The Infamous DVD, pt 1
Well, first thing I want to mention is how hard it was for me to find anyone distributing the "Emerging Church" dvd put out by the "Concerned Nazarenes." Supposedly, 1000's were being handed out, but someone voluntarily gave me theirs last night (Wednesday).
When I got back to my hotel, I watched the first 2 hours. Then, this morning (Thursday), I watched the final 45 minutes.
It was extremely grating. My wife fell asleep after 30 minutes. She likes boring documentaries so....
Okay, I will be more serious in addressing this dvd.
The movie (?) begins with ordained elder Bev Turner of the Church of the Nazarene telling us that she is concerned about the emerging church and its influence on the Church of the Nazarene (CotN). We are not told where she pastors.
We are then introduced to a very rough looking guy (please do not make me remember names, I will NOT watch this again) introducing himself as the host for the dvd (never mentioning his connection with the CotN). His first interviewee is Dr. Gary Gilley, pastor of an independant church who blasts all things emerging because of the lack of roots in church history and tradition. The irony is thick here - an independant church blasting someone else, anyone else, for the lack of roots in church tradition and history.
Dr. Gilley is an author of books of dispensational thought and spends much of the time bashing Brian McLaren, the supposed leader of the emerging church. Gilley mentions many times that the emerging church (ec) refuses to listen to others when they are wrong, but never concedes the possibility that he could listen to them if he was wrong.
Another talking point is that the ec is only focused on experiences and that experience is not very important. This is especially humorous since the DVD is targeted at a church that has the root of its tradition in experiential expressive ways. Yes, the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene relied a lot on experience in its hey-day and is known for people "being blessed", "running the pews", and "experiencing sanctification" because their "heart was strangely warmed." Nope, no experience here... Oh yeah, not once in this whole interview is the CotN mentioned.
In between sessions, there is a clip from McLaren and no critique from the producers. I am sure they think that what is being posted is proof of his heresy, but honestly it made me feel more comforted that there is hope yet.
The second interview is with Ray Yungen. He is also an author of books, but not a Nazarene. Ray was a little bit better of an interview, but not by much. Ray's big problem are things like prayer stations, labyrinths, lectio divina, and the like. To him, these are all pagan, non-biblical practices. This is a big concern as we are not to bring in non-biblical things like spiritual formation into the church. My response is then how do we account for why we celebrate Christmas and Easter on the particular days that we do? Are these completely free from the secular paganism? Or do the people putting out the dvd not celebrate these days? I mean, it isn't like the word Christmas is in the Bible.
The inbetween was a clip of Oprah where one of her guests argues with her about Jesus being God. Oprah makes it very clear that she is not a Christian by what she says. This clip is juxtaposed with another where a lady asks Oprah how she can believe as a Christian while also believing that everyone can believe whatever they want. Oprah's response was that a preacher once said that God was a jealous God. This concerned Oprah because she did not know why God would be jealous "of" her. She believed that God loved her and that God was in all things, so how could God be jealous of her?
I honestly have never met of the ec who would agree with Oprah in this situation. I don't know of any postmodern who would agree with her. I'm sure there is somoene somewhere. Those of us who are or are friendly with emerging/postmodern agree that Oprah is wrong.
The third interview was my favorite. It was a lady who was formerly of the New Age movement turned Christian. She conflicted with Gilley about experience saying that she seeks to truly experience God and that is what all believers are to do. This made the host twitch in his seat. Mostly she talked about the occult and New Age. The host tried to imply that this was synonomous with what those in the ec espoused, but that is a pretty big stretch.
More to come once I've had sleep.
Peace.
When I got back to my hotel, I watched the first 2 hours. Then, this morning (Thursday), I watched the final 45 minutes.
It was extremely grating. My wife fell asleep after 30 minutes. She likes boring documentaries so....
Okay, I will be more serious in addressing this dvd.
The movie (?) begins with ordained elder Bev Turner of the Church of the Nazarene telling us that she is concerned about the emerging church and its influence on the Church of the Nazarene (CotN). We are not told where she pastors.
We are then introduced to a very rough looking guy (please do not make me remember names, I will NOT watch this again) introducing himself as the host for the dvd (never mentioning his connection with the CotN). His first interviewee is Dr. Gary Gilley, pastor of an independant church who blasts all things emerging because of the lack of roots in church history and tradition. The irony is thick here - an independant church blasting someone else, anyone else, for the lack of roots in church tradition and history.
Dr. Gilley is an author of books of dispensational thought and spends much of the time bashing Brian McLaren, the supposed leader of the emerging church. Gilley mentions many times that the emerging church (ec) refuses to listen to others when they are wrong, but never concedes the possibility that he could listen to them if he was wrong.
Another talking point is that the ec is only focused on experiences and that experience is not very important. This is especially humorous since the DVD is targeted at a church that has the root of its tradition in experiential expressive ways. Yes, the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene relied a lot on experience in its hey-day and is known for people "being blessed", "running the pews", and "experiencing sanctification" because their "heart was strangely warmed." Nope, no experience here... Oh yeah, not once in this whole interview is the CotN mentioned.
In between sessions, there is a clip from McLaren and no critique from the producers. I am sure they think that what is being posted is proof of his heresy, but honestly it made me feel more comforted that there is hope yet.
The second interview is with Ray Yungen. He is also an author of books, but not a Nazarene. Ray was a little bit better of an interview, but not by much. Ray's big problem are things like prayer stations, labyrinths, lectio divina, and the like. To him, these are all pagan, non-biblical practices. This is a big concern as we are not to bring in non-biblical things like spiritual formation into the church. My response is then how do we account for why we celebrate Christmas and Easter on the particular days that we do? Are these completely free from the secular paganism? Or do the people putting out the dvd not celebrate these days? I mean, it isn't like the word Christmas is in the Bible.
The inbetween was a clip of Oprah where one of her guests argues with her about Jesus being God. Oprah makes it very clear that she is not a Christian by what she says. This clip is juxtaposed with another where a lady asks Oprah how she can believe as a Christian while also believing that everyone can believe whatever they want. Oprah's response was that a preacher once said that God was a jealous God. This concerned Oprah because she did not know why God would be jealous "of" her. She believed that God loved her and that God was in all things, so how could God be jealous of her?
I honestly have never met of the ec who would agree with Oprah in this situation. I don't know of any postmodern who would agree with her. I'm sure there is somoene somewhere. Those of us who are or are friendly with emerging/postmodern agree that Oprah is wrong.
The third interview was my favorite. It was a lady who was formerly of the New Age movement turned Christian. She conflicted with Gilley about experience saying that she seeks to truly experience God and that is what all believers are to do. This made the host twitch in his seat. Mostly she talked about the occult and New Age. The host tried to imply that this was synonomous with what those in the ec espoused, but that is a pretty big stretch.
More to come once I've had sleep.
Peace.
posted by Mike W. McVey @ 1:01 AM
1 Comments:
At June 26, 2009 at 8:02 AM ,
Christy Gunter said...
Wow. I can't believe the COTN wasn't even mentioned once. It was simply a video attempting to prove emergents are wrong. Wow.
I really appreciate you taking the time to post this-- and thank you for watching it DURING ASSEMBLY with so much going on-- so the rest of us outside of Orlando can see.
You ought to check out my blog sometime. I'm now subscribed to yours.
I look forward to future posts.
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