The Sandwich Has a Middle
Seeing as I made, for the first time, some “face” contacts in the Emergent Christian world last night, I suspect that some of my new acquaintances will be visiting this blog. National Emergent US coordinator Tony Jones told me he already has been a reader here. So I’d like to invite any of my readers who consider themselves emergent to read a recent article by Westminster Theological Seminary professor of church history Jeffrey Jue entitled “What’s Emerging in the Church.”
Jue expresses appreciation for much of what Emergent is trying to say to the church, but expresses a focused concern. He points out that most Emergent spokespeople have a strong desire to connect in two directions historically. On the one hand, they want to explore the “ancient faith,” the beliefs and practices of the early church and its teachers. Jue commends this desire. On the other hand, they are pushing for the church to move forward into the 21st century and think about what church should look like in a postmodern age, also something Jue concedes the whole church needs to be thinking about.
However, Jue’s article is a plea not to throw out the middle of the sandwich. He suspects that many in the Emergent movement have become so enamored with ancient/future conceptions of the church that they have thrown the Reformation baby out with the bathwater. In particular, he challenges the assertion by some Emergent writers that the Reformation (and the Reformed wing of theology in particular) are wholly a product of Modernity. Jue purports that the Reformation was actually an anti-Modern movement.
I’d be most interested in what any of my Emergent readers (or even Closet readers, for that matter 
) think about Jue’s critiques. I’d just ask that you please read his full article before responding, rather than commenting on my inadequate summary.
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September 16th, 2005 at 1:26 pm
Well, I left you a comment on your Emergent Evening post, thinking I was leaving it here.
September 16th, 2005 at 2:01 pm
While I would agree with almost everything Jue says, I would repeat some of the same observations I made some time ago in this blog entry on Calvin and Calvinists as described by Carl Trueman. That is to say, there’s an issue of what the Germans call Wirkungsgeschichte, examining the effects, reception, or influence that particular texts make and receive in subsequent history.
That’s not to say that the Reformed Orthodox were crypto-modernists, but it is to recognize that their formulations may have been unwittingly shaped by some kinds of modernist assumptions and shifts and that, more importantly, their texts were received into the subsequent tradition in a way that arguably aided and abetted modernist tendencies.
I’m not necessarily saying that this is what happened historically, but if it did, nothing in Jue’s argument would count against it and the concerns of the emergent sorts might have some legitimate grounds. I love Reformed theology, even at its most scholastic, but I can see why some might have worries about it, particularly in terms of speaking that theology to our contemporary world.
September 16th, 2005 at 6:16 pm
Gayla…I responded on that thread.
September 16th, 2005 at 6:20 pm
Joel,
Your comment got me wondering if there are any “Reformed Emergent” churches out there…churches that are decidedly in the Reformed camp, yet are trying to address the ways in which Reformed theology has become dry, dusty, and disconnected from the mission of the church to the world.
Matter of fact, I think my present church, Liberti PCA, might fit that bill…although they’d probably shrink from any conscious identification with the Emergent label.
September 16th, 2005 at 9:37 pm
There are lots of PCA (mostly Redeemer model) churches that are very missionally focused. Another that comes to mind is Mark Driscoll and the Acts 29 network as being quite reformed (although Baptist) and missionally focused.
September 16th, 2005 at 10:49 pm
Some good examples there, Tim…thanks!
September 17th, 2005 at 9:39 am
I had the pleasure of having a discussion with Brian McLaren about a month ago. It confirmed a number of my own suspicions about his critics, and where he’s trying to take his chunk of the emergent movement.
I kinda wish that Jeff would have read carefully the introductory chapter of McLaren’s _A Generous Orthodoxy_. I think that there McLaren makes fairly clear that he’s not interested in throwing the reformation out. To the contrary he’s interested in taking _every_ Christian tradition and utilizing what they do best and correcting what they do worst, and all through a humble Christian give-and-take (hence the emergent language of “conversation”). Methinks that’s a poweful idea, and I’m all for it.
