God As a Problem and Why I Don’t Blame People for Having a Big Problem with the Church: Part 2
Continuing on the topic of bad theology and misrepresentations of grace as a reason people see the church as boring….or irrelevant…(see my last posting for “Part 1”).
A couple of problems with seeing Christianity as all about sitting up and flying right: One, being nice simply is not a sure fire formula for things turning out right. It’s all too clear that the good do die young and the fair and caring often get the shaft. Secondly, even if temporal security and prosperity do work out for you and you do in fact attribute it to your fidelity, still, can you be certain of your eternal destiny? The payoff for faithfulness is always a bet, and not a good one at that.
We like to think the Devil is our problem and God is our friend who rescues us, when it’s really God who is the problem. God is just too “omni-everything!” Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnipresent and all the rest, and all that we do and believe never consistently or determinately produces the results we want from Divinity.
I think most thinking and feeling people have figured this out and when they hear or see a church life and preaching/teaching that espouses what I am calling here a “Erasmusian theology” they figure it’s not worth their time. Others have figured it out, have seen the theological stumbling blocks, but still stick it out in churches where church gets defined as this place for the upright (or at least for those who admit they are not but who have gathered the gumption to say they are sorry and have enough faith to put them in the best light once again) because gaining a foothold for a decent life through being good is worth the price of suspending honesty from the pulpit (truth be told, being decent and fair is, actually, a good bit of the time, good for business and certainly good for the children to learn!).
But what if you want to be theologically and anthropologically honest? Is there any good word for us concerning our problem with God? Certainly there is, but I don’t think it’s heard enough in today’s church. I’ll finish next week with a thought on what that “good word” actually is.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Sunday, January 2, 2011
God As a Problem....and Church Too. Part 1
God As a Problem and Why I Don’t Blame People for Having a Big Problem with the Church: Part 1
It’s possible, perhaps even probable, that the reason so many people are abandoning the church is because it’s theology and practice keeps trying to be Erasmusian in order to appeal to the “common herd” (Erasmus’ own term for the regular folk outside of the university and academic elite – see Luther’s Works Volume 33:45) and this “herd” is tired of being rounded up, corralled (and slaughtered?!).
Most preaching and teaching about Christ today makes Christianity about being morally upright and doctrinally correct. Erasmus, in his debate with Luther over the freedom of the will, was concerned that if grace were free there would be no motivation for people to behave decently and believe accordingly and the result would be societal chaos and degeneration. Erasmus argued that Christianity was about getting on the right track ethically and morally and Christ was required to get you there.
There are, of course, just a couple of problem with this approach! Next week I’ll lay them out for you, but in the meantime, why don’t you chime in and tell us all what you think.
Do you think grace is cheap or costly or free? And what would you say is the difference between the three? And how much difference does it make how grace is preached and taught on how much people give the church the time of day?
(I think that most people who have given it much thought have figured out that the Erasmusian theology is problematic and that any church that divies it out is not worth their time. To them, the church is boring and irrelevant)
“God as a Problem….” to be continued!
It’s possible, perhaps even probable, that the reason so many people are abandoning the church is because it’s theology and practice keeps trying to be Erasmusian in order to appeal to the “common herd” (Erasmus’ own term for the regular folk outside of the university and academic elite – see Luther’s Works Volume 33:45) and this “herd” is tired of being rounded up, corralled (and slaughtered?!).
Most preaching and teaching about Christ today makes Christianity about being morally upright and doctrinally correct. Erasmus, in his debate with Luther over the freedom of the will, was concerned that if grace were free there would be no motivation for people to behave decently and believe accordingly and the result would be societal chaos and degeneration. Erasmus argued that Christianity was about getting on the right track ethically and morally and Christ was required to get you there.
There are, of course, just a couple of problem with this approach! Next week I’ll lay them out for you, but in the meantime, why don’t you chime in and tell us all what you think.
Do you think grace is cheap or costly or free? And what would you say is the difference between the three? And how much difference does it make how grace is preached and taught on how much people give the church the time of day?
(I think that most people who have given it much thought have figured out that the Erasmusian theology is problematic and that any church that divies it out is not worth their time. To them, the church is boring and irrelevant)
“God as a Problem….” to be continued!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)