If you’re wondering what about that statement I reject, I could point to plenty of items, but the short answer would be Article XII, which Tim Bulkeley quotes, especially this: “We further deny that scientific hypotheses about earth history may properly be used to overturn the teaching of Scripture on creation and the flood.”
I’ve written on all this before. For now I just want to provide the link and open the discussion.
Since I’ve been talking about churches and leadership, I thought it would be useful to point to this article on UMC.org: Local church pastors on the rise. As usual, I think we’re behind. My personal belief is that the whole system of education we’re using, including degrees is well past its prime. If we made use of all the resources available, there would be no reason we couldn’t make better opportunities available for local church pastors to improve their skills.
But my experience with local church pastors suggests two things: 1) For every local church pastor who has a weakness, there’s very likely an elder who also has a problem, and 2) Local church pastors also have skills in ministry that many of your full elders do not.
I’m just not that enamored of the wonders of seminary education. But it’s not the education we need to get rid of. What we need to do is restructure the means and time when education is delivered, received and applied.
Recently I’ve encountered a seeming avalanche of comments, articles, and posts that claim that some new technological tool will make you stupid. Or possibly lazy. Or immoral. Or something.
Doubtless the first stone knife was similarly received — as the end of manly dependence upon unformed sticks and stones, and the birth of a generation too lazy to rip the skins off their prey with their bare hands.
Amongst the things I’ve been told will make people stupid are cell phones, tablets, laptop computers, PowerPoint presentations, television, and YouTube. These things will make you lazy, destroy your memory, rip out your analytical capabilities, and probably precipitate immoral behavior. Or something.
Thus contrary to the upright nature of previous generations, the current generation is going to hell in a handbasket. And doubtless using cliches and incomplete sentences too.
Besides the myth of the golden age, which seems to infect people around my age, this is simply nonsense. Tools are tools. We will use them according to our character. Any tool can be misused. Television can convey information and be educational. It can also convey abominable trash. A PowerPoint presentation can be boring beyond belief (I’ve made one or two), or it can contain helpful illustrations that aid understanding and memory.
I believe it is intellectual laziness that causes us to blame the tools for the result. The sort of moaning that some folks in my generation indulge in regarding modern technology is enabled by our own intellectual laziness, lack of critical thinking, and unwillingness to examine the facts.
So quit moaning about progress. Learn new things. Make effective use of new tools. Get involved in educating the next generation. Or go ahead and vegetate.
Oh, and about that seeming avalanche I mentioned in the first paragraph. That’s laziness too. There’s no recent avalanche. People have always complained about these things and always will. The only thing that happened today is that I got annoyed enough to write a blog post.
(This continues a series that started here, and continues with part 2, part 3, and part 4.)
The second mark of a New Testament church according to Dr. David Alan Black is Christian baptism. He explains why he explicitly uses the term “Christian” with baptism. There’s a distinction there that’s important and Dave discusses it. Here’s the video. The discussion of Christian baptism begins at about 08:45.
There are several things that Dave says about baptism that I fully agree with. He believes in baptism by immersion of believers, i.e., people who make the choice to be baptized. He also believes baptism should immediately (or very closely) follow the decision. I also, however, believe that this is an area on which there should be a great deal of tolerance for differences.
For example, I attend a United Methodist congregation. The norm is to baptize infants and then confirm them as youth. I grew up in a church (Seventh-day Adventist) where one dedicated children as infants and then baptized them when they made their own decision. I made my decision to be baptized at age 9.
While I strongly prefer one option, and many of my reasons are the same as Dave’s, I am quite able to be a member of a church where the practice is different. I would note that the United Methodist Discipline does allow for baptism by immersion, so a United Methodist pastor can practice believer’s baptism by immersion. He or she could not, however, refuse to perform infant baptisms, at least as I understand it. I know that some Methodist pastors are quite dogmatic on the point. My preference would be to see a quite open choice. For example, if a family prefers some kind of baby dedication, where is the problem? Again, I also know a number of Methodist pastors who would go along with that.
