So, Now What?

I've been reading through Frank Viola's book Pagan Christianity at the urging of my friend, Sim Church Planter, and another reader who posted a comment on my blog entry discussing a Viola article. This book only provides historical support for the gut feeling I've had for years that something is terribly wrong with the way we do church.

Honestly, I stopped reading the book after reading the first two chapters and the last two. I'll finish the middle some time later. The reason I stopped is not that I disagreed with Viola, but that I found myself screaming "so, now what?" I don't need to spend days listening to someone tell me what I've already found to be true by experience. To Frank's credit, he suggests reading his companion book Rethinking the Wineskin to learn about the practices of the first century church. Great marketing there, Frank... put the problem and the solution in two different books. Now, I've got to go nuts until I get the other one.

Seriously, his entire premise and the facts that support it raises serious questions and strong emotions for me. First, the emotions... I feel like a charlatan for propagating this stuff for years in the church as a pastor. I would march myself down to my former churches tomorrow morning, confess my deception, and beg for mercy, if only they wouldn't have me committed or, worse, burned at the stake. My genuine remorse for deceiving the faithful is tempered by my anger for being personally hood-winked and sold a bill of goods since childhood.

Now, for some questions, beyond the obvious, "what do we do now?" Honestly, in a pursuit to be 1st century ecclesiological purists, aren't we simply trading one tradition for another, albeit a simpler and much older one? Hijacking pagan rituals and customs is evident much earlier in scripture, i.e. David and the Zionist tradition or Abraham offering Isaac as a child sacrifice. Scripturally, the nature of the relationship between God and humanity evolved from pre-history until the time of Christ and the 1st century church. Who are we to say that it must cease to evolve to a deeper level? Do we not make the same misguided assumption that Solomon did in Ecclesiastes that what is has already been and there is nothing new under the sun?

I think there are values that should be gleaned and replicated from the 1st century church, but honestly, it is not a prototype for all time. God did not dispense His Spirit into a perfect vessel that only cracked several centuries later in Rome, nor did Christ choose the perfect spotless bride who only grew uglier with time. God chose cracked pots. Christ chose a prostitute for a bride, much the same as Hosea. We are what we are, and He loves us nonetheless.

I think it unwise to lump all pagan practices into the category of evil influences, as compared to the spiritual utopia that is 1st century Christianity. Appreciation, respect, and adaptation of our pagan culture provides a bridge through which the incarnational life of Christ can flow from His church to the world. I am leery of "us versus them," insider versus outsider, mentality. It has proved dangerous time after time, from the treatment of the first church in Jerusalem toward Gentile believers to the treatment of protestant churches in America toward blacks and homosexuals.

In light of what the 1st century church may have done right and what the 20th century church has done wrong, the question that emerging Christianity continues to ask is what does it mean to be a follower of Jesus Christ in the 21st century? In other words, so, now what?