Emerging Church Discussions

Reflections of today’s discussion with Don Carson, Andrew Hamilton and Geoff Westlake…
Don is a famous evangelical Christian scholar, a Doctor of Philosophy in the New Testament. He has recently written his book ‘Becoming Conversant with the Emerging Church’. Andrew is the WA director of FORGE mission training and Geoff is the Director of ReFrame – a network of missional leaders in WA. They are both leaders in emerging missional churches in WA

To begin with - it must be made aware that the emerging church is very hard to define well, it is also rather different in nature and direction in WA as to America/Europe - however there still are several similarites. Don was rather strong on this point - to express that not all the criticism's in his book are as applicable in WA.... So to begin, Don gave an overview of his book.

He spoke of the strengths and positive aspects of the emerging church culture and then outlined some aspects to be cautious of, or resist. This was the framework his book adopts, with an obvious effort to meet the WA context rather than an American context.
Some noteable strengths include the honest missional drive, the strength in being culturally aware/reading the times, plus the awareness and desire to ask questions concerning what, how and why we ‘do/be’ church in certain ways.
Some noteable weakness include the dubious definitions and understandings of modern/postmodern, the lack of strong biblical theology often found in these movements, the lack of personal commitment to ‘truth’ and the connection with social dynamics being a greater driving force than the connection with the Father often is.

After his talk, both Andrew and Geoff took turns to respond, agreeing with certain aspects of Don’s point of view and disagreeing with other statements – all to be expected.

I was impressed with the combined discussion from Andrew and Geoff. Meeting them before and being involved with Geoff on other occasions, I know them to be men of integrity and adherence to the truth of the Gospel. Andrew shared some of his thoughts on emerging churchs in WA, adding some strengths to the movements stance and suggesting some of Don's criticism's which are not necessraily true in our local context. Geoff shared in more detail of the practical workings of his church community. Being careful to demonstrate its authenticity to both scriptural truths and local context. He suggested that 'established' church's and 'emerging' church's can both learn and gain from each other, that neither is necessarily superior, but both have examples of 'good' and 'less good?' churchs within their boundaries.

Check out Hamo's website - 'Backyard Missionary' for a more detailed overview of the discussion, and postings/comments from many who attended or interested in the discussion.

I left with a mixture of feelings – I do feel as though the more I investigate ‘church’ and how I want to do/be it – I seem to feel both uneasy with my current situation – yet still an uncertainty about the direction I want to move in. I want a connection with a stronger missional community, yet not sure in what context to best work towards this…. Grrrrr….