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M-Paul -> RE: The Emergent Church (7/1/2008 9:54:05 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: rhippie
I need some info on this "church". I've seen lots of resources to show what is wrong but I'm looking for personal experiences. I'm also curious about any connections to "The Simple Church" paradigm
Christians using the label “evangelical” for self-identification have a concept of the emerging church that no one in the movement recognizes. However, if the emergent church is actually defined as new forms of church structure and worship made possible due to new forms of technology, then the simple church is emergent in the sense that it is a form of a house church.
The house church was actually referred to as “emerging” before there were big technological changes affecting the church, but it was the internet that gave an additional big boost to the movement, as these people could start conversing with each other so easily and over such a big area, and outside of the resistance of the traditional church. Then, the question came up, that if the term “emerging” is used with church, doesn’t that mean “postmodern,” as it would, for instance, in literature. The emerging church people said that there was no way for the term “postmodern” to apply to the emerging church, but the possibility of its applicability might occur in the future, the discussion of which could occur now. However, then evangelical scholars jumped on the term, and used it to condemn the movement. The emergent church people say their response is merely a sham.
However, if there is any church structure in the emerging church movement that could be conceived of as “postmodern,” I think that would be the house church, due to its focus on the individual, the ministry of all believers, and due to its rejection of traditional church structure in favor of merely just following the bible, which in reality is a new form of doing church for our time.
The simple church is a house church without whole church structure. They don’t even have members. In my opinion, their arguments dissolving away scripture on whole church government are ridiculous. However, people in the simple church really are reacting to abuse from the traditional church, and the simple church is usually found in environments where abuse has been prevalent. Unfortunately, without whole church government, they make themselves even more vulnerable to abuse and also heresy.
However, at times it seems there is a focus on the abuses of the traditional church in the house church/ whole church structure. I think this stems to a large measure from the house church freeing ones mentality on what constitutes abuse. I didn’t leave the traditional church because of abuse, but once I was in the house church, I realized how much abuse there really was in my former environments, that I had been conditioned to accept as normal. But in the house church/ whole church we preach complete unity with the traditional congregational churches, and we avoid judging people from other church structures, such as Episcopal.
M-Paul
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