Kruse Kronicle

The Other Six Days: Index

The Other Six Days: Vocation, Work and Ministry in Biblical Perspective

A Book Discussion

Why Discuss this Book?

Chapter 1

Beyond Clericalized Theology
Beyond Unapplied Theology
Beyond Academic Theology

Chapter 2

Laity and Clergy
Ministry in the Old and New Covenants
Emergence of the Clergy

Chapter 3

Two Peoples or One?
The Trinity and the Nature of the Church

Chapter 4

Personal Vocation
Christian Vocation
Human Vocation

Chapter 5

Work in Historical Perspective
Work in the Bible
Trinitarian View of Work
The Good of Work

Chapter 6

Ministry in the Bible
Trinitarian Ministry
Leadership in the Bible
Call and Ordination

Chapter 7

Three Roles, One Body
Prophet
Priest
King

Chapter 8

God's Sending Mission
The Church and Mission
Equipping for Mission

Chapter 9

Understanding the Powers
Confronting the Powers

Epilogue

Living Theologically

Final Thoughts

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The Other Six Days: Final Thoughts

The Other Six Days

As I said at the beginning of this series, this book has had a great impact on me. I think it does an exceptional job of getting to the core of what mission is and what it means to be the Church. Here are a few of the things that I appreciated most about the book.

Ministry

Stevens wrote that ministry is service rendered in the employ of another. Ministry is not a list of duties. Ministry is anything we do in response to God. Ministry can be teaching a Sunday school class or helping out at a homeless shelter. But ministry to God can also be balancing debits and credits or operating a cash register. Ministry is defined by who we are doing for, not by what we do.

Three vocations

I found the breakdown of vocation into personal, Christian, and human vocations to be very helpful. Our occupation is not our vocation but it can be an expression of our vocation. Vocation is the call of God upon our lives in some very personal ways and in some very corporate ways.

Trinitarian view of ministry

At the top of the list of things I appreciated from this book is the Trinitarian view of ministry. There is the call of the Father to creation stewardship; the call of the Son to Kingdom service; and the call of the Spirit to exercise gifts. The delineation of these combined with a perichoretic understanding of their interrelatedness is powerful. It makes it difficult to see any aspect of life as outside God’s call to ministry.

Ekklesia and diaspora

Conceptualizing the church as the gathered and as the dispersed is absolutely essential to getting a grip on the mission of the Church. Only then does it become clear that the primary locus of the mission is as the saints dispersed throughout the world during the week, not in the four walls of a “sacred” building.

Prophet, Priest and King

I appreciated Stevens recovery of the munus triplex concept, the three offices held by Christ. Seeing ourselves individually and in community as the incarnation of Christ in these functions is powerful stuff.

I hope you have found this in depth review helpful but I would strongly encourage you to go beyond my summaries and get the book. I have only skimmed the major themes. The book expands and explicates many of these topics in rich ways that are well beyond these posts.

The Other Six Days: Vocation, Work and Ministry in Biblical Perspective

An index to my posts is in the following post.

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The Other Six Days: Epilogue - Living Theologically

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Epilogue - Living Theologically

The epilogue is subtitled “Living theologically.” Stevens suggests that this phrase is an oxymoron to many. Theology is an abstract discipline detached from every day life. Therein lays the problem. Stevens is fond of the quote by Puritan William Perkins, “Theology is the science of living blessedly forever.” So how do we make the connections? Stevens suggest that we look through three lenses: Orthodoxy, orthopraxis, and orthopathos.

Orthodoxy

Orthos relates to something being “straight” or “right.” “Doxa” means “glory” or “worship.” “Doctrine that lines itself up (orthos) with scripture is designed to be a blessing to every day life and, at the same time, to bless God (doxa) in life itself." (244)

Stevens argues that the key to healthy orthodoxy is redeeming the routines of every day living. Each act of daily live is an opportunity to engage in orthodoxy. He recounts the themes in the book like stewardship, incarnation, equipping and ecclesiology. All of this involves straight thought. While this is challenging, what is more dangerous is unapplied theology. A purely intellectual orthodoxy tempts us to think we can manage God. “Theology begins with admiration, not problems” Stevens writes.

Stevens also writes that “The goal of biblical theological education is to increase our love for God and to make us more human.” (246) I particularly liked is statement, “Doctrine that does not lead to doxology is demonic.”

Orthoparxy

Orhtopraxy relates to “right practice.” Reflection on orthodoxy leads us to action. Our actions lead us back into reflection. Stevens writes:

True Christian action – orthopraxy – is gratuitive, free from contrivance, free from a calculating spirit, free from contract: I do this for God and God does this for me. Orthopraxic living is essentially spontaneous. With Jesus in our hearts we love because there is someone in need, not to gain approval by God or to receive the benefits of Christian action. (250)

Then later here writes:

Orthopraxis is not measured by excellence, by efficiency or by it religious character, but by faith, hope, love. We must cultivate the heart and not merely the husk of such action. (251)

Orthopathos

Orhtopathos is a word coined by Richard Mouw meaning “right caring.” Not only must we educate the mind but we must educate the heart. Stevens writes, “Chrysostom argues that the rich are not owners of their wealth but stewards for the poor.” (252) I would suggest the rich are stewards for God who cares deeply about the poor, but the bottom line is we need to have what we care about rightly ordered. When we truly invest our neighbor it inadvertently becomes a means of grace for us. Taking action to care about the things God cares about changes the nature of our caring. We need to develop a right passion for God and to become passionate about the things God is passionate about.

