Moving on...

For those of you who actually read this my blog is moving to www.eroseberry.wordpress.com

Currently Reading Overcoming Barriers to Growth: Proven Strategies for Taking Your Church to the Next Level By Michael Fletcher see related

Understanding the Gospel

This was a lecture given by Scott McKnight at the Spiritual Formation conference at Trinity this past week.  Just curious of what you thought...

The following outline was used for my talk at the Spiritual Formation Forum in Milwaukee last week. My week was more hectic than I wanted — owing to about five things happening at once, not the least of which was major house repairs, and so was unable to attend the whole forum. Next year I hope to. But, this is my outline. My central thesis, which I outlined in Embracing Grace, is that a theory of spiritual formation is at work in how we present the gospel and that everything flows from that gospel. To change spiritual formation from an individual emphasis to an ecclesial emphasis will mean that we have to broaden our sense of the gospel so that Church is vital to the gospel.

Robust Gospel, Robust Spiritual Formation

Scot McKnight
North Park University

Spiritual Formation Forum
Elmbrook Church
Milwaukee

Introduction: Here I talked about developing “skills” in basketball — like shooting and dribbling. But some skills can’t be learned alone in your driveway — like passing and rebounding and team play. Spiritual formation is too often too much about shooting and dribbling and not enough about about passing and rebounding. (And reading the defense.) So, this talk is dedicated to a one-sided emphasis on the need for a gospel that will lead Christians to realize that spiritual formation is not just about individual spiritual formation but also about ecclesial spiritual formation.

1.0 The Standard Gospel Presentation

God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life.
Your problem is that you are sinful; God can’t admit sinners into his presence.
Jesus died for you to deal with your “sin-problem.”
If you trust in Christ, you can be admitted into God’s presence.

Problems:

1. No one in the NT really preaches this gospel.
2. This gospel is about one thing: Humans gaining access to God’s presence.
3. This gospel creates an individualist Christian life.
4. This gospel sets the tone for the entire evangelical movement.
5. This gospel leads to spiritual formation being entirely about “me and God.”
6. The evangelical gospel has created a need for evangelical monasteries.
7. The evangelical gospel turns local church into a volunteer society.
8. The evangelical gospel is rooted in Theism or Deism, but not perichoretic Trinitariaism.

2.0 A Robust Gospel Presentation

1. A Robust gospel can’t be “tractified.”
2. God made you as an Eikon to relate in love to God, to self, to others and to the world.
3. The “fall” cracked the Eikon in all four directions.
4. Bible readers can’t skip from Genesis 3 to Romans 3.
5. Genesis 4—11 reveals the “problem” of sin: the climax is a society of Eikons trying to build their way to God.
6. Genesis 12 begins to restore the Eikon by (1) covenantal commitment and (2) forming the family of faith. THE REST OF THE BIBLE IS ABOUT THIS ELECTED FAMILY OF FAITH.
7. The “problem” is finally resolved in “four atoning moments”: the life of Jesus, the death of Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus, and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
8. The “locus” of resolution is the family of faith: three big words in Bible are Israel, the Kingdom, and the Church.

3.0 Robust Gospel, Robust Spiritual Formation

Individual spiritual disciplines are important; they aren’t the point.
I assume their importance and their disciplined practice.

Jesus

1. Jesus thinks with the term “kingdom”: society in which God’s will is done.
2. Jesus’ primary category for spiritually formed people is the Jesus Creed: Mark 12:28-32.

Paul

1. Paul thinks with the term “church”: the fellowship of the Spirit that realizes through the Spirit the kingdom vision of Jesus.
2. Paul’s primary category for spiritually formed people is “giftedness”: 1 Cor 12—14.

John

1. John thinks with the term “life” or “fellowship”: the light of God invading a person’s life so that they live in the light of fellowship and love.
2. John’s primary category for spiritually formed people is “love God, love one another”: 1 John.

4.0 Conclusions

1. The Church is what God is doing in this world.
2. Spiritual formation is both personal formation and ecclesial formation.
3. The gospel is something that is both proclaimed and performed and what we see is what we are really preaching.
4. Our biggest needs:

A gospel that is robust.
A spiritual formation that flows out of that robust gospel.
A spiritual formation that is shaped by the kingdom/church vision.

Currently Reading The Faith Once for All: Bible Doctrine for Today By Jack Cottrell see related

Lots to think about....

Got some stuff on my mind...I wonder what Jack Cottrell would do.

If Jack Cottrell were a rainbow I'd follow him to a doctrinal pot of gold.

Currently Listening Beyond the Wall By Kenny Garrett see related

Timeless Truths...

Claret is the liquor for boys; port for men; but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy.
                                                                                                                 
                                                                                                                     Samuel Johnson

Currently Listening The Best of Buddy Rich By Buddy Rich see related

Biblical Narrative as Sermon Illustration?

Tonight I ran across this article (http://blog.preachingtoday.com/2007/05/when_biblical_illustrations_ar.html) by the proffesor of preaching at Talbot.  He makes the case that there is rarely a good time to use biblical narratives as illustrative material, and that in the end it may fail to do what it intended, or be in applied in an inproper way.  While I think he offers some good suggestions, I am becoming more and more in favor of occasionally drawing on biblical narratives for several reasons.

(As I write this I'm sitting on my back porch.  It's 70 degrees out, my chair is reclinable, and I've got a glass of red wine and cuban cigar, smuggled in by someone from my church.  There is some great jazz playing on the laptop and my dog is rolling around in the yard.  Not that you needed to know any of this, but it became clear to me that this is one of those moments you choose to savor and I'm just hoping to caputre it for myself.

Why use biblical narratives in preaching?

1.  The problem of biblical illiteracy
You don't have to be in a church for very long to realize that many in our congregations are simply unfamiliar with much of the bible, specifically the Old Testament.  The past few days I've been reading through Genesis, and it has been amazing how much I had forgotten.  It has been fantastic revisiting these stories and allowing them all to play out in my mind (the most painful recollection being that of Simeon and Levi's revenge in Genesis 34).

Using these narratives are a great way to increase  the literacy of our congregations without having to do a verse by verse series through Genesis, not that that would be a bad thing (some of you know my non-sexual, most of the time, crush on Mark Driscoll).  While we do need to be exegetically careful about the ways in which we apply them, we should not shy away from these stories.  The full range of human experience is found in them: anger, revenge, love, sex, violence, war, worship.  By being good story tellers we can draw our people into these great narratives that have all the attention grabbing details we could want, and at the same time they are becoming familiar with the meta-narrative of scripture.

2.  They are far better than most of my own

In the short amount of time I've been preaching at PVCC I've realized that well over half of my sermon illustrations are drawn from my own life. Part of that being because they are the easiest to think of, and part of that being I prefer not being around other people.  While it has been a humbling experience to be transparent with the audience, I find myself using rather mundane stories to try and describe great truths.  Not that getting stuck behind the lady in the fast lane who has eleven items instead of ten doesn't speak to patience, but it seems like there could be a better way to go about it.

When speaking on our faith and trust in God why not go to the story of Abraham?  His struggle of wrestling with God for years over the fulfillment of God's promise takes that lesson to a place that I can't go in my own limited life experence, but who wouldn't connect with a husband and wife who have been promised a son waiting year after year as God continues to delay the birth of Isaac.  Who wouldn't have looked for other ways to bring God's promise to fruition (Abram sleeping with Hagar)?

While there is a great deal more that could probably be said about this, I just ran across this article tonight, and felt like responding to it.  If you're looking for something a little funnier, maybe more satirical, be sure to checkout Jared Allan Wheeler's blog (ignore the newest post).