September 17th, 2005 at 11:36 am
Yeah, Justin, unfortunately (for himself and for the Emergent movement) McLaren has become identified as the spokesperson for Emergent, so anything he says (or people think he said) becomes tagged on the whole movement. Although I think it’s fair to say that the vast majority of people/gatherings that identify themselves as Emergent probably agree with most, if not all, of what McLaren teaches. However, Emergent is a conversation (as they love to say) between Christians of many different stripes, some of whom (as Tim pointed out above) are solidly Reformed.
By the way, my wife informs me that Dr. Jue issued an apology in his Church in the Modern Age class yesterday for remarks that he’s made that imply that Emergent is anti-intellectual. He held up Kevin Vanhoozer (and in particular, his latest book The Drama of Doctrine) as an example of a very thoughtful theologian who has connections to the Emergent movement. Does anyone know what those connections are?
September 17th, 2005 at 1:20 pm
Mark:
You asked about Reformed Emergent churches. Can’t answer that one, but you might want to check out a couple of bloggers who identify themselves as Reformed and (more or less) emergent. I’m thinking here of some WTS grads. Primarily Dan Passerelli at “Life of a Steward“. Dan blogged Jeff Jue’s essay here, so you might want to read that. In that blog Dan also identifies a few other bloggers who are “seeking to emerge” from a Reformed setting. Two of them, Jerry Fourroux and Jeff McMullen are also recent WTS grads.
Doug
September 17th, 2005 at 1:25 pm
Oh, Doug, Karyn will be SO pleased that you’ve just added three more blogs to my regular reads. She already threatens to move our marriage relationship entirely online!
Seriously, thanks for those. It will be nice to know that I’m not “alone out there.” Which is to say, while I haven’t made the leap fully into Emergent (and how does one know when one even has?), I can definitely see commonalities with the way I’ve come to think.
BTW, I took the liberty to “fix” your links so they are more accessible here in the comments.
September 17th, 2005 at 2:35 pm
Mark:
Feel free to fix my links so that they work. I have no idea how to do such stuff (evidence, no doubt that I am hopelessly unemergeable). OK, so you’re reading more blogs on marriage-time. But Karyn is learning to read Inscriptional Hebrew, Moabite and Phoenician. So it seems like a fair trade-off.
I’m intrigued by the “Emergent and Reformed” question. But let me be honest. I’m way out of the emergent loop. (We might be in the same age bracket, but you’re way cooler than I am.) The sum total of my engagement with emergent thinking is to have read a few blogs and McLaren’s New Kind of Christian (I was actually a bit disappointed by it; it wasn’t as “edgy†and postmodern as I had expected/hoped). OK, I also drink beer with John Franke so that’s got to count for something. OK, so I’m ignorant on the subject. But ignorance hasn’t stopped me from pontificating before, so why change now?
I’m intrigued by what I’m reading from and about the emergent church. My first reaction is that it’s not hard to be critical. I think that Jeff Jue has put up some good warning signs in his essay. Emergents would do well to listen carefully to the voice of a classic and thoughtful strand of the Protestant tradition (I trust that didn’t sound too arrogant).
But emergent and Reformed? Hmm. Sounds like oil and water … or is it? I can see a couple of strands with in conservative North American Reformed theology that might encourage such a “marriageâ€
(1)The biblical-theological (i.e., redemptive historical) strand of Reformed biblical interpretation, with its orientation to narrative ways of theologizing strikes me as having some interesting points of contact with more emergent/postmodern categories of thought. So I could see some profitable conservations between that strand of reformed theology and emergents.
(2)The other strand in Reformed theology (at least at Westminster Seminary) is that offered by the under-appreciated work of the Harvie Conn, especially his 1985 book, Eternal Word and Changing Worlds. Harvie understood the profoundly contextual character of all theology and (again, from the very little I know) contextualization seems to be one of the important issues raised by the emergent church. More specifically, Harvie contended that theology, to be theology, had to be missional. Listen to his 1982 lecture on the “The Missionary Task of the Church,†which you can get from the bookstore you work for (!). (You can also a read a revised version of the lecture in the Westminster Journal from 1983).