As he wraps up this epilogue, he offers this rhetorical question?

Might not the most pernicious heresy in the church today be the disharmony between those who claim to be theologically approved but live as practical atheists? (254)

I think this heresy in rampant within the Church. Until we address the issue of equipping every believers to be a minister in the world 24/7/365, the Church will continue with to be impotent in the world.

This is the end of the book. I will have some wrap up comments tomorrow as well as an index.

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The Other Six Days: C9 - Confronting the Powers

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 9 -  Resistance - Grappling With the Powers

Confronting the Powers

“The power of filling, subjugating, and dominating “all things”, including these powers is reserved to God and Christ alone. But the function of demonstrating God’s dominion and love is entrusted to the church. She is appointed and equipped to be a public exponent of grace and unity…the beginning of a new heaven and a new earth.” (Karl Barth, Ephesians, I, 365. Page 230 in Stevens.)

Stevens says the first and foremost effective strategy for coming against the false claims of the powers of our age is preaching. That said, preaching alone does not cut it. There is also what Stevens calls public discipleship. He identifies four historic approaches to this and distinguishes them in the following way:

Ways of Grappling with the Powers
	Exorcism Intercession	Suffering Powerlessness	Creative Participation	Just Revolution
Vocation	spiritual liberation	witness to fallenness	regents	social change
Means	prayer	powerlessness	work/ politics	civil disobedience
Metaphysic	demonic	colonized structures	fallen and colonized structures	None (Marxian)
Denominations	charismatic	anabaptist	mainline	Liberation theology
Authors	Watson Wimber Schlier?	Yoder	Mouw Berkhof Ellul	Bonino Guiterrez

Which is right? Stevens believes they all are. All are needed to give a full orbed witness of the Church. The challenge is living in appreciation of what each of these differing perspectives might contribute to confronting the powers.

Stevens emphasizes the importance of prayer. He notes that when Paul writes about putting on the full armor of God in Ephesians 6, that each piece of armor is added through prayer. Intercessory prayer transforms both ourselves and those we intercede for. Stevens also writes of the important power of martyrdom in unmasking the powers.

In the concluding section of this chapter, Stevens reflects on eschatological implications. He reflects on Paul’s declaration in 1 Corinthians 13 that only faith, hope and love will last. He suggest that the implication is not so much that acts of these three in themselves will last but rather works grounded in these three will be what last. Stevens rejects the idea of a the world one day being consumed and a new world being put in place. All of our works will have an impact on the world that is to come. That which is done in accordance with the New Creation will survive and that which is not will be transfigured. How does that happen and precisely what does it mean? God has not revealed an answer. In some sense our actions make a permanent mark on the future yet everything shall be renewed. I like the quote from Leslie Newbigin that Stevens uses to close the chapter:

We can commit ourselves without reserve to all the secular work our shared community requires of us, knowing that nothing we do in itself is good enough to form part of that city’s building, knowing that everything – from our most secret prayers to our most public political acts – is part of that sin-stained human nature that must go down into the valley of death and judgement, and yet knowing that as we offer it up to the Father in the name of Christ and in the power of the Spirit, it is sage with him and – purged in the fire – it will find its place in the holy city at the end. (238-239)

This chapter wraps up the body of the book. We will look at the epilogue tomorrow.

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The Other Six Days: C9 - Understanding the Powers

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 9 -  Resistance - Grappling With the Powers

Understanding the Powers

As we go about the work of being the Church in the world we must be aware that we are not working in a neutral environment. There are forces and powers at work in the background. Some people find demons behind every problem and others reduce all issues to socio-psychological matters. Neither of these is a healthy perspective. An attempt to in some way neatly compartmentalize them is not helpful either.

Stevens catalogs several terms that refer to the powers:

• The divine Council (Ps. 81:1) – a heavenly hierarchy.
• Angels (Gen. 3:24; Rev. 1:1) – invisible spiritual beings who are messengers of God.
• The devil/Satan (Mt. 4:1) – a malevolent spiritual being who is totally opposed to God and God’s purposes.
• Demons (Jas. 3:15) – a variety of evil forces and beings operating under a single unified head.
• The world (Jn. 15:18) – the world system organized against God and his purposes.
• Principalities and powers (Eph. 6:12) – both socio-political and spiritual powers
• Mammon (Lk 16:9) – money that pretends to give security, the ‘almighty dollar’
• The flesh (Gal. 5:16-17 – the self turned in on oneself, life lived as though Christ had not come, died and been raised.
• The law (Rom. 7:12; 8:2) – the good gift of Torah that has been twisted by sin into a way of gaining righteousness.
• Death (Heb. 2:15) – not merely the cessation of the life but a power that holds people in lifelong fear. (219-220)

Stevens readily embraces the sociological aspect of fallen social structures but he is unwilling to de-spiritualize them. In seeing the spiritual at work, we must neither deify nor demonize the structures. There are personal spiritual beings at work for good and evil, systemic evil is very real. Stevens advocates a holistic perspective.

We also must not take the view that structures and institutions is evil in themselves. Family and nation were part of God’s purpose for humankind. Yet these structures and institutions have been colonized by human and nonhuman powers to establish a kingdom that is in defiance of God. The good news is that those powers have been defeated and are limited in the havoc they can cause. Stevens uses an example from WWII. The Allied forces stormed the beaches at Normandy on D-Day in June, 1944. It was almost a year later before we came to Victory in Europe (VE) Day in May, 1945. Christ’s first coming was D-Day. His return will be VE Day. On that day, all hostilities will cease.

