ANKofCty endeavors to consider 10 questions that Brian says are transforming the faith. Truth is, these questions are not transforming the faith, but Brian wants them to, and he’s right to want it. The ten questions: (1) The Narrative Question, (2) The Authority Question; (3) The God Question, (4) The Jesus Question, (5) The Gospel Question, (6) The Gospel Question, (7) The Church Question, (8) The Sex Question, (9) The Future Question, and (10) The Pluralism Question are good ones, and Brian hopes to help push us ahead as we think through them together.

At the heart of ANKofCty is what McLaren calls, the “Greco-Roman” reading of scripture. This, it seems, is the root of our collective problems in terms of church and culture. Brian argues that freeing ourselves from this narrative releases us to answer the 10 questions Brian poses more faithfully. Within the Greco-Roman reading of scripture, Brian argues, there is no room for story or development, which ultimately gives rise to a “six-line narrative” that prejudices our reading of scripture. McLaren argues the “six-line narrative” leads us to all the wrong conclusions about everything – which Brian endeavors to demonstrate throughout the remaining pages of ANKofCty. In the end, Brian argues that we have read the Bible backwards with our filter coming through Paul, the apostles, Augustine, Plato and the Platonism and philosophical systems that are foreign to the true nature of the scriptures. Therefore, our view of Jesus and the Bible is not the Jesus OF the Bible, but a character – or caricature – inherited by thousands of years of interpretation lodged and birthed by the Greco-Roman narrative and Greek philosophy. This is Brian’s central thesis and gives rise to his conclusions.

I think Brian is both right and wrong. In fact, having read nearly all his books, I have never felt more strongly that he is both right on and far off course. This is what I mean: In terms of McLaren’s analysis of the Greco-Roman reading, he is dead on. The problem is that there is no way to avoid this, no way to time travel back through scripture and get something other than what we already got. This is where Brian is right and wrong. Having been raised in a “Restoration” movement, I know all too well the nonsensical pitfalls of thinking you can just skip over history, doctrine, theology, and theological and ecclesial development and get back to “the real thing.”

It cannot be done!

At best you miss the richness of the tradition that has given life to the faith that gives us life, at worst, you become a partisan to largely uneducated, ununified and incoherent belief system. If we were able leap backward over the hurdles of history to uncover a new way – or the grand old way – to read and interpret text without the obstacles course of 2000 years worth of interpretation and thought, then we would be forced to just to pick a method, system or interpretive lens and go with it arbitrarily.

Been there. Done that. Thank you very much.

All of that to say this; even Brian is coming at the text from somewhere “post-Jesus” in terms of history. Is he right in arguing that the method we’ve chosen is bad for hosts of reasons? Yes. Is it possible for us to read and interpret Jesus the way McLaren wants us to, without the narratives that have been imposed heretofore? Unfortunately, no.

This means that all of our conclusions, even Brian’s, have to be held loosely, with epistemological humility. Perhaps it is my own ecclesial history, but something in my gut churns at the thought of dismissing church history and the schools of thought developed through it. For this reason, I’m open to the idea that I may be seeing shadows and experiencing paranoia where there need not be. I may be reacting to something not explicit in the pages of ANKofCty.

At the same time, Brian has offered the most helpful way forward on a number of issues that are becoming tremendously important to more and more people – sexuality, pluralism, etc…. He is far from convincing his critics or those entrenched in either/or, black/white, privileged / unprivileged thinking, but Brian’s conclusions, I think, are generally pointing the church in the right direction – though I need more convincing in some areas, myself. Both critics and fans of Brian know where he’s going with many of the issues addressed in ANKofCty before they turn the first page, but what is good about his work is that he provides a useable way forward for conversation (for those willing to have it). Using the Biblical text, McLaren at least gets the ball rolling and establishes what can become common language around these issues. This, I think, is the great service Brian has done for us.

In addition, Brian explores Romans in ways many will find broadening. In fact, I read ANKofCty with my Bible open. Trust me: this does not happen often! What more can you ask of a book? Brian forced me to look into the scriptures and I found myself looking differently. That alone is worth the price of purchase. I doubt that I’ll ever be able to read Romans the same way after engaging ANKoCty.

