How do you move from renewal to being a church movement?
8 Feb 2010
So with my post yesterday, that gave a summary of Caleb Maskells’ call to the association of vineyard churches, to understand it’s future as one moving from renewal of church into being a movement of disciple making churches, what are the immediate questions and responses to that, that I have? What do you have?
1. Learning from history: The easiest question to ask, and hardest to answer, how? Evangelical history can be seen as the move of Christians wanting to renew existing churches, who end up planting, and forming their own churches and church movement. What lessons can we learn from that history and process, of what to attend to and what not to do? Again with Caleb as a church historian, I’d love to have hear him do that for us, and maybe he’ll jump into the comments here with some ideas from Church history.
2. Institutional gearing: Caleb indicated that within the Vineyard’s own history, that it didn’t have the internal mechanisms to respond to the challenges it faced and questions that were asked. How will it make that transition this time? Or to put it more crudely how does the movement not only ask the questions further, and explore the implications together, and put it’s institutional weight behind that process?
One immediate thought I have in response:
Ecclesiology & Consumerism: We desperately need an understanding of the nature of church, if we are ever to stop being captive to the fads of consumer culture and the market. I’m increasingly convinced that Evangelicalism is on the one hand intrinsic to the development of capitalism, whilst at the same time having within it’s history the resources and experiences of robust responses to market society.
The desire to be missional in the markets but not of them, led ultimately being too much of them. A flexible and pragmatic ecclesiology allowed the formation of evangelical faith in the new emerging capitalist market societies of the west, but in the end ceded it’s understanding of the nature of church to the dispensing of religious goods and services.And many emerging ecclesiologies seem to be as captive to the same problems, not matter how much they protest otherwise.
And within that diagnosis renewal can be understood as a fad, the means to feel good, and have God as the provider of consumer dreams. Too often the most important elements of life of 1) relationships, 2) where we live, and 3) our work, is not sourced from missional imaginations, but from consumer dreams. More crudely you might have Oprah, but I have Jesus, who trumps you, to get me the same way of life you are after.
What does it mean to have an identity within Church, that is not about whether church works for me, how it makes me feel, what it gets me, but instead is about missional identity, can be addressed by a turn to understanding the church in history. Our own Vineyard history, our larger rich evangelical history and the even greater depths of the traditioned life of the Church in history.
And within that exploration we might discover that our theology of the Kingdom and experience of the Spirit, remain our greatest resources to this transition. The now and not yet of the Kingdom frames a way of life that is missional, all our hopes and aspirations for life. Our understanding of the Spirit, allows us to explore how He can rescue us from captivity to consumer agency and allows us to enter into identity with others, in the body of Christ, where the Church is the public of the Holy Spirit.
Tradition (which as Oliver O’Donovan reminds us is ’spontaneity in slow motion’), Kingdom and Spirit, might be the way forward for us. As Oliver O’Donovan puts it. And of course that all begs the question, what does that look like in the real world in practice? I’ll put some suggestions into another post in this series for that.
Tagged: ecclesiology, Vineyard Churches
10 comments
Trackback
Comment by Jason Coker
11.34 pm on 8 Feb 2010
You wrote:
“And within that exploration we might discover that our theology of the Kingdom and experience of the Spirit, remain our greatest resources to this transition.”
For what it’s worth, I couldn’t agree more. Middle of last year, as I approached the church planting process, I was wrestling powerfully with whether or not to remain in the Vineyard . I have friends whose networks are much more engaged with the pursuit of being missional. That is very important to me, and it’s a conversation that feels somewhat marginalized in the Vineyard.
However, in the final assessment, I could find no other group that held to a robust Kingdom theology and a vibrant grounding in a healthy form of Holy Spirit ministry (I think the exception would be certain camps in the Anglican church). I think these make us well positioned for the future, and when I think of Wimber saying, “Take the best and go,” I think of these two things as “the best” aspect of Vineyard legacy.
That combined with my longstanding relationships kept me in the Vineyard.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jason Clark
11.37 am on 9 Feb 2010
Hi Jason, I think much of the missional movement of the last 10 years has become very ‘post-charismatic’, for lots of reasons.
Understanding the spirit, within kingdom and mission, seems vital to any future church that sees people come to faith?
Reply to this comment
Comment by Stuart
6.44 pm on 11 Feb 2010
Sorry for being ignorant but what are you meaning by ‘missional’. Wikipedia says it has at least two meanings.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jason Clark
7.03 pm on 11 Feb 2010
HI Stuart, a good question, of the short hand we are using for large discourses.
