Emergent Theology and the Exclusivity of Jesus Christ
Mar 17th, 2010 by John
Emergent theology seems to have reached a muddling place. All kinds of ideas are being creatively combined to produce a “new kind of Christianity.” Others more competent than I am have pointed out that what is touted as new is really actually old. Brian McLaren offers old line Christian Liberalism dressed up in postmodern clothes, but it is still old Liberalism.
A sticking point in today’s emergent conversations is the exclusivity of Jesus Christ as both the only authentic revelation of the true God and the only access point to that God. Brian McLaren rightly questions the haranguing snootyness of some factions in Christianity who harp on “who’s in” and “who’s out” of authentic faith. What I think Brian misses, however, is that it is one thing to question the way Christ’s exclusivity is presented to a wrecked world, but it is a whole other thing to make Jesus just one of the many nice (and religious) ways to get to God. Christ’s exclusivity seems to bother McLaren and others a lot; it seems too intolerant; it seems religiously bigoted; it can be infuriating.
Here’s the skinny. Jesus Christ is an infuriating person. He was in his own day and he is in our day as well. Many are aware of the lexical slight of hand that McLaren uses in his interpretation of John 14:6. He seems to not like that verse, and he certainly doesn’t like the way that verse is used by some. On the second concern–the way the verse is used by some, McLaren has a valid point. To use the verse obnoxiously and intolerantly is way out of line. I don’t think Jesus spoke it as a blunt weapon to be put into our “witnessing kit.” Context is vital.
Yet, the statement is there: “…no one comes to the Father except through me.” That is exclusive on the face of it. Jesus spoke it to the Eleven in the Upper Room conversation. Yet, we must go deeper into this idea of exclusivity. Thankfully, again, Jesus helps us…this time in his prayer recorded in John 17.
Take off your shoes because we are on holy ground. The Son is addressing the Father in his last extended session of prayer with his friends. After this prayer, the dominoes tip quickly, tumbling toward the cross. In this prayer Jesus says this, “I revealed you those you gave me…” (v. 6). There seems to be an echo to John 1:18, “No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.” Exactly who did Jesus make known and/or reveal? In John 17:3 we hear Jesus praying this: “Now this is eternal life: that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” (emphasis added).
We know that Jesus’ exclusive claim to make Israel’s exclusive God known infuriated the Pharisees and entertained the Sadducees. We know that Rome winked at this strange Jewish religion and gave Israel special permission to maintain their exclusive religious beliefs. Yet, when the early church began, in the power of the Holy Spirit, to spread into the religiously pluralistic world of the Roman Empire, the exclusive declaration “Jesus is Lord” (and Caesar is not) became dangerous to your Christ-following health. “Jesus is Lord” infuriated Rome. As N. T. Wright has pointed out: the most advanced religion in the world and the most advanced political system in the world conspired together to stamp out the exclusivity of Jesus the Christ.
There is only one authentic God. Only Jesus has revealed that one authentic God. Only in relationship with Jesus Christ is that one true God known (experienced). In fact, Jesus even explains that “eternal life” is only in that relationship. It is in no other relationship or religion.
There is no grand cosmic unity beneath the surface of all world religions including Christianity-viewed-as-a-religion. Both Old Testament and New Testament concur that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and the God of the Lord Jesus Christ sits in judgment upon the religions of the world. I know this is hard to acknowledge. It’s more palatable to muddle. Muddling defuses the exclusivity and we can all be very nice, imagining the great vast unity just below this world’s volatile religious surface. But that fantasy just won’t work in the real world of the Jesus Way.
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Years ago I heard a theologian remark, “God is not limited to a means of grace but we are.”
His point was that we only come into relationship with God through the grace we receive in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Faith in Christ is the only gospel we’ve been given to preach.
But the fact that God has given us this one message to preach doesn’t preclude God from applying the atonement in ways he has not revealed to us. So to speak with finality about those who have not put their faith in Christ is overreaching. But how ever it is that those who come into relationship with God apart from having put their faith in Christ in this earthly existence, it will still be Christ’s atoning work that made this relationship possible. God will simply have applied it ways he has not revealed to us. No one comes to the Father except through the Son. God is free to do what he will with atonement made by Christ but we are free to preach only one gospel.
