66 Comments
Feb 14, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

I see your "Just as I Am" reference at the bottom. Nice touch. We may need all 15 verses for this invitation.

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Feb 14, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

Thank you, and very well done! I won't hold my breath that they will come...the allure and seduction of power is too great, in my view. I quit using the E word to describe myself more than 6 years ago and I don't think I will live long enough to be willing to reclaim it.

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Feb 14, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

Thank you Scot. This is my favorite invitation in the Bible: "The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let the one who hears say, “Come!” Let the one who is thirsty come; and let the one who wishes take the free gift of the water of life." (Rev 22:17). It's so simple - it speaks of meeting a real need - who doesn't get thirsty? And it speaks of beauty - what bride is not beautiful inside and out, on their wedding day, dressed up and radiant with happiness (hopefully)? It's not triggering either for anyone who has trouble with images of abuse and violent death. Invitations open things up rather than locking them down. Evangelicalism in my experience seems to be about locking things down rather than opening them up. The gates of hell shall not prevail means the gates have been opened. Things might get messy when we fling the doors wide open but isn't that what Jesus wanted? He said ""Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men's faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to." Jesus spoke of people actually trying to get in, and they couldn't because the religious experts of his day were stopping them. I think if you try to get rid of the messiness then grace is lost along with it.

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In many ways, the evangelical expansion was not unlike the western expansion of the colonists. Manifest destiny tends to determine what is or isn't "God's plan" by looking back at the powerful's ability to conquer it, build it, and overcome it. Evangelical leaders simply renamed the obstacles. To the colonizers, rivers, mountains, animals, people groups, cultures, and religions were blocking the path to what their god wanted for them. The evangelicals (which I have been most of my life. God help me.) built bigger buildings, events, platforms, celebrity, and sought more power, position, and benefits (sounds opposite to Phil. 2?), all the while trampling on women and people of color like colonists killing buffalo, only their weapon was not a long gun, it was the Bible.

I guess "divine right" is just as present in this not so "Christian" nation as it was in the old country.

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Feb 15, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

ADD American Blindspot: Race, Class, Religion, and the Trump Presidency by Gerardo Martí (2020) https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/153811609X

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So good. "Abuelita Faith" is really a stirring read that came out last year

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Feb 14, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

I really appreciate your work on this, Scot. It certainly shows the way in which your ecclesiology has adapted over time. I think that's important for all of us as we journey alongside each other and alongside Christ.

Honestly, though, I wonder how effective the word evangelicalism is to the gospel story today. It only means one thing in the eyes of people who have little or no faith experience. And for those who are struggling in the aftermath of spiritual abuse, it is a word that brings back painful memories. That's why I would never, ever call myself an evangelical and I never use the word evangelical to describe what Christians should be. It's not a helpful word anymore.

Now, that leads to a different question--what is a better word to describe who we are? I tend to be more mainline anyway, but growing up as a Baptist in the south I still hold on to Jesus' instructions that we serve as witnesses to who Christ is. So, perhaps, the word I would use is witness. What could be more appropriate for Christians than to actually witness (martys) by sharing our story, which is the gospel story itself.

Again, I really appreciate your work on this. I just think it's time to kill off that E word completely because it doesn't mean what it once did.

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From my vantage point most of our evangelical theology is written from the position of at least some privilege. That's not to dismiss it in any way. Rather it is to say that we have perhaps ignored the margins of say African American or Hispanic theology, not to mention theology coming from the 2/3rs world. I am really grateful for the evangelical influences of NT Wright, Scot Mc Knight, Stanley Hauerwas, Walter Brueggemann, Craig Keener, The GOCN, Stanley Grenz, Dallas Willard etc. in my own life, but when I read that list it puts me with 'my own' so to speak. These are admittedly my predominent shaping influences. But I need hear from the poor about the poor. From women about women etc. It's a newish adventure for me and one I am really enjoying. The brand of 'American Israelism' that infects the evangelical world at present is disturbing to say the least...thanks for this. Good food for thought.

