I was a young adult when the classic movie “The Karate Kid” came out. It was great fun watching the underdog succeed. I appreciate it more, however, for the funny yet wise sayings of Mr. Miyagi.
One came to mind while I was reading chapter 2 and 3 of TNC. “You walk down the street. Right side, safe. Left side safe. You walk in middle; squish like grape.” The moral of the story? The third way that Tony speaks about regularly in this book is stinking dangerous!
Tony tries desperately to compare this third way with the Protestant Reformation, and he is left wanting. During this reformation, he forgets that the true church, that had existed for 1500 years (much of it underground) was the lava that burst forth through the crust which was the Apostate Roman Catholic System.
Martin Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Tyndale, and others, for all their foibles, were men who were not seeking a third way, rather, they were seeking God’s way in coming out of the prison system of the false Church of Rome.
During this ’soul searching’ comparison, a few things come out about Tony and Emergent. First, and one that really calls into question whether these people are really Christians at all is the attack on the truth of the scripture. Tony will say that these are people having a conversation, but on page 19, like Rob Bell does in his book Velvet Elvis, Tony slyly calls into question whether the Bible can be trusted.
Tony argues that emergents desire to question the foundations, even the Bible. In doing so, He calls God a liar. He also opens the door to deconstruct the Bible like it is some normal book of literature. In fact, Tony does not see the Bible as a Holy Book, rather, He sees it as propaganda. Page 45 is very telling, where Tony compares the Bible to Mao’s little red book. Is the Bible really to be reduced to this type of propaganda?
Back to the third way. On page 45, he sets the stage, calling into question reading the Bible in a healthy way, saying that most evangelicals read the Bible to prove their views to be right concerning homosexuals and women in leadership. These would be those on the right, both politically and religiously, those rotten fundamentalists. Then those on the left, both religiously and politically, those mainliners, who view the Bible with skepticism. These groups fight a continual tug of war. They fight between church polity, political parties, right interpretation of scriptures, social issues, and cultures. These wars between right and left have turned off these emergents, causing them to want to drop out. Then there is the third way.
The third way is to not be beholden to any one church- the church is organic, and as we cultivate our way through life we find different places in our culture that we can see God, and therefore those things are right and good. There is no sacred and secular- everything is sacred! We do not want to impact culture, nor do we want culture to impact us. Really, there is no culture. We want to do things in the way of Jesus, how he loved and accepted anybody.
The thought of wrath and judgement does not align with their view of Christ, so they leave that part out. Those in the third way do not hold to any political parties, rather, they pick and choose which planks are important to them. They don’t like the parties, (but they will vote for Obama because of a sense that he is anti-establishment, and brings a subjective feel of hope) Of course the Bible is a sacred text, but the third way stays away from terms like inerrant and sufficient, they do not believe that it is sufficient for doctrine.
They believe that it is living, not in the way that it says, but in the way that culture (which does not exist) can help us understand that Paul did not really mean that women shouldn’t be leaders in Church, or that homosexuality is a sin that will separate from God. No, homosexuality is to be honored and understood, and we should be accepting. After all, Jesus is a welcoming guy. He is our good buddy in the sky. He is not going to judge us, because we are joining with him to bring our picture of his kingdom here to earth.
Mr. Miayagi had it right. The emergents Third way is unsafe (just the way they like it) Unfortunately, they will wind up being squished like the proverbial grape when that truck of judgement and wrath that they do not believe in runs them over.
~ Pastorboy
Doug
pastorboy
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