Incarnate 2007: Session 6 - Malcolm Duncan
9 06 2007
Malcolm Duncan doesn’t skirt around issues. I guess he gets a lot of flak. But sometimes you just have to take the flak to move things forward, and I respect the way that he does that. I am rather like that too, so it is good to find someone else doing it too, and taking some of the heat!
Malcolm said a lot of good things, and one or two things that are more controversial. He talked about finding the most marginalised people in our communites and defending & standing up for them … Muslim, asylum seekers, gay … love them, listen to them, serve them, stand up for them. He is clear that you don’t have to agree with them, but I guess some will get pretty steamed up about his suggestion.
My take on it is that we are very dualistic in our thinking. Just because there is some part of people’s lives that we don’t agree with, we write them off as being wrong, deluded, sinners etc. They have nothing to teach us or have no value, so we think. Just think about books: would you read a book differently if you knew it was written by someone from a different religion? or they were living with their partner and not married? or was actively gay? Should we not be reading all books the same? Listening, learning, evaluating? Taking the good, and leaving behind the rest?
But I don’t think we need to be so defensive. We must remain distinctive … yes there is a difference between Christians and Muslims - our faith in Jesus is central and core to our identity as Christians. Just because I listen, learn from, and love Muslims doesn’t diminish my faith in Christ and His centrality. I wonder if we get threatened by this stuff because we pretty insecure about our identity as Christians?
OK … I am putting myself in the line of fire again …
Anyway, there was lot of other good stuff that he talked about. Notes once again in the “read more” section. I particularly enjoyed the way he started with some liturgy and “lectio divina” (imaginative reading of the Bible) to remind us and open us to God speaking when listening to someone teaching, and then led us in some more “chanting” or sung response as a confession to God of how we haven’t thought, listened, seen, or spoken with the heart of God.
Tags: Faithworks, Gospel, Incarnate, Incarnate Conference 2007, Malcolm Duncan
Session 6 - Malcolm Duncan
Throughout the history of the church
The gospel is good news to all people at all level, to every part of their lives.
But we often narrow down the gospel to the little bit that we are passionate about - personal salvation, societal transformation…
“Our” gospel, the bits we like best …
But we must see the gospel in light of 2000 years of history.
We must weave together the different strands of the gospel together.
Many churches only have one strand left … maybe preaching or social gospel … but they are getting weaker, as there is nothing to hold or feed or sustain the single strand.
What are the different strands we are to hold together?
Prophetic: not just foretelling. 75% is about forthtelling. Saying God’s perspective on what is happening. To challenge the spirit of the age. Eg. on climate, education, the way we treat people. To speak God’s heart on a situation, rather than the world’s heart. History - has dire consequences if we don’t do this, for example in Nazi Germany. We need to understand God’s word, and God’s heart, and speak it out with clarity.
Find the marginalised and excluded people in your community, and stand up for them. Love them, listen to them, serve them. You don’t have to agree.
Salvation: Mental, social, emotional wellbeing. Very connected to the word “shalom”
Presence: Being a Jesus people. A people of God should be a people of joy. Love your neighbour … do you know the names of the people who live in the 6 houses either side of us. A people who live & demonstrate the presence of Christ.
“When you done this to least, you have done it to me” Mt 25. When we serve the poor, we see Jesus. It is a thin place.
Prayer: Remember prayer and devotion to God is vital. We must be transformed by Christ. Where we go, we bring Christ with us. We are not a cheap social service. We are the light; wherever we go, we transform it.
Proclamation: Truth tellers. But not preaching at them. Not truth argues. We don’t need to confront people with truth, but dialoguing about truth.
The paradox of Transformation:
God can meet our needs - but sometimes we are in need
The joy of serving of Christ - but sometimes we get hurt
Christ can make you whole - but we are also broken
Christ can give you hope - but sometimes we are hopeless
Anyone who has done something of lasting significance, has also lived a live a pain.
There is no other way - the way of the cross, the way of pain, struggle and challenge. There is nothing more powerful to look in someone’s eyes and see something dawn in their eyes: they matter to God, there is hope …
Despite the pain - it is worth it.
Unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies …
Our lives fall to the ground and our pain will bring transformation.
5 Key Principles:
We are living in transformation from Christendom to post Christendom…
1. Identity: An identity that is clear, leads us to service not separation. eg. Jesus washing feet, including Jesus. Christian identity leads us to service.
2. Equality: Phil 2 … Jesus equal with God. Equality is not something to be grasped. Service must always comes first. In society we are facing the greatest debate on the rights of different groups. How we position ourselves will determine our influence for the next 50 years. Equality mustn’t be grasped.
3. Influence: We are emerging from Christendom. The only power we need is the power of the presence of Christ. The influence that comes from service.
4. Conscience: Are there things that we can and can’t do? Yes. We don’t need to seek legislation for these things, but stand in the tradition of 2000 years of Christian history, and accept persecution. Our conscience must remain true to our identity of being Christian.
5. Diversity: Is there something to learn from other groups, religions? Diversity is something to be celebrated.
Haven’t had time to digest the full post, but wanted to comment on this:
“would you read a book differently if you knew it was written by someone from a different religion? or they were living with their partner and not married? or was actively gay?”
Err, yes. I like to know quite a bit about what an author’s worldview, philosophy, etc. is before reading their material. Otherwise I might be influenced and persuaded by a worldview which points away from Christ (Cf. 2 Cor 10:5). Every time I listen or read ANYTHING, I have a set of filters with which to apply context and to understand what is being set. I would suppose everyone does this, whether they realise it or not. If I judge a source to be trustworthy, I can relax and not apply so many safety-checks to my cognitive processes, or whatever you want to call it. The more I am unsure about the author and what he or she has written, the more I will screen more carefully the material.