I’m going to refrain from arguing the biblical material on this. I think Dave has gone over that quite well, and in this case I am substantially in agreement.
Let me bring in short quotes from our other two authors.
Ruth Fletcher brings in a completely different issue that may cause some concern to United Methodist readers, or those from any other church that has a fairly high view of sacraments. I’m quoting from Thrive, page 141:
As the church finds its way into the future, the role of clergy will shift even more than it already has. Although some ministers will preach and lead worship, many will give their time to training lay people as worship leaders and small group facilitators. Although some will offer pastoral care, that care will extend beyond the members of the church into the neighborhood. Although some will teach, that teaching will focus on equipping individuals to serve in various roles both inside and outside the church. The sacramental tasks of baptizing, leading in communion, presiding at weddings and funerals increasingly will be shared with people beyond those who are ordained.
Here I would have to say two things. First, I personally don’t see that baptism should require an ordained person. Second, as a member of a community that requires that an ordained person carry out any baptism, I will not put my first belief into practice. That is a matter of submission to the community. While I would forcefully argue for and even insist on using the community’s permission with regards to the method and time of baptism, I would also argue that where my community has a firm position, I should, as a member, live in accordance with that rule. Nevertheless I do believe that every member should be in ministry, and that ordination should not be reserved for one gift or set of gifts but should be for all. We should lay hands on and commission every member to minister using their gifts.
Let me continue with a slightly longer quote from Bruce Epperly in Transforming Acts (p. 85):
Such dramatic experiences – whether evangelical or mystical in nature – are not normative for all Christians. Some of us are born Christian. As cradle Christians, we are dedicated or baptized as infants, and then grow in grace not by drama but through a gentle, day to day walk with God. Nevertheless, most of us eventually face moments in which we have to say “no” to one way of life – or certain behaviors or lifestyles – to say “yes” to another.
Providence is both gentle and dramatic. We can experience God, while we are playing with our children and looking across the table at a beloved spouse or friend; we may also discover God in the storms of life, helpless yet saved by a power beyond ourselves.
Third, Paul’s Damascus road experience invites us to connect our spiritual experiences, whether at worship, at camp, or on the road, with discovering our vocation and mission in life. Paul is clear that his mystical experience was not an end in itself, but an invitation to a new self-understanding and vocation as God’s messenger to the Gentile world.
Bruce is talking about the dramatic conversion experience of Paul, which relates in some ways to baptism. Numerous times I’ve encountered people who do not remember a time when they did not know Jesus. They don’t recall a particular decision moment, because they were believers from as early as they can remember. In some ways, my own view of baptism as a thing to be chosen by believers relates to my own experience. I grew up in a Christian home, but I distinctly remember the time when that belief became mine rather than someone else’s. It was no longer my parents’ faith. It was mine. That was at my baptism.
Tonight I’ll be continuing my study on Eschatology, using my Google+ page and YouTube channel. I’ll embed a YouTube viewer below.
In preparation for this study I think it would be useful to read my post from earlier this morning titled Link and Notes on Textual Criticism. That may sound irrelevant, but in it I try to say something about why I study details even though I don’t think we can attain certainty that we have the details right.
In talking about eschatology I’ve found that there’s great complexity in explaining all of the various views of the end times. For many, eschatology (if they know the word) is supposed to be about outlining how future history will go and how we will know that Jesus will appear. I’m not going to sneak anything up on you. I reject that viewpoint. Neither prophecy nor any other form of predictive statement, including the extended visions of apocalyptic, provides or is intended to provide an outline of the end of the world. What it is intended to accomplish is to let you understand how to live through the difficult times and come through to the end. The end of the particular trouble—and much of this material comes at a particular time of trouble—may not end with the end of the world. Much of apocalyptic literature reads that way, assuring suffering people that God will win in the end, but the times of trouble pass, and “the end is not yet.”
