Since Off the Beaten Track was published I have been having some interesting conversations around emerging church and redefining church. I am in the process of putting something together around the issue. I asked Jonny Baker for his thoughts about my thoughts of the need for a more radical rethinking of church and how this fits into what is currently going on. His reply was “There is no emerging church take on church… It is a range from trying to transition existing churches to a complete reimaginging of church. It’s a series of conversations people are having. If you don’t think it goes far enough you just join in the conversationâ€?
I guess my feeling coming from a missionary minded perspective is that a lot of the “reimagingingâ€? if far more about what is DONE in church (which a friend described as rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic) than a true reimagining of WHAT IS CHURCH. There is very little evidence of a wholesale paradigm shift rooted in theology that is “reimaginingâ€? what church is. Off the Beaten Track led to more of this reimagining and the metaphor – “church is both the city on hill and the journey to that cityâ€? So to get me in on the conversation and to get a broader view I have taken the first story from the book and posed a question.
A highly skilled draughtsman decided to try to turn his hand to portraits. After all he was able to reproduce technical drawings in minute detail, and he reasoned that if he applied the same skills to his painting, the likeness would be accurate and exact. He started with his family and sure enough the reproductions were exact, as good as a photograph and yet he and all who saw them knew there was something missing. On meeting a famous painter one day he explained the problem and was advised that he needed to start with the soul not the image. “What do I paint then� asked the draughtsman.
“Forget the rules and the reproduction, remember the past, embrace the present but realise and paint the future� replied the artist.
What do we need to paint in relation to church?
Is the emerging church just painting over the cracks?