Evangelicals rediscovering "tradition"?

The Future Lies in the Past -- Why evangelicals are connecting with the early church as they move into the 21st century.

Many 20- and 30-something evangelicals are uneasy and alienated in mall-like church environments; high-energy, entertainment-oriented worship; and boomer-era ministry strategies and structures modeled on the business world. Increasingly, they are asking just how these culturally camouflaged churches can help them rise above the values of the consumerist world around them.

For younger evangelicals, traditional churches are too centered on words and propositions. And pragmatic churches are compromising authentic Christianity by tailoring their ministries to the marketplace and pop culture. The younger evangelicals seek a renewed encounter with a God beyond both doctrinal definitions and super-successful ministry programs.

So what to do? Easy, says this youth movement: Stop endlessly debating and advertising Christianity, and just embody it. Live it faithfully in community with others--especially others beyond the white suburban world of many megachurch ministries. Embrace symbols and sacraments. Dialogue with the "other two" historic confessions: Catholicism and Orthodoxy. Recognize that "the road to the church's future is through its past." And break out the candles and incense. Pray using the lectio divina. Tap all the riches of Christian tradition you can find.

This is the road to maturity. That more and more evangelicals have set out upon it is reason for hope for the future of gospel Christianity. That they are receiving good guidance on this road from wise teachers is reason to believe that Christ is guiding the process. And that they are meeting and learning from fellow Christians in the other two great confessions, Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox, is reason to rejoice in the power of love.

He's good at punching my buttons. So much to comment on. Let's see...

For younger evangelicals, traditional churches are too centered on words and propositions.

Sorry, those are the tools of thought. Can't do without them. The word is what we've been given.

Live it faithfully in community with others

I"m a grumpy loner. All this chatter about "community" grates on me.

especially others beyond the white suburban world of many megachurch ministries

Y'all might try actually moving out here past the lily white suburbs. There is a world outside Chicagometropolitanarea.

Embrace symbols and sacraments.

The preached word and right administration of baptism and the Lord's supper will do fine for me, thank you.

Dialogue with the "other two" historic confessions: Catholicism and Orthodoxy.

Maybe. Only once you are thoroughly grounded in your own. We're talking the nature of the gospel here.

Recognize that "the road to the church's future is through its past."

Why?

And break out the candles and incense. Pray using the lectio divina.

"On every high hill and under every spreading tree.." Do we dance naked in the woods? What's the limit?

Its about “experience” replacing teaching from the word and ritual verses freedom. The Emergents adapt this and that from other religious traditions more because it “feels” like they think church should feel (except sometimes instead of an altar they will have an old tire encircling candles because it’s more ‘cool’).

In regards to this article, they are speaking largely of “evangelicals.” Right now, evangelical churches are being torn apart by seeker sensitivity and Emergent. They bring about new “traditions” by trashing old ones. Doctrine doesn’t matter. Not even the atonement. It ain’t pretty.

Here’s one such article from LightHouse Trials. If, as sandyeggo says, all one is doing is reading portions of the Bible, no foul. But as sandyeggo points out, far too many protestant churches have embrace occultism and are leading many to destruction.

http://www.lighthousetrailsresearch.com/afa.htm

Experience being given authority over the Word of God is always wrong and dangerous. Life and experience must be interpreted in light of Scripture, not the other way around.

Let us warn our friend against the apostasy promoted by Christianity Today.

I agree with you on the bristling over 'For younger evangelicals, traditional churches are too centered on words and propositions.'

Hey, if somebody doesn't have to have that to have the mind of Christ, great, more power to them, but like yourself, I have this big problem with something spelled,..S--I--N.

Damnedest thing, is that it is so incredibly sinful, that it has scarred my thinking in just so many ways. I find out that if I happen lapse into S--I--N,..even in my thinking while reading the Bible, that if i don't get back into fellowship with God by rethinking through faith in Him and confessing my sin to Him, even my Bible studies will get my thinking screwed up, on the wrong track, leading me either into a form of legalism or the other extreme of lasciviousness when I apply those lessons to life.

I even find myself quoting Scripture, but missing the meaning that Christ provided, if I'm not in fellowship when I'm studying Scripture.

So in effect, without remianing on the right path with Him, no matter what I do, I end up scarring my thinking, such that when I'm facd with similar situations in the future, instead of thinking through faith in Him, I tend to slip back into those past thinking trends I had while I wasn't in fellowship with Him.

A lot of those times are seemingly very responsible, independent of Him, very worldly, lots of solutions for problems, lots of common sense advise, but an interesting thing happens. They always tend to drift away from Him and miss the mark.

I've found that sometimes, in order to really understand just what the heck Scripture is conveying to me, I simply have to go back to individual syntax, and semantics of words and expressions, sometimes in the original language, and I discover I never comprehended even the notion of what the Word had originally said, simply because I had been allowing my thinking to read into the verses what I thought they meant on my own, instead of allowing God to show me what He simply had inspired the writers to state when they wrote the Scripture in context.

Amazingly, some dedicated men with what has to be a spiritual gift, have not only communicated some of those words and propositions in technical jargon, but they intuitively know how to just hit the nail on the head with specific phrases, at the right time, at the right place, with diverse, sparse audiences, where amazingly His Word gets communicated, when I might not have understood His meaning had they not preached it.

Experiences are one thing, but its also a pretty incredible experience to study the Word from a gifted pastor-teacher who is equipping his audience with a supernatural spiritual gift of communication to their explicit mental needs to grasp the actual Word being conveyed.

Seems as though some who are preoccupied with others just studying 'words and prepositions' don't fully appreciate the ability of explicit words and phrases to express some things, and why other words or phrases were explicitly not used in also communicating His very Word, from Millennia ago, for our grasp at this very moment.

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