Stevens writes, “The cross was both a political act and a cosmic victory.” (228) The outcome of the war is a done deal. God is in the mop up stage leading to the consummation of his victory over powers of this age; to the redemption of humanity and all creation.

In the next post Stevens reflects on what this means in terms of mission and eschatology. For now, what do you think of Stephen’s characterizations? Does this fit with your read of scripture?

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The Other Six Days: C8 - Equipping for Mission

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 8 -  Mission - A People Sent by God

Equipping for Mission

In the final section of Chapter 8, Stevens writes that, “Our mission work is not to get people to ‘come to church’ but to go with the Son of Man into the world.” Stevens identifies five principles that are essential to effective equipping.

“First, the reality of the sovereign divine placement of ordinary Christians in workplaces, neighborhoods and spheres of influence must be recognized and supported in the communal life of the church.” (210-211) Steven’s draws us back again to the concepts of gathered (ekklesia) and dispersion (diaspora). He compares it to the heart and lungs. The blood is oxygenated and sent out to fight diseases and to energize. The blood returns to by oxygenated and is sent out again. The primary locus of the work of the blood is not in the heart and lungs but in its travel through the body. Similarly, the primary locus of mission is not in the gathering but in the disciples dispersed throughout the world in their daily lives. He writes that Dutch theologian J. C. Hoekendijk proposes that “…if a church’s structures thwart the possibility of its members serving relevantly in the world, we are to regard these structures as heretical.

Second, ‘go’ structures must be developed alongside the ‘come’ structures. Nearly all of our institutional structures are oriented around “come and hear” and “come and see.” (211) These are valid expressions of the church’s mission but what is needed ever bit as much is interest in the structures that send people out in mission.

“Third, we need to ordain/commission people with a proven mission in society with as much seriousness as we ordain people to the pastoral ministry of the church: politicians, stockbroker, homemakers, schoolteachers, craftspersons, artists and musicians.” (212).

This takes me back to a movie made forty years ago starring Andy Griffith called “Angel in my Pocket.” He moves his family to a small town in Kansas to become the pastor of a church. His three children are talking to one of the neighbor kids they have just met. Griffith’s daughter says “Our father is a minister.” Her brother chimes in “Ordained!” The daughter then asks the neighbor boy, “What does your father do?” To which he replies, “My dad is in the hardware business.” One of Griffth’s sons inquires, “Ordained?” The boy responds, “Naturally.”

What is it about this exchange that should seem so funny to us? Steven’s quotes Alan Roxburgh saying, “the priesthood of all believers is continually undermined by the practices of ordination.”

“Fourth, … by encouraging people to see the workplace, the primary place where people meet, as a natural place for evangelism (Acts 16:16-19; 17:17, 19:9-10, 23-9)” (212-213)

Fifth, Stevens suggests finding ways to help creatively bridge the physical distance between churches and the workplace. One suggestion he makes in quoting Gordon Preece is that “Where possible church buildings should be located near the commercial centre rather than be lost in suburban back streets.” (213)

In summary, Stevens says, “The goal is the whole people of God engaging in the whole mission of God in the whole world.” (213) What do you think of Steven’s principles?

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The Other Six Days: C8 - The Church and Mission

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 8 -  Mission - A People Sent by God

The Church and Mission

The threefold nature of what Stevens calls the “Human Vocation” includes communion, community-building, and co-creativity. This vocation was corrupted by human rebellion but God promises to restore all three aspects. Our Christian vocation is to be actively participating in the realization of the promise God has given. Here is a chart Stevens uses to summarize this (199):

FULLFILLING THE HUMAN VOCATION
The Human Vocation	The Promise	The Christian Vocation
Communion	The presence of God	Belonging to God
Community-building	The people	Being God’s people
Co-creativity	The land	Doing God’s work

In The Mission of God Christopher Wright uses a simple diagram involving two triangles of differing sizes. He labels each point of the larger triangle like this:

Top = God
Bottom Left = Humanity
Bottom Right = Earth

The smaller triangle is inside the larger triangle and touches it at the top point labeled “God.” It is labeled like this:

Top = God
Bottom Left = Israel
Bottom Right = Land

The idea is that God is expanding the smaller triangle to encompass the entire larger triangle. “Israel” comes to include all of humanity. “The land” comes to include all the earth. A central means for accomplishing this is the Church being sent into the world by the triune God. Jesus said “as the Father has sent me I am sending you.” We go into the world and live out the Christian vocation as described above.

Stevens describes the scope of God’s mission as:

• First, God’s mission includes the individual person calling for the conversion of heart and mind on the basis of the good news announced and embodied in Jesus Christ.
• Second, God’s mission is directed to the whole of society, to structures of common life, bringing righteousness, justice, the empowerment of the poor and the liberation of the oppressed.
• Third, God’s mission is directed to thought-forms and cultures that shape the way people think and act.
• Fourth, God’s mission is concerned with the whole of creation, to conservation, sustainable development and the renewal of the earth. (202)

We noted yesterday that “Mission is what God is doing in the world through the church, and even without the church, to bring his creation to its consummation: unity and fullness [in] Jesus Christ.” Here is one of Steven’s more radical observations about mission in the world.

