No doubt because it's something President Obama is doing, a good deal of the American church will mindlessly and predictably condemn the idea of opening up relationships with Cuba again. I don't know enough to have an opinion that matters, although it seems to me I'd rather Cuba be friends with us right now than Russia.
That's not the point of this post. The opening of relations will undoubtedly open up more opportunities for Christianity in Cuba. In fact, it already has. We've already seen in recent years increased opportunities for the church in Cuba.
I hope we'll be very careful about this re-entry. On the one hand, I suspect this one will work a lot better than our work in Russia, which has seemingly evaporated after over two decades of work with little to show for it. One of our difficulties in Russia, I believe, was the fact that the Baptistic form of Christianity we tried to plant in Russia had little traction with the culture of Russia. Why didn't we try a reform movement within the Orthodox Church, much as Wesley did within the Anglican church? My hunch is because we didn't have enough historical or theological depth to see what that would look like. My hunch is that we just assumed a Billy Graham church growth approach was the Christian approach. I could be wrong.
The situation is different in Cuba. There is already a virulent form of Protestant Christianity in Latin America, and it fits much better with the culture of the Wesleyan Church than Russia did. In other words, we might be historically and theologically unaware of ourselves and still be able to present a form of Christianity there that resonates with the culture.
What I do hope is that someone somewhere in our church will actually be thinking about these things. I would hate to see happen what seems to have happened in Russia--initial great openness to spirituality after the iron curtain came down, followed by somewhat of a rejection of the cultural form of Christianity that rushed in thereafter.
Showing posts with label evangelism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label evangelism. Show all posts
Friday, December 19, 2014
Monday, October 15, 2012
The Decade of Evangelism (1970s): Black and Drury
I am pressed for time so will only do chapter 18 today from Bob Black and Keith Drury's, The Story of the Wesleyan Church. So far it's been:
Chaps 1-2 About Wesley and the origins of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in abolitionism
Chaps 3-4 About its activist early days that were low church, pro-women (and anti- some other things)
Chaps 5-6 The post-Civil War let down, when the best and brightest returned to the Methodists
Chaps 7-8 Birth of Pilgrim Holiness Church
Chapter 9 Multiple Ministries
Chapters 10-11 Roaring Holiness 20s
Chapters 12-13 Institutional Solidification (30s/40s)
Chapters 14-15 Prelude to Merger
Chapters 16-17 The Wesleyan Merger
Now chapter 18.
______________
It is interesting to watch how the Wesleyan Church rode the waves of American evangelical culture in the last decades of the twentieth century. So in the 70s we did door to door evangelism like everyone else. Then we would continue with church growth in the next decade and eventually leadership development. Of course there's nothing wrong with any of these. It just seems that we have mostly been a follower denomination rather than one that leads the way.
I was only a child but those days of the Four Spiritual Laws and Evangelism Explosion made an impression on me. After all, Dr. D. James Kennedy's church was in my home town of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I remember going to hear John Maxwell's "Evangelism Principles in Action" for the Florida district. I still remember him talking about how much easier it was to say "WESSS-LEYAN" than "Church of Christ in Christian Union." He held the attention of a kid who had trouble paying attention to anything, which was quite a feat.
My local church implemented "GRADE" with its Andrews, Timothys, Barnabases, and Abrahams. To this day I like the pattern. The Andrews are evangelists, the Timothys are disciplers, the Barnabases encourage, and the Abrahams pray.
Still, he was part of my childhood guilt network. He made you feel guilty if you didn't witness to the person sitting next to you on the plane, the taxi cab driver, the cashier in the check out line. It would only dawn on me a long time later that he was born to evangelize, an off the chart extrovert who could sell ice cream in a blizzard. It wasn't hard for him to talk to strangers.
The General Board's statement on abortion in 1971 was interesting: "Because of the sanctity of human life and the unique potentialities of the fetus we reject the practice of abortion as a technique in population control, or for personal convenience, social adjustment or economic advantage. We believe it may be employed therapeutically to safeguard the health or life of the mother, but only after spiritual, medical, and psychological counseling has been obtained. We believe an appropriate and morally acceptable alternative to abortion is to arrange for immediate adoption upon birth" (238).
This is a very interesting statement. It is interesting because it was hot off the press, fresh. Today we are so used to our position on abortion that it seems obvious to us. We can't even imagine that a Christian would take any other position. So today we would never refer today to an "unborn child" as a "fetus." That's become politically charged language. Indeed, it is fascinating that Black and Drury repeatedly say "most" were in favor of this position, implying that some Wesleyans at the time were not.
Finally, some Wesleyans in the 70s and 80s wanted to participate in the charismatic movement. The general church pretty much stomped on this one. Wesleyans who spoke in tongues were pretty much driven out of the denomination. A study was commissioned to conclude that tongues in the Bible were simply speaking in unlearned human languages from somewhere on the planet.