Likely the most out of character elements of ANKofCty comes in chapters 12 and 13 dealing with The Jesus Question. To articulate his vision of Jesus, McLaren takes on two vocal critics who happen to hold in common the ability to be consistently wrong and increasingly sought-after. For those in the know, the critics are fairly easy to recognize, though Brian does not name them. What is out of character is Brian’s pointed language. Having spent time with Brian multiple times, I’ve found him to be irenic and generous, these chapters weren’t. At the end of chapter 12, I wrote in the margin, “Bam! One in ___________ _______________’s kisser.”

Between you and I, the rebuke was long overdue. Overdue not because scores needed settling, but because this particular critic has, and often does, misread Jesus and the Bible, offering an alternative gospel, in my view. This critic seems to envision Christian leadership as a full-contact blood sport and Brian gives him what he wants. Brian skillfully disarmed the violent, warrior-only version of Jesus, which had the added benefit of fitting nicely into Brian’s overall aims in ANKofCty. At the same time, he gave one particular critic the only kind of conversation he seems to understand. Harsh! In this way, the rebuke can be described as incarnational – speaking to people in their own language.

If Brian’s goal is to get people thinking and talking, ANKofCty is a success. Clearly not all will embrace his vision, yet others will be freed to pursue the Spirit in wild and new directions. Ultimately, ANKofCty is more than worth the time. I suggest reading it community. Drink from it slowly and invest in the ideas, maybe even choosing one question and digging deep over time. This is not a book for singular and individual thought. Brian has returned to what he does best – challenging the church. And he does so brilliantly this go round.

I am one who has remained. In fact, I spent half of my seminary career learning about the emergent movement, and every time I mention the “E” word, I am mostly met with blank stares. No one left in the church has any idea what “emergent” is, and those who do seem to have a negative idea about it. And rightfully so. This movement has had the mentality that everyone can lead their own band, leading to a lot of bad music.

After reading Brian McLaren’s latest book, A New Kind of Christianity, I have come to realize that those in the emergent movement might be viewed as marching to the beat of a different drummer, but wow is it one heck of a beat.

This book is not emergent systematic theology, but is simply a guide to taking off the multitude of smudged and dirty and coloured glasses through which we see the story of God who created all things good.

This book should be the first in every emerging library.

I have just finished reading McLaren’s latest book, A New Kind of Christianity. Having read several of McLaren’s other books, I would consider this one to be essential. I mean “essential” in two different ways:

1. “Essential” in the sense that A New Kind of Christianity is a streamlined and tightly focused distillation of ideas that McLaren has explored elsewhere. This book seems to contain the concentrated essence of what McLaren’s theological labor has produced thus far. I often found points which he had sketched out in previous books now re-drawn in sharp, clear and muscular form. As a result–at under 300 pages–this book packs a great deal of theological, intellectual and inspirational punch.

2. “Essential” in the sense that A New Kind of Christianity is *the* Brian McLaren book to read, whether you haven’t read anything else by him or whether you have read everything else by him.

A New Kind of Christianity is built around the exploration of ten important questions that Christians throughout the world seem to be asking more and more and with greater urgency. These questions are:

1. What is the overarching story line of the Bible?
2. How should the Bible be understood?
3. Is God violent?
4. Who is Jesus and why is He important?
5. What is the Gospel?
6. What do we do about the Church?
7. Can we find a way to address human sexuality without fighting about it?
8. Can we find a better way of viewing the future?
9. How should followers of Jesus relate to people of other religions?
10. What do we do now? (How do we translate our quest into action?)

McLaren doesn’t so much provide pat answers to these questions as give thoughtful responses which leave the door open for further exploration. His tone throughout is humble, circumspect and low-key. This is not a book for people who want a pedagogue to tell them what to believe. Rather it inspires you to bring your own theology into the light and take an honest look at what you believe, why you believe it and if, perhaps, you ought to rethink a thing or two (or ten).

As an example, early on McLaren provides a brilliantly simple visual representation of the Biblical narrative according to Western “Greco-Roman” Christianity (aka Catholicism & Protestantism). He then proceeds to carefully deconstruct that “Greco-Roman” narrative and present an alternate “Hebrew” narrative which is vibrant, hopeful, appealing and, frankly, makes a whole lot more sense. One begins to realize that this “New Kind of Christianity” is also very ancient.

As a Quaker, I found myself surprised at the parallels to Quaker theology which I found all through this book. I had an opportunity to ask Brian about this on a conference call and he responded very enthusiatically. He is quite familiar with the theology of Friends and spoke in glowing terms of Quakers. Perhaps George Fox & Co. were at the far bleeding edge of what has come to be called the Emergent Church Movement! In the book, McLaren refers to those throughout Church history who, like the Quakers and Anabaptists, provided a “minority report” on what it means to follow Jesus.