The church’s mission then is to find out what God is doing in the world, celebrate it and embrace his mission. The church has the character of an ‘intermezzo’ between God and the world, and is an illustration (in word and deed) of God’s involvement in the world. (205)

God communicates to the Church AND to the world. The Church is to be God’s image at work in the world but God is at work in the world apart from the Church. Part of what the church does is help the world see what God is doing already in the world.

The church’s mission is not to ‘bring in’ the church, or even to extend it. The Church’s mission is to ‘bring in’ the Kingdom. In this way the people of God participates in, embodies and serves what God is accomplishing by creation, salvation, sanctification and consummation. But the church does not circumscribe God’s work. The church is God’s primary agency in fulfilling his sending. But it also recognizes and welcomes the irruption of the Kingdom of God everywhere. (206)

Stevens wraps up this section observing that “The church does not have a mission; it is mission.” He laments the fact that the church is still largely divided between the clergy (missionary specialist) and laity (supporter of missions). The reality is that the ordinary believer becomes a “missionary” at baptism.

On Monday we will finish Chapter 8, looking briefly at equipping for mission. Before we go there, what do you think about how Stevens has framed mission? I have doubt his take will be controversial for many.

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The Other Six Days: C8 - God's Sending Mission

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 8 -  Mission - A People Sent by God

God's Sending Mission

“Mission is what God is doing in the world through the church, and even without the church, to bring his creation to its consummation: unity and fullness [in] Jesus Christ. (Eph. 1:22-23; Col. 1:15-20)” (193)

“Mission is thereby seen as a movement from God to the world in respect to creation, care, redemption and consummation. It is all that he is doing in his ‘sentness’ in the world. Not only does the Father send the Son, and the Father and Son send the Spirit, but the Father, Son and Spirit send the church into the world. Mission is the sending of God from first to last.” (194)

“So God is not only the One sent but is the content of the sending ‘for in every Person of the deity God works in His entirety.’… He is Sender, Sent, and Sending.”  (194)

These concepts lay the groundwork for Stevens understanding of the many aspects of God’s sending mission. There is the sending of Adam and Eve into the world to full the earth and bless it. There is the sending of Abraham through whom all the nations of the world will be blessed. There is the sending of Jesus into the world to be God incarnate and bring all earthly powers under his Lordship. There is the sending of the Spirit by the Father and the Son to be the true impulse for mission, sending the church into the world. Even as the Son is sent, so does he send the apostles into the world to establish his Church. Quoting G. F. Vicedom, Stevens writes:

‘The apostles have the duty and assignment to establish the church and thereby they become the foundation of the building upon which all other work was to be based (1 Cor. 3:9ff.) …This gives their work and proclamation the character of revelation. Such a claim cannot be made by the bishops.’ Elders and bishops are watchmen, not the foundation of the house. (196)

Then there is the sending of the church by the triune God.

Stevens sums up his thoughts on the mission of God this way:

To sum up, theologically mission is not a human activity undertaken out obligation to the great commission, or even simple gratitude. It is God’s own mission in which we have been included. It is what God is doing to bless all the nations through the resurrection of Christ and the outpouring of the Sprit. Mission work itself is not motivated by the need of the world but by the sending God who calls and empowers. It is for this mission and in this mission that the whole people of God gains an apostolic (sent-out) status. Together the laos of God is the creation of God’s sending and the means of his further sending. (197-198)

Next we will take a look at sending in the OT and NT, and we will examine what it means to be God’s sent people, but I will stop with this much. There is a real richness here that is worth reflecting on. Mission is about so much more than personal piety, observance of rituals, or political action. It is about being sent into the world by God and imaging the content of what is being sent by God, both individually and corporately. Powerful stuff!

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The Other Six Days: C7 - King

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 7 -  King

The third of the three offices fulfilled by Christ and exercised through his body the Church is the office of king.

The idea of being a royal priesthood comes from the Old Testament:

Ex 19:5-6

5 Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, 6 you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites." NIV

Here we have the idea of “treasured possession,” which is very close to the idea in the New Testament of kleros (clergy); God’s portion or inheritance. The idea is repeated by Peter in the New Testament:

1 Peter 2:9

But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. NIV

Again we have the notion of special people, the whole people of God, set apart to be a “royal priesthood” or “kingdom of priests.”

We also look to Hebrews:

Heb 5:7-10

8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered 9 and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him 10 and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek. NIV

Melchizedek was the priest-king that Abraham encountered in Genesis 14. Christ is the priest-king with whom we are joined as his body.

The Kingdom of God is not a realm or territory. It is the rule of God as King. It is in the hearts and minds of those who have become a part of God’s New Creation. The church is not the Kingdom of God but represents the King of all creation to creation. I love the way Stevens distinguishes that it is not the purpose of the church to ‘bring in’ the church but rather to ‘bring in’ the Kingdom of God.

The first and most significant place we exercise our kingly authority is over our own passions and desires, to live in accord with the rule of God. Kings think ahead and try to discern what is best for there domain. They use their power to bring about that which is good for their domain. We do this in even the most mundane duties of life, bringing the values and concerns of God to bear on the work we do in the world.

To summarize the three offices at the end of the chapter, Stevens writes:

What do prophets do? Their work is discerning, communicating, exposing, seeing that justice is done, revealing outcomes – the very thing God’s people can do in corporations and homes. What do priests do? Their work is bridge building, mediating, expressing meaning, evoking faith, blessing, bringing grace – again what the whole of God’s people is able to do in the world. What do kings do? King work is ruling, organizing, planning, providing, nurturing, integrating, settling arguments, solving problems, co-ordinating, expediting, consummating – again ways that God’s people serve in so-called secular occupations, in church and in the home. (189)

I really like this chapter. I like the idea of Christ living out his threefold offices through his body the church. When I see service to God in this threefold way it becomes clear that everything we do can truly be ministry.

