This is a witty and smart work written by a pastor and a member of his congregation and they are out to set the rather crooked record straight about what so-called and not so so-called emergent authors, pastors, leaders, bloggers, and others which reject conventional labels are presenting as the rationale and basis for the emergent/emerging (DeYoung & Kluck use these words interchangeably - although some view them as markedly different) movement and how embracing social issues doesn't mean you need to forsake a life founded upon orthodox beliefs, propositional truths about Jesus, and the authority of Scripture.
As a disclaimer to anyone who may stumble across this blog I feel I should report the same disclaimer DeYoung and Kluck put wholeheartedly in their book,
"We fully understand that emergent means a hundred different things to a hundred different people, so if what you read in these pages is not what you mean by emergent then so be it...We do not think of our emergent sparring partners as the "bad guys", no doubt many people reading this book have been helped by these [emergent leaders]...when we talk about the emergent church we are not simply referring to what is new, postmodern, culturally with-it, or generationally up and coming, the official Emergent organization, or the Emergent village; we are talking about a movement led and inspired by a cadre of authors and pastors who express many of the same concerns with the evangelical church, hit on many of the same themes, and often speak as the most influential voices in the emergent conversation...We don't want to get hung up on labels let alone poison anything that has been called emergent."
To begin DeYoung addresses the question he is asked most frequently, "So what is the emergent church anyway?" and he says defining the emergent church is like nailing Jell-O to the wall. This is, he says because of several reasons, first because it is new and all new movements are usually amorphous and hard to define, but the blurry nature is also very intentional as emergents view themselves as just participants in a "conversation"; emergent authors and bloggers do not view themselves as authoritarians or theologians but as talkers.
DeYoung counters this position of being just "talkers" and the general lack of accountability within the movement with the fact that thousands of books have been sold, podcasts are downloaded everyday, speakers tour the country, and once this happens you cannot deny that you are indeed a leader and teacher whether you want to be or not and this is serious because as James says, "Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness" (3:1)
The things emergents are addressing generally involve the importance of relationships and inclusivity, addressing the social needs of people; their mantras include, "doing church differently" and "all we need is Jesus"; and the leaders include, Tony Jones, Doug Pagitt, Spencer Burke, Brian McLaren, Dan Kimball, Rob Bell, and Peter Rollins. They rally around postmodernism which really means anything that is deconstructed, embraces uncertainty, lacking central ideas or hierarchy, anything that departs from tradition or the way that things have been done in the past, and so on.
In this book DeYoung and Kluck address several issues and interpretations where the evangelical church and the emergent movement seem to be at odds and why it is important to not just dismiss these differences as unimportant because they come back to the foundations upon which the church was built and in some circumstances the very fundamentals of Christianity, such as: the importance of the journey verses the destination, the knowability of God, uncertainty verses humility, homosexuality, the encouragement of doubt as a part of our faith, the acceptance of rebellion and the legitimacy of authority in the church, the Bible as inerrant, etc.
I would highly recommend this book even if you are not interested in the emergent movement solely as a work that will get you thinking about what you view as foundational and how important it is to hold fast to the truths of the word. I was eager to read this book as I know someday I will be searching for a new church home and I wanted to use this as a resource to help me be as discerning as possible when examining the doctrines and fundamentals of a new church and not let things not found in scripture effect my decision about where I should be and I am really glad I read this book.