My point is that there are strands in the conservative Reformed tradition that might “fit†well with the concerns of the emergent church and those threads of commonality could be the basis for interesting and constructive discussions between the two groups.
Sorry this turned into an essay rather than a comment.
Doug
September 17th, 2005 at 3:09 pm
Mark,
I’m always really encouraged by your theological thoughts on here. I know I’ve said that before, but I thought I’d say it again.
Last week I had a similar discussion on Reformed Presbyterianism and Emergent with my friend Sarah here in Edinburgh. She just started reading Don Carson’s “Becoming Conversant with the Emergent Church”, and I plan on reading it as soon as I can (moving in with her and her husband Jonathan should make this easier, if I’m sneaky!), and it prompted the question you presented. As Tim mentioned, there definitely seems to be a strand of the PCA church that is picking up on some of the things Emergent is campaigning (for lack of a better term), and as “conservative” as Sarah and I are, we both agreed that we are really really encouraged by that - it’s a breath of fresh air that we think could really be good of the Reformed church.
I wonder how much some of the Soverign Grace churches are beginning to fit the bill? (It’s an honest question, as someone who only has a passing knowledge of Mahaney and SG.)
M
September 17th, 2005 at 9:31 pm
Doug:
A beer with you and John Franke…now that’s an evening I’d pay to be part of! And remember…I’ve only really had direct contact with these Emergent guys since Thursday night, which makes me only about three days cooler than you.
I very much agree with you that the two strands of the Westminster-brand Reformed world have real connections with much of what I heard at the cohort. As I might have said elsewhere, Tony Jones who spoke to us that evening commented that all of the appearance of going head-over-heals postmodern was a necessary “phase” for Emergent to go through as it took on the behemoth of Modernity. Now, as the movement enters what might be termed its adolesence, he said that most Emergent leaders and churches are far more interested in talking about (and doing) missional church. They are still very much engaged in the theological/philosphical conversaton, but they don’t want that to be the only thing (or even the center of) what they are known for.
Unfortunately, some of their critics are latched on to the postmodern thing as if that was all Emergent was about.
September 17th, 2005 at 10:35 pm
Michaela:
Always nice to hear from you! I wouldn’t discourage you from reading Carson’s book (and since I’m “fixing links” in this thread, I changed the purchase link you put from Amazon to WTS Bookstore…my bread and butter!). Like I said, read Carson’s book, but be aware that the Emergent folks I talked to Thursday night uniformly feel that Carson was very unfair to them in several of his criticisms.
For one thing, Tony Jones, national coordinator of Emergent US, told us that Carson purports to be taking on the belief system of Emergent, but Emergent is not a set of beliefs. Rather, it is an ethos. He used the metaphor of a coffee shop, a place for safe conversation. He told us about a coffee shop back in Edina, Minn., run by a lady with 85 piercings and tatoos all over her immense body…pretty much the anti-Starbucks. Now he said that shop definitely has its own ethos. Looking at the posters on the wall, the newspapers scattered about, and the lady behind the counter, you can pretty much bet that most of the patrons there voted Kerry-Edwards. Yet, a couple of white-shirted Republican Mormons could walk in, sit down, order some lemon water, and be welcomed right into a spirited conversation. Emergent isn’t a school of theology, it’s a way of going about theology. Most of Carson’s critique was of the theological statements of Brian McLaren. Now while it’s fair to say that a great many Emergent people would agree with much, if not all, that McLaren has said/written, he does not establish the theology of a movement that has no established theology.
Second, the folks I spoke with said that Carson misrepresented their interaction with postmodernism. He portrayed them as naively swallowing postmodern relativism hook, line, and sinker. They protest that they are not relativists, and that they totally reject the kind of postmodernism (almost exclusively confined to academia) that rejects absolutes. They vigorously believe in absolute truth, they are just more suspicious of man’s ability to draw a complete circle around it and definitively outline it than Modernity has been…which strikes me as a healthily “Reformed” way of looking at things.