Along with Christopher Wright, I do think that God is at work in the world apart from the church. The church is there to be the visible representation of God in the world helping to reveal how God is at work in the world. I’m persuaded that we will see those who have not known Christ by name in the consummated Kingdom but to preach anything other than Jesus Christ is to thwart the mission God has given the Church.
Anyway, great post!
Michael replied to John, “But the fact that God has given us this one message to preach doesn’t preclude God from applying the atonement in ways he has not revealed to us.” I agree with that, Michael. I like to remember that there is a passage that says the Holy Spirit will blow where He wills. Who am I to say that some person who lives in a place where they have never heard of Jesus but wants very much to do the will of God cannot be visited by or even indwelt by the Holy Spirit? I do not think “all religions lead to God” but I do believe that true seekers of God will find God and it will be because of Jesus that they will. God seeks to have a relationship with each and every one of us.
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Michael K. and JoanieD,
I would like to agree with you both but I have yet to see what you propose to be a biblical or New Testament reality. We can argue from the grace of God and the presence of the Spirit, but I do not see any text that makes what you propose a confident assertion. I may be wrong.
If we sincerely do God’s will according to our understanding of god (my understanding would be Christian) then are we OK? I’m just afraid of this thinking in my own life will lead to less or less passion for giving for foreign missions or any other evangelistic proclamation. I think any universalist or pluralistic view of the religions will lead to complacency. Yet on the other hand God’s grace is so large that any one genuinely seeking him would find him. I could be wrong; there is no test for that theory. In the Book of Acts though, Baptism, receiving the HS and believing in the Israel (Christ event) seemed very important in the NT. Christianity is the supreme narrative or the truest narrative. I may not be saying this if I wasn’t born in a country where Christianity isn’t all around us
To John in #4: Well, I like to remember that in Luke, when Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting when Mary came to visit her, Elizabeth was “filled with the Holy Spirit.” And we read that Simeon (who met Jesus in the temple when Jesus was 8 days old) “was just and pious….and the Holy Spirit was upon him.” Then we have the centurion, Cornelius, in Acts who was said to be God-fearing, praying all the time to God and God gave him a vision of a messenger from God who told him to summons Peter. And of course we have people in the Old Testament who had visions and prophecies through the Holy Spirit. Now, we know that it is only through Jesus that the Holy Spirit comes to people and it is only since Jesus died, resurrected and ascended to the Father that the Holy Spirit is “available” to everyone who calls on Jesus in faith. But, these passages in the scriptures give me hope that everyone who, like Cornelius, prays to God for the grace, knowledge and love needed to live a life that is Spirit-of-God-filled will be heard by God. God died for us all. God loves us all. I am far from well-educated in these matters, but I just know that God’s love can reach to anyone who somehow is humble enough to know that he or she needs God. We MUST tell the world about Jesus, because people have SUCH a hard time believing that God really cares about us, really loves us. When you think about it, if anyone really believed in only one miracle done by Jesus, they would see that he is unlike anyone who has ever lived and he is God in the flesh. Once they understand that, they can listen to what Jesus said about the Kingdom of God and about forgiveness of sins and hopefully they can then believe it. I have a friend who goes to church, loves to go to church but who tells me and others that she does not believe these miracles and does not believe in Jesus the way we do. She thinks people made up the stories about Jesus doing these things because people need or want to believe stuff like that. I am not sure how I should discuss these things with her. Her intellect is keeping her from believing what she sees as foolishness. We know what Paul said about the foolishness of the Gospel…it’s the Truth!
Sorry I wasn’t able to return to this earlier.
Everyone who died prior to Christ’s incarnation died without knowing who Jesus is or how they would ultimately be saved. And it wasn’t just the Jews. Matt. 12:41 and Luke 11:32:
“The people of Nineveh will rise up at the judgment with this generation and condemn it, because they repented at the proclamation of Jonah, and see, something greater than Jonah is here!”
