Introduction
Quote
“After bomb damage in 1991 and 1993, St Helen’s sought permission to renovate so as to provide more seating. Societies dedicated to preserving period architecture vigorously protested. They wanted the church restored as a monument, not as a centre for gospel proclamation to the city.” (p. 14)
Heading 1: The church in an age of pluralism
Old notion that there was no salvation outside the church has been challenged.
Important caveat: If the church rather than Christ becomes the centre of our devotion, spiritual decay has begun. A doctrine of church must focus on Christ and His Lordship. It is to Christ and not to ourselves that we witness.
Being a witness to the world in our community.
Political awareness and activism has reached evangelical churches – how do we witness for truth and justice without forfeiting pilgrim status, remembering that Christ’s kingdom is not of this world?
Quotes
“An enlightened Christian world citizen, we are told, will avoid Christian terminology that might offend other religious. He or she will speak of God as ‘he / she / it’.The only God who might take offence at this neutering is the God of the Bible, noted for his exclusive claims.” (p. 15)
“To be sure, if the church rather than Christ becomes the centre of our devotion, spiritual decay has begun. A doctrine of the church that does not centre on Christ is self-defeating and false. But God said to the disciples who confessed him, ‘I will build my church.’ To ignore his purpose is to deny his lordship. The good news of Christ’s coming includes the good news of what he came to do: to join us to himself and to one another as his body, the new people of God.”
“Christian witness that is limited to private religious experience cannot challenge secularism. Christians in community must again show the world, not merely family values, but the bond of the love of Christ.”
I find it amazing how this small portion of the chapter has so much... I think it merits an entire post in itself.
I think the short 4 pages which Clowney devotes to this topic doesn’t do it justice. For sure, his goal is more ambitious: to map an ecclesiology in a book that can reach out to laypeople and ministers. With that in mind we easily forgive Clowney’s brevity on this matter. However, the themes on these pages should be expanded some.
1) Consideration of the Church’s “sacramental monopoly on salvation.”
Some of us may know that the Church of Rome taught that there was no salvation to be found outside the Church, but I’m sure that even less know that this was also a doctrine which the Reformers taught. Calvin and Luther both emphasized the importance of the Church in the work of God in salvation.
This chapter considers the doctrine from the angle of postmodernist thought: that the doctrine is undermined by assertions of the importance of other religions and of the importance and respect and tolerance toward the other.
While in no way undermining the importance of respecting and tolerating those of different faiths, Clowney suggests (but never says) that this is a problem. And it is.
At its heart, the gospel is a truth claim. It is something that you either accept or reject. The simple truth is that if you accept it, then the view of the other cannot be correct. The problem is that we often like to have our cake and eat it too. We assert that we are Christians, and yet at the same time worship at the altar of the unknown God. Somehow, we are able to reconcile the fact that we worship the same God as religions which deny the deity of Christ.
How can this be?
However, there is any angle to this claim which I wish to explore, and which I think is a pertinent problem in the Church today – that of the unchurched Christian.
Many assert that they are Christians, yet do not associate themselves with a local Church. Granted, they claim themselves to be part of the Church universal, the invisible Church. However, they severely undermine the importance of the local Church in the process.
The local Church was never far from the minds of the Reformers when they taught about this doctrine of Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus (outside the church there is no salvation). Luther referred to the “company of believers”, and seeing how they believe, live, and teach. Calvin likewise unequivocally said that “away from her (the visible Church) bosom one cannot hope for any forgiveness of sins or any salvation.”
While a lesser problem than that of postmodernism, this is definitely an important issue to address too.
- I realize that I have so much to talk about these 4 pages alone – I shall reserve the next discussion for the future, considering 2) A Christo-centric view of ecclesiology; 3) Corporate witness through the Ekklesia; and 4) Christian activism in the context of the doctrine of the Kingdom of God.
