What is Emergent?
Nailing Jell-o to a wall. Stapling wet noodles to the ceiling. You will have about as much success attempting these things as you will at defining Emergent. To begin with, you have to decide what to classify it as; is it a movement, a group, a way to keep High School kids going to church, a denomination, a groundswell, a heresy, a conversation, an appeal to younger evangelicals, an ever-changing feeling? All of these classifications have been suggested in some form. For our purposes, I will call it a movement: in the sense of “a collective effort by a large number of people to try to achieve something, especially a political or social reform” – like, “the civil rights movement.” This seems a fair description since Emergent includes many different denominations, backgrounds, etc. and a leading attribute is the desire to bring about change.
The movement must certainly include the word “church,” since it makes all its appeals for change to the church at large. Even though Emergent is not a “church” in and of itself, it is true to say it is a movement within the greater church body.
Now for the actual word “emergent.” What is meant by it? Brian McLaren attempts to illustrate the use of the term by referring to “emerging saplings in a forest floor,” “emergent wetlands” or emerging, concentric circles as seen in the rings of a tree trunk. The thrust of each illustration is to suggest that Emergent is something that is growing out of the past Christian tradition, encompassing it and expanding it into new realms. Thus, Emergent (at least in McLaren’s characterization) is not against the church per se, rather it is growing out of the fertile decomposition of previous generations and assuming that into a new future. That is why Emergent is so flexible and fluid – and why McLaren can write things like: “So will our current emergence yield a superior and ultimate form of Christianity? Will the emerging form finally get it right? Of course not!”
Carson gives a rather lengthy description of Emergent that amounts to a sort of definition:
...during the last dozen years, “emerging” and “emergent” have become strongly associated with an important movement that is sweeping across America, the United Kingdom, and elsewhere. Many in the movement use “emerging” or “emergent...” as the defining adjective for their movement. A dozen books talk about “the emergent church” and “stories of emergence” and the like. One website encourages its patrons in “emergent friendship...”
At the heart of the “movement”—or as some of its leaders prefer to call it, the “conversation”—lies the conviction that changes in the culture signal that a new church is “emerging.” Christian leaders must therefore adapt to this emerging church. Those who fail to do so are blind to the cultural accretions [“build up” or “accumulation”] that hide the gospel behind forms of thought and modes of expression that no longer communicate with the new generation, the emerging generation... I should stress that not only is the movement amorphous, but its boundaries are ill-defined.
Some would argue that the very attempt of defining emergent is misguided! It is not something to be defined in a cold, modernistic, scientific manner. That whole category is out of place. It is like asking a hockey player his batting average – it is the wrong question. For these, Emergent is something to be experienced, felt, walked in, and embraced... it is not a static thing to be pinned to the laboratory table and dissected into little bits. Hence the constant use of phrases like, “Emergent is a conversation.” Perhaps that explains the definition offered on both the US and Canadian Emergent websites: “Emergent is a growing generative friendship among missional Christian Leaders.” That says something – but not much.
Towards a Working Definition
So, fully aware that many people will not like my definition (some by the fact that I am creating one at all, others by the fact they disagree with the content of it and still others by the fact that it is too imprecise!) for my purposes I will speak of the Emergent Church Movement (EC throughout this paper) as that collective effort of diverse individuals sharing a similar worldview (that embraces much of post-modernism) to re-define the mission of the church, the doctrine of the church and the essence of the church in order to more relevantly and purely reflect God’s purposes in this day.
Broken down into bite-sized pieces, the whole thing is trying to say this:
· collective effort – EC is big into words like “conversation,” “dialogue,” “gathering (instead of ‘conference’) and the like. There is enormous emphasis on communal effort in reaching understanding and in impacting the surrounding world.
· of diverse individuals – While the collective comes first, those who comprise it will be from a wide range of religious and socio-economic backgrounds (although predominantly white, male and western!)
· sharing a similar worldview (that embraces much of post-modernism) – Foundational to the movement is an embrace of much or some of what post-modernism (loosely-defined) has to offer. Some of the divisions within EC (as reflected in later sections of this paper) are the result of varying degrees of affinity to and understanding of post-modernism.
· to re-define – Or, “re-imagine” or “re-think” or a slough of other terms that mean start at the bottom, assume nothing and work your way to a conclusion on everything. Much of the angst of EC is aroused by what is perceived as an irrelevant evangelicalism that refuses to engage the world around it. Therefore, Christians must re-do everything from worship to leadership structures in order to represent Christ accurately to this culture. The three main areas of emphasis are:
o the mission of the church – why the church exists
o the doctrine of the church – what the church believes
o and the essence of the church – the fundamental nature of what it means to be a Christian
· in order to more relevantly and purely reflect God’s purposes in this day – What might be labelled as the real goal to all things EC. To be relevant.
The New Tripartite Division
This definition is more precisely focused by noting the three “tribes” within EC. This “hot off the press” categorizing is extremely helpful in the overall analysis, as it identifies some of the distinctions under the one large, encompassing definition I have offered above.
First, the Emerging church is a broad category that encompasses a wide variety of churches and Christians who are seeking to be effective missionaries wherever they live. This includes Europeans and Australians who are having the same conversation as their American counterparts. The Emerging church includes three distinct types of Christians. In a conversation with Dr. Ed Stetzer, a noted missiologist, he classified them as the Relevants, Reconstructionists, and Revisionists.
Relevants are theologically conservative evangelicals who are not as interested in reshaping theology as much as updating such things as worship styles, preaching styles, and church leadership structures. Their goal is to be more relevant; thus, appealing to postmodernminded people. Relevants commonly begin alternative worship services within evangelical churches to keep generally younger Christians from leaving their churches. They also plant new churches to reach emerging people. Relevant leaders look to people such as Dan Kimball, Donald Miller, and Rob Bell as like-minded leaders.
The common critique of Relevants is that they are doing little more than conducting “cool church” for hip young Christians and are not seeing significant conversion growth. Within the Relevants there is also a growing group of outreach-minded Reformed Relevants, which look to men like John Piper, Tim Keller, and D. A. Carson for theological direction.
Reconstructionists are generally theologically evangelical and dissatisfied with the current forms of church (e.g. seeker, purpose, contemporary). They bolster their critique by noting that our nation is becoming less Christian and that those who profess faith are not living lives markedly different than non-Christians; thereby, proving that current church forms have failed to create life transformation. Subsequently, they propose more informal, incarnational, and organic church forms such as house churches. Reconstructionists, who are more influenced by mainline Christian traditions, will also use terms like “new monastic communities” and “abbess.” Reconstructionist leaders look to such people as Neil Cole and Australians Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch.
The common critique of Reconstructionists is that they are collecting disgruntled Christians who are overreacting to the megachurch trend but are not seeing significant conversion growth.
Revisionists are theologically liberal and question key evangelical doctrines, critiquing their appropriateness for the emerging postmodern world. Reconstructionists look to such leaders as Brian McLaren and Doug Pagitt as well as other Emerging Christians.
The common critique of Revisionists is that they are recycling the doctrinal debates of a previous generation and also not seeing significant conversion growth. What ties each of these types of Emerging Christians together is a missiological conversation about what a faithful church should believe and do to reach Western culture. However, beyond that there is little unity because there is widespread disagreement on what counts as faithful doctrine and practice.
This three-fold division is rather new and the jury is out on whether “every tribe” agrees first of all with the distinctions and secondly with their placement in them! I include it here, however, as it reveals the large disparity in the movement as a whole. Most of the authors and writings I will treat in this paper would fall into the Stetzer-Driscoll Revisionist category. That should be kept in mind throughout.