I personally believe that is true of Acts 2, but it is almost certainly not true of 1 Corinthians 14. You get the feeling some times that the general board sometimes has appointed scholars in order to rubber stamp what they already wanted. Of course that's not true scholarship. True scholarship has to be willing to come up with a different answer than it prefers.
And of course the application of Scripture isn't as simple as just interpreting what it meant originally either. So much of the church still functions with a fundamentalist hermeneutic. Rather than get a sense of the whole Bible, we jump from individual texts directly to today.
Today, I would say that the Wesleyan Church in general has a "don't ask, don't tell" policy on tongues. It's not allowed in public worship, but I doubt that many Wesleyans would try to stop you today from praying in tongues at home, maybe not even in a small group that was open to it. But the WC of the 70s forbade all of these.
By the way, as an example of the hermeneutical process, neither the fact that Paul allowed interpreted tongues at Corinth nor the fact that he forbade uninterpreted tongues there automatically tells us what God wants us to do in a specific local congregation today. We will have matured hermeneutically when we begin to understand these sorts of things.
Chaps 1-2 About Wesley and the origins of the Wesleyan Methodist Church in abolitionism
Chaps 3-4 About its activist early days that were low church, pro-women (and anti- some other things)
Chaps 5-6 The post-Civil War let down, when the best and brightest returned to the Methodists
Chaps 7-8 Birth of Pilgrim Holiness Church
Chapter 9 Multiple Ministries
Chapters 10-11 Roaring Holiness 20s
Chapters 12-13 Institutional Solidification (30s/40s)
Chapters 14-15 Prelude to Merger
Chapters 16-17 The Wesleyan Merger
Now chapter 18.
______________
It is interesting to watch how the Wesleyan Church rode the waves of American evangelical culture in the last decades of the twentieth century. So in the 70s we did door to door evangelism like everyone else. Then we would continue with church growth in the next decade and eventually leadership development. Of course there's nothing wrong with any of these. It just seems that we have mostly been a follower denomination rather than one that leads the way.
I was only a child but those days of the Four Spiritual Laws and Evangelism Explosion made an impression on me. After all, Dr. D. James Kennedy's church was in my home town of Fort Lauderdale, Florida. I remember going to hear John Maxwell's "Evangelism Principles in Action" for the Florida district. I still remember him talking about how much easier it was to say "WESSS-LEYAN" than "Church of Christ in Christian Union." He held the attention of a kid who had trouble paying attention to anything, which was quite a feat.
My local church implemented "GRADE" with its Andrews, Timothys, Barnabases, and Abrahams. To this day I like the pattern. The Andrews are evangelists, the Timothys are disciplers, the Barnabases encourage, and the Abrahams pray.
Still, he was part of my childhood guilt network. He made you feel guilty if you didn't witness to the person sitting next to you on the plane, the taxi cab driver, the cashier in the check out line. It would only dawn on me a long time later that he was born to evangelize, an off the chart extrovert who could sell ice cream in a blizzard. It wasn't hard for him to talk to strangers.
The General Board's statement on abortion in 1971 was interesting: "Because of the sanctity of human life and the unique potentialities of the fetus we reject the practice of abortion as a technique in population control, or for personal convenience, social adjustment or economic advantage. We believe it may be employed therapeutically to safeguard the health or life of the mother, but only after spiritual, medical, and psychological counseling has been obtained. We believe an appropriate and morally acceptable alternative to abortion is to arrange for immediate adoption upon birth" (238).
This is a very interesting statement. It is interesting because it was hot off the press, fresh. Today we are so used to our position on abortion that it seems obvious to us. We can't even imagine that a Christian would take any other position. So today we would never refer today to an "unborn child" as a "fetus." That's become politically charged language. Indeed, it is fascinating that Black and Drury repeatedly say "most" were in favor of this position, implying that some Wesleyans at the time were not.
Finally, some Wesleyans in the 70s and 80s wanted to participate in the charismatic movement. The general church pretty much stomped on this one. Wesleyans who spoke in tongues were pretty much driven out of the denomination. A study was commissioned to conclude that tongues in the Bible were simply speaking in unlearned human languages from somewhere on the planet.
I personally believe that is true of Acts 2, but it is almost certainly not true of 1 Corinthians 14. You get the feeling some times that the general board sometimes has appointed scholars in order to rubber stamp what they already wanted. Of course that's not true scholarship. True scholarship has to be willing to come up with a different answer than it prefers.
And of course the application of Scripture isn't as simple as just interpreting what it meant originally either. So much of the church still functions with a fundamentalist hermeneutic. Rather than get a sense of the whole Bible, we jump from individual texts directly to today.
