{"id":20514,"date":"2018-11-21T18:13:53","date_gmt":"2018-11-22T02:13:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=20514"},"modified":"2018-11-27T01:47:40","modified_gmt":"2018-11-27T09:47:40","slug":"where-and-who-is-god-in-the-chaos-of-ideas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/where-and-who-is-god-in-the-chaos-of-ideas\/","title":{"rendered":"Theology in the chaos of ideas: Grenz & Olson"},"content":{"rendered":"

Further back than I care to remember, I wrote a dissertation titled, Interpreting the Text: The Gulf between Trained Clergy and the Laity<\/em>.[1]<\/a>The motivation came at the end of my first year in ordained ministry. What surprised me was the cavernous gap spanning the way I viewed scripture and society in contrast to the people who made up the community in which served. I still remember the push-back I received from older colleagues who believed that my concern was to provide people teaching that comforted and affirmed their beliefs and values, while at the same time provoking the congregation to live what they believed. This advice didn\u2019t sit well with me. Moreover, in contrast to a keeping-the-peace model of ministry, many of my colleagues were doing precisely the opposite by regularly lobbing theological bombs that dismembered the conservative ‘grounds of people\u2019s being’. Neither of these approaches felt palatable pastorally, or missionally, in a time when postmodernism was emerging from the dark halls of psychology into the light of mainstream thinking. Consequently, the mind chaffing questions erupted, \u2018why the theological gap between clergy and laity?\u2019 and why the two unhelpful clerical responses?\u2019.<\/p>\n

Re-reading Stanley Grenz and Roger Olson\u2019s book, Who Needs Theology?: An Invitation to the Study of God <\/em>prompted me to find my dissertation and re-read it.[2]<\/a>For something so old now, it wasn\u2019t half bad, which, by extension meant it was slightly better than half-good. However, I was asking the right questions. Looking at the date of Grenz and Olson\u2019s book (1996), they were writing in a similar era and also attending to the same problem. Politically the western world had begun a seismic shift in social, economic and ethical thinking, and the ordinary people of God were unprepared by pastors, who were equally ill-equipped, to navigate the brewing revolution.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Postmodern Architecture – new and old<\/p><\/div>\n

At the time Grenz and Olson wrote, Who Needs Theology<\/em>, others were also responding to the changing context, and their writings became a guide to help pastors and church ministry leaders understand what was happening, while simultaneously forming a plan to shift Christian paradigms in a new age. Mark Noll\u2019s Scandal of the Evangelical Mind<\/em> was an unwelcome indictment of American Evangelical thinking, but in fairness, it was a stinging rebuke of Evangelicals lack of reciprocal intellectual engagement worldwide.[4]<\/a>In 1999, Robert Webber released, Ancient-Future Faith<\/em> as a voice for faith traditions in the clamour of postmodernism,[5]<\/a>while Webber\u2019s The Younger Evangelicals<\/em>sagely, but pointedly, spoke to a passing generation about their fear of the new winds blowing across their comfortable religious landscape.[6]<\/a>At the same time the ethicist and public intellectual, Stanley Hauerwas teamed up with historian, Alex Sider, to encourage new ways of starting theological discourse by making the teaching of the Mennonite, John Yoder, accessible to those who had never heard of him, and were unlikely to if old evangelical publishing companies had their way.[7]<\/a>Even today, the era in which Grenz and Olson became significant contributors to a more open evangelical movement, continues. Despite his death in 2005, Grenz\u2019 writing remains an important and pivotal part of evangelical reconsideration, such that, by 2008, Mark Noll was encouraging Evangelical and Catholic dialogue about the future of Christian learning as reciprocity between what was, what is, and what is yet to come.[8]<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s nearly thirty years since I wrote my \u2018half-good\u2019 dissertation and about twenty-five years from the time when I read Who needs Theology<\/em>. Even now I reflect on it as a helpful resource to navigate the world of conservative Christian dogma and engage with the continually unfolding world of justice-based faith movements and the rapidly emerging acceptance of theological deconstructionism.<\/p>\n

Written for interested lay people and pastors the book makes self-evident observations about the \u2018who\u2019s who\u2019 of Bible interpretation and theological thinking: folk theology, lay theology, ministerial theology, professional theology, and academic theology. Though the authors don\u2019t expressly articulate it, folk theology is pervasive in much of evangelicalism. The authors describe it as, “unreflective beliefs based on blind faith in a tradition of some kind” which, in pastoral leadership underscores the tension of telling people what they want to hear and what they need to think about. At the other end of the spectrum, they claim academic theology is too often, “disconnected from the church and has little to do with concrete Christian living”.[9]<\/a>However, on this last point, I wonder if the authors were unkind to academics, as not all ideas need to be rooted in pragmatics; thought experiments and ideas need discussion as rational concepts without legs. Conversations about the Holy Trinity, for example, will rarely reach the needs of ordinary thinkers and actors, but the conceptions surrounding the nature of the Trinity requires constant querying if the mystery is to remain as theological mystery and not be pragmatically relegated to the margins of theological oblivion.<\/p>\n

