Christ is Supreme - Even Over Asian-Americans
Oct 2nd, 2006 by admin
I came back excited for the supremacy of Jesus Christ my Lord and Savior. More than anything, even beyond Post-Modernism and a critique of the Emerging Church, this conference was about Jesus. More than feeling perturbed against the Emerging Church for stripping away the God-savoring doctrines of grace in their view of the church, I feel sorry for them. To lose the wondrous truths about the powerful work of Jesus on the cross and the amazing resurrection and the subsequent exaltation of Christ, would be horrific beyond words. I feel sorry for them that they will not experience the fullest measures of grace and love that the cross brings to all people trust in the name of Jesus. This was sweet to my soul and there is so much to apply, in my ministry, my preaching, my care for souls, and my life as a son of God and a believer of Christ. For this, I am so thankful for this weekend.
What was also notable about this weekend was a conversation I was having in the shuttle ride from my hotel to the airport with a fellow conferee. He was an African-American brother in Christ and the two of us began to discuss the dearth of non-Caucasians at the conference. While I totally agree with Voddie Baucham that diversity must NEVER be the end goal of our worship of Christ, and that sometimes diversity in itself can be misleading and an idol in itself, I also think there is something to the fact that the worship of Christ around the throne will be of all colors, nations, tribes, and tongues. I guess as a person who is a minority, I longed for others of different ethnicities to have the same savoring passion for Jesus there.
I felt this throughout the conference, though it wasn’t something that was overtaking my enjoyment of the time, there were a few reminders that I was in the minority. For example, my friend and I were walking around in downtown Minneapolis, and an SUV pulled up with a number of college girls in the car. They said, “Hey Chinese guys!� And then they moved on to some other verbal epithets of ethnic prejudice. Minneapolis, while an urban center, was still quite unwilling to accept “China men,� it seemed at least at that moment. The incident got me thinking about what was taking place inside the walls of the conference and upon reflection of the conference, I began to see that though the teaching was so wonderful, and yet, there was a dearth of those things related to people of different colors.
The music was one example. It seemed to be focused on the majority audience. Even the faster, livelier songs were turned into muzak sounding praise. I have no problems with such music because I actually love all forms of music of all different ethnicities. In speaking with my African-American brother, he knew of hiphop rappers who actually sing songs using John Piper’s theology!!!! Wow, to hear such music there would have been wonderful, or what about Latin music with Reformed theology, or maybe a bit of a hard-edged song concerning the doctrines of grace? Such music is out there and others like it could really benefit from being intentional in this way so that the doctrines of grace movement does contextualize where it needs to. The Emerging movement gains other ethnicities because they speak a certain language of relationship. The only problem is that without the doctrines of grace, that language of relationship is a dead end and a sinking ship leading to destruction.
When I was with the Evangelical Covenant Church, I was so impressed by their intentional outreach to other ethnicities. They mixed up the worship team to reflect diversity. They openly reached out to Latinos and African-Americans and Asians. The speakers reflected that outreach. It was clear-cut that they made this an intentional act. But as an Asian-American, I still did not feel comfortable there. My heart language, not an Asian language but a Christ-supreme, cross-centered, grace-affixed language, was not spoken there. Can there be both, a contending for the faith with the doctrines of grace, and a place where different peoples come together for the Gospel? I believe so. I think Asian-Americans, like other ethnicities, are unknowingly (and yes, knowingly) being swept in by the Emerging movement and quickly jettisoning the doctrines of grace like the rest of the Emerging Church. The communal, relational, conversational, missional aspect of the Emerging Church speaks to the heart of Asians since they are these very things by culture. And yet, this is a red herring because at the end of the day, relationship apart from the Triune God, the work of Jesus Christ, the propitiating, wrath satisfying cross of Christ, and the exaltation of Jesus is the only way that ultimate relationship could ever occur. This is where reconciliation is in its truest forms. This message needs to be out there. But because of a lack of contextualization, the message is not reaching beyond the walls of the majority American church on a grander scale.
I appreciated what Mark Driscoll said, “Let’s contend for the faith in the one hand and contextualize in the other.� Most of the people at the conference, as he pointed out, are great contenders. Fighting for the doctrines of grace is something that everyone there agreed with, and yet, contextualization is perhaps the great challenge of Reformed-minded people. It can be done, and I hope it will be done across ethnicities.