On that same conference call (courtesy of The Ooze), McLaren said that it took him far longer to write this book than any other book he has written. It shows. Now that I have finished reading it, I plan to begin re-reading it immediately. This is an extremely important book. Buy it. I am not exaggerating when I say that if I could afford to, I would get a copy for every Christian and every spiritual seeker I know.

When I read A New Kind of Christian trilogy several years ago, I was in the midst of a spiritual and emotional depression. I was, in McLaren’s words, “between something real and something wrong.” I had begun to question a lot of what I had been taught, a lot of what I preached, a lot of what gave me identity as a Christian and as a pastor. And I knew that if I expressed my questions and doubts, it would cost me my job. A New Kind of Christian gave me the courage to step out and journey onto some terra nova, leading eventually to the launching of Vintage Fellowship, the emergent faith community I have the inexpressible privilege of shepherding.

For me, Brian McLaren’s books are like a turn-by-turn GPS, always one step ahead of me, guiding the way. In the same way that A New Kind of Christian charted the path I would journey, so now, I believe A New Kind of Christianity will chart the path that Vintage Fellowship is journeying.

A New Kind of Christianity has framed the ongoing discussion our faith community is having. It’s like Brian has been having coffee with us. He asks 10 essential questions:
-What is the overarching storyline of the Bible?
-How should the Bible be understood?
-Is God Violent?
-Who is Jesus and why is he important?
-What is the gospel?
-What do we do about the church?
-Can we find a way to address human sexuality?
-Can we find a better way of viewing the future?
-How should the followers of Jesus relate to people of other religions?
-How can we translate our quest into action?

McLaren engages each question thoughtfully, opening up a space for discussion, dissent, and development. I am sure my fundamentalist friends will not be OK with his questions, let alone his proposed answers. But I am no longer a fundamentalist, and I love the space to explore and wonder. Many times throughout the book, I felt affirmed, reading a perspective on a question that I shared. Many more times, I was challenged to look at a question from a new perspective. And what a blessing that space is.

As tremendously important as McLaren’s framing of the quest for a new kind of Christianity is, maybe his most important contribution to the discussion is his gracious and gentle manner. He describes some of the reaction his teaching has engendered. And he responds to some of his critics. He could have reason to come on strongly, defensively, and argumentatively. He never does. He maintains the kind of irenic spirit that I think makes God proud. I hope that I can emulate it.

Constantly searching for metaphors to help map the territory ahead, McLaren describes the maturation process of humanity in general and religious thought in particular in terms of the colors of the spectrum. As I read his description of the movement from red to yellow through green and blue to violet, it was as if I was reading my own story. In short, reading A New Kind of Christian and launching Vintage Fellowship was my journey into the indigo shade of honesty. But I am ready to move beyond honesty to peace. I am ready to continue my quest. I am not confident of much, but I am confident of this: A New Kind of Christianity will be a map I return to again and again as I seek to lead myself, my family, and my church into the violet horizon of a hopeful, peaceful future.

Thanks, Brian, for doing it again.

I think I’ve read each book that Brian McLaren has authored. I’ve certainly reflected on a few of them on this blog. Between his books, and hearing him speak, and even a brief conversation or two, I’ve always been drawn to his genuine, and generous, spirit.

While McLaren has garnered plenty of critique (and that’s putting it mildly), I have appreciated his posture and willingness to bring difficult questions into public dialogue. And through all the critique, it has seemed to me that most of his work has been about asking questions while implying, or sometimes gently suggesting, a few challenging answers. He’s done a lot of asking, “What if?”

There is a shift in McLaren’s newest book, A New Kind of Christianity. There are reviews around the internet and few are fully embracing McLaren’s latest work. Most suggest that he has gone too far as reviewers distance themselves. My take, as the title of this post suggests, is that the gentle proddings of his “what if?” questions have become a more assertive “what if…” set of suggestions, or as he would say, responses.

I want to read this book as an open and expanded understanding of Chrsitianity — one that will broaden and challenge my own thinking. It certainly seems like the quote I posted from his introduction last week invites that very thing.

