Sola Emergent: The Emerging Church and Revelation - Part 1

I have proposed what I believe is the real problem with the Emerging Church, or at least as I understand the movement. The illustration I like to use is of an angle known as the law of the angle. If you have 2 lines that run over top one another, one representing pure orthodoxy and true Biblical Christianity and the other line representing one's theological perspective, the minute one's theology differs from true Biblical Christianity the two lines will break, creating an angle. That break may begin over something small and insignificant. But as the two lines continue they drift farther and farther apart.

The Emerging Church has drifted away from orthodox Christianity, and I have gone in great detail over the months giving example after example. But I do not see the Emerging Church as starting off wrong, but ending wrong. What do I mean? The Emerging Church looks at the law of the angle and stands on the other end. On the other end of that angle isn't theology, but cultural analysis and missions. They ask questions like, how can we best engage the culture in order to reach the culture? What is culture? What must we do to impact culture? How can I best reach my neighbor? Etc. As a result of chasing after culture they have then compromised on theology. Therefore, rather than begin with theology and end in cultural engagement, as the law of the angle implies, they begin at cultural engagement and end with theology.

In Emergent language, they might say that they care more about being missional than being theological. The problem is one cannot be missional unless we are first theological.

And as the Emerging Church travel back on this angle, we see how they are unorthodox and heretical in much of what they teach. I believe that there are two foundational truths one must believe and have a right understanding in order to be an orthodox Christian: Redemption & Revelation.

I have dealt with the Emerging Church's wrong view of redemption in some detail. In essence, the Emerging Church is becoming more and more a postmodern version of the Social Gospel. We see this in the illustration above. Most theologies begin by looking at redemption and revelation, the Emerging Church begins by looking at culture. Therefore, they begin by looking at issues like postmodernism, Christianity in a postmodern context, and then on to issues like homosexuality, abortion, politics, etc. This has led to their misguided understanding of redemption, thus adopting a social gospel for postmodernist. It involves no sin, no repentance, and really, no belief. Only cheap grace with a water downed message. "Join us and we'll make the world a better place," and nothing more.

The Emerging Church's dive off the orthodox cliff from a redemptive perspective is already set in motion, it is clear now that they are making the same mistake in the area of Revelation. In a next series of posts, I want us to look at the dangers the Emerging Church proposes in this critical area of orthodoxy. Like redemption, if we get this wrong, we get Christianity wrong. And no matter how sincere we become, we miss the message of Christ altogether.

We must begin by looking at what seems to be one of the most important books in Emergent circles by Phyllis Tickle called, "The Great Emergence." The basic premise is that every 500 years, throughout Christian history, there as been a great revolution. For example, Gregory the Great, the Great Reformation, etc. The argument goes that every 500 years, God "reforms," the Church, redefining and redirecting some of it's doctrine and practice. Each of these movements mark a major change in culture and thus a change in doctrine. Tickle seems to see this as an act of Providence, part of God's divine story.

And we are in one of those transitional moments in history, she argues. The "Great" this time is, according to Tickle, the Great Emergence. Tickle sees the Emerging Church as the movement that will redefine history and reshape the Church.

And one of those issues that will be redefined deals with revelation. We must go back to the Great Reformation where the battle cry was "Sola Scriptura" (Scripture alone). This anthem was in reaction to the abuses of the Catholic Church who held tradition as authoritative as God's revealed Word. Therefore, Martin Luther, John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli, John Knox, John Craig, Minno Simmons, Philip Melanthon, and the other Reformers declared that Scripture was God's only revealed Word, and we must let is shape our theology and ecclesialogy alone. Nothing else.

Tickle argues:

Orthonomy may be defined then as a kind of “correct harmoniousness” or beauty. In effect, when it is used as here [in regard to Sola Scriptura], it means the employment of aesthetic or harmonic purity as a tool for discerning truth—and therefore the intent and authority—of anything, be that thing doctrine or practice. Thus it is very common to find that many emergent Christians are genuinely confused and befuddled by the Reformation Protestants’ constant wrestling with modernist questions of historicity.

An emergent, in observing heated debates or impassioned conversations about the factualness of the Virgin Birth, for example, can be truly puzzled. For him or her, the whole “problem” is just not “there” in any distinguishable or real sense. For the emergent, as he or she will be quick to say, the Virgin Birth is so beautiful that it has to be true, whether it happened or not…

The new Christianity of the Great Emergence must discover some authority base or delivery system and/or governing agency of its own. It must formulate—and soon—something other than Luther’s sola scriptura which, although used so well by the Great Reformation originally, is now seen as hopelessly outmoded or insufficient,… (The Great Emergence, 149, 150, 151)

You can see where this is going. As this Great Emergence takes place, we must reevaluate everything it means to be a Christian. Not only must we reevaluate redemption, we must also reevaluate revelation.

