I am going to write a couple of posts on the book "The Emerging Church" and what has changed from my perspective since the 5 years it came out. Each post will address something I have learned or has changed or has stayed the same and has been further affirmed.
...The term "emerging church" isn't new, it was used for a book called "The Emerging Church" in 1970 by Bruce Larson and Ralph Osborne. I have read that book and it was mainly about change needed in the church for the advancement of the gospel in the "emerging" world of 1970. When I wrote the book of the same name in 2003, that was pretty much the same thing but 33 years later. There will always be change needed in the church for the mission we are on as different time periods of history emerge and cultures change and develop. Perhaps in 33 more years the term will resurface again and someone who is 5 years old right now will write a book caled "The Emerging Church" about what is "emerging" and changing in the mission of the church in the year 2042.
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As I think of the future, I want to focus on the reason I got into the whole emerging church world. It was about evangelism - as in seeing "lost" people (using that word in a healthy way) come to a saving knowledge of Jesus, repenting, experiencing grace and receiving new life by the Spirit and joining in on the mission. Things needed to be "deconstructed" in the church, so there was deconstruction for the sale of evangelism and mission.
My entry into the emerging church world was because of the reality of the increasing amount of people who aren't Christians and weren't experiencing the joy of salvation and knowing Jesus in this life and the reality of eternal heaven and eternal hell in the life-to-come is a reality. I fully know the Kingdom of God is here and now and Jesus' teaching was more focused on how we live life now, not the here-after. But at the same time, hell still exists and if you want to know more about what I think about hell I wrote about it here). This urgency about the Kingdom here and now and about heaven and hell to come (I am fully aware and in alignmnet with N.T. Wright on how we have incorrectly talked about the after-life). But never-the-less, this is exactly what fueled the passion of why Josh Fox, myself and a core team planted Vintage Faith Church in 2004. People who don't know Jesus or experienced the gospel yet. Underneath all the emerging church discussion for me, was evangelism and Jesus' words from Matthew 28:18-20 and Acts 1:8.
But...back to what has changed since the 5 or 6 years since The Emerging Church was written.
If you were to have asked me about what the core of the emerging church is, I would have responded with "evangelism and mission in our emerging culture to emerging generations". And from that, other things were of course included, alternative worship, discussions on ecclesiolgy etc. as a means for fruitful evangelism. But evangelism for me was underneath it all. Today, I certainly sense if you asked someone what is "the emerging church" it would mean a whole lot of of different things than that. In fact, I don't even think the word "evangelism" comes up when I start hearing about "the emerging church" for the most part anymore. It means so many different things theologically today. I will talk about theology in a later post, but over the 10 years the emerging church world has also become so theologically diverse that it has become understandably confusing. 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 (as I assume they would strongly disagree with me). So that has changed as well from my perspective.
So.... the first thing that has changed in the 5 years since the book The Emerging Church came out is that in my opinion, the definition has changed. I am not wedded to any term and I don't think most people are. I, like most others, are wedded to the gospel and to Jesus' command of making new disciples - not a term to describe it. I have gone through the disiullusionment stage about church, and been hurt by the church and the whole deconstruction phase and questioning phase.
So I understand that very deeply. But the urgency of eternity here and the here-after and the people who are not yet Christians who need to hear about experience in this life the saving gospel of Jesus is what enabled me to rise me out of that. I want to focus time, prayer and energy on healthy evangelism and new disciples of Jesus being made who weren't Christians before in our new cultures and new generations. That may involve all varieties of conversations including anything from music and art to justice to leadership to all types of thing. But underneath it is evangelism and the words of Jesus in Matthew 28:18-20 and Acts 1:8 and mission driving it all. So in moving ahead, I don't think using the term "emerging church" as it is generally defined today, describes this like it used to.
I am using "missional" more these days, although that term has different meanings too and knowing human tendencies that will prpbably go through definition changes. (For a good web site about what "missional" is, go here) Defintions come and go. The mission of Jesus doesn't. The urgency of the gospel doesn't (until Jesus returns).
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