A wee caveat!

My friend and colleague in Prague, Rollin Walls, has just been reviewing an essay for me. He makes a very important point, which I quote in full from Walls' own work, Rival Versions of Theological Enquiry. The point is that Brueggemann can be accused of reducing the Gospel to merely social action. I agree with this warning - hence the 'three dimensional Gospel' blog entry below. We cannot afform to simply 'sermonise', 'spiritualise' or 'socialise'! We need a grasp of righteousness that points to God as well as to our fellow man. But there is still validity in Brueggemann's point that there is indeed a social, interpersonal aspect to righteousness. Oh, if only any one of us could get it perfectly right all the time! Yeah. Right. .....

Walls, both as New Testament specialist and missiologist, forcibly and persuasively states,

'Granted that such a postmodern paradigm is upon us, we must, once again, recognise that this shift may bend towards a deconstructive or tradition approach to contextual missions. An example of the former might be given with Walter Brueggemann once again. He affirms a deconstruction of 'old missional assumptions and practices.' These include the scope of God's mission being extended outside the Church--a point made often enough by others. But for Brueggemann, this does not mean that the Spirit goes ahead of the Church, preparing the hearts of those seeking God to hear the salvific message of Christ. This would, apparently, be to conceive or practice the Church's mission in 'absolutist or triumphalist terms.' Instead, it means 'religious pluralism'. 'Mission' under such restrictions no longer has a Christological or ecclesiastical focus. It is rather an action theology to redress the inequities in the world. Disestablishment of the Church (apparently this is as much Christian theology as any institutional Church) means being able to recognise ‘the companionable presence of many others … journeying in the same direction.' ‘Christian faith can never be satisfied with a theology of hope that is purely attitudinal, abstract, or ‘doctrinal’’—it must be hope in action. Mission, then (for Brueggemann), entails addressing the injustices resulting from global technology. It also entails ecumenical (inter-religious) dialogue: ‘We may also find, in such dialogue, points of commonality in both theology and ethics, and so expand our conception of the missio Dei.' This anthropological mission of hope, deemphasising Christ, conversion and Church, becomes a movement open enough to include others 'journeying in the same direction'. Mission in action (is reduced to and) involves enacting hope by participating in the harsh realities of AIDS, subjugation (by Western powers outside the West), and ethno-religious conflicts. (from Rollin Walls, Rival Versions of Theological Enquiry).  Italicised parenthesis mine.

Rollin has understandable reservations regarding such a missiology! Rollin Walls' analysis and reservation expressed regarding his reading of Brueggemann therefore needs to be heeded. Because if we lose the centre in Jesus Christ to our Gospel, what sort of Gospel is left? In the end of the day, we own only the knowing of 'Jesus Christ and Him crucified'.