Jesus Cropped from the Picture

Jesus Cropped from the Picture

In too many cases, the individual Emerging, not the Story of God’s work throughout history, becomes the arbiter of truth. As Gibbs and Bolger said, “In a time of immense cultural change and disconnect with the church, emerging churches retrieved the Jesus of the Gospels, but not necessarily the Christ of history.” 95 Therefore, their incoherent identity leaves them without sufficient traction to contextualize. A better approach would be to start with a definitive understanding of the Kingdom Story, then contextualize in the culture of Postmodernity. Community Emergings react against the privatized faith of Traditionals and Pragmatics, preferring to self-actualize in small, connected groups. 96 They seek to distance themselves from a focus on personal relevance by living their faith in community. But the reality is they search for personal truth within a community of faith, where worshipers pursue an experience with God through a variety of individualistic ways. The individual is the one who determines what is acceptable worship. As one Emerging said, “Begin to express yourself using tools that you understand. You may understand graphic design; you may understand Bulgarian nose flutes; the media is irrelevant.” 97 While they value community, they continue the Pragmatic’s view that institutions are required to serve the individual . 98 Some Emergings require gatherings to be relevant to a much greater degree than Pragmatics. “We want creativity, artistic expression, and to hear from one another. A meeting is only as good as the purpose behind it.” 99

Instead of starting with an objective, historic, and creedal understanding of Christian faith, Emergings seek to discover the meaning of their

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