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The Evangelical Alliance in the UK, have been asking Christians to support the Promise to Vote campaign.
I became a christian just before the age of 18, and my first opportunity to vote. Before and since them I have always thought that every person, of any faith and none should vote. By that I mean that if people want an opinion on government they should vote.
And by voting that includes spoiling a ballot form, for ‘none of the above’ which is still counted within our voting system and acknowledged. And after voting in several general elections I remain as convinced about that involvement and obligation as a member of a democratic country.
I don’t believe in the separation of faith from politics, convinced as I am that secularists and atheists have clear positions on faith, that are not precluded from public life, and that Christians similarly should not suspend their beliefs from public life. And that includes voting.
I also believe all forms of government are penultimate, fallen, and no matter how good, are not a substitute for the church in terms of identity for Christians. Politics can be engaged in passionately by Christians, but should always be something seen as a mixed bag and unable to bring what only God can bring. There can be no such thing as a ‘Christian government’, or one party that all christians should vote for.
And within that, I do think the role of Christians in voting, and politics is to remind governments of their responsibilities for justice and law. My confidence for that comes from what I think the resurrection of Jesus made manifest, and began with the early church and the Roman Empire. Christians are to pray for and engage with earthly rulers, and remind them of where their authority comes from, and that their authority is limited.
So after that reflection, I think I do see voting as a moral obligation for Christians, within that framework. And more than that, that voting is only the beginning of engagement with politics and public life that Chrstians need to attend to. As I write this I think that most Christians either have no involvement in politics, or are at the other extreme of collapsing faith into party politics.
So how do you see it?
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Back on the 31st january, in my post ‘Is there any move left in the movement‘, I suggested that I was going to take the presentation of 10 Vineyard Church values/distinctives, and explore how they might be run against some of the necessary theological questions of evangelicalism/emerging culture that the emerging church conversation has raised over the last 10 years.
Rather than do that on my own, we have some guest bloggers, and vineyard leaders doing theology who are going to be taking part in that here. Steve Burnhope (UK), Steve Hamilton (US), Steve Schenk (US), and Jason Coker (US), will be lending their blogging, and theological reflections to that end.
More details about the series will come out here next week. In practice we’ll take one value each week, with guest authors posting their theological re-imagings of them.
So do join in the discussions and comment with your responses, and if any of you want to join in with guest posts do drop me a line. I’m excited and looking forward to this very much.
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Bible Fresh is billed as a ‘partnership of over fifty agencies, festivals, colleges and denominations who are joining’ to help people grow in confidence with the bible, co-inciding with the 400th anniversary of the Kings James Bible.
I’ve been invited to speak at the London launch event on the 30th march, 6pm, at the London Institute of Christianity.
You can download a detailed flyer with event information here for London and other locations here.
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I’m back from a rich time at the Society of Vineyard Scholars. After sitting through papers and panels for 2.5 days, I’ve been asking myself, as I’m sure many other people would ask, ‘why bother with all that theology?’
I’ve got a few days off, so will return at the start of next week with a response to that, and the rest of my promised Vineyard Church series, on it’s distinctives and how they might be run against some of the theological issues the emerging church has been raising.
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Bert Waggoner national director of Vineyard Churches USA, made an introduction last night to the first event of the Society of Vineyard Scholars.
He located so well, the hopes for theological reflection at the event within the praxis of movements values, kingdom and mission. But what my attention the most was his conclusion, calling our attention to 4 things that this group was not going to be about. I reproduce them here, not verbatim but rather as I heard/understood them.
1. Smart: We are not the smartest people in vineyard showing each other how smart we are.
2. Critical: This is not a venue to show the vineyard it’s weaknesses, and to give the leaders a list of things that we think it needs to change.
3. Position: The papers and discussions are not necessary the position of vineyard churches. The work here is not an official expression, unless later approved by the movements leaders. It’s a creative space and time, for honest an exchange of ideas about the vineyard movement and theology.
4. Elitism: This is not a place to develop an elite smug intellectualism. We are a group of Christians wanting to be submitted to Christ and be real, with each other. Let’s keep it real, to have earthly engagements on subjects of interest to us and hopefully to God.That warms my heart, gives me hope for our exchanges, which begin with a day of papers and panels today. It’s been great after so many years of being in theological conversations to sit in one with Vineyard people.
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I’m travelling today, to the first event of The Society of Vineyard Scholars.I’ll be presenting a paper, based on some of my PhD research into consumerism, identity formation and ecclesiology.
I’m looking forward not just to the papers and discussions, but the time with other Vineyard pastors, and the hope that we really do rigorously explore some of the theological questions and challenges our movement faces.