But, in his most assertive book, Brian isn’t just inviting an expanded understanding of Christianity. In this book, he states that he is looking toward something different than most North American evangelicals have experienced. He suggests that those, like me, who try to stand with one foot in what we have known as orthodoxy, while broadening our views of Christianity, will be unsuccessful.

I guess it must be that I don’t take things as far as he does, because I don’t agree with him on this point. In the last five years, I’ve grown to a broader and richer understanding of the Christian faith than I’ve ever had, while still standing firmly within a creedal understanding of Christianity. I have authors like NT Wright, Dallas Willard, and even, um, Brian McLaren, to thank for this.

I’m not entirely sure what Brian was hoping for in this book. Time will tell what he accomplishes, but those who read should read with discernment. Of course, those who read any book should read with discernment.

Viewed in this light, the debate about McLaren, the emergent church movement and a “new kind of Christianity” is the theological equivalent of intramural flag football. You got a lot of guys on the field but none of them are particularly fit or skilled. And certainly none of them play at a professional level.

To push the analogy just one more step, the professional level that McLaren and his critics merely imitate, is the catholic tradition of theological orthodoxy of the Church Fathers and the sacramental, liturgical and ascetical practice of the historic Christian Church. Whatever our differences, this tradition is to be found in the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

Unfortunately McLaren and his critics are estranged from these Churches and this matters because the further one travels from the canon of faith and practice embodied in these two Churches, the further one travels as well from the Gospel.

For all their theological differences, qwhat McLaren and his critics do share is the lived conviction that the catholic tradition of theological orthodoxy is not incarnated in any single Church. They do not so much read the Fathers as skim them and so protect themselves from the ecclesiological conclusions that would, necessarily, undermine the notion their faith in the Church as an invisible collect of all believers everywhere rather than an historical, visible society, with shared faith, lead by a common episcopate and which meets together in the one celebration of the Eucharist.

Whatever else McLaren and his critics may disagree about, they agree in rejecting the understanding of the Church that informed the faith and practice not only of the patristic era but the contemporary Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

The judgment is not mine to make, but they are, I hope, men who love Christ and are sincere in their desire to live the Gospel. But in the end in having separated themselves from the Church (and for the context of this argument, we can put on hold an adjudication of the truth claims of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches relative to each other), they lack the one thing needed to bring their faith to fruition.

When I was ordained to the priesthood, Metropolitan MAXIMOS told me that I must have a special care for those who love Christ and lack the priesthood. His Eminence went on to explain that without the priesthood, there could be no sacrifice of the altar–that is there could be no celebration of the Eucharist. And without the Eucharist, without this rational and unbloody sacrifice, love, while real, would be stillborn.

It is this the cry of this stillborn love that I hear in both McLaren and his critics.

This no doubt sounds harsh. And it sounds so because it is. McLaren and his critics are not arguing over the Catholic and Orthodox faith but market share. They stand within traditions that are built on the more or less intentional rejection of the normative character of the first 1,000 years of Christian Tradition, from Church Tradition. Apart from this Tradition, however, they have no standard to adjudicate their claims relative to each other.

The tragedy of their debate, the reason I find it stillborn, is that to accept this standard, means to undermine the very thing they are debating: the post-Reformation Protestant-Evangelical-Fundamentalist vision of the Christian life.

But this is after all a review of McLaren’s A New Kind of Christianity. So let me end with a word about the book.

McLaren is not presenting us with a new kind of Christianity but simply a re-working of Evangelical Christianity. While he claims his work is post-modern, it isn’t. For that we should look to the works of John Milbank, Catherine Pickstock and David Bentley Hart. Read these theologians and the intellectual and spiritual poverty of McLaren’s work and the emegent church movement is clear.

Whatever good points there might be in his re-working, in the end McLaren’s “new kind of Christianity” demonstrates the inherent and internal theological and spiritual weakness of the Reformation in general and of Evangelical Christianity in particular. That weakness is the weakness of a merely partial faith, a faith that is not orthodox (or Orthodox) because it is not catholic (or Catholic) and not catholic (or Catholic) because it is nor orthodox (or Orthodox).

In Christ,

+Fr Gregory

I felt a deep sense of awe and gratefulness for Jesus. I felt my love and appreciation for him grow. Brian proposes that we not try to fit Jesus into our already established ideas of what God is like (inside or outside of the Bible), but establish our ideas about God around Jesus. Jesus is the culmination of our ideas about God. To see Jesus is to see the exact representation of God and the clearest picture of God. This was very freeing and exhilarating for me.

