I’ve taken some time out for reflection and study this week and have been very encouraged in the process. It is always true that the greatest learning happens in interaction, and I have been grateful this week for a series of thought-provoking interactions with a number of people.
The holiness/mission question won’t go away in my mind, and looking around at the general tone of the “theological conversation” at the moment I find myself increasingly dissatisfied.
There are a number of voices arguing for The Salvation Army to rediscover its Wesleyan holiness roots. They have a lot to contribute to the discussion of what it means to live for Jesus today, and much of what they say is challenging and helpful. However, what I find in some of these conversations is a concept of mission that is confined to narrow personal evangelism. Mission is so much more than evangelism, and I believe we need to rediscover a corporate dimension in mission as well as personal responsibility. It might also be argued that there is too much emphasis on how some people in our movement’s history interpreted Wesley rather than on what he actually taught, but that’s a whole different discussion.
Somewhere else in the conversation are the voices of “new expressions” – in lots of forms – but in all the years this conversation has been running it seems some people can never get off the “inherited church bad; fresh expression good” band wagon and it seems to me that there’s a lot more critical discussion than constructive activity going on. The result seems to be a broad definition of mission, coupled with a poor quality of discipleship that nowhere near matches the rhetoric.
We don’t need an understanding of holiness that induces guilt and legalism, but neither do we need an understanding of holiness that is so liberal that we can all hide behind the missio Dei because God will make a happy ending regardless of what we do.
All these are old conversations, but can we begin to take them in a new direction? Can we rediscover, through Scripture, what holiness means for living a Jesus lifestyle in our age? Can we rediscover corporate dimensions of holiness and mission as well as individual ones? Can we really begin to understand that to live “in Christ” means participation in the divine life, that holiness and mission can never be divided? Can we frame the conversation in a way that respects where we came from?
At this point lots of people, many of whom I respect, will tell me why I am wrong – but I still think something is missing.
Filed under: mission, spiritual formation Tagged: | fresh expressions, holiness, mission, salvation army, spiritual formation
That’s a really interesting post and I look forward to what is to follow.
My comment is that as I see it – and others may energetically disagree- fresh expressions are not supposed to be a place of serious discipleship (other than for the leaders!). Disciple formation involves living missionally and being part of a covenanted or committed community. Fresh expressions as I have seen them are either landing places for those who are missionally far removed- those who would simply never walk into a church,ie pre Alpha, or pre-pre-Alpha even,or they are places where the (sometimes very wounded) dechurched believers can come to find a safe spiritual home and place of recovery, and hopefully as part of that recovery come to engage in mission again with others, this time in a form of church that is more helpful for them.
I think discipleship needs to happen a whole stage further on than Fresh Expressions in a committed missional community,unless you define discipleship very broadly, or the FEx has had a chance to attain a significant level of maturity.
The raw reality is that most of the FEx people I meet are pretty traumatised by their attempts, often motivated by lofty ideals, to net what they are doing with inherited church. The i/c usually provides tentative and uncertain funding, can be a hostile environment for people who want to innovate, and even when well-meaning, often simply doesn’t ‘get it’, leaving the usually conscientiously accountable practitioners trying to work under people who believe what they are doing is meaningless, of little value or downright wrong.
I understand from the Sheffield Centre they recently had difficulty finding FEx that had lasted five years in order to assess results. Looking at the picture of funding available in churches,and the kind of leadership situations that are typical – ie unpaid leaders trying to work with a few elderly and untrained volunteers and inadequate budget and resources, this does not surprise me. The fact is they are trying to create places where people far missionally removed from churchgoing can come, sit, have a drink and be listened to,ask questions and make relationships, in a safe setting. I’m seeing a huge amount of hard work going on, and particularly lay and non-stipendiary church leaders in our network are often left too exhausted by their workloads to come and talk with others about what they are doing. It’s worth actually exploring further perhaps, to see what is happening.
I’m delighted if inherited churches find ways to engage believers and reach out to those who would not come to church. Lets pray it happens more, and old and new forms of church come together in warmth and mutual encouragement.
Wow you guys use some big words. To me Eleanors description of a fresh expression sounds like Rehab for people to get them back into “proper” Church.
I think Discipleship can happen at a very early stage and even before someone is part of a “commited missional community” otherwise you can be in danger of putting the Church before Christ. “You must learn the ways of the Church before you can be a follower of Christ”. Personally, I think spiritual formation can begin at the point of contact.
I agree though that you can’t seperate personal holiness and evangelism from mission, to me they are an attempt to compartmentalise our christianity. This bit of our lives in mission, this bit is where I learn how to be holy, that’s where I do evangelism, and that’s where I worship. It’s all part of the whole not separate or different.
“Can we frame the conversation in a way that respects where we came from?”
I think we have to but we also have to be careful that it is ‘where we came from’ and not ‘where we are’. I think there is a huge difference. If we look at these questions as a Movement, the Salvation Army, then we have to look at the original value system and work from there. Now in a lot of our established SA Churches this value system has changed.
I hope that makes some sense, don’t know if it helps the converation or not really, but they’re my thoughts anyway