Some of the Emergent leaders/writers named in Carson’s book have attempted several times to make contact with him in order to allow him to be “conversant” with them, as the title of his book claims one should be. He has thus far refused their invitations for dialogue. McLaren has said that in his case, Carson indicated being open to talking with him some time, but I don’t know if that has taken place. Here is a very gracious statement from Brian McLaren, posted in the reader review section for Carson’s book on Amazon:
For a detailed and thoughtful response to D. A. Carson’s take on Emergent, see The Emergent Church - Another Perspective: A Critical Response to D. A. Carson’s Staley Lectures by David M. Mills (pdf format), PhD. While this is a critique of a series of lectures, not the Becoming Conversant book, the lectures cover all the major critiques Carson made in the book.
September 18th, 2005 at 10:30 am
Michaela:
Just realized I didn’t respond to your question about Sovereign Grace churches and EC.
I’ll just share with you my personal experiences with SG. Please take it as just that; I have no idea if my encounters represent the whole at all.
First off, there’s that very active SG mameber mutual friend of you and me, Kirk. Or at least mutual former friend for me, I guess. He seems to have cut off all communication with me since he came to believe that I was exploring some areas that he considered outside the bounds of historic Reformed faith. Very sad for me; even though we often infuriated one another, I really enjoyed knowing him and wish he’d stuck around for the “conversation.” Anyways, while I never engaged Kirk in a direct discussion of Emergent (since back when I was talking with him I had little idea what it was), we had many discussion about issues I now know would be quite relevant.
Most significantly, Kirk felt I had seriously departed from the gospel in my growing perception that we were called to apply the gospel in more than just individual “going to heaven” salvation; that the gospel of the Kingdom of God has implications for all of life, including areas such as social justice, the environment, etc. This upset Kirk greatly. He felt that such thinking watered down the gospel, which to him was completely about justification of the individual sinner before God. This is certainly antithetical to Emergent thinking.
Now that might just be Kirk, except that I think what I’ve seen and experienced of SG churches (totally from the outside; I’ve never visited one) might be confirmatory. If you examine the books and online sermons of SG churches, and especially of its key leaders such as Mahaney and Joshua Harris, you’ll see that they deal almost exclusively with issues of personal piety. Now let me hasten to say that what I’ve read or listened to of theirs in that vein is mostly very good; I’d take issue with a few of their approaches, but that’s not of concern here. However, apropos to your question, I have not seen anything in SG literature/messages that addresses the kinds of concerns Emergent is raising. That’s an argument from silence, I realize, but there you have it.
Summary: The Sovereign Grace movement seems to me to have produced some of the most thoughtful, serious, and passionate churches and Christians I’ve known anywhere. As a movement that is both “sanely” charismatic and Reformed, they fill a unique nitch, and I’m glad they’re there! But I would suspect that they would be suspicious of and cautious toward the EC. I may be totally wrong on that, and would welcome correction from anyone in a position to know better.
September 19th, 2005 at 8:01 am
I went to a cohort meeting here in MN with Tony Jones and he opened the discussion by saying, “We are Emergent. Our website sucks, we have no money, and a lot of Calvinists hate us.” Then I told him I was a Calvinist. It was a fun time
September 19th, 2005 at 12:24 pm
I have to confess that I took a certain glee in observing the shape of some eyebrows around the room at the cohort when I casually mentioned that I’m a WTS M.Div.
Had about the same shock value as if someone joined a Bible study at an OP church and casually announced that they really thought Barth was a great theologian.
September 19th, 2005 at 4:43 pm
So, I read that Franke article that is linked from his name. Then I was told that Trueman and Gaffin had both responded to it in the following issue of WTJ. Gaffin’s was typical Gaffin: Reformed, in line with the tradition, asking what is distinctively Reformed about Franke’s proposal, dealing with the Spirit speaking in the Scripture and disagreeing with Franke’s understanding of WCF I.
