{"id":11182,"date":"2017-01-25T22:17:41","date_gmt":"2017-01-26T06:17:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dminlgp.com\/?p=11182"},"modified":"2017-01-25T22:17:41","modified_gmt":"2017-01-26T06:17:41","slug":"keepin-it-real","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/keepin-it-real\/","title":{"rendered":"Keepin’ it Real"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Christian\"<\/a><\/p>\n

When working with people from different ethnicities, cultures or eras, contextual theology is critical to consider so we can propel people towards a relationship with God versus pushing them away from Him.\u00a0 Transforming theology into contextual theology not only makes sense but gives freedom for individuals to represent the nature of God in a way that is comprehensible to those individuals.<\/p>\n

I find this to be a refreshing and inviting way to introduce theology, despite how this bumps against some of my rigid Christian education or objective classic theology I’ve experienced. To operate in contextual theology frees me up from the staunch belief system that I am compromising the integrity of the gospel because I’m changing it to fit the environment; it allows me to be subjective and culture friendly while presenting theology. This is what I had to learn, and am still learning to do when I counsel with non-believers who have no concept of God in their lives or when their perception of God is judgmental, harsh, and punitive. It makes me go to the person and learn the history, experiences, and culture of the individual instead of making the person come to me when presenting theology or spiritual concepts. In social work, this is called treating the “person in the environment” methodology. When you treat the person from their environment, it changes your perspective and influences your therapy techniques.<\/p>\n

Similarly, when we operate from the perspective of contextual theology, we also read the Bible in context to its’ culture. This is valuable when we attempt to apply certain scriptures to our culture, as we can take passages out of context and perceive it to be objective, classic theology, versus contextual theology that fosters a subjective view. Tragically, teaching the Bible out of context has created grounds for: instituting slavery, exaggerative punitive measures to children, spiritual abuse of leaders, and gender biases to name a few. Teaching the Bible within context makes a significant difference in evangelizing successfully.<\/p>\n

Conversely, we can compromise and betray the integrity of Christianity when we allow culture to have too much of an influence in shaping it. Finding the balance where culture does not define theology and theology is not incongruent with culture is a challenging task to define and achieve. Ideally, theology and culture need to develop a symbiotic relationship to make Christianity appealing and comprehensible to society.<\/p>\n

The various models used to express contextual theology are unique solutions to the diversity one encounters in sharing Christianity, and provides creative modalities in teaching theology. \u00a0Out of the 6 contextual theology models described, the one that seems to best describe the spirit of contextual theology is the Translation model. Presenting Christianity as something that is relevant and pertinent to the current culture, while preserving the spirit and integrity of Christianity appears to embody the heart of contextual theology. The Anthropological model is intriguing, as it emphasizes the goodness of the person and the healing God offers to people.\u00a0 This model could be paralleled to some psychology theories that capitalize on the value of humans and relationships. As a therapist, I find myself often using these two models to bring about spiritual and emotional healing in a person’s life and their relationships. But now I know what I am technically doing and look forward to strategically applying more contextual theology principles in my work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When working with people from different ethnicities, cultures or eras, contextual theology is critical to consider so we can propel people towards a relationship with God versus pushing them away from Him.\u00a0 Transforming theology into contextual theology not only makes sense but gives freedom for individuals to represent the nature of God in a way […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":86,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[15,13],"class_list":["post-11182","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bevans","tag-garner","cohort-lgp7"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/86"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11182\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}