I’m probably not the best one to write on this impulse, but the series would not be complete without it. Postmodern philosophy is a bit over my head. In any case, it’s not like everyone in the Emerging Church follows (or has even heard of) Jacques Derrida.
Those in the Emerging Church are more concerned with “Post-modernity,” which is roughly the culture that is resulting from the trickle down effect of postmodern philosophy. In addition, there is a realization that current ways of articulating and defending Christianity which many employ may in fact have more to do with the influence of modern philosophy, such as Foundationalism, than with actual biblical Christianity.
Postmodernism in the Emerging Church
I think I’ll let professor and famed “Jesus Creed” blogger Scot McKnight do most of the explaining. He’s written an excellent piece concerning the Emerging Church and Postmodernism, which can be found here. McKnight says that postmodernism does not reject truth, but rejects the idea that meta-narratives can be proved by rational and objective means. A meta-narrative is a “comprehensive explanation of reality,” which I think can be regarded, in terms more might be familiar with, as a systematic worldview. McKnight compares this to Augustine’s, “I believe in order to understand.” It’s similar to pressuppositional apologetics‘ defense of the need of circular reasoning when arguing for an ultimate authority.
Instead of absolute proofs, McKnight says that the “Emerging Movement form of post-modernity operates with a ‘proper confidence’ or a ‘chastened epistemology.’” Basically, this results in a view that acknowledges that all human knowledge is limited, that it is only God who is absolute truth, and that it is only God who can completely understand absolute truth. It is “by trusting in God, and by living in the way of Jesus, and by living out as a community of faith” that truth is found by Emerging types who are postmodernist (which not all are).
Just as no one asks for a rational proof for love, Christianity does not need to be (and cannot be according to some) proved in a rational, objective fashion. The focus for emerging types is not on proof, but on faith and trust in God. As McKnight wrote,
I know Jesus died for me not because I can prove it but because I trust God’s work in Jesus Christ. That is the only kind of proof I can offer for love. I love, therefore, I know I love and am loved.
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If one is merely acknowledging the fact that humans cannot know completely, then I wholeheartedly agree. The danger in the emerging movement comes not from addressing postmodernism, but embracing it.
Some in the EC have protested modernism so much that they have unwittingly embraced postmodernism without acknowledging or understanding postmodernism’s inherent weaknesses as well.
Carson deals primarily with this issue in his book, which I will have to review on here sometime soon.
In the book The Church In Emerging Culture Micheal Horton makes the point that post-modernity is as foreign to the church as modernity is. That is to say both are secular world-views (If you want to understand how modernity is secular look at the work that is being done by those promoting Radical Orthodoxy) that do not come from scripture. The church right now is really struggling with post-modernity because in a lot of place it has attached itself to modernity and now doesn’t know how to deal with the critique (spoiler for my next post). The answer is simple really; jettison modernity and embrace biblical truth and you’ll begin to see what is acceptable in post-modernity…but that admittedly is really hard to do.
There are things in both modernity and post-modernity that do match up with the Christian worldview, but there are a lot of things that don’t. What the church needs right now is prophets (those who are knowledgeable in this field and have discernment) with a critical eye to examine it and inform the church about it.
Well put Bryan. Sounds like you have an interesting article coming up.
http://teampyro.blogspot.com/2007/09/biblical-propositions-yoga-positions.html
Jason, check out this link. It includes a podcast that Pagitt made regarding a discussion he had after his CCN interview with MacArthur. It’s pretty damning, maybe literally so. I think I am finding myself getting pretty close to wondering aloud if one can say Pagitt is a Christian. He mockingly laughs about Christians going to the Bible as an answer to stress. AMAZING!
Oops, Jasen, not Jason.
As my friend said, Pagitt represents the most left portion of the Emerging movement, but then again, isn’t he the logical end to the uncritical embrace of postmodernism that is found in almost all Emerging churches?
First, I disagree that the “embrace of of postmodernism” in emerging churches is uncritical. I’m not sure what you mean by “logical end.” If you mean that the logical end is relativism or denial of scriptural sufficiency, then I’d disagree. That would be similar to saying that the logical end of churches embrace of modernity is shown by the Jesus Seminar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus_Seminar), or that the logical end of Calvinism is no evangelism.
As for Pagitt’s comment I think it was way overblown. He’s looking at stress as more of a medical issue, thus his implication that reading scripture might not be the most useful thing to do in this case. If he had made the joke about weight loss instead of stress would it be ok?
Anyways, if people want to make the case that Pagitt doesn’t believe in the sufficiency of scripture (which he might not depending on how you define sufficient) there are much better ways of making that case.
Ok, I should modify that last statement… I shouldn’t have said “almost all Emerging churches.” I would change that to read “many Emerging churches/leaders.”
That said, the logical end of an uncritical embrace of postmodernism is Doug Pagitt (and those in the Emerging movement who are unwilling to PROPERLY critique postmodernism). Those who are willing (Driscoll, etc) do not represent that logical end. Or to take your example, HYPER-Calvinism (not Calvinism) has as its logical end the lack of evangelism. The logical end of the Emerging movement as a whole hopefully is NOT Pagitt or McLaren, but that remains to be seen.
I am surprised and dismayed by your continued defense of Pagitt. You are now getting to a point where you seem willing to reach for straws to defend his evermore egregious statements. This is actually the first time that I’ve seen or read something regarding him where he has no room; he completely showed himself to be a fraud. No Christian (much less a pastor) should so denigrate a fellow believer as he did in that post-interview conversation to Dr. MacArthur (“I apologize for him…”). That unbeliever he was speaking to gave him a ripe opportunity to give a Biblical response and to share the Gospel with her, but instead he was a spiritual coward and ripped on MacArthur.
As for what Pagitt was referring to when he said “stress,” does it matter? Stress is obviously not just a “medical condition,” as yoga is not proposed as primarily a medical solution but a SPIRITUAL one. Thus, to go elsewhere than the Bible for a spiritual solution is to imply that the Bible, Christianity, and God are not sufficient in answering all of life’s spiritual issues. And Pagitt mocks that idea.
It’s becoming more and more clear that Pagitt is leading people astray and is a false teacher. Scriptures have some pretty harsh words for those people.
I’m not defending things he said about MacArthur.
To say that stress is just not a medical condition is to admit that it partially is a medical condition. And there’s reliable evidence that physical things like exercise can positively impact some one’s stress levels (and various other things, like depression).
And concerning Yoga, I agree with what MacArthur said about it:
“Well that would depend on how the yoga is conducted. If it’s just purely exercise, and you’re a strong Christian, it probably wouldn’t have any impact on your faith.”
Just because you’re doing something called yoga, doesn’t mean you’re doing something you shouldn’t spiritually. I wouldn’t use the term yoga, because it’d probably confuse people (if you’re doing the body positioning aspects and not also ways of mediating, etc. that are not Christian), but adopting names from pagan places is nothing new. Even some of the names of God in the OT were adopted from pagan god names.