Our church is in the process of joining Sovereign Grace, an incredible movement of a cross-centered, God-glorifying church. I love the people, the teaching, and the vision. But again, the feel is the same when it comes to reaching those different ethnically. There is clearly an openness to anyone, but the deliberate intentionality to bring this to such people is not so evident.
This is not a call at all to compromise the doctrines of grace with a movement for diversity. I was in such a place before and I felt quite alone. My heart was hungering for truth. But instead, it only received the message, “We are non-Creedal.� No, I have no desire to be in such a place. Instead, my longing is for the contending of the truthful propositions that Jesus Christ is King over all, and all must submit and yield to the King. He has satisfied God’s perfect and righteous wrath. He has borne our sins. He has clothed us with His robe of righteousness when we believe in the powerful name of Jesus. And we are now sons and daughters of the Most High God.
And my longing is that I and we might contextualize this marvelous truth to all cultures and subcultures here in America and to the ends of the earth. I don’t think this is a dream, but a reality (Matthew 24:14; 28:18-20). I just hope that we can see this unfolding each year throughout the Church.
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Sam, sounds like you had a wonderful time. Wish I could have been there.
Some of what you wrote was so inspiring, but I find that some of what you state about the emerging church to not be true, and I think that the fact that you say you feel sorry for them is more than a little condescending. that kind of statement is precisely what doesn’t go over well with many young adults. And trust me, Asian Ams are not being “swept” into the Emerging Church, while many AAs are predisposed to postmodern views of the world, zero of the leading voices in ther emerging church movement are asian. i think a good deal of AA churches are trying to find ways to reach the young generation and they are seeking what mediums of contextualization work just as you say, and that has been one of the greatest challenges, especially when they have preservation of the mother culture as one of their priorities. It’s much like your criticism of diversity for diversity’s sake, except in this case, it’s solidarity for solidarity’s sake.
So I stand with you in the fact of Christ’s work for me, his sacrifice, his atonement, his holiness, his deliverance of me, and I will contend for the faith, that is borne out of his grace and love for me, long before I knew or could comprehend it. But I think that the emerging church can flesh out how some of the contextualization can take place. There are good things there if you look, but invite them also into your world, don’t feel sorry for them or perturbed. In the end, they are also trying to reconcile this world to the Gospel, granted they may be missing a few pieces, but assuming that they are knowingly leading people away from Jesus is pretty insulting, they dont’ think so.
Let me go back to a few things you said. First, what things have I said about the Emerging Church that are not true. This is what I know about the Emergent Church. According to the Emergent Village, they write:
“We are committed to doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God. In the words of Jesus, we seek to live by the Great Commandment: loving God and loving our neighbors – including those who might be considered “the least of theseâ€? or enemies. We understand the gospel to be centered in Jesus and his message of the Kingdom of God, a message offering reconciliation with God, humanity, creation, and self.”
Notice that what is missing in this is that we must seek to live by the Great commandment and yet, what is notably missing is the work of Christ. Mark Driscoll put it best when he said that Emergents seek the Kingdom (as from this quote) and yet the King is missing.
Emergent Village also says:
“We are committed to honor and serve the church in all its forms – Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Pentecostal, Anabaptist. We practice “deep ecclesiologyâ€? – rather than favoring some forms of the church and critiquing or rejecting others, we see that every form of the church has both weaknesses and strengths, both liabilities and potential.”
What is “deep ecclesiology” when there is no ecclesiology. How can a Roman Catholic view of salvation be the same as a Protestant’s? Is there anything to critique at all? Isn’t that all of Paul’s letter to the Galatians, a critique of an anti-Gospel teaching?
There is so much more that I can write here. But again, I’d like to refer to Mark Driscoll. The Emerging Church is taking out so much of what we Orthodox Christians view as essential (Virgin Birth, Trinity, Penal Subsitutitionary Atonement, Inerrancy of Scripture, literal hell), that the EC is essentially is not just a “New Kind of Christian,” but rather, a “New Kind of Religion.”