How about you? Does seeing ministry in this way have any particular meaning for you?

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The Other Six Days: C7 - Priest

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 7 -  Priest

There are three senses in which we carry out priestly acts as the priesthood of believers.

“First there is the priestly ministry of access to God through worship and intercession.” Because we all have direct access to the Father, we can confess our sins to each other and receive absolution. We can intercede with God on behalf of fellow Christians and on behalf of the world. We can bless God with worship and we can bless the world with the presence of God.

“Second there is priestly ministry through service in the world.” We can help the helpless and include the outsider. We can ask strategic questions about problems that face the world and work for solutions. We can call people to a better vision for the world.

“Third there is priestly ministry of daily life.” Romans 12:1-2 talks about offering ourselves as a daily sacrifice. Everyday acts of work and service are sacred acts when done out of reverence for God and in response to God’s call. “Ordinary life is infused with God’s presence and can be given back to God as ‘spiritual worship’ (Rom. 12:1)”

Stevens emphasizes that our “priestliness” (my word) derives from our connection to the high priesthood of Jesus and we all participate in that priestly ministry; not just a few as representatives in some vicarious way. As you can gather from the three paragraphs above he also emphasizes that we fulfill our priestly function both in the gathered community life of the church and in the dispersed life of the community.

All this said, Stevens is concerned about an overly individualistic view of priesthood:

Not so obvious is how Protestants have lost the corporate priesthood completely in the granular individualism that has paralyzed Western culture, so making each individual Christian his or her own priest, a do-it-yourself priesthood. In comes Protestant churches the priesthood of all believers has degenerated into one vote per person as a way of finding God’s will for a congregation, or allowing every male (!) to have a turn in the pulpit. (176)

Stevens believes there needs to be a balance between “extreme individualism” and “oppressive coporateness” in how we conceive of this priestly function. We are individually priests but we are also corporately priest to the world, incarnating the priestly work of Christ in the world.

I really like what Stevens has to say about this balance. Too often the priesthood of all believers is used as a rationale for Christian individualism instead of seeing it as an extension of Christ’s work and the community we are gathered with.

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The Other Six Days: C7 - Prophet

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 7 -  Prophet

The Church is prophet, priest and king to the world. Today we look at being prophetic.

Prophet

I wrote in the last post that:

Prophets told forth the future and told forth God’s purposes in specific contexts so as to bring people to repentance and faith. They kept the people’s past with God before the people and ministered hope about the future.

Just as there is a priesthood of believers, so is there a prophethood of believers. Pentecost was the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy (Joel 2:28) that all God’s people would begin to prophecy. We have God's Word to instruct us. Prophecy is not a personal attribute or innate ability – it is a gift of the Spirit and the empowering presence of God. Through the work of Christ and the presence of the Holy Spirit in each believer’s life, there is no longer a need for “a prophet” to be God’s intermediary. Each member of the body of Christ is capable of prophetic utterances and witness. The role of leaders is to equip and educate individual believers in the Word so that they may be able to preach and equip others as well. Unfortunately, what we have is an inversion of the New Testament vision. Quoting missiologist Roland Allen, Stevens writes:

“It would be better to teach a few men to call upon the name of the Lord for themselves than to fill a church with people who have given up idolatry, slavishly and unintelligently, and have acquired a habit of thinking that it is the duty of converts to sit and be taught to hear prayers read for them in the church by a paid mission agent.” Who could have designed a system, as surely happened, by which people can hear two sermons a Sunday for the whole of their lives and not be able to open up the Bible to others publicly? (171)

Stevens suggests that an authentic prophethood of believers would have the following traits:

First, every believer is called and equipped by God to bear witness to the gospel and to bring God’s Word to the world. A person does not need the ‘gift’ of preaching to be a witness.

Second, the prophethood of all believers means that each Christian should be ready to bring God’s Word ‘in season’ (when prepared and expected) and ‘out of season’ (when the opportunity comes unexpectedly and inconveniently, 2 Tim. 4:2)

Finally, the primary equipment of believers for the ministry of prophecy is continuous inundation with the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18) …The Holy Spirit is not given to the gifted, confident and ambitious but to the poverty stricken. (172)

Finally, Stevens says the Church is not just a collection of individual preacher/prophets. Corporately the Church lives out a prophetic function. By alleviation of suffering, promoting justice, and exhibiting godly stewardship, we speak forth God’s truth into the world as a corporate entity. While we each engage in prophetic work we are not prophets in the Old Testament sense of being individuals set apart from the rest of the body for a unique task. Our prophecy flows out our interconnectedness to Christ, the prophet, through the power of the Holy Spirit.

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The Other Six Days: C7 - Three Roles, One Body

The Other Six Days

Part Three - For the Life of the World: Chapter 7 -  Prophets, Priests, and Kings

Today we begin the third and final part of the book. Part I dwelt on “A People Without ‘Laity and Clergy.’ Part II reflected on being “Summoned and Equipped by God.” In the last three chapters we will examine what it means to be the Church “For the Life of the World.” In case you haven’t noticed, the headings for each part can be linked together into a sentence that forms the basic thesis of Stevens’ book:

“A people without ‘Laity and Clergy,’ summoned and equipped by God for the life of the world.”