Today, I would say that the Wesleyan Church in general has a "don't ask, don't tell" policy on tongues. It's not allowed in public worship, but I doubt that many Wesleyans would try to stop you today from praying in tongues at home, maybe not even in a small group that was open to it. But the WC of the 70s forbade all of these.
By the way, as an example of the hermeneutical process, neither the fact that Paul allowed interpreted tongues at Corinth nor the fact that he forbade uninterpreted tongues there automatically tells us what God wants us to do in a specific local congregation today. We will have matured hermeneutically when we begin to understand these sorts of things.
Thursday, September 06, 2012
A Robust Sense of Evangelism
Scot McKnight, in King Jesus Gospel has, along with N. T. Wright, refocused us on what the gospel actually is in the New Testament. Despite the embarrassment of the Gospel Coalition, whose key players for some time have been trying their hardest to plug the leaks in their sinking ship.
Sorry, the truth doesn't care. The gospel is the good news that 1) our God reigns (Gospels) and that 2) Jesus is king (Paul), 3) along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts). It's not about how to get saved and, although our salvation is part of the good news, it is a minor part. It is more an implication of the gospel than the focus of the gospel. In Luke, the gospel is primarily good news to the poor and the disempowered (thus the GC conference this year where they will apply all their intellect to argue that the earth is flat).
Here's the next step. Since the gospel is God and Jesus focused--not me focused, not my salvation focused--this has implications for what it means to "evangelize" and what "evangelism" is (since it is the verb, "to proclaim the good news") and what an "evangelist" is ("someone who proclaims the good news").
An evangelist is someone who proclaims the good news that our God reigns (Gospels) and that Jesus is king (Paul), along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts). To evangelize is to proclaim to others the good news that our God reigns, that his kingdom made its Normandy landing in the ministry of Jesus (Gospels), that Jesus is God's king over the cosmos (Paul). That proclamation is evangelism.
True, going would seem to be part of this evangelism and, yes, such preaching aims at a response. What response? Confession of the lordship of Jesus, of course, since he is king (Romans 10). Repentance and submission to the rule of God, of course (Gospels). Such a response of course means you will be saved, but that is a consequence. The focus is on the reign of God and his Christ, not on me.
A final word on the Great Commission. The Great Commission is about making disciples. Nothing is mentioned about evangelism, although evangelism certainly fits with the Great Commission. But evangelism is not mentioned. You make disciples by 1) baptizing them and 2) teaching them. Baptizing does get them in, but involved a confession of Jesus as Lord and thus submission to his kingship. Becoming a follower was thus not a matter of praying a sinner's prayer or a moment of justification.
Once we have a more accurate understanding of the gospel, then we'll have to have a more robust sense of evangelism too.
Sorry, the truth doesn't care. The gospel is the good news that 1) our God reigns (Gospels) and that 2) Jesus is king (Paul), 3) along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts). It's not about how to get saved and, although our salvation is part of the good news, it is a minor part. It is more an implication of the gospel than the focus of the gospel. In Luke, the gospel is primarily good news to the poor and the disempowered (thus the GC conference this year where they will apply all their intellect to argue that the earth is flat).
Here's the next step. Since the gospel is God and Jesus focused--not me focused, not my salvation focused--this has implications for what it means to "evangelize" and what "evangelism" is (since it is the verb, "to proclaim the good news") and what an "evangelist" is ("someone who proclaims the good news").
An evangelist is someone who proclaims the good news that our God reigns (Gospels) and that Jesus is king (Paul), along with all the good stuff that entails (Acts). To evangelize is to proclaim to others the good news that our God reigns, that his kingdom made its Normandy landing in the ministry of Jesus (Gospels), that Jesus is God's king over the cosmos (Paul). That proclamation is evangelism.
True, going would seem to be part of this evangelism and, yes, such preaching aims at a response. What response? Confession of the lordship of Jesus, of course, since he is king (Romans 10). Repentance and submission to the rule of God, of course (Gospels). Such a response of course means you will be saved, but that is a consequence. The focus is on the reign of God and his Christ, not on me.
A final word on the Great Commission. The Great Commission is about making disciples. Nothing is mentioned about evangelism, although evangelism certainly fits with the Great Commission. But evangelism is not mentioned. You make disciples by 1) baptizing them and 2) teaching them. Baptizing does get them in, but involved a confession of Jesus as Lord and thus submission to his kingship. Becoming a follower was thus not a matter of praying a sinner's prayer or a moment of justification.
Once we have a more accurate understanding of the gospel, then we'll have to have a more robust sense of evangelism too.
Saturday, October 29, 2011
McKnight's King Jesus Gospel 1
I was able to get a copy of Scot McKnight's new book, King Jesus Gospel over here. My initial hunch is that it might be a very helpful book at this time. I thought I would try to dawdle through it these next few weeks.