Trueman’s response was fantastic! He basically outdoes what Franke is trying to do, showing that Franke’s response to postmodernism is no response at all and that, disappointingly, it doesn’t even begin to deal with the complexity of issues involved in a Christian dogmatic confessing theology in the context of the postmodern world. Trueman really drives home the complexity of the postmodern context with references to lots of pomo thinkers and the issues they’ve brought up that Franke overlooks. It’s a great critique, and even manages to somewhat set some lines for how to think about doing theology in a pomo context. I think it’s pp. 311-325 or something like that in the WTJ following Franke’s article. Highly recommended.
September 19th, 2005 at 6:16 pm
Hmmm. Jason may look like me, but he sure doesn’t sound like me.
Doug
September 19th, 2005 at 6:44 pm
I’ll try to look those up, Jason…but I haven’t even had time to read the original Franke article yet. This is what I get for raising a “hot topic” during the school year…half a dozen must-read blogs from Doug and an armload of journal articles from you!
If we’re going to read that whole dialogue, I found a reference online to a response by Franke to Gaffin’s and Trueman’s responses, which is supposed to be in WTJ vol. 65, no. 2.
September 19th, 2005 at 6:46 pm
Doug:
Maybe Jason’s one of the bast…
never mind
September 23rd, 2005 at 9:58 am
before i comment, let me just say that i haven’t read that much (at least compared to those here, apparently) on the Emergent churches, but i do have some concerns about them from what i have read in both positive and negative takes on the whole deal. all that to say, i’m going to give my understanding (and limited insight) of the movement and want to know if i’m on target or way off-base.
it seems to me that the Emergent Movement (or conversation or whatever) has largely grown out of experience with bad churches. churches that, like mark has alluded to, focus so much on the individual and focus so much in “closing off” the church from the big, bad world that they sort of become their own private little cult. now that’s a gross overgeneralization, but i’m trying to make a point. the Emergent movement then, after having experience with these churches, takes things to the complete opposite in response.
i’ve talked to someone who has become involved with the Emergent Movement and he told me that, basically, “we reject the idea of the church as an institution.” shocked by this, i pressed him and he backtracked a little, but not much, in saying that the Emergent Movement, and, specifically, church (according to them), is more about meeting people where they are (or entering conversation with, you might say) than about meeting as a body of believers for the sake of worshiping the Lord. he said that their idea of “church” is about reaching out to people through arts or coffee shops or through service projects, etc. so i just want to know if that is an accurate take on the Emergent Movement.
September 23rd, 2005 at 2:34 pm
Brandon,
As everyone notes, the Emergent Whatever-it-is is as notoriously difficult to pin down as is the “postmodernism” that supposedly spawned it. The people I’ve talked to that claim the lable bristle at any language that tries to tag them as an organization or a movement. Tony Jones, the national coordinator of Emergent US (sounds organized, doesn’t it?
) said that he can’t stand it when a critic says, “Emergent believes…” because Emergent doesn’t believe anything. As we’ve heard way too many times now 
, Emergent folk like to talk about themselves as a “conversation,” a safe place for Christians of all stripes to interact theologically without fear of attack.
However, even the leadership of Emergent admits that they tend to attract a certain niche of person. Not only do they tend to be often from bad church situations as you said, but also of a more liberal bent politically and theologically. Tony Jones put it like this: that’s who happens to frequent the coffee shop, but anyone is welcome to come in and join the conversation.
That being said, I’ve become aware of some churches who either consider themselves Emergent or others would consider them that who seem to carry what we would call “high views” of scripture, salvation by grace through faith alone, etc. One example seems to be the Mars Hill Church of Pastor Rob Bell in Michigan
September 23rd, 2005 at 11:06 pm
Blind comments from an ill-informed, and (relative) theological neophite:
It sounds to me like this discussion is a dicotomy in approach, where we should rather keep what is good in both.
I had a fantastic conversation with a dear friend tonight about her entrance into ALANON (sp… Alcohol Anonymous’ support group for the friends and familly of alcoholics). A phrase that struck me was when she said “They provide a place where you can share your truth.” Please don’t go relativistic on that phrase… the truth in question here is more about how you enabled the alcoholic’s behivour, or were wounded by it, etc.