With chapter 7, we now turn more directly to the mission of the Church.

Three Roles, One Body.

As we examine the Old Testament we find three functions for which there was a divine anointing. Priest, Prophet and King:

• Priests – Maintained the sanctuary and sacrificial system, guarded and taught the scriptures, acted as judge in matters of ritual uncleanness, and discerned God’s will.
• Prophets - Told forth the future and told forth God’s purposes in specific contexts so as to bring people to repentance and faith. They kept the people’s past with God before the people and ministered hope about the future. They were the faith barometers, as Stevens puts it.
• Kings – Anointed representatives of God to bring order, justice and peace to the nation.

Through his life, death, and resurrection, Christ has taken all three of these roles unto himself. He is the threefold officeholder (munus triplex) of priest, prophet, and king. He exercises these offices through his body the church of which he is the life-giving, animating head. Within the Roman Catholic tradition there has been a tendency to see specific individuals called to a particular office like priest. Stevens makes the case that it is the body of Christ collectively that occupies these offices and not specific individuals. None of us alone are priests, prophets or kings, yet we offer priestly, prophetic and kingly service to the world.

We will briefly look at each office over the next three posts.

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The Other Six Days: C6 - Call and Ordination

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 6 - Ministry - Transcending Clericalism

Call and Ordination

This final section of Chapter 6 teaches heresy ( at least it would be thought so in many Presbyterian circles *grin*). Stevens argues that there is no “secondary,” “special,” “inner” or “secret” call to “the ministry,” or ecclesial leadership. It is a heresy I happen to agree with.

Stevens quotes the Catholic theologian Edward Schillebeeckx:

…that the modern situation in which a community might not be able t celebrate the eucharist because not priest is present is theologically inconceivable in the early church; the community chooses a president for itself and has hands laid on him so that they can also be a community that celebrates the eucharist … In that case the vitality of the community in terms of the gospel is the deciding factor, not the availability of a body of priestly manpower, crammed full of education in one place or another. (151)

At the transition to second millennium we begin to see the priesthood as something truly and essentially different from the laos of God.

Calvin and Luther struggled with these issues. Calvin posited that there was an “inner” or “secret” call. Always concerned with church order, Calvin was concerned to distinguish between legitimate ministers and those who had merely talked themselves into pursing ministry. However, Luther allowed that the call can come from the church. The community selects individuals to serve on behalf of others.

Stevens shows that the typical “call” to ministry in the New Testament was by one of the apostles calling someone into a position of leadership, or by the community selecting leaders from among themselves. Some ask “What about Paul’s road to Damascus experience?” We must remember that this was Paul’s conversion experience. Yes, he was called into ministry but we are all called to ministry at baptism. Paul was called directly by Christ to fulfill a certain role, as were the other apostles. But there is nothing that suggests that this is the normative way that church leadership happens.

Back in chapter 4, Stevens wrote about four types of call relating to our vocation: effectual, providential, charismatic and heart. For church leadership, Stevens suggests there is a fifth call: ecclesiastical call. While this does not preclude a special existential call, Stevens suggests that the normative call is the body of believers discerning the persons suitability for church leadership based on gifting and character. Stevens writes that:

By and large we have missed the main thrust of the New Testament and reverted to a pre-Christian view of clergy and laity: a general call to the people and a special call to a few. (155)

So what about ordination? (Hold on to your seats Presbyterians.)

Theologically and practically, commissioning to such leadership is important since, as we have seen, a Christian servant working in the church needs an ecclesial ‘call’. …But there is nothing in the Bible like a hierarchical patter of ordination, ordination for life, or ordination as a sacrament that conveys grace, ordination for life, or ordination as a sacrament that conveys grace, ordination that leaves an indelible mark on the ordained and gives the priest the exclusive right to celebrate the eucharist. There is also nothing like ordination as practiced by Protestants which gives exclusive right of the ordained, especially those of the Calvinist tradition, to preach the Word and minister the sacraments (Institutes, IV.3.8) (156-157)

In defense of Presbyterians (and it is a weak one), the relegation of the preaching and sacraments to a minister is not so much theological as practical. With a high value on order, it is believed that the proper preaching of the Word and administration of the sacraments well best ensure handled this way. In practice, I suspect a great many Presbyterians see the pastor as a special class of Christian distinct from the laos of God. The line is very murky between pastors as a special caste and pastors as one of the community.

Stevens suggests that the way forward requires us to ask four questions:

First, what is ministry? It is putting ourselves at the disposal of God for God’s purposes in the church and world. Ministry is from God, to God and of God.

Second, who are the ministers? The whole people of God as community is God’s true ministerium in both its gathered life (ekklesia) and dispersed life (diaspora).

Third, how is ministry undertaken? What form does it take? It is in both word and deed, both overtly and covertly, to persons and to organizations, both directly and indirectly.

Fourth, where is ministry undertaken? Service from God and for God takes place in both the church and the world. (157-158)

Stevens closes Chapter 6, the final chapter of Part II, with this quote from Thomas Gillespie, past president of Princeton Seminary (and fellow General Assembly Council member.)  Concerning what must happen for recovery of the ministry of the whole people of God, Gillespie writes:

It will be realized only if the ‘nonclergy’ are willing to move up, if the ‘clergy’ are willing to move over, and if all God’s people are willing to move out. For the ministry of the community is rendered first and foremost in the world and for the world. It is performed in the daily lives of its people, in their participation and involvement in the structures of a complex society, in their sacrificial obedience in ‘worldly affairs,’ in their mission to reclaim the world for the God who claims the world in love. (158)

Amen!