A dictionary or Wikipedia will give you a ‘thin’ account of the term missional, but for a ‘thick’ understanding of the term, as to how we are using it here, see:
http://jrwoodward.net/2008/11/a-primer-on-todays-missional-church/
Reply to this comment
Comment by Stuart
10.32 pm on 12 Feb 2010
Thank you Jason for the link about the term missional, and for running these discussions.
In JR Woodward’s ‘A Working Definition of Missional Church’ he says that to be a Missional church is to ‘join God in the renewal of all things.’ If the Vineyard is to move from being a ‘renewal movement’ to a ‘church movement’ does that mean it must become less missional?
Are we dealing with different definitions or aspects of renewal? I think a bit more clarity is needed.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jason Clark
11.34 pm on 12 Feb 2010
Hi Stuart,
By renewal here we are talking about charismatic renewal. It does not mean that to be missional does not need a renewing experience of the spirit. But it does mean that a focus on the experience if christians, is not the same as the focus on being missional with non christians.
Jase
Comments won’t nest below this level.
Comment by Stuart
1.19 pm on 19 Feb 2010
I agree Jason. Somehow the renewal ‘experience’ has been separated in many peoples thinking from being missional (if I understand the term correctly). This highlights the separation of renewal ‘experience’ from a renewal of our minds to understand the will of God. This is a major concern for me and why I agree with the thrust of what I think Caleb is saying. I think there should be a shift from defining the Vineyard by the strengths it has that corresponds to a lack in other churches (after all, if the Vineyard has been successful in being a renewal movement then such lack should have diminished somewhat in those open to such a renewal). In my own use of the words, that is to move from thinking about ‘distinctives’ to thinking about ‘values’ within a more rounded understanding of Church.
I also agree that there is much more to understand in the area of Kingdom theology. The understanding of the dynamics of the Kingdom is, in my view, critical to moving forward and being able to adapt to social changes around us without losing what we have been given. Derek Morphew’s teaching has helped me in this area but I think there is much more to unpack.
Both of these areas take me back to the need to go to the scriptures and let the Holy Spirit lead us into all truth – both understanding and expression.
Reply here
Comment by Silent Witness
3.45 pm on 9 Feb 2010
Very good questions. As someone working on a House Church plant I can see where these questions will be helpful in the process I am going through.
Reply to this comment
Comment by Joshua Hopping
2.01 am on 17 Feb 2010
“What lessons can we learn from that history and process…”
In a lot of ways, the Vineyard Movement reminds me of the Moravian Church during their formative years (1457-1700~). Similar to the Vineyard, the Moravian Church was established and ran by lay-men with little to no formal theological training (yes, Wimber was on staff at Fuller, but most of the folks at the beginning where pragmatic individuals who focused more on what worked instead of theory or theological).
Soon the Moravians became a breath of fresh air in the midst of a region controlled by the Roman Catholic Church. They focused on teaching the people in their language (Vineyard – casual, everyday preaching style), having lay people give out the communion (Vineyard – everyone can play), married priests, and salvation by faith.
As time marched on, the Moravians begin to realized that they could not just rely on lay people to led the movement. They needed the help and guidance of the scholars within their group to root their practices in the Word of God. However, this was not an easy transition for them as most of the people within the movement did not like scholars or professional clergy members. Yet, the leaders of the Moravian Church knew that if they were going to keep on the course that God had for them, they were going to have to discuss and record their theology.
In the same way, the Vineyard Movement is beginning to enlist the help of its scholars to document and discuss the practices and beliefs lived out over the last 30 years. As this happens, I would not be surprised if we get a lot of push back from the more pragmatic, “Spirit-led” crowd within the Vineyard. The challenge to the leadership is going to be whether or not they are willing to weather the storm. Or given in…
I hope that Vineyard will push on through this storm – even if lose folks – with the hope that we will come out stronger and with a deeply rooted Kingdom Theology.
Similar to how the theology of the Moravains spawned a 100-plus year, 24 hour, 7 days a week prayer movement; a missionary movement that sent out more missionaries in 30 years then 200 years of Protestantism (and, I might add, that the missionaries where all lay people trained in “servant evangelism”); and the praises of both Luther and Calvin (who said that they were closer to the truth then either one of their groups).
I’m sure that are tons more lessons to be learned from the Moravian Church (seeing how close the Vineyard Movement mirrors their movement)…. But that all I can recall off the top of my head. =/
Reply to this comment
Comment by Jason Clark
11.30 am on 17 Feb 2010
That’s a great analogue from church history, tnx.
Reply to this comment