Here’s my simple eschatology (click to expand):
You may find that particularly unsatisfactory. If so, you will perhaps want to listen to the way someone else interprets prophecy and eschatological language. But I think you are likely to be disappointed. The field of prophecy, whether we’re talking about ancient Israel or modern prophets in the church, is filled with cute explanations for why various interpretations of predictions haven’t worked out. I think there’s a reason for this.
Two options for that reason: 1) God didn’t want us to know or 2) We’re too stupid to figure out what God was saying. We’ve simply been wrong too many times.
I could say that the literature itself has failed either because we couldn’t get what God had in mind into print or because God has failed. Always assuming, of course, that I’m not willing to go with the traditional approach which is to forget about each failed prophetic interpretation and go on making more and more unsubstantiated predictions. Instead, I’ve looked back at these texts and I don’t think we’re supposed to get that sort of detail out of them. What we’re supposed to be doing is looking at how God has worked with people, the manner in which God is with us in the interim. I think we can learn a great deal.
So reading Revelation is not just a matter of looking for the literal meanings of various symbols. It is, instead a process of understanding how this text spoke to people in trouble and how it can speak to others who are similarly in trouble. I will be developing that point of view in this series.
The critical think to note from last week’s presentation is learning to make a break from the puzzle pieces approach. Much of the writing and preaching on Daniel and Revelation, or on eschatology in general is based on this approach. If I can find the right place in the text in Daniel 7, connect it with the right place in Daniel 8 and then 9, connect all of those to Isaiah 65 & 66 at just the right points, pull in a verse from 1 Thessalonians, then tie all of that to selected anchor points in Daniel 12 & 13, I ‘ll know what’s coming next. I can make a chart. I can be safe.
I would suggest that such charts are about as safe as the Tower of Babel. They come from our desire to eliminate uncertainty from our lives. We want to make our lives safe, to know what we will face, and most especially to be able to point to specific things we will avoid, while others suffer. In my view the pre-tribulation rapture partakes of wish fulfilment. We’ve read about times of trouble, and we want to find a way to say that we won’t be here for the greatest time of trouble. So we have found out when it will occur and we have found out that we can avoid it. Well, we think we can.
You know what I think? If the pre-tribulation rapture is true, as a follower of Jesus I should want to be here after the rapture to help take the gospel to those left behind. Yes, I know, there are various explanations of why this wouldn’t be the case. I just don’t believe them.
I will certainly be looking in this series at the wide variety of interpretations. How do we paste scriptures together to make doctrines such as the rapture? But I will be more interested in looking at the question of how we will live in the “God with us” period that stands between God’s creation in the beginning and God’s renewal at the end.
One might try to discard apocalyptic because of what it looks forward to. If the period of trouble will (or may) end without the end of the world, so clearly expected by the writer of apocalyptic, of what good can the material be? Well, in each case the time of trouble did end, and there was something in that message that helped through the time. We’re going to look for that.
Read Daniel 2 and 7. Now consider this: Is the key message in Daniel 3:18 or Daniel 7:13? (Leaving open the possibility that the answer is neither!) Which one do we quote or consult more?
Tonight I’ll be talking about the purpose of prophecy. I don’t believe biblical prophecy is intended for the same purpose as consulting psychics. (Note: I’m not maintaining that psychics can provide accurate information about the future. In fact, I believe they truly cannot. But people consult them in that hope.) Biblical prophecy is intended to help us live in God’s world with the knowledge that whatever happens God is with us.
Jeremy Myers at Redeeming God has an interesting post on textual criticism (HT: Thomas Hudgins). Myers is comparing the textual commentaries written by Bruce Metzger (with input of the UBS committee) and Philip W. Comfort. It’s fun to watch the critical scholars disagree!