I’ve struggled with the Old Testament and Jesus. I mean, even praying through the Psalms, I recoil at some of the stuff in there when compared to Jesus and the kingdom he is announcing. Why the difference and tension? Brian says that God meets us where we are. There is a progression in our ability of understanding God and at the top of that progression is Jesus.

I realized that Christianity has always been in flux and is not static. It has been growing, revising, evolving. I guess I’ve known that but this book was a good summary of a lot of this evolution in one place. I’ve been afraid during some points in my faith, especially in the last 5 years or so. Prayers have been offered like the following:

“Jesus, I don’t know what I think about a lot of things anymore, but keep me in your sights. You know I love you and want to live my life for you, but a lot of what I thought was true I see differently. I don’t know about all of this questioning. I don’t know about all of these major shifts in thinking about you, the Church, and life. But I’m holding on to you more than I ever have.”

And at several points during my reading I just got good with the idea that this isn’t an isolated experience in following Jesus. It’s been here all the time. Brian recounts a lot of the changes that happened and I reflected on some of the ones I’ve noticed myself. I thought about the Jewish/Gentile waters that had to be navigated with the birth of the Church. It was there as the Jews watched Gentiles become followers of Jesus. They were God’s chosen people and were to separate themselves from Gentiles. Jesus tells his apprentices to go into all the nations. Peter is sent to a Gentile centurion’s house (as a Jew he wasn’t allowed to even go into a Gentile home). He said this when he showed up at Cornelius’ house: ”You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with a Gentile or visit him. But God has shown me that I should not call any man impure or unclean…”(Acts 10) I cannot imagine how shocking that was to Peter. Jesus was challenging Peter’s thoughts and ideas about God. And Jesus still does that today. Instead of seeing this as something abnormal I’m learning to embrace it. Yes, my thoughts and paradigms may be changing, but I find Jesus right in the middle of it all.

I also felt at peace with my spiritual quest and being okay with the fact that others may not agree with me. I’m on a journey as we all are. But I’ve often felt uneasy that I may be in a different place then some of my friends. I’ve wondered if the questions I’m asking would be deal breakers and cut off our spiritual friendship or strain them. And I’d much rather keep unity with others than bringing unhelpful or inappropriate questions up to others if that’s not where they are. Brian has written with so much grace and humility towards others in this book. His encouragement to let people be where they are was very good for me. If a “new kind of Christianity” would be hurtful or unhelpful to someone, don’t offer it. Don’t try to rock their boat. Bless them where they are. But if we are journeying along and we do have some people who are asking similar questions, we can start having good and appropriate conversations about the questions we are having.

So in summary, I haven’t cited any sources for the book or given the basic structure of the book. I haven’t even given the main theme of the book. Here is a link to the amazon.com book page and here’s another link for a collection of reviews for this book where you can get more of the details. This book was hard to put down because each section builds into the next. I would recommend this book for anyone who has been questioning the Christianity and picture of Jesus they have been offered. I don’t recommend this book to anyone who doesn’t like Brian McLaren or to anyone who thinks a new kind of Christianity is a ridiculous or dangerous idea.

There was so much dealt with in this book that I may write some posts in the future regarding the 10 questions that Brian brings up in the book.

“Before…we are like lawyers trying to save an old contract, adding more and more fine print on page after page, until the provisions are weightier than the original contract. (This is good work, I suppose, and must be done for a generation or two, but it is not the work to which I feel called.) At some point, though, more and more of us will finally decide that it would make more sense to go back and revise the contract from scratch. And that work has begun. It is nowhere near complete, but the cat is out of the bag…”

And that cat is on a tear. McLaren attempts the impossible, essentially tossing out what you always thought was true, and starting again from scratch. The Fall of Genesis 3? That’s really a coming-of-age story. The storyline of the Bible? It’s really about the downside of progress, and about how good prevails in the end anyway. The Bible is a community library, and the violent, tribal God of the Genesis flood is “hardly worthy of belief, much less worship” – but those were early days, and our view of God is always changing. Jesus didn’t come to start a new religion, nor is Christianity the answer in itself. In short, almost everything you know about God, the Bible, and Christianity is wrong, according to McLaren.