The people of Nineveh were not Jewish neither did they know Jesus. Yet Jesus says they will stand in judgment Jews. There are other pieces of evidence that God was at work in the nations surrounding Israel. Does they incarnation of Jesus mean that God has now restricted the work he had previously been doing in the world?
I agree that we should not say about God what contradicts Scripture but neither should we confine God in ways God has not confined himself in Scripture.
As to the NT mission, God wishes to made known in his fullness to everyone. The Church is chosen instrument for being made known. While God may ultimately redeem others who do not know Christ, why would we want to leave others in confusion and without the knowledge and experience God? God has given us only one message to preach … Jesus Christ.
Michael,
I do agree that God does work outside the church, but with the O.T. story reaching its focal point in Jesus the Christ and with the N.T. commission to announce the God made known in Jesus to the world, why do we need to postulate another “way” or “name” or assess religions to be neutral when in fact they are rivals to the one true God? We’ve heard true stories of Muslim leaders having visitations of Jesus and converting to Christianity. The object of their faith so to speak was Jesus Christ and Jesus met them without the church as intermediary. A good friend of ours (yours and mine) has suggested I read Gerald McDermott’s *God’s Rivals.*
Good post, John. We must be charitable in our presentation, but hold fast to the truth of Jesus exclusivity — however we (or, better, Scriptures) define it.
John, I’m not suggesting that other religions be viewed as neutral. I’m saying that they are at the very best distortions and at worst antithetical deceptions.
There are two ways to view approach the issue. One is how does a human seek out God? There is only one path that leads to God and that is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
The other way is to ask how does God seek out human beings? God has established his Church in the world and calls all people into relationship with him through the Church. But is this the only way God works? Does God seek out people in their confusion and deception apart from the Church in ways imperceptible to us and in some way avail them of the atoning work of Jesus? Scripture doesn’t tell us but I think there are hints that point this direction.
I’m not meaning to pick a fight. Just wanted be clear about my meaning.
Michael K,
My good brother, I know you’re not the fight-picking kind. And I am not ruling out the “hints” in Scripture that you suggest. I want to proceed with as much clarity as I can on so important an idea. Thanks for staying in this discussion with me.
I’ve had my experiences in what you call “old liberalism” (I am my self a member in the United Church of Christ) and there is a big difference in my mind between the Emergent movement and the old liberalism which is thriving amongst mainline churches. Primarily, their starting points are quite different. McLaren and others start from evangelical fundamentalism and react thereto while mainline liberals don’t often feel much obligation to the evangelical tradition. I was at a UCC retreat just this weekend with some high school students and while I was there I was reading McLaren’s new book (which I think is great, by the way) and McLaren seemed refreshingly conservative after a day talking with my fellow UCCers. McLaren starts from Scripture and comes out. He takes the writings of folks like Paul to be authoritative and theologically trustworthy. Old liberalism doesn’t seem to have such an obligation. While scripture is beloved by the old liberals, it’s not always authoritative and it’s rarely “infallible.”
I think the Emergent movement has come from a different direction, has met and kissed old liberalism (even borrowing some of its’ lingo, and has yet continued in a different direction. They’re taking a sort of proverbial baton from old liberals but they are taking in still in the direction of Trinitarian particularity.
I’ve never found McLaren’s perspective, for example, to be threatening to the exclusivity of Christ… unless you quote him out of context. The openness of the Emergent movement flows from a lingering sense of the particularity of Christ. That sense does not always linger amongst old liberalism.
Wes Ellis,
Thanks so much for presenting your perspective on Emergent and in particular Brian McLaren. Your insights are very helpful.
[...] On this crucial, timely issue that will not be going away anytime soon, I recommend the following post by John W. Frye I came across this week called Emergent Theology and the Exclusivity of Jesus Christ. [...]
“Here’s the skinny. Jesus Christ is an infuriating person. He was in his own day and he is in our day as well.” – well said! much to my dismay, i had lost the link to you and your blog – but alas – tis found! awesome.