If anyone believes I consider that a negative comment on critical scholars, let me disabuse you of that notion. It is, instead, a comment on the texts and sources we have to work with. The reason we have disagreements is not that scholars are somehow stupid or unnecessary, but rather that the evidence is, in fact, complex and requires serious study. Often there isn’t enough evidence to come up with any real conclusion. Where I would criticize critics, and in fact any biblical scholar, is in making conclusions that imply evidence that is better than they have or are likely to acquire.
When attempting to make the evidence solidly in favor of one conclusion, Christian apologists like to spend their time talking about the New Testament. Why? Because the New Testament evidence is much clearer. Not necessarily clear, but clearly than that for the Hebrew scriptures (or Old Testament). You have an abundance of New Testament manuscripts that tends to put most issues into pretty strong consensus territory. Such is not the case for the Old. We have, in many cases, just enough evidence to suggest that there is a great deal we’d like to know but lack the evidence to study. Looking at the differences between the Septuagint and the Massoretic Text, for example, suggests many possibilities, but leaves us without a detailed trail of evidence to study.
There are a number of responses to this complexity. We can give up on knowing what scripture teaches. We can decide that the inspiration of scripture operates in very different ways. Or perhaps we can think that the Holy Spirit guides people in the church (and out of the church, for that matter) as they study, and that God doesn’t mind that we come to different conclusions.
I choose the latter, and apply this to various higher critical methodologies as well as textual criticism. The details are fun to study, but we don’t have to settle all the details in order to be followers of Jesus. We don’t have to settle all the doctrinal issues in order to be followers of Jesus. Yes, it’s fun, and I think even useful to study all those things, but settling them is not necessary. God can guide you when you study your English (or other native language) Bible as well as he can study me when I read Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek. Maybe even better, for all I know.
Because I believe that inspiration resides in God’s actions in history and that one of those actions was the production of scripture (yes, scripture in its various debated forms), I think it’s still useful to study everything about the text, from its prehistory to it’s canonical state, to it’s dissemination and variety of translation. I don’t believe God resides at just one point. I may hear from God as I apply source criticism to Genesis, for example, seeing two different creation stories and looking at them independently. I can also hear from God when I see those as combined into the larger volume of the book of Genesis and the Pentateuch as a whole. I can still see God when I look back at that creation story from the perspective of the New Creation which is in Christ Jesus.
When I read scripture in this fashion, debates about inerrancy and historicity tend to fade into the background as I hope to listen to every echo of God’s voice in the texts I have using whatever means I have to dig out that echo.
I’m an Amateur Radio operator (KT4B for those who care). I remember when I was in my teens how I would try to contact different parts of the world. It was nice to do so using a reasonably high powered (200 watt at the time) transceiver and a directional antenna on a tower 50 ft high. I could hold conversations with people on the other side of the world if I did the work right. Sometimes, however, things didn’t work so well. Careful listening and careful sorting through the interference could still get a message through.
I remember once operating from Georgetown, Guyana (WB4BUQ/8R1 at the time) and trying to contact a station in Iceland that was using just 200 mW of power. To qualify for the award he was seeking we had to be able to exchange a certain amount of information and then verify the contact via mail. In normal conversation it would take less than 30 seconds. Using Morse Code and his low power station it took close to a half an hour.
The information was of no value to me or to him, other than to confirm the effort and its success. But there was great growth in my skills (I don’t know about his) to be gained simply from the effort.
That is my view of digging into the shadowy, difficult details of scripture. It’s a learning process. It doesn’t really matter whether I come to the same conclusion as you do. I’ve spent time searching for and looking at the echoes of God’s work, and that is enough to justify the effort.
(This continues a series that started here, and continues with part 2 and part 3.)
Dave’s first mark of a New Testament church is evangelistic preaching. (Book: Seven Marks of a New Testament Church.) I’m a member of a church that’s part of a mainline denomination. I’m a mainliner. In general, we don’t like the word “evangelism” or related terms like “evangelistic.” You can watch Dave’s remarks starting about about 4:45 in the video and runs for about 4 minutes.