1971
In this opening foray, Scot paints the picture of what he is addressing--American evangelism that is overwhelmingly focused on getting someone to make a decision, pray a prayer. He recounts the story of visiting a man in the days of Evangelism Explosion (we Wesleyans did the same thing with Maxwell's stuff). The key point was to get some stranger or near stranger to pray a prayer.
In the story he recounts, the deacon he is with misses all the social cues at someone's house. They have gone to the home of a one time visitor to the church. After prolonged persistence, the guy prays the prayer. They leave. The deacon celebrates--someone's been saved. The man never darkens the door of the church again.
Then Scot gets real. He figures that by conservative estimates, 50% of these decisions don't amount to much of significance afterwards. Teasing American evangelical biases, he suggests that the correlation between evangelical "decisions" and solid faith later is about the same as the correlation between Roman Catholic children baptized and significant faith later.
Here's a poignant quote: "Focusing youth events, retreats and programs on persuading people to make a decision disarms the gospel, distorts numbers, and diminishes the significance of discipleship" (20).
So it begins...
1971
In this opening foray, Scot paints the picture of what he is addressing--American evangelism that is overwhelmingly focused on getting someone to make a decision, pray a prayer. He recounts the story of visiting a man in the days of Evangelism Explosion (we Wesleyans did the same thing with Maxwell's stuff). The key point was to get some stranger or near stranger to pray a prayer.
In the story he recounts, the deacon he is with misses all the social cues at someone's house. They have gone to the home of a one time visitor to the church. After prolonged persistence, the guy prays the prayer. They leave. The deacon celebrates--someone's been saved. The man never darkens the door of the church again.
Then Scot gets real. He figures that by conservative estimates, 50% of these decisions don't amount to much of significance afterwards. Teasing American evangelical biases, he suggests that the correlation between evangelical "decisions" and solid faith later is about the same as the correlation between Roman Catholic children baptized and significant faith later.
Here's a poignant quote: "Focusing youth events, retreats and programs on persuading people to make a decision disarms the gospel, distorts numbers, and diminishes the significance of discipleship" (20).
So it begins...
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Sermon Starters: 21st Century Evangelism
The lot fell on me to give the brief, 10 minute charge at the Masters in Ministry consecration service today. Here was my outline:
Intro: The two articles, "Collapse" in Christian Science Monitor and the Newsweek article that says the fastest growing religion in America is non-religion, secularism.
Hunch 1: There are some shifts going on, but it's not the end of true "evangelicals," people of God's good news for the world. In the words of Mark Twain, "the rumors of my death are somewhat exaggerated."
Hunch 2: This is in response to the defeat of the older generation of evangelicals in the election. In 2004, they marveled at evangelicalism's power. In 2008, they tell of its destruction.
Moot question: Should we try to force the rest of the world to behave the way we think they should. Moot question. We don't have the power to anymore (secret: we never did in the first place).
Evangelism for the 21st century:
1. evangelism by compassion--others will be attracted to Christianity if we are actually helping them with their worldly needs.
2. evangelism by life change--if I'm no different from anyone else except that I'm forgiven, then Christianity is useless. If Christianity is true, then others should find me someone they want to be like, someone they want to be around, someone they can count on.
3. evangelism by the miraculous--I read from 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5a and mentioned 2 Corinthians and Galatians. Power accompanied the coming of the gospel in the early church.
The fastest growing segment of Christianity is in the southern hemisphere in the 2/3rds world and it is charismatic. I don't speak in tongues, and not everything is genuine, no doubt. But there should be manifestations of God's power in signs and miracles all around us, if this thing we call Christianity is true.
Intro: The two articles, "Collapse" in Christian Science Monitor and the Newsweek article that says the fastest growing religion in America is non-religion, secularism.
Hunch 1: There are some shifts going on, but it's not the end of true "evangelicals," people of God's good news for the world. In the words of Mark Twain, "the rumors of my death are somewhat exaggerated."
Hunch 2: This is in response to the defeat of the older generation of evangelicals in the election. In 2004, they marveled at evangelicalism's power. In 2008, they tell of its destruction.
Moot question: Should we try to force the rest of the world to behave the way we think they should. Moot question. We don't have the power to anymore (secret: we never did in the first place).
Evangelism for the 21st century:
1. evangelism by compassion--others will be attracted to Christianity if we are actually helping them with their worldly needs.
2. evangelism by life change--if I'm no different from anyone else except that I'm forgiven, then Christianity is useless. If Christianity is true, then others should find me someone they want to be like, someone they want to be around, someone they can count on.
3. evangelism by the miraculous--I read from 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5a and mentioned 2 Corinthians and Galatians. Power accompanied the coming of the gospel in the early church.
The fastest growing segment of Christianity is in the southern hemisphere in the 2/3rds world and it is charismatic. I don't speak in tongues, and not everything is genuine, no doubt. But there should be manifestations of God's power in signs and miracles all around us, if this thing we call Christianity is true.
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