The Supremacy of Christ and the Church in a Postmodern World
or Contextualize! (The Organ May Need to Go...)
As “emerging” church planter and pastor Mark Driscoll took the stage at the Desiring God conference, a lot of people were wondering the same thing: Will he cuss?
No, he didn't. And now, on to the theology. Jesus himself was a missionary, sent into a specific time, place, and culture, with native languages and foods.
I saw Driscoll as most closely embodying the theme of the weekend, since Mars Hill Church, in Seattle, is aggressive where orthodox doctrine and Christ’s supremacy are concerned - and also aggressively evangelistic. Starting with a handful of “strung-out Indie rockers” in 1996, Driscoll has grown a church that today is over 6,000 strong. He has surmounted all kinds of obstacles to bring the gospel to postmodern people on a scale that most pastors can only visualize while zzzzs are rising from their heads. His objective last weekend? To equip other men to go and do likewise.Christians in America should do for their neighbors what they would do for the nations, carefully studying cultures and subcultures in order to translate biblical truth into a given cultural stream.
Driscoll’s talk was the easy on the ears, and you can get the MP3 here: The Supremacy of Christ and the Church in a Postmodern World, Mark Driscoll. The message was divided roughly in two parts, Christology and Missiology. I'll comment on the main stream of Driscoll's thought under these two topics.
Christology
Driscoll opened by contrasting an overemphasis on Christ's incarnation, typical of some "Emerging Church" types, with an overemphasis on Christ's exaltation, typical of some "Reformed" types. He pointed out that the emerging tendency leads to an extreme emphasis on Jesus' manhood, elevating humility over authority, "conversations" over commands, and in some cases resulting in a little-wuss caricature of Jesus too small to worship. Reformed circles, on the other hand, may stress the divinity of Christ in a heavy-handed way that results in a portrait of Christ as an imperturbable Superman, distanced and unrelatable.
Driscoll's point in describing these two extremes was not to downplay Christ's humanity or his divinity, both of which are splendidly visible in the Gospels. Rather, he held up the incarnated-exalted God-Man of the Bible and targeted the reductionism that seizes on one trait at the expense of the other.
Missiology
The Missiology Driscoll described flowed out of his Christology. He asserted that as Christians take the gospel to their cultures, they will need be engaged in two complimentary tasks, Contending (for the exalted Christ) and Contextualizing (in the same way that Jesus did, as an incarnational missionary).
Two illustrate this paradigm, Driscoll used the metaphor of two fists, the left tightly clenched on timeless truth (nonnegotiable doctrines), the right open to embrace timely ministry (culturally targeted). Driscoll went on to briefly outline nine "left hand" doctrines (Contending ) that he believes are currently being challenged, and therefore vital for the church to defend. These included the authoritative nature of scripture, the exclusivity of Christ, and the reality of hell.
By way of explaining the "right hand," or Contextualizing, Driscoll pointed out that Jesus himself was a missionary, sent into a specific time, place, and culture, with native languages and foods. Christians in America should do for their neighbors what they would do for the nations, carefully studying cultures and subcultures in order to translate biblical truth into a given cultural stream. On the topic of Contextualizing, Driscoll also noted that interacting with any culture will involve rejecting some elements, receiving some, and redeeming others. In other words, contextualizing is not a non-critical activity.
Reflection
The way Mark Driscoll describes evangelism resonates strongly with me. I like the simple connections he makes, i.e., If you love your neighbor, you'll contextualize the gospel so he can understand what you're saying. I don't think this is extremely radical, especially in light of the New Testament, where many of the epistles focus on clashes between Jews and Gentiles, as the old-school "children of Abraham" tried to ram their religious culture down the throats of new converts.
Paul loudly condemned those who equated Christianity with any single cultural expression, and argued that Christians were free to follow Jesus while keeping their customs, clothing, food, drink, language, you name it - so long as these things did not compromise the gospel, and the life-transformation it began.
Today, at least in North America, this seems to be a very controversial topic. I think Driscoll's message is vital, not because Driscoll is cool and "culturally clever" (John Piper) and probably has a solid hoops game. Rather, these things are vital because they are biblical. The gospel can never camp out in a single culture, and those who love Jesus and their neighbors will always be looking for ways to contextualize.
Monday, October 09, 2006
DG06: Mark Driscoll
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10 comments:
"Driscoll has grown a church that today is over 12,000 strong."
FYI, our largest single-Sunday attendance to date has been 5300. Not sure where you get 12,000.
That figure was based on the following paragraph (plus math), reinforced by what I thought I heard Mark Driscoll say at DG06.