I have very much in mind, that it was 1999, when I travelled to a Vineyard event organised by Todd Hunter, that had Dallas Willard, Brian McLaren and Stanley Grenz presenting. That event changed the course of my life, and got me back into the theological reflection and studies, that have shaped the last decade of my life and ministry
This paper ‘ Perspectives on Church, Gospel & Culture in the 21st Century’ by Todd Hunter, now 11 years old (that I remember like it was yesterday), seems so prescient for our discussions this week. In some ways it would make a great paper to have presented again.
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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:
Continue reading »
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Over the last week, we have had a lively discussion here with the post ‘is there any move left in the movement’, prompted by my reflections on a talk by Caleb Maskell.
In that post I promised some follow up, one of which was to review Caleb’s analysis of the vineyard movement , and future possibilities in more detail.
So starting here, I offer an outline of what I heard Caleb say, and then I’ll post some of my questions and reflections in a follow up post.
1. Transition: The vineyard is in transition, moving from a ‘renewal movement’ to a ‘church movement. A movement that renewed the church at large, but that now needs to become a movement of disciple making, and this transition has been and is still, a painful one.
2. Pruning: Caleb drew on some bible passages much used by the Vineyard itself (e.g Isaiah 61), to frame this process as part of season, and the wintering of the Vineyard and a time of pruning that has been taking place, for the necessity and before the possibility of new growth. Things that used to work don’t any more, and many of us in vineyard might be asking if we are a branch that has been cut off.
3. Choice: As a movement we can pursue more extreme forms of renewal and revival, for our orientation, but need to bear in mind the revivals our movement prophesied that didn’t happen, and perhaps instead explore the move to be a ‘church movement’
4. Causes of the Vineyard Wintering:
a. Toronto: The realisation that renewal is not an end in itself no matter how much some of us enjoyed it. The Toronto blessing and the Toronto Vineyard Church, was the moment the Vineyard really went global as a renewal movement amongst a renewal movement. Yet this most famous of vineyard churches stopped being a vineyard church, and the promised revivals didn’t come to pass.
b. Evangelicalism under question: The Evangelicalism that Vineyard based itself on came under fire, with questions from the Emerging Church, about authority, bible, worship, evangelical culture, and rightly so. This rocked the boat of the church in the US and UK. The Vineyard movement didn’t have the institutional gears to respond to this, no matter how much it new the questions were important.
c. Moral Failure: The burn out and major moral failings of some of our most well known leaders, has been ongoing, and a large cause of the pruning and pain.
d. Next generation: The first generation of kids have grown up in the vineyard, and made us consider more directly the questions they are asking about church and faith. This raises the needs for a sense of formation over time and not just in the moment. A church ‘renewal’ is in the moment, whereas a ‘church movement’ looks for things over time, and formation, for practical wisdom alongside the immediacy of the prophetic.
5. Silence not judgment: Seasons of pruning are best met, at least initially, with silence not judgment. Like the feeling of visiting a graveside or ending a marathon, wintering seasons bring a combination of joy and pain, victory and defeat is not easily distilled. But we must bear its weight and we must learn from it. We ignore its lessons at our peril. We are coming into a new season of spring, but we must come with more maturity, with the wisdom born of our suffering.
6. Hope: That hope is that we have the tools, but we must begin to ask the hard questions that arise, for building a movement that makes disciples. There are things to think about theologically and practically, to think these through, and of how we are forming our theological imaginations.
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Back in mid january I mooted the idea of moving my blogging from here back to www.jasonclark.ws. Thanks for all your comments and feedback/suggestions.
I’ve decided to make that move, and this will take place later this month. Reasons I’ve landed on are:
1. Focus: I want to blog about more than Deep Church theological issues, including church planting, Christians and mental health, church leadership, teaching/preaching resources, the nature of full time church ministry etc. Running www.jasonclark.ws and www.deepchurch.org.uk is also a challenge in terms of focus and costs.
2. Deep Church – Jim Belcher: Jim tells me that my site was the inspiration for his book title
A great book, that has a strong presence under ‘Deep Church’, and I want to differentiate this site from there in terms of identity.3. Future developments: A site under my name is easier to develop and change direction than one with a smaller focus.
The Deep Church site will stay alive, but stop being a blog and become a site for resources around that topic, and connections.
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With the post and discussion about what the future of the Vineyard Church movement might hold, these resources from Faith & Leadership on the future of denominations might prove useful.
In particular I found Brian McLaren’s contribution both supportive of what denominations can do, as well visionary with regards to challenges, changes and possibilities.