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Mar 5, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

First time caller. Never had you as a prof in Deerfield, but all my guy friends liked & respected you so much. #Fave I hope someday to see that same, deserved respect here in your comments sections.

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Feb 19, 2022Liked by Scot McKnight

Thanks for speaking truth to the church and doing so in love!

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Agreed. The marriage of conservative evangelicalism to right-wing politics (I am a centrist) has moved a contingent of E's to an anti-immigrant mindset. It is unfortunate that the very people who declare their love of the Scriptures tend to ignore those lessons of kindness and inclusion to the foreigner which has both Old and New Testament foundations. The book of Ruth goes a long way in showing how the immigrant enriches God's people, and how this woman from Moab is a vital link in the line of Christ. A point I have made in teaching on this book is that the Church must be seen as an international, diverse body of believers; people who neither look like us, or speak our language. This must be remembered; tribalism is not Christian.

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Scot, I think I need to create a new bookmarks folder for, "Things that make me go, hmmm..." ;-) Seriously though, I'd always thought of myself as Evangelical, but recently dropped that moniker as it has become more of a Right-wing political affiliation than a doctrine or even a true historical narrative. However, as I read here, maybe there could be a way to pick up that tag again, but in a way that reflects the wonderfully diverse, sometimes beautiful and sometimes horrific, world wide, passionate (driven?), human and divine story which is Evangelicalism. Thank you for your constant reminders...

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Hi Scot,

I simply want to commend something that you and many true scholars say. As you mention below, this is not your area of expertise. That said, your wide reading demonstrates you know more about this area than the vast majority. Too many are confident that their view is correct, even though there is a superficial understanding of the issue. I wish Christians (and all Americans) had more self-awareness to know what it takes to be literate on an important issue.

"I’m jumping lanes outside of my discipline so I may need to be corrected about some of this. But this is what I think. I welcome your comments. There are huge gaps in my reading. Forgive them."

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Thank you, Scot for this balanced and fair treatment of the issue at hand. I love your heart for the church as a whole. May God bring healing to his church and humility in us all to see where we need to change…

Blessings!!

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ON. FIRE.

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Standpoint epistemology is a helluva drug.

Modern critiques from social constructivism, without any basis in truth, don’t lead to good or correction. They are a toolbox for obtaining power.

Some who are against critical social theories, such as myself, have been deeply entrenched within its lenses, and have come out the other side saying “the slippery slope is real”. We’ve seen too many friends and family members turn on those that love them most with cries of patriarchy! White supremacy! Nazi! Transphobe! And the like. We’ve seen how gender ideology is destroying young people across the country, many in our own churches. Weve seen a lot of Christina Cleveland’s and David Darks and others who have joined a new fundamentalist religion that looks a lot more like Derrida and Marcuse than anything resembling Christianity, mainline, evangelical or anabaptist.

I don’t need critical social theories to see the progressive revelation of scripture towards women. I don’t need critical social theories to see how the biblical narrative relates to empire. I don’t need disingenuous social constructivists spinning the worst possible narratives to have eyes to see when the church is or has been wrong. I do need our academic thought leaders/celebrities to take a healthy pause and see what they are doing; aligning with the coastal elite against the people they are supposed to be serving. Critical social theories have all ready entered the leadership void of mainline Protestantism, colonizing those institutions (oh the irony). Now we’re “deconstructing evangelicalism” by broad brushing millions of people, labeling and in many cases dehumanizing them, and dismissing any critque with racist, mysogynist, etc.

I’ll say - as a Christian pacifist - I first realized something was wrong when my cohort started openly supporting antifa, talking about punching nazis. That gave me enough pause to be able to step back and look from a birds eye view and see the cultural revolution that was occurring.

They will come for the church once it’s no longer useful. What they cannot colonize they will problematize and attempt to destroy.

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