Here is a link to a four part interview with theologian Stan Grenz. The interview took place in Seattle with Dick Staub (author of a number of books, most recently Christian Wisdom of the Jedi Masters) whose radio program, The Kindlings with a focus of theological and cultural intersection. The interview focuses on the nature and role of theology.

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4

A smattering of academic assessments of the emergent church:

• International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church (Volume 6, Number 1 / March 2006) “Emerging Church.”
• Criswell Theological Review (Volume 3, Issue 2/2006) “The Emerging Church”
• “Glimpses of the Emerging Church,” by Ruth Powell
• “An Ecclesiological Assessment of the Emerging Church Movement” by Dr. John S. Hammett
• “An Exploration of the Emerging Church in the United States: The Missiological Intent and Potential Implications for the Future” by Aaron O. Flores
• “The Message of the Emerging Church” by Dr. Jason P. Clark
• “Exploring the Emerging Movement: A Summary and Critique” by Christian Cryder
  

Peace, dwight

“A Tribute to Stanley Grenz” by the Princeton Theological Review has recenlty been published.  (Spring 2006, Volume XII, Number 1, Issue 34).

Prolegomena:
* “In Dedication to Professor Stanley Grenz” by Erik Leafblad

Introduction:
* How I Took Barth’s Chair, and How Grenz Almost Took It From Me by Ed L. Miller

Articles:
* Straddling the Tasman: The Relevance of Grenz’s Revisioned Evangelical Theology in the Australasian Context by Brian Harris
*The Implications of Postmodernism for Theology: On Meta-narratives, Foundationalism, and Realism by Jim Beilby
* Faith Seeking Understanding in a Postmodern Context: Stanley Grenz and Nonfoundational Theology by John R. Franke
* Grenz’s Theological Method and the Commodification of Religion by Bradley B. Onishi
 

Reflections:
* Stanley J. Grenz’s Contribution to Evangelical Theology by Roger E. Olsen
* Stanley Grenz, Women in Ministry, and the Trinity: A Model in Practical Theology by David Komline
* Stan Grenz Among the Baptists by Myles Werntz
* Theology for Pastors: Appreciating Stanley J. Grenz by William Mangrum
 

Book Reviews:
* Review of Stanley Grenz’ The Named God and the Question Review by Keith Johnson
* Review of Stanley Grenz’ Rediscovering the Triune God: the Trinity in Contemporary Theology Review by Daniel McClain

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The following was written by theologian LeRon Shults, and was sent out in today’s Emergent/C (the newsletter of emergent).

“The coordinators of Emergent have often been asked (usually by their critics) to proffer a doctrinal statement that lays out clearly what they believe. I am merely a participant in the conversation who delights in the ongoing reformation that occurs as we bring the Gospel into engagement with culture in ever new ways. But I have been asked to respond to this ongoing demand for clarity and closure. I believe there are several reasons why Emergent should not have a “statement of faith” to which its members are asked (or required) to subscribe. Such a move would be unnecessary, inappropriate and disastrous.

“Why is such a move unnecessary? Jesus did not have a “statement of faith.” He called others into faithful relation to God through life in the Spirit. As with the prophets of the Hebrew Bible, he was not concerned primarily with whether individuals gave cognitive assent to abstract propositions but with calling persons into trustworthy community through embodied and concrete acts of faithfulness. The writers of the New Testament were not obsessed with finding a final set of propositions the assent to which marks off true believers. Paul, Luke and John all talked much more about the mission to which we should commit ourselves than they did about the propositions to which we should assent. The very idea of a “statement of faith” is mired in modernist assumptions and driven by modernist anxieties – and this brings us to the next point.

“Such a move would be inappropriate. Various communities throughout church history have often developed new creeds and confessions in order to express the Gospel in their cultural context, but the early modern use of linguistic formulations as “statements” that allegedly capture the truth about God with certainty for all cultures and contexts is deeply problematic for at least two reasons. First, such an approach presupposes a (Platonic or Cartesian) representationalist view of language, which has been undermined in late modernity by a variety of disciplines across the social and physical sciences (e.g., sociolinguistics and paleo-biology). Why would Emergent want to force the new wine of the Spirit’s powerful transformation of communities into old modernist wineskins? Second, and more importantly from a theological perspective, this fixation with propositions can easily lead to the attempt to use the finite tool of language on an absolute Presence that transcends and embraces all finite reality. Languages are culturally constructed symbol systems that enable humans to communicate by designating one finite reality in distinction from another. The truly infinite God of Christian faith is beyond all our linguistic grasping, as all the great theologians from Irenaeus to Calvin have insisted, and so the struggle to capture God in our finite propositional structures is nothing short of linguistic idolatry.

“Why would it be disastrous? Emergent aims to facilitate a conversation among persons committed to living out faithfully the call to participate in the reconciling mission of the biblical God. Whether it appears in the by-laws of a congregation or in the catalog of an educational institution, a “statement of faith” tends to stop conversation. Such statements can also easily become tools for manipulating or excluding people from the community. Too often they create an environment in which real conversation is avoided out of fear that critical reflection on one or more of the sacred propositions will lead to excommunication from the community. Emergent seeks to provide a milieu in which others are welcomed to join in the pursuit of life “in” the One who is true (1 John 5:20). Giving into the pressure to petrify the conversation in a “statement” would make Emergent easier to control; its critics could dissect it and then place it in a theological museum alongside other dead conceptual specimens the curators find opprobrious. But living, moving things do not belong in museums. Whatever else Emergent may be, it is a movement committed to encouraging the lively pursuit of God and to inviting others into a delightfully terrifying conversation along the way.

“This does not mean, as some critics will assume, that Emergent does not care about belief or that there is no role at all for propositions. Any good conversation includes propositions, but they should serve the process of inquiry rather than shut it down. Emergent is dynamic rather than static, which means that its ongoing intentionality is (and may it ever be) shaped less by an anxiety about finalizing state-ments than it is by an eager attention to the dynamism of the Spirit’s disturbing and comforting presence, which is always reforming us by calling us into an ever-intensifying participation in the Son’s welcoming of others into the faithful embrace of God.”

Peace, dwight

Here’s a helpful essay by Miroslav Volf, titled “Christianity and Violence.”  Volf delievered this as the 2002 Boardman Lectureship in Christian Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania.
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“We Know More Than Our Pastors” by Tim Bedner.

peace, dwight

Jennifer Goodson (one of my colleagues at MHGS) just publishing a powerful article titled: 

“Exploiting Body and Soul“ in Sojourners.

peace, dwight

How Can the Bible be Authoritative?   by N.T. Wright.

Vox Evangelica 21 1991.

Here is a great article by Dr. Elaine J. Ramshaw titled: Power and Forgiveness in Matthew 18.  The article first appeared in Word & World.

Peace, dwight

Religion & Ethics on PBS did a story on the Emergent Church, part one, part two & video extras (“what is the emerging church?”).

peace, dwight