Spent some time on the phone this morning with friend Jon. He brought up an interesting point that I want some feedback on. We're trying to do this emergent thing (kaleo) at a Nazarene church. Admittedly, this is not your typical Nazarene church, but there are some people who still embody pieces of the tradition, even if they don't fully understand why they embody it and which parts are disposable and which essential to Christianity. That being said imagine an emergent congregation in the middle of Nazarene church life: for those of you unfamiliar, Nazarenes have historically been holiness folk that eshewed cultural expressions like movies, television, and dancing, as well as social practices like drinking and smoking. Much of that has changed over the years, but some of the prohibitions or at least the guilt for indulging the previously taboo issues remains.
Jon was wondering if the group in the greatest danger in an experiment like ours wasn't the emergent folk or the hardline Nazarenes, but rather the folk in the middle--the ones who embody pieces of the tradition at the same time understanding that the tradition is changeable and ought to be that way. There is little danger of emergent folk becoming traditional Nazarenes, and there is less danger of senior traditional Nazarenes becoming emergent, but what about those folks in the middle? How do you learn to jettison pieces of a tradition that no longer make any sense but still hold sway over your emotions and faith practices?
Let's take drinking as an example. Most of the young-ish Nazarenes I know don't honestly believe there ought to be a prohibition against drinking (ditto for the young-ish Southern Baptists I know). Having grown up in the tradition though, they either do it secretly or don't do it and don't have a grammar to attach their abstinence to that makes any sense. If I say drinking is okay or if the old Nazarene says it's not, what is the impetus behind the middle-grounder believing either option? Let's dispense with Paul's admonitions in Romans 14: he clearly says those who don't drink are weak in faith whenever they look down on or judge as unspiritual/immoral others who do, and no one will abstain from sex so his brother or sister doesn't stumble. There is NO morality attached to drinking. Jesus did it. Call it a sin and you've created a bizarre Christology. We have entire denominations encouraging their congregations to be weak in faith. Amazing.
I want to be able to say to middle-grounders drinking is not an issue. I mean really not an issue. Like my lovely wife who says it's as important morally as the choice to wear shoes or not. (We're not talking about abuse. Anything can be abused and anecdotes don't constitute a reasonable argument.) I mean it shouldn't even be something to talk about, but because the hardliners insist it's an issue, it becomes a matter of Christian liberty and legalism. That makes it something I have to talk about. How do I do it without damaging folk in the middle or scaring them away from the conversation? Bear in mind, we're just talking about alcohol at this point; we're not even talking about soteriology yet. For issues like alcohol I might be labelled a libertine or liberal by hardliners; for soteriology, I'll be a heretic, a far more serious charge in their minds.
So what do I do? How do you have the conversation without middle-grounders feeling like two extreme sides are vying for their loyalty in such a way that we cease to care about the people as people and care only for our position or ideal? Where is the best place to start this conversation without scaring folk off? I'm in the Nazarene church, so alcohol comes up, as it would in a SBC church, but do I start with practices or theology or wherever an individual starts the conversation? What about for preaching? Where do you start then?
To be emergent at least means the willingness to rethink traditions. It means that even long-settled issues are up for debate, like soteriology and atonement, and it means the denominational sacred cows are up for debate, like drinking or instrument-free worship services. The goal of questioning the traditions is to live as closely to the ideal as possible and not allow extraneous things like rules about drinking or hymns about bloody Jesus to cloud the character of God. It's also a way of keeping ourselves honest.