This would apply to books, films, sermons, articles, etc.
I would say one of the most important things when assessing anything is to assess what is being said behind and through the actual words or text. I guess some would call that discerning the spirit of what was being spoken or written.
I am quite alarmed that you would suggest to do otherwise!
Perhaps you are suggesting to be open-minded and to hear openly what others have to say, even if they are espousing a POV which does not concur with our own? Certainly I read widely, and don’t always agree with what I read. But to read without discernment seems contrary to scripture, and part of the discernment is to understand where the author is coming form.
Actually I would have thought this is quite post-modern, you know, literary analysis and author-reader interactions and all that
I think you miss the point of what i am saying here alastair - i am actually suggesting the opposite of what you are saying …
I am certainly NOT suggesting that we read without discernment, but rather we should read EVERYTHING with discernment. I think sometimes, just because our favourite author or preacher says something, we don’t apply the same thought processes to it, as we would if others are saying it. BUt i think we still need to think and evaluate what they are saying, as much as we think about what others are saying if we disagree with most of what they are saying.
So for me, I am less bothered about WHO is saying it, but more bothered about WHAT they are saying … i listen, evaluate and take the good, leave the bad.
I have come across a lot of accepting everything that people say, in the church. For example, a prophetic person who is good, helpful and accurate in what he says … so we begin to stop evaluating and then he says something that isn’t helpful, good and accurate and WHAM! We accept it, and it causes all kinds of trouble.
Of course we discern the messenger as well as the message, but I think that is on a moment by moment basis. So someone might be speaking a great sermon but then suddenly get a bit angry. They might at that moment be speaking from their flesh, but the rest actually be good. If we write him off, we miss the gold and precious stones. So my point about dualism is that we tend to do exactly that: we say person A is a liberal christian so write them off as having nothing to say; person B is sound, so what he says is good. I don’t think that we should do that.
Does that make a bit more sense of what i am trying to say?
OK I understand a little better.
But I think I made a valid point: that looking for a controlling worldview or paradigm from a speaker is a helpful step in analysing their message.
I see your point: truth is truth, whether spoken by a heretic, Joe Bloggs, or a saint. But I think things get more complicated than that.
For example, take Marcus Borg. Much of his scholary research on the historical Jesus has been instrumental to the likes of N T Wright’s new theology. However, given as Borg believes Jesus is still dead in his grave, I don’t have much time to waste on reading his views on the Resurrection, on the Spirit, etc.
I suppose if I had all the time in the world, I could read and listen to every POV there was. Since I don’t, I have to restrict myself as I don’t want to waste my time. But I do try to listen to different positions that would challenge my own, as well as listening to material that tends to re-inforce my beliefs.
Am I grasping the wrong end of the stick here?
No … I actually think you are saying exactly what i am saying…
… it sounds as though you are doing what i am suggesting: you are evaluating what someone says. So taking Borg, he says some good stuff that you are learning from (or NT Wright is), but where he moves into something that you don’t, you disregard. I am not suggesting that we listen to everything, but just evaluate what people are saying.
I didn’t know about Borg’s view on the resurrection. I have got a book of his and am enjoying… In the past i wouldn’t have read a book by him, just because he had a view on the resurrection that fundamentally disagree with. Now I will read because he has some good things to say on other subjects.
What do you think? Are we agreeing once again????
Perhaps we are agreeing now. The crazy thing about blogdom is that it is so easy to misunderstand. Makes for some good banter, though
I think my point is that its almost impossible to verify and double-check everything a speaker/writer says, so you have to go on some notion of trust. Borg seems to know a bit about historical Jesus, so its worth listening to him (Although I’d rather listen to his research through the lens of N T Wright, since Wright frequently corrects/disagrees with him).
I suppose the problem is many speakers/writers speak/write outside of their immediate authority. So Dawkins writes about religion/faith, something he clearly knows little about. If I want to learn about faith, I would not read Dawkins.
Actually, thinking about I am finding it hard to articulate the process I go through to weigh the authority and reliability of what I read. It may be worth a blog post in the future…
Your original question was whether you would read a book differently if you knew the author was X or believed in Y. Your implicit answer was NO, whereas my answer would be YES. So surely we are looking at this differently?
Ultimately, I suppose it boils down to this: given what we know about the author and their worldview, how is that going to shape and confine what they are communicating, be it truth, error, or some mix of the two?
So if Tim LaHaye writes a new book on the rapture, I am unlikely to read or believe it, since I don’t accept the worldview which his subject makes sense in. If Borg writes a book entitled “Why Jesus is still in the grave informs our view of human sexuality”, I am likely to use the book for kindling.
I would say, and perhaps this was your point all along, that most Christians I know don’t read widely enough and don’t challenge their own beliefs often enough. I try do that a little bit: my blog for example, links to some non Christian blogs as well as to Christian ones I frequently would disagree with (don’t mean this one!), but its good to debate and learn from each other, even we can’t agree always.
Was that your point?
OK - here is another thought: I think it does depend on what you reading and why. If I am reading theology, because i have some training and experience in this, i feel in a position to evaluate what others say … even if they have more knowledge. I find i read or listen to something and it goes through my worldview and biblical filter, whoever it is that is writing or speaking.
However, where i think you are very correct if you don’t have much knowledge and want to find out more. So if i look up something on Wikipedia or Britania on a subject i know very little about, then actually being able to trust the source is very important…