Thursday, December 30, 2004

If I’m honest

If I’m honest, I find it really hard to engage with current criticisms and questioning of the emerging church. I see them on good friends – say, Maggi Dawn or Paul Fromont or Phil and Dan – and my eyes just glaze over.

So many words. I’m not sure why I glaze over – whether my context is so different, or perhaps I’m just so immersed I have little time to think.

Or perhaps I’m not emerging. Maybe I should change my blog name. That will be a good holiday project – to come up with a new blog name!

Posted by steve at 12:18 PM

8 Comments

  1. Hmmm, I can find some similarity with my own situation in what you say – but there is another reason for the ‘glazing over’: some as destined to talk about emergence, some are called to live it, some can do both. I have no doubt you’re emergent!

    Like one of the psalms said ‘Just do it’. Or was that the Nike slogan?

    (For other potential commenters: It was a rhetorical question!)

    Comment by Jonathan — December 30, 2004 @ 2:42 pm

  2. Addendum: You know I’ve been thinking about what I wrote – and I don’t want u to think I was inferring that you shouldn’t blog while others like Maggi Dawn blog about emergence! Ummm what I meant was that some use blogging to step out of emergence and write about it ‘from a distance’ (almost sociologically/technically), whereas you (and me) usually use blogging to BE emergent! So keep on blogging, be yourself and happy new year! GBY, Jonathan

    Comment by Jonathan — December 31, 2004 @ 1:01 am

  3. Hmmmm. Mate, sorry for making your eyes glaze over. I think it’s a bit about context…it’s about me being less immersed…it’s about my experiences…it’s about the Kingdom of God…it’s about my cynicism and disappointment…its about my temperament and preference for a middle way that wants to see renovation and renewal…it’s about me processing, thinking, it’s about my engagement and wrestling with William Stringfellow…it’s never, never meant as criticism. You have been and continue to be a huge source of inspiration and encouragement…it all seems so complex and multi-layered…it makes me tired too and my eyes want to glaze over…it’s 4.37am and I can’t even sleep…I’m just a prodigal trying to make my way slowly home. Shalom friend.

    Comment by Paul Fromont — December 31, 2004 @ 4:33 am

  4. p.s. Yes, I was trying to be polemical, to encourage debate and conversation but I see my comments more as concerns rather than criticisms…I value the missional underpinning enough to feel concerned when it feels like it’s being lost and the hard practical work and thinking that is being done by practitioners such as yourself is “dumbed down” in order to better package and market EC…I would be deeply saddened if all that you and others have worked, prayed, and sweated for with regards to missional engagement, kingdom etc is undermined (at one level) by the ‘Christian’ mass market. I recall Mark P expressing a similar concern a couple of years ago.

    Comment by Paul Fromont — December 31, 2004 @ 5:11 am

  5. thanks Paul. I am in no way saying I feel criticised, just processing the fact that I am aware I am less engaged, and wondering if that says anything about my space.

    I’m not worried about the marketing. People always “make do.”

    Comment by steve — December 31, 2004 @ 8:30 am

  6. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury concerning the need for a mixed-economy model said “If Christ is the embodiment of God, and the Church is his body on earth. Then no single expression of Church can ever exhaust Christ. It is about finding out what God is doing and joining in.”

    Shouldn’t that be it? I understand the wrestling with old paradigms because I think it helps articulate new ones, I do it myself … but in the end I think we do best to realise that there will be many embodiments. None will be the right one, but each a piece of a jig-saw when put together, looks like Christ.

    The biggest issue for me these days is that we all hit the road and look to join God in the street… doing things.

    Comment by Garth — December 31, 2004 @ 12:56 pm

  7. Garth, thanks for reminding me of Rowan’s statement.He’s right.

    Comment by Paul Fromont — December 31, 2004 @ 12:57 pm

  8. Am glad to learn from you ifyou wish thanks, God bless.

    Comment by olanipekun — January 6, 2005 @ 3:31 am

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