Traditional church services, especially over the past decades have failed to provide that outlet, that place of healing. Without those deep conversations, where one person truly joins another, a person can be left feeling cold, and this feeling can permiate an entire church community.
To me, it sounds like the ‘emergant church’[1] is trying to offer a place more suited to that kind of encounter, at the expense of a more formal/liturgical worship service. I’d bet that there is some tremendous value in that, but I’m loath to throw away the liturgy with the bathwater.
[1] sorry… that phrase/title annoys my Catholic sensabilities… the Church is always ‘emerging’ from the tomb along with her Master.
September 24th, 2005 at 1:12 pm
Jason:
Thanks for some interesting thoughts. Once again, my comments will come from one meeting with some Emergent Church leaders and the limited amount of reading I’ve done, so take them for what they’re worth.
Seems to me one of the things that has become wearisome to Emergent folk is the perception that their movement is primarily about worship service style. This probably results from two things. First, it’s probably true that most (but not all) Emergent churches favor an ancient/future style worship service with contemporary-style music, candles and incense, and often things like prayer stations, artwork created on the spot as an act of worship, and open discussion/questioning of the sermon as it’s delivered. Second, many boomer mega churches, wishing to add a cool “Emergent” service to their lineup of niche services, set up worship services with those types of elements and then think they’re doing the whole Emergent/postmodern thing.
The people I talked to/read would say that while exploring new/old styles of worship is something important in a lot of their churches, it is not the main thing they are about. So they would say a church could be full-blown liturgical and still Emergent in its attitudes, theological conversation, and missional orientation.
October 30th, 2005 at 11:51 am
This is a rsponse to Mark Traphagan’s 9/18/05 comments on the Sovereign Grace league’s reaction to the emerging church. I am a long-time member of the founding church of SG. Brian McLaren actually attended our church briefly before planting his own. Though there has been no official statement of our position they sell D.A. Carson’s book about the movement in the bookstore and that means they agree with most of his positions. They will also be hosting a New Attitude conference in May that will address certain trends in the emerging church.
January 21st, 2006 at 2:48 am
This thing, the emerging church, do the majority of reformed christians hate it? If so why?
January 21st, 2006 at 11:06 am
I would certainly hesitate to speak for the “majority of reformed Christians.” I don’t think anyone’s taken a poll on this. My sense would be that, if by majority you mean the average reformed Christian in the pew, they don’t think about it a whole lot unless it becomes an issue in their local church. The brouhaha you are hearing in books and online comes almost exclusively from the seminary-trained reformed scholars and academics (and their blogger fans) who probably represent a minority within the community.
As to why they are so upset (”hate” is a pretty strong word; I would hope that’s not actually the case)? I would say read what they are writing. They are concerned that emergent/postmodern Christians have pretty much rejected the doctrinal concerns of the Reformation, concerns that these Reformed scholars see as crucial to the orthodox Christian faith.
May 12th, 2006 at 12:11 am
Mark,
Catchy title brother. I think the way Dan handled the article is a good approach. Jeff raises the issue well, where’s the middle, or better yet lets not forget about the middle. This should concern us because of the neo-liberal trend to read much of our post-reformation guys as modernist. My tendency though is to think this is something that is more easily placed at different doorsteps than the emergent crowd…I’m wondering how many of them are even keen to the whole post-reformation question. Jeff may have read over some things from concerns elswhere in the post-conservative and post-liberal conversations going on today.
Though the emergent community may have inherited some things as well. I’m thinking that depending on what form of community different leaders came from, baggage came along with them. Some emergent people using Reformation themes would be Driscoll, Franke, and Armstrong.
Glad to hear about the meet and greet, how does Tony like his drink. Just kidding.
May 12th, 2006 at 12:25 am
Wow, Anthony, you got out your shovel and dug deep into the Sacred Journey this evening!
May 12th, 2006 at 12:26 pm
Some people cope with the burden of finals by turning to SmallVille (stay supper Sam) others cope by looking at old blogs. How about you brother…