In the book Dave calls this sign “evangelistic preaching.” The word “evangelism” here is used to emphasize that this is not the kind of preaching we normally think of when we hear the word “preach” in modern English. The preacher preaches and sermon and the congregation says “Preach it, brother!” This, on the other hand, is not speaking to the congregation in order to teach them about the faith of which they are already a part. Rather, this is proclamation of the message to those who haven’t heard it before.
The word “evangelism,” and of course the related word “evangelistic” has a bad reputation in mainline circles. (Remember that I’m thinking about this in the context of being a member of and working in a United Methodist congregation.) I don’t particularly mind if people want to avoid the word, just so long as we don’t avoid the activity. Mainliners have an excellent way of avoiding ineffective or offensive methods of evangelism: We just do no evangelism at all. By offensive I don’t mean offense at the gospel itself. There are those who are offended, for example, if I say that Jesus loves even terrorists. That’s fine. I’m still going to say it. Jesus does love them. On the other hand if I say, “You bigoted moron, Jesus loves terrorists as much as he loves you,” it’s quite possible the hearer will be offended (quite justifiably) at being called a bigoted moron and may never even hear the second part.
It’s especially important to realize that people can disagree with you without being bigots or morons. It’s even more important to remember that Jesus loves everybody, and that includes bigots as well. In fact, it would be really great if we quit thinking of people in those categories. Challenge their ideas or their actions as dangerous, but value everyone as a person, especially those you find hard to value.
Dave used one way to say “evangelize” in the video when he said “share the love of Jesus with them.” How do I do that? Well, it starts with learning to love them myself. It’s much easier to act from love if you do actually love. Then fit your proclamation, whether in actions, words, or any combination of them, to the particular situation.
We’re going to share the love of Jesus much more effectively when we do it because we are loving like Jesus, rather than doing it in order to build church membership, build up our personal count of people saved, or justify ourselves and our way of life. If we thought of evangelism as “sharing the love of Jesus” I think we would find that easier to remember.
Dave starts with this point because that’s where the passage he’s using, Acts 2:37-47, starts. The passage starts there because this is the historic moment. We won’t always find ourselves with an audience that needs to hear words.
The description of Paul’s message at the Areopagus rings a familiar bell for twenty-first century North Americans. Paul is sauntering through the marketplace of spiritualities – it could be Cambridge, Ann Arbor, Berkeley, Madison, or Washington DC where I live. He is gazing at the seat of intellectual, political, and spiritual power and prestige. Statues are everywhere, not unlike Washington DC, London, Paris, or Beijing – to gods and heroes, sacred and secular, known and unknown – each portraying a certain vision of human life and ultimate reality. Paul is both amazed and scandalized at the panorama of diverse and conflicting spiritualities.
Jewish by upbringing and theology, Paul is overwhelmed by the thought of people worshiping objects that are less alive than themselves. Perhaps, he is amazed that people still worship gods such as Zeus who are not only promiscuous in their dalliances with human beings but also vindictive, angry, and punitive. Why would anyone worship raw power when you can experience God’s love? Why would anyone follow a religion of fear when he or she could experience God’s loving acceptance, grace, and companionship? Why would anyone exalt the gods of violence when the prince of peace welcomed them with open arms?
He engages in conversation with some of the local spiritual leaders and philosophers of the city. They don’t know quite what to make of his vision of a universal God, whose life cannot be contained by statues or institutions, and whose love was manifest in a suffering savior. “Tell us more,” they ask, because like our culture, they lived with gods aplenty – there as many religious options as there are cable or dish television stations.
Paul enters into dialogue, honoring their religiosity, affirming their quest, but suggesting another better alternative, the path of salvation and wholeness pioneered by Jesus of Nazareth who was unjustly crucified, but miraculously resurrected to bring healing and wholeness, transformation, and love to all creation. There is an “unknown God,” whose wisdom is luring us forward even when we are unaware of it, and this is the God Paul has experienced through his encounters with Jesus Christ.