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The Other Six Days: C6 - Leadership in the Bible

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 6 - Ministry - Transcending Clericalism

Leadership in the Bible

"While the New Testament has no place for clergy as a separate category of believer, the Scripture has many references to leaders within God’s laos." (145) Stevens notes that “leadership” is described in several ways in the New Testament:

• Proistemi – “The one who goes before.” (Rom. 12:28) He notes it is a verb not a noun.
• Kybernesis – “Administrators.” (1 Corinthians 12:28)
• Episkopoi – “Overseers” (Philippians 1:1, Acts 20:28, 1 Timothy 3:1) Stevens remarks that this is “a term for minor responsibility” without elaborating.
• Diakonos – “Servant” (1 Timothy 3:8) Position of lower status.
• Presbyteroi – “Elders, or older wiser people” (Titus 1:5)
• Poimenes – “Pastors or shepherds.” (Ephesians 4:11)

Stevens then makes this critical observation:

Conspicuously missing from the list of leadership words is ‘priest’ (hiereus), a word which until the end of the second century was reserved for Christ and the whole believing community. (146)

The dilemma for the church is the need for both charisma and institutionalization. Ministry without charisma becomes dead and wooden institutionalism focused on power and institutional preservation. Charisma without institution is ever in danger of spilling over into fanaticism and subjectivity.

Some believe they see an evolving distinction between official leaders and charismatic service in the New Testament in response to these pressures. However, Stevens, referring to Gordon Fee, shows that the growing distinction was not between official and charismatic leaders but between itinerate and resident leaders. The local leadership configuration varied from location to location but with always had a plurality of leaders. There was no uniform system of government with official offices and titles. What we do see, is a uniform effort to devise leadership strategies that best equipped the whole laos of God in their many contexts to be ministers in the world! “Rather than having the church assist them to do the work of ministry, leaders are assistants to the rest of the body to empower them for their service in church and world.” (149)

And that brings us to a very large elephant in the room. Is there a special call to professional ministry? Stay tuned for that discussion but what do you think about Steven’s assessment of leadership so far?

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The Other Six Days: C6 - Trinitarian Ministry

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 6 - Ministry - Transcending Clericalism

Trinitarian Ministry

Ministry is Trinitarian in nature. In the third section of Chapter 6, Stevens reflects on the Trinitarian nature of ministry.

There is ministry in God; God is ministry.

Ministry is not a mere human activity. There is mutual service rendered within God the Trinity. “Ministry is of God not merely for God.” It “…is relational, characterized by love. It is both unitive and creative, as well as redemptive and curative.” (141)

God’s ministry is invested in the whole people of God.

We are made one in Christ (John 17). Stevens writes:

We may carefully speak of the laos of God not so much as a Christocratic community, as Kraemer does, but a ‘Christodiakonic’ community (if I may be allowed to coin a word). It is the people of God through whom God continues to serve through Christ in the power and presence of the Spirit. It is both kenotic (self-emptying) and ek-static (taking one outside of self). It is ministry by God, for God and to God. Such a ministry under the New Covenant makes the whole people of God the true ministerium. (142)

(That is a mouthful but it is very rich.)

Ministry is characterized in love.

Ministry for the people of God is not a delegated activity but derived, participatory and perichoretic. Ministry is God continuing his own loving service in and through his own people ‘incorporating our servant-existence in Himself and incarnating among us the self-giving of God in sheer love and compassion to mankind.’ (quote portion is T. F. Torrance) (143)

Ministry seeks the blessing of creation through incarnation.

The nature of mission is not found in the Church’s addressing the world but in it being full in com-passion with it. (Quoting John Zizioulas) (144)

Ministry is eschatological.

The church ministers not only in the ‘now’ of the Spirit but in the ‘not-yet’ of the full coming of the Kingdom. It looks for, lives for, longs for and serves in view of the full irruption of the Kingdom at the second coming of Jesus. As such its goal is not only souls saved for eternity but the renewal of all creation under the headship of Jesus Christ (Eph. 1:22; Col. 1:19-20). (144)

I think that is enough to dwell on for one post.

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The Other Six Days: C6 - Ministry in the Bible

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 6 - Ministry - Transcending Clericalism

Ministry in the Bible

What is ministry? As we look around the Church today, Stevens suggest that there are five criteria that usually come into play.

• Place – Work in the church rather than the marketplace and home.
• Function – Done on behalf of the whole, such as priestly ministration.
• Need – Meeting ‘spiritual’ needs rather than secular needs such as preparing a meal for a family.
• Title – Reverend.
• Designation – (Suggested by Roman Catholic scholar Yves Congar) with over reference to Christ, so that service is rendered to others in the name of Christ and because of Christ. (132)

Is this an accurate way of viewing ministry?

Stevens invites us to return to what scripture has to say about ministry. At this point he writes what I consider to be one of the most important insights given in the book.