Disagree? It’s probably because you have a Greco-Roman worldview, or worse. You may be someone who gets “authority and employment” from the old way of reading the Bible, which means you have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are. To go back to McLaren’s earlier image, you’re maybe a lawyer who loves fine print and who hates cats being let out of their bags. You’re probably like the theologians and pastors who:

“…sew on a patch here, cover up that bit over there with some duct tape, put a nice coat of cheerful paint on that section over there, play really uplifting music to distract from that bit under there, move the furniture so that part doesn’t show, and so on.”

You’re either misguided or have a vested interest in keeping things the way they are. Either way, it’s hard to disagree without looking pitiable.

What to make of all of this?

First, I want to say that McLaren does make some good points. He puts his finger on some real problems. This isn’t damning with faint praise. It’s important, because it’s what makes a book like this so compelling. Lots of people are going to buy what he says because they resonate with his critique.

Second, I’m grateful that McLaren has articulated his views. I suspect that there’s going to be less guessing about what McLaren believes in the future. I don’t think his views are a surprise to a lot of us, but they’re in print now, and it’s going to be a lot easier to talk about them.

Third, I’m going to predict that this book gets a lot of traction. I joined a conference call with McLaren last night and heard a number of people – including pastors – rave about the book. I think it’s going to be one of those books in which the fans and critics speak past each other. The early reviews seem overwhelmingly positive. They won’t be surprised if people like me don’t like it. He takes some swipes at Mark Driscoll and John MacArthur, and sometimes comes across in a belittling way to evangelicals in general. He takes swipes at his critics sometimes that leave me gasping – and the fact that he does it with a friendly smile doesn’t really help. This is going to be a polarizing book.

I really have to say that this is one of the most frustrating books I’ve read. I have a friend who says off-the-wall things. Half the time he’s profound; the rest of the time he’s just a bit random. I felt that way with this book. There are some potentially profound sections, but there’s lots in the book that left me baffled. I can’t remember reading any book that left me shaking my head so much. So much hinges on his assertion that we read the Scriptural storyline through a Platonic worldview, for instance, but I was far from convinced. His interpretation of Job, which he used to explain how we should read Scripture, left me scratching my head. His conclusions (or proposals) are so sweeping, and based on such baffling premises sometimes, that I hardly know where to begin.

Finally – and most importantly – this is not a minor tweak of Christianity. It is a repudiation of the church’s understanding of God and the gospel. It really is tearing up the contract and starting all over again. McLaren says we’ve got the whole Biblical storyline, as well as our ideas of God and Scripture, all wrong. He’d rather be an atheist, he says, than believe in the God that many of us think is found in the Bible. You don’t get any more basic. We are talking about two fundamentally different versions of Christianity and the gospel.

That’s what makes this book so hard to critique. Supporters of the book will say that I’m critiquing it from a Greco-Roman mindset, using the Bible as a constitution text rather than as a community library. So my criticisms will be expected. McLaren’s proposals go all the way back to the level of presuppositions, and unless you share his presuppositions it will be like complaining that the color red isn’t blue enough. Fine, they will say, but it wasn’t meant to be blue. He’s not only giving us a new version of the Christian story, but he’s making it very difficult to critique his new version using the resources of the old one. But I’m simply not convinced that he’s made the case that he thinks he has.

Like McLaren, I believe we need to honestly examine our beliefs and practices, making corrections even when it’s costly and uncomfortable. I believe that every generation needs to rediscover the gospel. But unlike McLaren, I’m not ready to toss the creation-fall-redemption storyline, or think that I’ve moved on from the God of Genesis 4-6. I’m simply not ready to say our old understanding of the gospel is wrong. We may need to rediscover it and be changed by it, and grow in our understanding of it. But that’s different than tearing up the contract and starting all over again.

A few years ago, I was struggling with some of the issues McLaren raises. But I found that some of the answers being proposed were less, not more, satisfying. I believe that our biggest need is not for a new Christianity, but instead to rediscover some of the contours of the gospel we may have forgotten. We don’t need a new contract; we need to “guard the good deposit” that’s been entrusted to us (2 Timothy 1:14).

We really don’t need a new kind of Christianity. We need to do a better job of rediscovering, and living in light of, the one we already have.

I’ve read a bunch of reviews. The thing I’m seeing very frequently is the comment that Brian Mclaren is controversial.

May I submit that such statements may be false?

I see it more that any queries (questions and quests) for truth are inherently controversial because Truth itself is controversial. And this is true not just for nonChristians of every stripe but most especially for Christians.