The next issue facing us is what to do when the current services at our Seattle (Ballard) campus overflow, likely by November. Right now we have a few seats at the 9 a.m. service, none at the 11 a.m., a few at the 5 p.m., and nearly none at the 7 p.m. Plus, we have grown by 1,200 people there each of the last three years. - from the Resurgence blog.
If you're feeling defensive, OR if I just got it wrong, I could scale the stat back, though.
I don't think this is extremely radical, especially in light of the New Testament, where many of the epistles focus on clashes between Jews and Gentiles
I think I would have to agree with that, it just reminds me of an old saying:
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is a great deal of difference.
But agreeing with theology is always a good place to start. We can work on the orthopraxy later (and by that, I mean my own orthopraxy)
I think I agree with you about where the challenges will be located, Gymbrall. In the conversations I've had, few people have disagreed with "contextualization" in theory. It's the working out of the concept that requires mental sweat. What exactly does this mean? What will it look like?
The answers will depend on the people and the communities involved...
Hi Ariel,
You've written a thoughtful review here. A nice Reflection too. (I was surprised to see your 12,000 number for MH though.)
Like you, I think Driscoll's missional approach is hugely successful. I'm still not comfortable with his (or Piper's) Reformed theology however--from a purely Biblical point of view. I don't see the five TULIP points borne out when I study the grand arc of redemption history. But Driscoll is accurate when he says this: Reformed circles, on the other hand, may stress the divinity of Christ in a heavy-handed way that results in a portrait of Christ as an imperturbable Superman, distanced and unrelatable.
A question: Did you catch Challies.com's "Desiring God Reflections?" Did you also come away from the conference feeling as if Piper had criticised Driscoll's style? According to Challies, Piper said, "A pastor cannot be clever and show Christ as glorious. Mark Driscoll, you're clever. You have an amazing ability to turn a phrase and make statements that draw people back week after week. But it's dangerous. So many pastors will see you and try to imitate you and then try to watch all the movies and TV shows so they can try to be like you." In essence, Piper was bringing correction to certain aspects of Driscoll's style and delivery, while stating that they agreed on the most important issues of doctrine." If Piper did in fact say this, do you agree? Do you think a pastor can be clever but still show Christ as glorious?
Closer to home: Here's an article from the Seattle P-I that's surprisingly favorable toward the launch of the new MH West Seattle congregation. What's more telling are the 342 comments--the sort one might expect. Take a look.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/287214_marshill02.html
God bless, e-Mom
If Piper did in fact say this, do you agree? Do you think a pastor can be clever but still show Christ as glorious?
I think if we are talking about cleverness in speaking, then Charles Spurgeon comes to mind. From what I've read, they issued tickets to the morning and evening services so that as many different people could attend each week. At the same time, in I Corinthians 2, Paul talks about how he held back from eloquence at least in certain cases.
I think it's an interesting question, but what it raises in my mind is this, was John Piper speaking about cleverness in the abstract or in the specific (as in Marc Driscoll's "brand" of cleverness - whatever that may mean)
[I should point out that I'm not looking for an answer to that last question.]
I went ahead and updated the "12,000" count to a more modest number...my bad on that.
Additional thoughts in a couple minutes.
Did you also come away from the conference feeling as if Piper had criticised Driscoll's style?
To an extent, yes. I thought it would have been better for Piper to inform Driscoll of his concerns privately, first. However, these two guys are apparently solid friends, and Driscoll published their email interactions on this topic. Piper went so far as to admit that while criticizing Driscoll's "cultural cleverness," he (Piper) arguably demonstrates "academic cleverness" himself...
If Piper did in fact say this, do you agree? Do you think a pastor can be clever but still show Christ as glorious?
I think the concern is a legitimate one, but I have a hard time seeing how it can be "applied" down the line. No doubt there's a "cleverness" that makes the speaker look good while detracting from the message. I also think there is a "cleverness" that adds to the message, and makes for clear communication. You could argue that part of effective communication is cleverness leading to contextualization, and that this pertains to skill, talent, gifting, etc.
So the issue seems primarily to be one of conscience, to me, something pastors should pray through with humility. I don't think I would go so far as to say that Driscoll's "cleverness" crosses the line. Of course, John Piper is much wiser than me. Maybe I just like cleverness.
Paul talks about how he held back from eloquence at least in certain cases
That at least demonstrates that eloquence is not an end to itself. The Corinthians were obsessed with "honor" and oratory, and Paul knew that their egos needed to be smacked down, not massaged by a leader they could point to and feel prideful about.
Then there was Athens, where Paul "cleverly" used a main stream of culture, "the altar to an unknown god," to float the gospel through...
Maybe a litmus test is: Did I come away thinking, "What a cool guy? or "What a great God?"
Maybe a litmus test is: Did I come away thinking, "What a cool guy? or "What a great God?"
Nice!!!
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