As a body of Christ-followers, we cannot overstate the importance of the task before us. What we are facing as this new century unfolds is the need of a radical reformation of our faith. The negative trends regarding the Christian faith and its place in western culture that began in the last quarter of the 20th Century show no signs of abating. In fact, any brief survey of the values and social mores of our culture reveals that a number of these trends in post-modern culture are taking place more rapidly than originally predicted.
If the church is to reclaim a position of significance and influence in our advancing culture, we must face head on the problems that are of our own making as well as find creative ways to adjust to those situations that are spawned elsewhere. In either case, it all begins with Christians getting a handle on its historic capacity to deal with diverse problems and discover creative strategies to ignite and foster a new respect from those voices who once were its most prolific critics. In the final analysis, all of this rests on the church’s ability to rediscover just who and what Jesus was and to live his message in ways that communicate his love and justice in the world. Brian McLaren speaks to these themes:
Many people don’t realize that the Christian religion – in its Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, and Pentecostal forms – is the largest, richest, and most powerful religion in the world. If the Christian religion “misunderestimates” the message of Jesus – if it doesn’t know or believe the truth about Jesus and his message – the whole world will suffer from Christian ignorance, confusion, or delusion. But if it discovers, understands, believes, and lives Jesus’ message – if it become increasingly faithful to the reality of what Jesus taught in word and example – then everyone could benefit.
If we are to begin to make inroads into our post-Christian culture, we need to identify those aspects of our own making that create obstacles to engaging non-believers and peripheral Christians is a conversation regarding the true essentials of Christian living. One of our primary obstacles is unfortunately now so ingrained in the faith that it has assumed the status of “Sacred Cow.”
We live in a culture that is, in spite of over 200 years of historical separation, dominated by the Enlightenment. Most of us don’t recognize this, but that lack of awareness doesn’t make the fact any less true. The Enlightenment has cast a long shadow over Western culture, especially the church, and it continues to do so.
For those of us who claim Christianity as our worldview, this lingering hangover of rationalism, logic, and intellectualism has robbed us of the very core of our faith and, in its stead, has substituted a sterile and inadequate imposter. Rather than experiencing our faith as a living, vital, relational organism, the norm has become “faith equals right belief.” This represents a major tragedy in terms of the heart of Christianity and, although right belief has some degree of importance, it pales in comparison to the emphasis Jesus placed on incarnational service based on love.
This issue has been exacerbated by two-plus centuries of preaching and teaching that extols the notion that salvation is attained through belief in the accepted set of ideas. Faith is equated with belief and belief is seen as the cornerstone of the entire edifice of Protestant doctrine. It has been going on for so long now that any challenge to the validity of such a notion is seen as heresy. To assert that a Christianity that is based on incarnational themes such as relational imperative, spiritual transformation, and compassionate service is to invite the heckling banter of a cadre of “true believers.” For these people belief takes precedent over doing and faith (which means belief to these folks) overrides works, even if that work is identical to the service done by Jesus.
Friends, we need to jettison this fatal tumor of false perspective, spawned by the Enlightenment and reared by the 19th Century Evangelical forerunners before it suffocates us completely, turning us into carbon copies of the whitened sepulchers the Master Jesus viewed with such disdain.
The overshadowing event of the past two centuries of Christian life has been the struggle between orthodoxy and modernism. In this struggle the primary issue has, as a matter of fact, not been discipleship to Christ and a transformation of soul that expresses itself in pervasive, routine obedience to his ‘all that I have commanded you.’ Instead, both sides of the controversy have focused almost entirely upon what is to be explicitly asserted or rejected as essential Christian doctrine. In the process of battles over views of Christ the Savior, Christ the teacher was lost on all sides…..Discipleship as an essential issue disappeared from the churches, and with it there also disappeared realistic plans and programs for the transformation of the inmost self into Christ-likeness. One could now be a Christian forever without actually changing in heart and life. Right profession, positive or negative, was all that was required. This has now produced generations of professing Christians who, as a whole, do not differ in character, but only in ritual, from their non-professing neighbors….
After much study, prayer, and reflection on these issues I have come to the conclusion that we Christ-followers are called to a more dynamic, vital, and holistic walk of faith. Indeed, we are called to a participatory involvement in God’s Great Story of incarnation and redemption. In fact, this was basically the view held by Christianity as a whole right on up through the Middle Ages and to the years preceding the Enlightenment. It was the illegitimate marriage of Enlightenment ideas to theology that changed the flavor and texture of the Christian faith and resulted in the dry, sterile form of religion that we find in many Protestant congregations today. And before I am accused of being of a narrow anti-evangelical bent, let it also be said that this same defective theology became the norm for the liberal wing of the faith as well as the old Mainline denominations, upon which Taps was blown two decades ago.
The late Robert Webber spoke clearly to this issue, discussing the validity of an ethic of faith-based works and the dire need for a return to the ancient, relational model of the faith. Listen as he clearly juxtaposes the ancient model of faith and the post-Enlightenment religion that is rampant today:
The incarnational model of the ancient church is relational. God relates to humanity by becoming one of us. We relate to God because, through the incarnation, we are lifted up into a relationship with the divine. In this ancient depiction of incarnational spirituality there is a divine indwelling of God, a mystical union between God and man, a relationship of continuous prayerful dependence. Contemplation of God and his wondrous story is characterized by the delight of the heart, an inner reality that proceeds from a union with God that is real…..By contrast, a justification/sanctification spirituality is less relational and more intellectual…..In summary, ancient spirituality is placed within the whole story of God and maintains the dynamic relational aspect of spirituality that is in union with God. On the other hand, the impact of the Enlightenment emphasis on justification and sanctification separates spirituality from the story of God (especially the incarnation in which humanity is lifted into God) and creates an intellectual spirituality that not only affirmed a forensic standing before God but one that equated spirituality with “right belief.” Spirituality ceased to be a “lived theology” and became faith as an intellectual construct.
Webber is not speaking of a return to a “feelings-based” religion. Like many astute spokespersons for the faith, he realizes that any spiritual truth based on our emotions is a tenuous commodity. Instead, Webber is talking about a Christianity that is anchored in God’s Sacred Story. Rather than being based on belief in correct doctrines, it is rooted in a life of active participation in God’s redemptive action. For Webber, true Christianity is relational, incarnational, redemptive, and restorative. The final chapters of God’s Sacred Story are the establishment of “new heaven” and “new earth.” All of these characteristics involve belief, but the entire edifice does not depend on belief. Instead, it depends on participation.
Intellectual religion is basically easy religion. When we base our Christian experience on kosher beliefs, we allow others to do our thinking for us. For many sincere Christians, the walk of faith basically consists of someone or some group telling them what they are supposed to believe and they fall in line with this expected code of doctrine, walking in mindless lockstep to the cadence being called by their theological leaders.
Please, don’t misunderstand what I am saying. I am not saying doctrine is bad, although in some cases it is just that. What I am getting at is that “unexamined doctrine” is a slippery slope. We need to take the time and make the effort to delve into the doctrines of our church, group, or denomination and see whether or not they hold water. More importantly, we need to deepen our understanding of God’s Sacred Story and start living it. At the end of the day, this approach is far more satisfying from a spiritual perspective.
© L.D. Turner 2010/All Rights Reserved
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