Loading ...Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture
by Michael Frost
Have you ever seen a photo of Michael Frost? He looks like he can beat you up.
That’s neither here nor there – unless you’re wanting someone in your corner in a Mark Driscoll debate – but this Aussie scholar-practitioner is not your typical armchair pontificator.
In his first popular solo writing effort, Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture presents a biblically-rooted paradigm for the church in emergence-people who are not at home either in the traditional church or in the secular world. As exiles of both, they must create their own worldview that integrates their Christian beliefs with the contemporary world. Exiles seeks to integrate all aspects of life and decision-making and to develop the characteristics of a Christian life lived intentionally within emerging (postmodern) culture. It presents a plea for a dynamic, life-affirming, robust Christian faith that can be lived successfully in the post-Christian world of twenty-first century Western society. This book paints a picture of a Christian lifestyle that can be lived in non-religious categories and be attractive to not-yet Christians, not to mention being credible to oneself. Such a worldview takes ecology and politics seriously. It offers a positive response to the workplace, the arts, feminism, mystery and worship. Exiles seeks to develop a framework that will allow Christians to live boldly and courageously in a world that no longer values the culture of the church, but does greatly value many of the things the Bible speaks positively about. This book suggests that there us more to being a follower of Jesus than meets the eye. It explores the secret, unseen nooks and crannies in the life of a Christian and suggests that faith is about more than church attendance and belief in God. And there are photographs – even of Frost himself.
http://viralbloggers.com/2009/01/exiles-living-missionally-in-a-post-christian-culture/
patl
Book Title: Exiles
Author: Michael Frost
Number of Pages: 333
A. Thesis and Argument of Author
We in the West today no longer live in a Christian culture. The world is changing, and the church has lost its foothold at the center of the dominant culture. Christians today live with a growing, nagging feeling of being in a different culture both in the world, and in the church. The Biblical model for this status is of exile.
Our status as exiles gives us the opportunity to reimagine and rethink Christianity.
B. Development of Author’s Argument
Exiles reimagine and rethink Christianity by doing four things.
Exiles remember dangerous memories of the promises and person of Jesus, who, opposite of the tame and kind image we have of him, was a dangerous subversive – and also our standard for Christian living.
Exiles practice dangerous promises of the Kingdom of God at hand. These promises remind us to be authentic to one another, to serve a cause greater than ourselves, to create missional communities, to practice generous hospitality, and to work righteously for justice for others.
Exiles offer dangerous critique of the dominant post-Christian empire by doing acts of justice, by calling people to care for the created order, and by comforting outcasts and oppressed peoples.
Finally, exiles sing dangerous songs of worship and of revolutionary relationship with Jesus the subversive messiah.
C. Transferable Principles for My Ministry Setting
Exiles shows a model of contemporary culture that I can identify with, and establishes what for me are intriguing connections to the Old Testament narrative, and the multiple references to Walter Bruggemann’s work are encouraging to me, as I’m also seeing other references to Bruggemann.
The book is one of the best descriptions of the foundations of emerging-missional church that I’ve read, although I don’t believe that the book is approachable enough to recommend to others in my congregation.
Apr 5th, 2009
knowtown
Frost’s first solo book is a remarkable contribution to the current conversation about how to best embody the Christian faith in our context. Frost is a great writer and story teller and has a great passion for the church. Following the same trajectory laid out in his earlier work with Alan Hirsch he argues that those who are leading churches may need to rethink how they are doing things if they want to effectively communicate their faith.
For those familiar with previous Frost and Hirsch works, there is nothing radically new here. But I find the tone of this current book to be much more helpful than those earlier books. I love Frosts ability to initiate conversations and question the things we hold with out being too confrontational. There is no doubt that Frost is more concerned with genuine relationships and conversation than he is with winning any argument.
There is a lot of great stuff in this book that challenges currently popular ministry methods. But it seems that there are a lot of unspoken assumptions in the book about the Gospel and the difference between Christians and “not-yet-Christains.” This left me feeling that sometimes Frost is talking in circles. The fuzzy soteriology makes for great story telling and statistics but in the end there seems to be little difference between what he means by “living missionally” and the methods of the churches he is critical of.
But it is a great book that will initiate conversation and is worth reading.
May 1st, 2009
circularthoughts
Michael Frost lives in Sydney, Australia where he is Professor of Evangelism and Missions at Morling College. He is also the “missional architect” of smallboatbigsea, one of Australia’s most innovative new churches. In addition to the book which is the subject of this review, he has co-written two books with Alan Hirsch; The Shaping of Things to Come: Innovation and Mission for the 21st Century Church (2003) and ReJesus: A Wild Messiah for a Missional Church (2009). (book back cover jacket)
The thesis of this book is that the death of Christendom has left us in a transitional exilic period in which we must act as exiles by embracing the intentional disciplines of dangerous memories, dangerous promises, dangerous critique and dangerous songs. (10)
Frost takes thirteen chapters divided into four parts to develop and defend his thesis. Part One, consisting of Chapters 1 – 3, discusses the discipline of dangerous memories, which for the Christian in exile are “those of a man who lived in nearly every way differently from the way we are told to live today” (11). Part Two, Chapters 4 – 8, is Frost’s discussion of dangerous promises, which are those ways of life that result in “the living, breathing promise to society that it is possible to live out the values of Christ” (15). Part Three, Chapters 9 – 11, looks at the discipline of dangerous critique, which is the risky process of pointing out the hypocrisies of the empire. (21) Finally, Part Four, Chapters 12 and 13, takes a look at our dangerous songs, which are the revolutionary songs that spark passion and action.
I enjoyed this book very much and believe Frost did an excellent job of developing and defending his thesis. He drew his idea of exile and the four dangerous disciplines from theologian Walter Brueggemann’s book Cadences of Home: Preaching among Exiles (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1997). I have not read Brueggemann’s book but plan to add it to my list of must reads. I found in Frost’s approach some practical applications for missional living, especially when it comes to doing such outside the confines of the institutional church. In particular, I thought Frost’s discussion of third-places in Chapter 3 was worth the price of the book alone.
A third-place is a place where people go to meet people, develop relationships, have conversations and basically do life. Some examples of third places are bars, coffee shops, bookstores and community centers. (56) Frost suggests that third-places “are the most significant places for Christian mission to occur because in a third place people are more relaxed, less guarded, more open to meaningful conversation and interaction” (58). Frost says that even a “cursory reading of the Gospels will reveal Jesus’ interest in being in third places” (59). His take on third-places served as a solid confirmation in my own missional experience.
I like to smoke cigars. In my city there is a quaint little tobacco shop called The Pipe and Tobacco Shop. In the center of the shop there is a round table where patrons can sit and enjoy a cigar or pipe and engage in conversation and fellowship. I like to go there from time to time, at least once per week, and enjoy a good cigar. I have been amazed at how easy it is to engage in spiritual conversations. In fact, I am convinced that I have had spiritual conversations of significantly more substance in that shop than I have ever had within the walls of an institutional church. I have found that this is, at least in part, what it means to live missionally as an exile.
May 28th, 2009
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