The Upcoming Revolution in Church Teaching

I think the church will soon move to a more experiential type of teaching. This won’t happen wholesale–the sermon and the current model of classrooms isn’t going away. But I think some interesting things are happening which suggests the world beyond the walls of church is a classroom, which while helpful is limited in geography, space, insularity and the model of teaching thinking within church walls includes.

I think early explorations into small groups and house churches suggest the proverbial walls are coming down. You’ve also seen a minor shift toward service as a REAL and LIVING part of the church service at the margins. Both of these shifts I think are profound.

This move by some will likely be criticized as:

1) silly
2) not ordered/not doctrinal (not “the model”)
3) entertainment or perhaps bending too much toward “seeker sensitive” movement.

All 3 of these are red herring or strawperson attacks on exercising Gods mission in creative ways which bring people to him. As such, I think each of these criticisms is unfair in turn. I think the model provided in Acts is one of support and uplift, rather than confining current pracitioners and believers like a procrustean iron maiden (which I’ll admit is probably an unfair characterization and hyperbolic, but I think the dramatic effect helps here). The inventive pragmatism of the rag-tag church planting and bootstrapping of the Apostles is pretty note worthy. If anything their model is certainly rugged and simple. But its one characterized by adaptation and re-newal, while not changing the fundamentals. The outright rejection of (most) all change in church leadership circles (which I will admit is waning….even dying) seems foreign to the. I think the Apostles pragmatism what characteristic of what I’d like to call “Biblical problem solving” which used human ingenuity and adaptation for Kingdom ends.

This Biblical pragmatism is not meant to challenge core doctrine or the crystal clear language from Jesus which goes in the opposite direction. I think though that the church may be in need of more people who stand in the door…and more Christians who shine the light by getting out of the proverbial salt shaker.

Extremes, Hyper-fundamentalism, and Christian Doctrine Cross-fire
Admittedly, most any doctrine, movement, or ideology can be pushed to an extreme (aka a hyper-fundamentalism), which runs counter. This is exactly the reason this sort of solution is called for.

It seems very odd indeed to me as a church goer of over 30 years, why it is that we might see this as more legitimate in youth ministry or in missions, but not in the church. I think some people in the church have indirectly turned themselves into door keepers on truth and doctrine…. This is especially troubling when multiple interpretations are legitimately in the text–when implied meaning (aka translation of the text) is critical for any resolution of the conflict (it might read better as “either resolution of the conflict”–in those cases its possible that BOTH solutions bare significant parts of the truth in Both/And fashion–instead of exclusive either or. Oddly I can’t remember any minister or church leader I’ve seen suggest a both/and solution to any interpretative conflict–that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t happened–just that its a rather rare occurance.).

In a dynamic world, we should never sacrifice core principles, but at the same time, those principles which we have artificially created and added to the text are certainly subject to amendment and adjustment.

One caveat: please don’t mischaracterize this for what it isn’t–it isn’t ethically without core–it isn’t emergent church–it isn’t Don Miller. Its just a call to re-evaluate how certain segments of the church look at church doctrine. Its a call for nuance in how differences in opinion and interpretation are grounded in humility rather than hubris. And by the way….these are just my two cents. I hope this helps in your walk and thoughts about the future direction of our community collectively called the church.