To the overzealous reader, Grenz and Olson\u2019s identification of two major theological tasks: Critical and Construction, may seem simplistic in 2018. However, remembering the context, they were helpful initial tools for critical engagement. It\u2019s worth remembering their Critical methodology that required an examining and evaluating Christian beliefs and then categorising those beliefs as dogma, doctrine, or opinion was threatening to many; despite being essential.[10]<\/a><\/p>\n

Their construction task of theology was to make sense of the outcomes of Critical evaluation.\u00a0How do we, “articulate our [evaluated] foundational beliefs about God and the world for the sake of living as Christians in our contemporary context.\u201d.[11]<\/a>\u00a0The tools for that construction task include three synoptic disciplines: develop a broad encompassing vision of the biblical message, know the theological heritage of the church, and understand contemporary culture. They argued that a synoptic understanding is the crucial, \u201cholistic perspective that attempts to draw into coherence the otherwise blooming, buzzing confusion of data.<\/a>\u201d[12]<\/a><\/p>\n

The book was written a while back, and it was an early start to new thinking. We\u2019ve come a long way since 1996, which is fortunate because the \u201cblooming, buzzing confusion of data\u201d has only increased. However, the books primary starting point on the absolute importance of doing theology and the simple tasks offered to that end hasn\u2019t changed; they remain a good starting point for all fledgeling theologians \u2013 be they folk, or incoherent academic.<\/p>\n

Notes<\/strong><\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>Digby Wilkinson, \u201cInterpreting the Text: The Gulf Between Trained Clergy and the Laity\u201d (Dissertation, Baptist Theological College, 1992).<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a>Stanley J. Grenz and Roger E. Olson, Who Needs Theology?: An Invitation to the Study of God<\/em>(Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 1996).<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a>Wilkinson, \u201cInterpreting the Text: The Gulf Between Trained Clergy and the Laity\u201d.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a>Mark A. Noll, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind<\/em>(Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1994).<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a>Robert E Webber, Ancient-Future Faith: Rethinking Evangelicalism for a Postmodern World<\/em>, 7th print. ed. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1999).<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a>Robert E. Webber, The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World<\/em>(Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 2002; reprint, 2nd).<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a>John Howard Yoder, Preface to Theology: Christology and Theological Method<\/em>, ed. Stanley Hauerwas and Alex Sider (Brazos Press, 2002-04-01).<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a>Mark A. Noll and James Turner, The Future of Christian Learning: An Evangelical and Catholic Dialogue<\/em>, ed. Thomas Albert Howard (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2008).<\/p>\n

[9]<\/a>Grenz and Olson, Who Needs Theology?: An Invitation to the Study of God<\/em>.27<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a>Ibid.80<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a>Ibid.80<\/p>\n

[12]<\/a>Ibid.146<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Bibliography<\/strong><\/p>\n

Grenz, Stanley J., and Roger E. Olson. Who Needs Theology?: An Invitation to the Study of God<\/em>. Downers Grove, Illinois: InterVarsity Press, 1996.<\/p>\n

Noll, Mark A.The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind<\/em>. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1994.<\/p>\n

Noll, Mark A., and James Turner.The Future of Christian Learning: An Evangelical and Catholic Dialogue<\/em>. ed. Thomas Albert Howard. Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos Press, 2008.<\/p>\n

Webber, Robert E.Ancient-Future Faith : Rethinking Evangelicalism for a Postmodern World<\/em>. 7th print. ed. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 1999.<\/p>\n

Webber, Robert E.The Younger Evangelicals: Facing the Challenges of the New World<\/em>. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books, 2002. Reprint 2nd.<\/p>\n

Wilkinson, Digby. \u201cInterpreting the Text: The Gulf Between Trained Clergy and the Laity.\u201d Dissertation, Baptist Theological College, 1992.<\/p>\n

Yoder, John Howard.Preface to Theology: Christology and Theological Method<\/em>. ed. Stanley Haurewas, and Alex Sider. Brazos Press, 2002.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Further back than I care to remember, I wrote a dissertation titled, Interpreting the Text: The Gulf between Trained Clergy and the Laity.[1]The motivation came at the end of my first year in ordained ministry. What surprised me was the cavernous gap spanning the way I viewed scripture and society in contrast to the people […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"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":[198,753,532,698],"class_list":["post-20514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-grenz","tag-grenz-and-olson","tag-olson","tag-who-needs-theology","cohort-lgp9"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20514","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\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20514"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20550,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20514\/revisions\/20550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}