Here we tie a different portion of our modern experience to a different portion of the book of Acts. Does the book of Acts seem more relevant to you with either of these approaches?
Now let’s get a taste of how Ruth Fletcher talks about this. Remember that she starts from looking at thriving churches and asking: “How did it happen?” The following is from pages 53-54 of Thrive: Spiritual Habits of Transforming Congregations, which talks about Spiritual Habit 5 – Engaging:
Every once in a while, those foreign missionaries would visit the congregation, telling tales of difficult living conditions and cultural challenges they had encountered while trying to share the good news of Jesus Christ in some exotic location. Some were doctors who brought healing to those who were sick. Some were teachers who helped young people learn and grow. Some were engineers who helped villages dig wells and install sewer systems. Some were evangelists who established new churches.
I remember listening to their presentations, being impressed by their stories, and feeling just a little bit glad that they would be returning to the dangers of the mission field while I would go back to putting my change in the offering box in the safety of my own home. Of course, I was not the only one who took comfort in being able to leave the mission work to the professionals; in those days, most members of historic Protestant churches were content to offer their monetary support and prayers for others who would travel to the mission field, out there, over there, while they stayed within the familiar circle of congregational life.
Yet transforming congregations do not just play a supportive role in the mission of the church; they actively participate in that mission. They see that the mission field of the 21 st Century begins at the church’s doorstep and stretches out into the neighborhood and into an interconnected, interdependent world. They understand themselves to be the missionaries who are called and sent, ready or not, to engage in making real God’s New Creation. [emphasis mine]
Now Dr. Fletcher is going to get involved in scripture in the next few paragraphs, but again, look at the starting point.
Also, while the position is different, some focus on mission, evangelism, proclamation, or perhaps we should just say “sharing the love of Jesus” is part of this basic approach for all three authors.
Now you’ll find differences in many areas. That’s part of what I want to celebrate. I believe that as I move to a new congregation (no, I’m not a church professional, just a member), and try to work with my fellow-members of the body of Christ, the ideas of gotten from learning from these three different authors are going to help. What is it that God is calling me to do to share his love in and with this new church community? I’m sure I’ll be finding out soon!
I’m embedding below my interview with Dr. Ruth Fletcher. I don’t have a full interview with Bruce Epperly on this topic, though we’ve discussed a number of his other books in various interviews. Just press “Play” to get rid of my picture and see and listen to Dr. Fletcher!
These two additional books show significant similarities in what they recommend for 21st century churches.
These two additional books show significant differences in their recommendations.
These two books show significant differences in the approach to finding the answers.
I want all of these differences and similarities to help stimulate people to their own study. I want to emphasize that though I’m friends with Dave Black and appreciate his work tremendously, I’m not trying to speak for him, nor am I simply trying to reiterate what he has to say in his book. What I’m doing is approaching his book as a member of a mainline congregation (I’m United Methodist), and asking what I should apply to my local congregation and how I should go about doing so. In fact, I hope that as I do this I’ll see more avenues for building up the spiritual life and discipleship of the church community I’m part of.
I’m not seeking uniformity, and I don’t think Dave is either. Two days after we taped that interview, he was preaching at the United Methodist church I now attend. He never asked any of us to become Baptists. But I’m not going to try to speak for him on any details. Uniformity is, I believe, one of the problems we have in the church. One of the mechanisms of uniformity is the church program. Repeatedly I have seen church members go out and learn about some program and then bring it back to their church. When they get back they are filled with the recommendations of the speaker, which often include the warning that if they don’t follow the program precisely things will go off the rails. So if a church already has an effective ministry to needy people, for example, there’s no option for combining the new things learned at the conference with what is already happening. We have to carry out the program.