And David, yes!, I absolutely do feel sorry for them. This is an anti-Gospel and according to Paul, let such a person be accursed even if an angel gives such a Gospel (Galatians 1). How is there a Gospel without a Virgin Birth when Jesus is not God? How is there a Gospel if Christ’s atoning work does not grant me God’s gracious favor by Christ’s righteousness? I feel sorry for them, like anyone who doesn’t know Jesus. This is not about patronization. This is a cry for all of us who hold to such things to say, YES, let us contextualize the Gospel, the be all things to all men (without giving up the Gospel) so that we might save some. I long for non-belivers of Christ to trust Him, like I do emergents.
David, you say, “trust me, Asian Ams are not being “swept� into the Emerging Church…� Ok, may I backtrack here and say that this feeling is not empirical, but only from my own conversations with different people and reading AA blogs. AA’s generally speak experientially, relationally, communally, shall I even say “missionally,� but I do not see too many contenders out there, at least not on the forefront. I guess again we need to ask ourselves what does it mean to be Emergent. I see a number of AAs heading that direction, where contextualization is highly emphasized and doctrine is minimally emphasized. And David, yes, there is the other extreme too where doctrine is highly emphasized and contextualization is minimially emphasized. I see that even with me and so I came away from the conference feeling as though I must intentionally reconstitute myself to do exactly that, to find the right balance, without ever giving up the doctrines of grace.
I also agree with you that the EC has taught orthodox Christians something about the necessity for contextualization. That’s why Tim Keller and Mark Driscoll are important, because they are fighting this battle, but they do not give in to the temptation to underemphasize doctrine.
Ok, David, maybe feeling “sorry for them� is a wrong choice of words. Shall I say, “I long for them to know the God-glorifying, Christ-exalting excitement of the work of Jesus on the cross.� But David, you wrote: “In the end, they are also trying to reconcile this world to the Gospel, granted they may be missing a few pieces, but assuming that they are knowingly leading people away from Jesus is pretty insulting, they dont’ think.� Are they really? Don’t you think they’re leading them to a different Jesus when they say the following things:
Here is Scott McKnight (an Emergent APOLOGIST) critiquing Spencer Burke (of The Ooze, an emergent website). David, I think Spencer Burke and others like him in the Emergent world IS leading people away from Jesus. You might find that insulting, but I find it tragic:
1. He doesn’t believe God is a “person� (195): “I’m not sure I believe in God exclusively as a person anymore either…. The truth is that seeing God as spirit more than person doesn’t destroy my faith� (195).
Instead, he is a panentheist  which means that “God is ‘in all,’ alongside my creedal view of God as Father, Son, and Spirit� (195). He emphasizes immanence, “radical connectedness� and “relational theology.� [Again, this is flat-out wrong: “panentheism� is not the view that God is in all but that all is in God, and there’s a big diference.]
[I will confess to you when I read that God is not a person, my blood boiled. To deny personhood to God, the hypostasis or “person�hood, denies the essence of Christian orthodoxy and the sole foundation for our personhood and the essence both of what the gospel is  restoring cracked (person-ed) Eikons to God, who is person  and what redemption is. This genuinely is what theologians have always called “heresy.� When he says he accepts the creedal view of Father, Son, and Spirit and then says he doesn’t believe God is “person� but “spirit�  frankly, this last statement completely undermines the former. What are the Father, Son, and Spirit but the persons of the Godhead?]
2. He’s a universalist who believes in hell. He believes we are all in God but that we can opt-out but don’t have to opt-in. What he means is that “I don’t believe you have to convert to any particular religion to find God� (197). [Spencer, this is not universalism, and you can’t be both a “universalist� and believe in hell. The latter denies the former.]
3. The God he believes in does not assign anyone to hell but it is possible to reject God’s grace. Hell is a “choice and not a sentence meted out by God� (200). He anchors such in the parable of the wedding feast and the prodigal son, in which God remains faithful to the older son. [I’ll pick on this: If there is a hell, and if God has in some sense created hell, then by creating it, he has opened a place for sentencing those who have chosen to opt-out; in this sense, it has to be defined as a sentence.]
4. Evangelism is simply telling your story and to “invite them to follow Jesus as we learn to follow him� (207). [Friendship evangelism.]
5. His proposal is “mystical responsibility�: “living in sync and in tune with the sacred rhythm of grace� (209) and a “commitment to an evolutionary journey toward personal, social, and communal transformation, where we pay attention to life, listen to its messages, and discover its opportunities� (211).
