Seeking Repentance

For the last couple of years I have been enmeshed with this conversation/movement called "Emergent." (or maybe its the emerging church.....heck i don't even know). I'm looking forward to the recent directions it is taking and the future path that I will travel with it. Either way, I have felt my faith be loosed, unravel, laid bare and almost lost at times. I have been gathering up the pieces and beginning to reassemble them but not as concrete slabs stacked one on top of the other. Rather, they are more like a web of belief (as flimsy as it may seem) that is interwoven in the fabric of my life. During this transition, I have asked myself deep questions as well as meaningless ones. I stood as one who was angry with the institution that man built called "church." My trust in their leadership and style and values and goals were trampled under my "revolutionary" new epiphany. Now I could dismiss those that were "modern" and begin to live out a faithful "postmodern/emerging" live, separated from those mechicalistic, colonial driven, so-called Christians.

Even though I hailed myself as "Enlightened" (how ironic), I began to see myself as one bringing disunity upon what God had deemed good. Actually, the credit goes to my wife who helped me see this ugly root that was beginning to form within my core. It was almost as if my negative reaction towards modern Christians/church was a reaction from being in conversation with Emergent, something I'm sure it didn't intend.

Now I'm not trying to pretend that I don't get mad at Christianity (myself included) or the institutional church from time to time, but I am learning and striving to honor all types of ecclesiastical forms, whether high or low expressions of church (aka: deep ecclesiology). I once heard someone describe this in a child/parent metaphor. The child might not agree with all his parents believe or taught him/her, but they honor they parents and see that their identity is rooted in the name given them. And so it is with us. Sure we may not appreciate a lot of what moderism has done to the body of Christ, but we are products of it and should realize that she is not our enemy. Instead, she has been a guide and a pilgrim along this journey and we should honor her and not ignore the name she gave us. Our intention should not be reactionary towards what someone else deems as right or good or even negative, but we should live out our legacy in the context we (or God) see fit and appreciate those that went before us as well as those going along side us who march to a different beat.