. That would be the third part of the powers trilogy)

This book left my head spinning in a good way. It begins with Wink looking at how the understanding of Satan evolved through the history of Scripture and beyond. This being/idea began as part of the heavenly hosts and was a viewed as God’s sifter who presented tests to his humanity to separate the wheat and the chaff.

However, as the Jewish people began to rethink their understanding of God as behind all good and evil, Satan began to take on a more prominent role as adversary. However, it is most likely after the biblical account closes that Satan is finally seen as evil personified.

Wink says Satan, in the gospels, is adversary. Satan, through Jewish tradition, is offering Jesus a quick fix. He can turn stones into bread to feed the masses and start a movement. Satan then uses Scripture to tempt him again to prove he is the Son of God by casting himself off the temple, perhaps alluding to Malachi 3:1-4. Then, Satan tempts him with the leadership of a Jewish empire ruling over all nations having overthrown Rome.

Wink concludes of Satan:

“He is no archfiend seducing Jesus with offers of love, wealth and carnal pleasures. Satan’s task is much more subtle…Satan offers him, in short, not outright evils, but the highest goods known to Israel. That is when the satanic is most difficult to discern- when it offers the good instead of the best.

The question to us becomes, “What traditional ‘goods’ are keeping us from the post-resurrection ‘Best’?”

Then take John Howard Yoder’s Politics of Jesus.

Yoder begins with the announcement at the baptism that Jesus is the Son of God, which he says,” is not the definition or accreditation of a metaphysically defined status of sonship, it is a summons to a task.”

Thus, “The tempter’s hypothetical syllogism ‘If you are the Son of God, then…’ is reasoning not from a concept of metaphysical sonship but from kingship”

Yoder goes on to state the temptation in Luke begins with the economic option, not a concern of Jesus feeding himself. A miraculous banquet supplied by turning stones into bread would yield him great power.

The second temptation is to be an imperial ruler. Bowing the knee before Satan is embracing the “idolatrous character of political power hunger and nationalism.”

Yoder then states that the pinnacle of the temple is about much more than Jesus taking a leap of faith. Two possibilities of meaning exist within the history of Jewish thought in the image of the pinnacle of the temple. One is that being thrown from the tower in the temple into the Kidron valley outside the temple was the punishment for blasphemy. Jesus may have been tempted to seek miraculous deliverance from the penalty for his claims to divine authority and kingship.

The second is the descent of an apparition within the temple which Wink too directed us to in Malachi 3. Jesus may have considered stopping at being an unheralded religious reformer and heavenly messenger and taking the violent path of many a “messiah” before and after him. Even here, the ultimate expectation is that the victory would mean the messiah wouldn’t die for his claims but his enemies would.

The question for Yoder would be, “Would Jesus follow the way of the kings of the world through all history in their thirst for personal and nationalistic power or as king of the world be the “bearer of a new possibility of human, social, and therefore political relationships.”

So are we stuck living in the now or bearing the new possibility of humanity?

It’s a lot to work through, but give some thought and let me know what you think.

Talking and Walking

I thought our discussion about where we're headed was valuable last night. It's a conversation worth continuing. I think there are probably important activities each one on us are undertaking.

Me? I do what I can find to do to help. But I'm mostly an idea guy. I have ideas, like starting a health clinic in The Colony/Little Elm area. Execution is the problem. I hardly know where to start and have tried contacting numerous folks who should be in the know but haven't had calls or emails returned. Truthfully, I've gotten discouraged and haven't done anything on tht front in the past few months.

But I think it is important that we both talk the talk and walk the walk, whether that is by acting together, or equipping one another to build our own networks of action and keeping one another accountable, in a supportive, non-guilt driven approach.

This post on the EV site from this woman from a non-Christian background seemed to say it all.

What we are saying has meaning for a wide spectrum of people. But that meaning will only last if it is accompanied by action. Love of God is non-existent without love of neighbor.

And I suppose this takes us to attractional church vs. missional church debate.

I don't want to turn this into a dualistic idea, but whatever the church model is, it must emphasize mission.

And if we heed the instruction of Walter Wink and N. T. Wright, mission takes the shape not necessarily of eliminating the powers of the nations but in resisting them inasmuch as they fail to reflect the purpose given them by the Creator by exploiting the weak and the poor and ruling through various forms of domination. It also means resisting ourselves inasmuch as we fail to reflect the image of the Creator.

In the words of Bono, it's not about charity. It's about justice. Or we can put it another way. It's not about dependency. It's about dignity.

I think this sort of collective spirit would put us fully in solidarity with the widow, orphan, and stranger and pull us over the walls we build on our paths. I think, also, we would find that the change needed to embrace such solidarity and the challenge it would present our culture's spirituality (by proclaiming and demonstrating that Jesus, the executed Christ, is Lord of the world) would reveal to us that there is opposition to Jesus, even in America.

These are strong words and this cohort blog is meant to be a dialogue, so please respond.

January 29, 2009 Location

We'll meet at ESCAPE, a coffee shop at 600 E. Bethany Dr. in Allen. Hope to see you there at 7:00 PM Thursday 1/29/2009

Location Change

It's a Grind on Springcreek in Plano has closed, so we will be picking a new location. Watch this blog for the new location before our next meeting on the 29th.

N. T. Wright on Paul

Just finished What Saul Paul Really Said. Wright demonstrates that Paul was about this world and its fulfillment, not its end. That his message was not about some new spiritual experience individuals have, but was about heralding the king of the world (no not Leonardi DiCaprio) and calling people to pledge allegience (faith) to Jesus the King (Christ) as opposed to pledging their allegience to Rome or any other political power or ideology of domination.

In addressing the themes of modernity (money, sex, and power) Wright says:

"The gospel creates allegience, not 'experience' per se. When we are truly announcing the lordship of Jesus, we must make it clear that, according to this gospel, the one true God has dealt in Jesus Christ with sin, death, guilt, and shame, and now summons men and women everywhere to abandon the idols which hold them captive to these things and to discover a new life, and a new way of life, in him...The gospel is the royal announcement. No herald in the ancient world would say, 'Tiberius is Caesar has become emperor: accept him if it suits you.'...But first it offers the cross...The only experience guaranteed by Jesus' summons is that of carrying the cross."

Wright makes this statement in making the point that "justification" is not about "how to get into heaven" but "who are the people of God" called to challenge the nations of the world in their idolatry and the parody they have made of life. The risk of this challenge bears the cross.

Strong words. Tell us what you think.