I recall the introduction of a small group related program to a church that already had two different types of small groups. Over a period of years there was constant complaining that the church couldn’t get enough people involved in this new program to make it work. Nobody was willing to consider combining the new program with what was already going on. So people who were leading in small groups felt overwhelmed by the requirement to attend classes, carry out specific activities that didn’t mesh with what they were already doing, fill out reports, and attend administrative meetings. That’s one form of the effort to enforce uniformity. Uniformity can be of practice, of doctrine, of polity, and so forth.
I’ll outline the differences in recommendations as I go through my series, though I certainly won’t be able to cover all three books. I’ll recommend reading all three, then, as I think all three authors would recommend, prayerfully studying and discerning for yourself and for your community what God’s leading is in your particular case. Then don’t feel the need of reinventing the wheel because you have suddenly become one of the enlightened ones.
I do want to point out differences in approach. None of this is intended as a critique of any of the authors. These are, in fact, the strengths of each that led me to want to write a blog series based on these books.
Dr. Black is a biblical scholar, and he is not a pastor, nor does he plan to be. He will tell you that he’s a full time missionary. In churchese, one could say full-time minister of the gospel. In his book you’ll find primarily a study of the text on which the book is based, Acts 2:37-47. For those of us whose thinking is seasoned by the Wesleyan Quadrilateral, he’s on the scripture line and it’s foundational. It’s seasoned by experience, tradition is acknowledged, it’s tied together with reasoning, but it is always scripturally rooted.
Dr. Epperly is a former seminary professor and a church pastor. He works from the biblical text but spends more time both on theology and sociology. His book is liberally sprinkled with his personal experiences which he ties to the experiences he’s using from the book of Acts. You’ll read lots of texts in his book, but you’ll be asked to think about those text in a much broader context.
Dr. Fletcher started from the other direction. She looked at churches that were successfully ministering to their communities, churches that were thriving, and asked what were the things they had in common. Her spiritual practices are derived from that. But don’t imagine that there is no theological reflection or scripture involved in the final result.
I found great joy in publishing all three books and I invite you to reflect on these issues for a few posts. I hope this explains what I’m trying to accomplish.
I’ve read recently about people cutting off dialogue because of certain behaviors of those on the other side. And indeed, there are times when dialogue becomes futile because someone else refuses to be honest or refuses to engage.
I’m writing this simply to appeal to those who want to see more dialogue, more working together, more actual exchange of ideas, and more true debate in which we actually engage one another’s thinking to be the good guys. Just that. You can respond to another person rationally and with sanity even if they are not likely to do the same thing. If this is done in a public forum, neutral parties who may be influenced will see what you do and be positively influenced by the way you debate as well as by the point you make.
This can involve the determination that you’ve said enough on a subject and are going to just sit back while someone else raves. If they bring nothing new to the debate, you don’t have to answer.
Dialogue will not prosper when we place too many preconditions on starting it. Be willing to let the other guy argue badly. The benefits of true dialogue are simply too great for us to allow obnoxious people to stop it.
I will be putting more material from Bruce Epperly in as I post more on the church, but here’s an exercise he suggests in his book Transforming Acts, pp. 19-20.
Acts of the Apostles is clear that doctrines are symbiotically related to behavior. Our doctrines emerge from spirit-centered experiences. Our experiences are clarified by our beliefs and take shape in practical application. Accordingly, what behaviors might your beliefs inspire in the areas of:
»» Personal stewardship
»» Care of family and children
»» Marriage and other significant relationships
»» Community involvement
»» Political involvement
»» Care of the Earth
»» Response to diverse opinions
»» Ways we respond to personal or global conflict (violence, reconciliation, consensus, peace-seeking balanced by appropriate protection).
»» Involvement in justice issues – first-hand support of vulnerable people and/or political involvement to achieve a social order more reflective of Jesus’ values.
One of the great strengths of Bruce’s book is that he challenges us at the end of each chapter to thoughtfully and prayerfully move to action.