Notice how Tickle describes Sola Scriptura: "hopelessly outmoded," & "insufficient." Why? Because we are no longer living in the world of the Reformers. By this, the Emerging Church is not referring to cars and planes, but to modernity vs. postmodernity. The Reformers lived in a propositional world where concepts like the Virgin Birth could be defended solely on revelation and proposition. But we don't live in such a world anymore. We now live in a postmodern world where story and dialogue rule the day. And if propositions are outmoded and insufficient, so are the things that drive them: i.e., Sola Scriptura. Therefore, it is not necessary to believe in a literal Virgin Birth, rather we must find ourselves in the story and see what the writer intended for us to understand. There is mystery here. Truth is overrated, mystery is the wave of the future.

Story is the name, mystery is the game. The goal is not to have all the right answers, but to ask all the right questions. Concepts like the Virgin Birth distract from what God is saying. The Virgin Birth, the resurrection from the dead, heterosexual marriage only, are propositions. These are inadequate and no longer relevant, therefore, they must be reevaluated.

Here, we must return where we began; the law of the angle. The Emerging Church has been around for over a decade and it seems that they are just now seriously beginning to deal with the issue of revelation. Why so long especially whenever it was the first and foremost issue, along with redemption, with the Reformers and other Christians (such as Augustine, etc.)? The answer is because their starting point is not theology, but culture and missions. Because culture has changed, so must the faith, so must theology. One can only understand the Emerging Church only whenever one understands the culture because it is the culture that drives and moves the Emerging Church.

Therefore, if culture has redefined Christ, so will the Emerging Church. If the culture has redefined Christianity, so will the Emerging Church. If the culture has redefined redemption, so will the Emerging church. If the culture redefines revelation, so will the Emerging Church. And since the culture is postChristian, so is the Emerging Church.

We see this trend in Tickle's recent work. She points out:

The next assault in this progression of assaults [upon Sola Scriptura] was the ordination of women to the Protestant clergy… The ordination of women was followed, of course, by their elevation to the episcopacy in the Episcopal Church in the United States. Clearly the battle of “Scripture only” was being lost. Now there was only one more tool left in sola scriptura’s war chest… Enter “the gay issue.”

To approach any of the arguments and questions surrounding homosexuality in the closing years of the twentieth century and the opening ones of the twenty-first is to approach a battle to the death. When it is resolved—and it most surely will be—the Reformation’s understanding of Scripture as it had been taught by Protestantism for almost five centuries will be dead. That is not to say that Scripture as the base of authority is dead. Rather it is to say that what the Protestant tradition has taught about the nature of that authority will either be dead or in mortal need of reconfiguration.

And that kind of summation is agonizing for the surrounding culture in general. In particular, it is agonizing for the individual lives that have been built upon it. Such an ending is to staved off with every means available and resisted with every bit of energy that can be mustered. Of all the fights, the gay one must be—has to be—the bitterest, because once it is lost, there are no more fights to be had. It is finished. Where now is the authority? (The Great Emergence, 100, 101)

Notice again: first comes culture, then comes theology. Since culture has redefined our understanding of what we have traditionally believed about Scripture, we must therefore reevaluate what we believe about Scripture.

There is one major problem with this method of missional theology. They declare that modernism is dead and can no longer reach the culture. Perhaps that's true. But to embrace postmodernism is to make the same mistake they criticize the modern church. Yes, the minute the Church became modern is the minute it began to compromise true Christianity because Christianity is not defined by culture or cultural trends. It is defined by Christ. Likewise, the minute the Church becomes postmodern is the minute it begins to compromise true Christianity. And before long, it too will be outdated. To chase after culture rather chase after Christ means the death of the faith and death of the founder of that Faith.

This is a dangerous trend and one that we will look at more closely in the next few posts. This is an important issue. To compromise on Revelation and Redemption is to cease to be Christian. I believe that the Emerging Church has ceased to be Christian.

Long gone are the words of Martin Luther at the Diet of Worms facing certain death:

"Unless I am convicted by Scripture and plain reason - I do not accept the authority of the popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other - my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen."