Emerging Church Put to Rest
In a recent post on the Out of Ur blog the issue of the term “emerging church” is said to be dead, or dying, or, at least, soon to be put to rest. Because of the increasing confusion about the term some emergent leaders, like Dan Kimball and Andrews Jones believe that the current state of the emerging church has become too broad to describe or identify with. Kimball says, “I can’t defend or even explain theologically what is now known broadly as “the emerging church” anymore, because it has developed into so many significantly different theological strands. Some I strongly would disagree with.”
Jones says, “Words change. We give meaning to words and we take it away. The word is problematic for many American institutions and often insulting to European ministries that preceded their American counterparts. So . . . most of you said to dump it and I will. But I am still staying connected to many ministries around the world that are using it.”
What are your thoughts about burying the term “emerging church”?
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I agree that it needs to go. There is too much confusion surrounding the term and it leads to misunderstanding. Like Kimball, I don’t feel comfortable defending my own thoughts about the emerging church because the term is interpreted so widely.
However, I do think that we need some sort of language to use when discussing the movement. Just have no idea what that looks like.
I think it is a little unfair to define something as an open conversation and then decide the term isn’t useful because it’s too open.
I may be mistaken, but wasn’t the initial idea of the term emerging church was that it wasn’t a particular theological position (or positions), but instead it was made up of people/movements who may disagree theologically, but are each in their own way responding to and questioning the current culture of church and society?
Richie, that’s exactly my understanding of what it was/is/should/could be. Unfortunately, it’s become a demarcation of borders or a camp for some to either defend or attack, which was never the intention, right? And so, since it’s become this hulking term that polarizes people in bad ways, maybe the work of questioning the status quo, whilst pursuing unity as the body of Christ, can continue with or without a term to hang on it?
Yeah, in my experience the term ends conversations before they begin. It could just be where I live, in Colorado Springs, but I’ve found that most of the Christians I know, even close friends, have an immediate defensive reaction to all things labeled “emerging”. But if we just sit down and discuss the ideas, a lot of times they will agree and be excited about the topic, and our friendship deepens. I think this is what the emerging movement was always about anyway- getting rid of anything that needlessly causes division and stands in the way of honest conversation. So it sort of makes sense that the people who value that most have to be among the first to take the steps of laying down their own “identity” to encourage unity.
Can we lose the other labels (like liberal, conservative, charismatic and evangelical) too? Because I don’t really know what they mean anymore either.
Its alright to abandon it. As long as we’re more concerned with “being it”.
The name has always been the greatest shortcoming of this conversation. Maybe if we focus on being and pursuing Christ, we can let more titles drop from us like the scales that fell off Paul’s eyes.
All moves of God are of God himself. Yeah, the Massive Intangible God who incarnated and made himself known to us first in the flesh. Now, in Spirit.
If we’re truly pursuing God, we’ll be following the leading of his Spirit.
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