I’d really like to know what you think of these ideas, and at one time I was going to end this series with your evaluations of Spencer’s ideas. But, I have a responsibility before God to be faithful to the gospel, so I have to say the following  and I don’t do so with anything but sadness.
The emerging movement is proud of creating a safe environment for people to think and to express their doubts. Partly because of what I do for a living (teach college students), I am sympathetic to the need for such safe environments. But, having said that, the emerging movement has also been criticized over and over for not having any boundaries. Frankly, some of the criticism is justified. I want to express my dismay today over what I think is crossing the boundaries. I will have to be frank; but I have to be fair. Here’s how I see this book’s theology as a Christian theologian. The more I ponder what Spencer does in this book, the more direct I have become  be glad I don’t have any more posts about this book.
Is Spencer a “heretic�? He says he is, and I see no reason to think he believes in the Trinity from reading this book. That’s what heresy means to me. Denial of God’s personhood flies in the face of everything orthodox. To say that you believe in the creedal view of God as Father, Son, and Spirit and deny “person� is to deny the Trinitarian concept of God.
Is Spencer a “Christian�? He says he is. What is a Christian? Is it not one who finds redemption through faith in Christ, the one who died and who was raised? If so, I see nothing in this book that makes me think that God’s grace comes to us through the death and resurrection of Christ. Grace seems to be what each person is “born into� in Spencer’s theses in this book. That means that I see no reason in this book to think Spencer believes in the gospel as the NT defines gospel (grace as the gift of God through Christ by faith).
David, I hope you don’t take this as combative. But I really felt as thouogh I needed to respond to your points because I didn’t want you to misunderstand what I was saying. As always, peace to you in Christ, brother.
Sam, you gave me a lot to think about (again) and David you heaped on even more. Thanks (I think).
I do find emerging/emergent “theology” hard to understand. It seems to be fluid.
Sam, thanks for your response to the comment.
And Tim, I’m in the same boat with you in terms of trying to find where emerging begins and where emergent ends.
Most of the criticism that you lay out Sam is appropriate for the Emergent group, which is the more extreme reconstructionist portion of the movement. There are others in the emerging conversation who contend more for relevance and revision, rather than the dramatic theological omissions that you are bringing up. So, at least on that point, I believe that’s where we might be crossing wires. I know this might sound more like splitting hairs as opposed to crossing wires, but I do think it’s important to make that distinction in the sense that although I find myself friendly to emerging church ideas and methods, I don’t consider myself Emergent for precisely those leaps in theology. I don’t think it’s a slippery slope either between one end of emerging to the deeper, more nebulous waters of emergent, as guys like Keller and Driscoll are proving that it’s very feasible to balance contextualization while holding onto orthodox faith.
This tension always exists. Put in marketing terms, do we want people to remember our ad? or buy our product? We have the greatest product on the planet earth, but nobody knows about us, how come the people that do know about us, continue to buy products far beneath our quality product? How much do you sell out in order to sell? How watered-down can “living water” get and still quench our thirst?
Obviously, the emerging movement is pushing the bar, and not everything that comes out of it is going to be good, but someone was bound to do it, I mean, it was inevitable. It’s just a matter of how well we can continue dialoging in a constructive sense or a polarizing sense. D4G was big step in the right direction I think, and from the reporting that you’ve done, it looks like you would agree.
I will say that my original intent of making the comment was only to point out that if indeed you “feel sorry for them”, and they were to read that, then your intentions of seeing them understand the transforming and redemptive work of Christ would not happen, simply because often such langauge is the very deterrent. I’ve become very sensitized to this because my wife was once Hindu, and though now she is a believer, she is acutely aware of how Christians sound, not to themselves, but to others. Many would-be believers are pushed away by offensive messengers, not merely an offensive message. In any case, I do appreciate your blog and your thoughts. I learn a great deal and I do enjoy it. Thanks.
I also want to say that “would-be believers” to what the Emergents are believing would make them believers in another religion, not in Christianity. And that is the scariest part of all.
When i was at Bethlehem baptist i was surprised to worship in Hindi (aradhna) and it is this ethnic diversity tat needs to be cultivated to reflect the inclusive nature of the church.
I was also at Boyd’s church near white bear lake… also was delighted to see the worship in latin/hip hop… it looks like a refreshing trend on both sides of the theological divide which is a good thing