Musings: Notes From My Daybook

In an attempt to address the many flaws in my knowledge, I began reading in William Abraham's The Logic of Evangelism this afternoon.  Though nearly 20 years old, I haven't read it (or about 2.3 million others).  But now it is the time!

Let me share a quote.  After exploring the vital nature of the kingdom he states:

" What is especially striking is the way in which the gospel of the kingdom initially spread.  It did not spread because of a carefully designed program of evangelism; nor did it start because the early disciples meditated on the Great Commission and felt that they had better obey it to assuage their feelings of guilt.  The church did not begin its evangelistic activity because it was terrified about the prospects that faced those who died without hearing about Christ; the Christian movement was not initiated by a band of professional evangelists eager to sign up a public relations firm and get the show on the road.  Rather, the gospel spread and the church grew because the sovereign hand of God was in the midst of the community that found itself surrounded by people who were puzzled and intrigued by what they saw happening. . . .   In other words, evangelism was rooted in a corporate experience of the rule of God that provided not only the psychological strength and support that was clearly needed in a hostile environment but that also signified the active presence of God in their midst." (38-39)

Been doing some reading lately:

Thanks to Brian I. for passing on Bono’s photoessay entitled On The Move.  This is a publication of Bono’s speech made last year at the National Prayer Breakfast.  Bono’s passion and vision is inspiring, hopeful, and sane.  He offers a place for persons of all faith to respond to the plight of Africa. 

Brian McLaren has recently released a new book, The Secret Message of Jesus: Uncovering the Truth That Could Change Everything.  Don’t like the title—there was little about Jesus’ message that was secret—if you read the Old Testament.  McLaren seems to think that if you package Jesus up as something new and mysterious that folks will be eager to learn about him (or buy the book).

Having made those remarks, McLaren is doing good stuff—rooting Jesus in the Hebraic prophets and setting the context to listen for Jesus’ teaching about the kingdom.  You can get it better by reading John Yoder or Lee Camp or N. T Wright.

Which brings me to another book Simply Christian by N. T. Wright.  This is a keeper.  He says it well and offers a constructive, hopeful vision for Christian faith.  Wright’s work is one that you can pass on to friends and others and find a great conversation going.  You can also rest assured that it rests in serious scholarship and a vital faith.

Tony Jones has authored a new book, Divine Intervention: Encountering God through the Ancient Practice of Lectio Divina. The book offers an introduction to this ancient way of prayer.  And if you have a short attention span or think like a 16 year old teenager, then this is the book for you.  However, if you want to read about lectio divina, then you might be better served by Basil Pennington (Lectio Divina: Renewing the Ancient Practice) or

A great piece by Jane Kramer on Islam and Christianity, or more properly on Roman Catholicism and Islam in the current New Yorker.  Titled The Pope and Islam, the article is more focused on the present Pope and his attempts to created meaningful dialogue, the piece sheds light on the larger issues facing constructive engagement with Islam.

Let’s see what else. . . .oh yes.   Perhaps most obscure, but with plenty of things to mull over—a collection of essays published in 2005 and edited by Harry Stout, Kenneth Minkema and Caleb Maskell.  Jonathan Edwards at 300 serves as an assessment to Edwards ongoing legacy to Christian thought and to American culture.  George Marsden, who wrote the magisterial biography of Edwards, observes in a new essay published in this collection that Edwards offers an intellectual integrity, an appreciation for beauty, and interestingly enough, a capacity to embrace science in ways that many contemporary evangelicals have a hard time doing.

Got to go.  More books to read!

Robert Webber. Ancient-Future Evangelism: Making Your Church a Faith-Forming Community. Baker, 2003.

Robert Webber, a prolific author with 40 plus books to his name, has tapped into some deep resources for understanding the church’s call to be the place of discipleship and transformation in this book. Well-known for his work on worship renewal Webber in recent years, has turned to the ancient world of earliest Christianity in search of frameworks that would make sense in light of contemporary culture.

His concern is that the church today is not forming disciples. He summarizes what the International Consultation on Discipleship, a group representing 54 countries and 90 different Christian fellowships, concluded in 1999:
• “Many converts to Christianity throughout the world fall away from faith.”
• “The church is ‘marked by a paradox of growth without depth.’”
• “Many within the church are not living lives of biblical purity, integrity and holiness.” (13)

Or, to put it another way, though persons may be converted or baptized they often fall away. This is true in my own experience and I think for most of the churches that I know. Webber wants to change this.

The target for Webber is to reframe our understanding of evangelism. Evangelism is not a moment but rather a process that takes place over a period of time. Evangelism is really discipleship and to demonstrate what that looks like, Webber turns to the first four centuries of the church to explore how the earliest Christian people nurtured people in the faith.

The first thing Webber wants his readers to know is that the early church was quite intentional about spiritual formation; they did not accept people into the community of faith until they had undergone a lengthy process of training and spiritual growth. Evangelism was not about an event—getting someone baptized. Rather, evangelism was a process with multiple stages, each marked by what Webber calls ‘rites of passage.’

Those stages were (48):
1. Evangelize into the gospel of Jesus Christ
2. Disciple into the church, its worship, its Scripture, its disciplines.
3. Spiritually form into the ethic and lifestyle of faith.
4. Assimilate into the church through a discovery of gifts, the Christian vocation of work, and caring for the poor and needy.

As persons passed through each stage it was marked by various Christian practices—including baptism, formal welcome into the way of faith, and formal induction into a time of instruction. With basic Christian teaching along each step of the way, the new believer comes to embrace the radical call of Jesus upon his life.

In addition, Webber notes at some length the wide spread growth of the early church. Noting the work of various sociologists and New Testament scholars such as Rodney Stark and Wayne Meeks, Webber presents a convincing case for the communal nature of early church. Evangelism was not something the early church did. Evangelism was the way the early church lived. The early church used the natural familial and social networks of their lives to be the conduit of the gospel message. By sharing their lives together and inviting others into that life persons witnessed the truth of the gospel in words and deeds of early believers.

This social reality has a great bearing on our present experience. How connected are we with other believers? In what way are we sharing our lives that allows others to see the gospel within us? Or, have we inadvertently insulated ourselves from non-Christian people by our “Christian” activity?

The second half of the book, entitled “Cultural and Theological Reflection,” offers an assessment of culture and its increasingly post-Christian flavor. Though often sweeping in his comments, Webber does present a cogent picture. Webber’s interest, however, is not in a philosophical debate. Rather, in a rapidly changed and changing world, Webber is concerned that the church practice intentional discipleship practices, model healthy community, worship unapologetically, and faithfully tell the story, letting the living Word call us into lives of obedience.

In the rapidly changing world, it means, by necessity, that the face of the church will change. It will become more intentional about the practice of discipleship. Churches will move away from thinking about members and began forming disciples. Churches will recognize that the present cultural values are often at odds with the way of Jesus and therefore churches will have to articulate—with clarity—the alternative way of discipleship.

The book is a good read and is challenging our church staff to begin stating in simple, clear language what it means to be a part of our congregation, how should baptism be practiced and taught, and how do we call people—beginning with ourselves and the existing persons within our congregation—into a way of obedience before Jesus. Letting the early church—and the historic church—feed our meditation on Scripture is a healthy and encouraging practice.