I recall Mclaren’s earlier book that became a trilogy – a new kind of christian – being banned in many churches. I get the sense that a lot of concepts or challenges presented in that book have since shaped many churches, even if indirectly.

A new kind of Christianity will undoubtedly cause at least just as much of a stir, if not more.

Here’s a few of my quick thoughts.

People are going to love it or hate it. It’s hard not to be provoked and challenged by the questions he brings up.

McLaren’s often known for offering great questions and little in the way of answers. I got the feeling this was a bit of a ‘coming out’ book (though I think McLaren honestly puts where he’s at every time he writes, he’s just a bit further down that path now).

Hardcore/New Calvinists will hate much of the answers he provides.

The premise of most of his arguments is based on the framework in which we see things. Change the framework and everything within it changes. The new kind of christian focused more on the modernist mindset, he goes further back with this book showing how much of our theology is based on a Greco-Roman platonic worldview obsessed with either/or states and perfection.

Process theology and the general arc of the biblical storyline also shapes how we continue to evolve in our faith and humanity

I think many churches will have a hard time matching up what McLaren proposes and their current statement of faith (ie. his views presented on Scripture, the second coming, etc.) At the same time I think most statements of faith are profoundly lacking, incomplete, and rarely represent the actual practice of the church anyways.

McLaren usually does an impressive job with ignoring critics and smothering those who differ with kindness, so I was surprised when he took an unnamed swipe at Mark Driscoll (he’s going to have a field day with this one). There’s definitely some extra edge in this book (but none more than the fury his critics have heaped upon him)

I wonder if there will ever be healing between the different ‘camps’ in the future?

Overall, I’m glad McLaren does what he does, even if I don’t agree with all of his ideas and approaches. My guess is critics will continue to hate him, because he isn’t what they want him to be. He’s not a defender of the faith (as it is). He’s not someone who’s just proposing new methodologies to timeless truth (as we know it).

I find it odd that many of us will allow ourselves to consume and be shaped by music, media, technology, etc. that may have a radically different theological concepts from us, but vehemently not want someone like McLaren to be heard.

Our planet is in enough of a jam as it is, can’t we just let the guy feel his way forward and share what he’s learning with the rest of us?

There’s some extra chapters available on his website that people should also dig into.

I’ve heard the words “heresy” and “controversial” used so very many times regarding McLaren… I had to find out for myself. Now I know I am supposed to be reviewing the book, not the author… But I have to say, while I’m sure I don’t necessarily agree 100% with all his conclusions, as a person who asks questions myself, I find myself endeared to McLaren as one not afraid to question.

I picture the author as someone who when asked a question, though he is able to provide many possible answers, may also answer with “I don’t know.” And that is refreshing.

I have to wonder… Why all the hype? Just an observation from my own experience, but I think that pastors (and I am generalizing here) feel the burden of responsibility to not just shepherd, not just seek Jesus themselves, but to “defend the Faith.” And when “The Faith” extends into matters of theology, it becomes dangerous to not have all the answers. What happens if people find out you don’t have the answer? What happens if we can’t be sure where God stands on important issues? What if The Bible doesn’t actually have an answer to every question, every problem, every issue? Now, don’t get me wrong and label me a heretic… I believe the Bible has THE answer… Jesus. But what if it doesn’t have a black/white, do this/don’t do that type of answer to every question?

I love that McLaren is brave in asking these “Ten Questions That Are Transforming The Faith” (Narrative, Authority, God, Jesus, Gospel, Church, Sex, Future, Pluralism, What-Do-We-Do-Now). I think just asking these questions… admitting that as Christians, we don’t have all the answers… acknowledging the importance and validity of these questions (and others like them)… I think that’s a step in the right direction. To say, Ok, so we don’t have it all together, and we refuse to make stuff up or continue to stand on what we know deep down is shaky ground… We’re not going to cop out like that anymore… I think to repent like that to the unbelieving world around us really means something. And I think that rather than discrediting us… Christianity (what pastors with “all the answers” are afraid of), not being afraid to ask GIVES credit to God… where credit belongs in the first place.

So thanks Brian McLaren for not being afraid. Thanks for not having all the answers. And thanks for putting it into wonderful, hope-inspired, beautifully thought and written words in your book A New Kind of Christianity. I pray that as a result, the rest of us will allow our hearts to be soft and teachable enough to ask our own questions, even when there are no answers, and continue to stand on the one answerable question, Jesus…
Posted by Jaimee Holmes at 11:08 AM