Hope found in role of emerging churches

Spiritual vs. religious
Hope found in role of emerging churches

How do you respond when someone says: “I am a very spiritual person. I am just not religious”? Or perhaps you have heard, “Religion is for those who are trying to avoid going to hell. Spirituality is for those who have been there.”

I will be honest: I too often become defensive or even dismissive rather than exploring what the person means by such statements.

I feel irritated at the implication that the organized church is a shallow escape for those who are out of touch with everyday realities. I bristle at the allegations that our energies and resources perpetuate religious institutions rather than invite people to experience a Christ-centered, Spirit-filled life. I spurn the idea that one can escape the messiness of human institutions and sinfulness and achieve some realm of pure spirituality.

In fact, the word of God finally puts to death such illusions and frees me for a life of faith by God’s grace on account of Christ. Apart from the people and practices, the rituals and routines, the expectations and imperfections of the institutional church—“organized religion”—my spiritual life would languish.

In being defensive and dismissive, however, have I given more evidence of a quarrelsome and hostile faith that leads people to want to be spiritual but not religious? Have I missed the opportunity to have a conversation about faith? When I do listen, I often hear what has been happening in a person’s life—not just a recital of events but evidence of profound struggles.

The distinction between being religious and being spiritual is common among people who are acquainted intimately with the grief of betrayal unmasked in others and themselves. It often is born out of a deep longing to experience the presence of God’s mercy when the people of God have seemed without mercy.

When I cease being defensive or dismissive and let the conversation shift from “religious” to “spirituality,” I am reminded of the gifts that each person has to share. As it turns out, our best gifts are not the things we often get so wrapped up in—bricks and mortar, programs and projects, lists of activities and weekly calendars. It is the spirit and the fruit of the Spirit’s life in us: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23).

When I listen to people such as Jay Gamelin (see "Door openers"), ELCA campus pastor at Jacob’s Porch, Columbus, Ohio, talk about “living grace radically, falling in love with Jesus, and respecting the word and each other,” I hear the yearnings of my own heart.

I hear my hopes for the church when servant leaders in the emerging church say, “Ultimately the cross of Christ is not cool. It’s never going to be in popular demand. So we are just striving to be as obedient to the Spirit as possible, living in the way of Jesus, creating an economy of giving and receiving that’s radically different from the brutality of our world. We can’t offer a perfect church, either, but we can offer a community to help draw out [people’s] gift[s] for the world.”

Finally, I realize that it is not up to me to resolve the tension between being spiritual and being religious. The simple remedy is Jesus, whose Spirit was open to those outside the boundaries of conventional wisdom: a frequently married Samaritan woman Jesus met at a well, tax collectors named Matthew and Zaccheus, Martha and Mary grieving over the death of Lazarus. Jesus listened to their stories, ate with them, opened their eyes to God’s kingdom and became their trusted friend.

When he was asked how he could do it, Jesus responded, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners” (Matthew 9:12-13). With such a gracious invitation I no longer need to be defensive or dismissive, just thankful and joyful for such a Savior.

This column was published in The Lutheran, the magazine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Visit www.thelutheran.org and scroll down to "Columnists" to read the presiding bishop's latest column.

Bishop's Messages
For a complete listing by date of messages and statements made in 2008 by Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, visit All Messages, 2008.
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A reader response: That the ELCA presiding Bishop gives legitimacy to the movement called emerging church by writing an article is significant. I have wondered about the spiritual blindness exhibited among mainliners regarding this movement that seems to transcend the 16th century modern tribal expressions. Our synod invited me last June to lead a forum on emerging church. What I found there were people seeking definition, in order to control it or determine its capacity to be a legitimate ecclesial expression. But the truth is, people are emerging with a new hermeneutic that is colored by the postmodern context in which we live and hear God's Word. This ecclesial reality is happening. The question I've been pondering is to whom are we, as church, submitting ourselves? Is it to the institutional norms and traditions? Is it to our tribal identity? What territory are we defending and why? Martin Luther was not afraid to speak the truth into a political/religious system that had forgotten the gospel. What if this is a time when there are voices listening with Spirit-tuned ears to the Words of Jesus? What if this is a time when new voices are emerging to call the church to a way of life that is consistent with the story of salvation revealed to us in the good news story of Jesus, a way of life that must be recontextualized and reconstructed in the cultural milieu of 21st century North America? As this church emerges, will our tribal stories make room for a new telling of the gospel?