The Bible addresses this massive confusion with a liberating perspective: ministry is defined by Who is served (the interior form) rather than the shape and location of the deeds done (the exterior form). Ministry is service to God and on behalf of God in the church and the world. Ministers are people who put themselves at the disposal of God for the benefit of others and God’s world. (133)

Stevens examines the language of the Hebrew Adad and Sarat. Abad means “to work or to make” and in later in books in the Old Testament it comes to mean worship - service directed towards, things people or God. Genesis 2 gives us the image of humanity working/worshiping in a sanctuary-garden. Sarat means “Personal service rendered to an important personage, such as a ruler (Gen. 39:4), and the ministry of worship on the part of those who stand in a special relationship to God, such as priests (Ex. 28:35)." (135) Both reveal important aspects about the relationship between work and ministry.

I also appreciated what Stevens writes about the concept of “the servant of the Lord.”

This concept of the servant of the Lord is racially different from the contemporary view of ministry which boils down to being servants of people or the church for God’s sake rather than serving God for the benefit of people and God’s world. The difference is subtle and sublime. The essence of ministry/service is being put at the disposal of God. The need is not the call to service. The call comes from God – from the most comprehensive service of Adam and Eve in Eden to the work of an evangelist. (136)

Stevens diagrams God’s work toward creating servants upon the earth after the fall. He starts with the nation of Israel. That funnels down to a remnant. That funnels down to the messiah, Jesus Christ. From there it widens to the whole laos (people) of God. When the people did not respond to God’s call to be his servants on the earth, God became his own servant and became a new Adam, the first in a new humanity.

Stevens writes:

New Testament apostles, prophets, evangelists and pastor-teachers are not the culmination of their Old Testament counterparts. That is the fatal equation that leads to exclusively male pastors and priests in the church. Jesus himself fulfills all Old Testament leadership and service. And in Christ the people as a whole become servant of the Lord. Baptism is the universal ordination of people into the universal ministry of the people of God: ‘we are baptized by one Spirit into one body … Now the body is not made up of one part but of many’ (1 Cor. 12:13-14). Leaders are merely people who serve other servants in a particular way. (138)

Finally, Stevens reflects on the Greek term diakonia. It is the word we translate “service” or “ministry.” It is work done in the employ of another. All of the people of God do service or ministry. We are all called to diakonia. Stevens writes:

So it is significant that many of the Greek words available to distinguish an official ministry from ordinary diakonia were not used by the inspired New Testament authors: telos (office), time (task, emphasizing the dignity), arche (mageistry) and leitourgia (publilc service or priestly cultic service). With the exception of telos, when these words are found in the New Testament they refer to Jewish priests, Moses, to pagan civil officers and sometimes to Jesus, but not to church leaders. When Paul does use a priestly word, as he does in Romans 15:16, it is the priestly duty of proclaiming the gospel, not ministering at the altar, a priestly ministry that all believers share. (140)

There is much more to cover from this chapter but we will quit here for today. I believe that what Stevens has written in this chapter goes right to the heart of our dysfunctional confusion about the nature of the church and how we see our daily lives connected the larger things of God. What do you think? Am I hyperbolizing?

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The Other Six Days: C5 - The Good of Work

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 5 - Doing the Lord's Work

The Good of Work

Stevens closes chapter five pointing to the intrinsic value of work. Most of us are readily aware of the extrinsic value of work; it creates wealth for us and allows us to sustain our lives. But work is good in itself. It has intrinsic value. Work is one of the primary ways we exhibit the image of God.

Work is good for the world. From the first chapter of Genesis we see that God made humanity for the world to work it and make it more bountiful and beautiful. Work is good for the neighbor. By combining our work with the work of countless others we mutually enrich each others lives. Our gospel work brings hope, restoration, meaning and peace to those separated from God. Work is also good for us. Our work plays a central role in our sanctification. Stevens presents a wonderful quote from Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s Life Together.

Work plunges men into the world of things. The Christian steps out of the world of brotherly encounter into the world of impersonal things, the ‘it’; and this new encounter frees him [or her] for objectivity; for the ‘it’-world is only an instrument in the hand of God for the purification of Christians from all self-centeredness and self-seeking. The work of the world can be done only where a person forgets himself [or herself], where he loses himself in a cause, in reality, the task, the ‘it’. In work the Christian learns to allow himself to be limited by the task, and thus for him the work becomes a remedy against the indolence and sloth of the flesh. The passions of the flesh die in the world of things. But this can happen only where the Christian breaks through the ‘it’ to the ‘Thou’, which is God, who bids him work and makes that work a means of liberation from himself. (125)

Go back and read that paragraph a couple more times. When we come to see our work in this way, work ceases to be something compartmentalized from our “spiritual” life and becomes the focal point of our spiritual formation.

Have you experienced the work you do as spiritual formation?

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The Other Six Days: C5 - Trinitarian View of Work

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 5 - Doing the Lord's Work

Trinitarian View of Work

So what is God’s work? Stevens lists more than thirty adjectives from the Bible that describe God at work. He identifies four themes:

Creator – forms, fabricates, maintains and finishes.
Lover – does relational work, bringing dignity, health and meaning.
Savior – does redemptive work, mending, uniting and saving.
Leader – does community-building work and brings things to consummation.

Based on these observations Stevens writes:

Every legitimate human occupation (paid or unpaid) is some dimension of God’s own work: making, designing, doing chores, beautifying, organizing, helping, bringing dignity, and leading. (119)

But beyond this, Stevens offers what I think is one of his most powerful insights; a Trinitarian view of work. Just as there are three persons of the Trinity who are different and yet thoroughly interrelated, so are there three types of interrelated work. We can generally identify each type of work with each person of the Trinity. (Clearly all members of the Trinity being one do all three types of work, yet we can identify certain kinds of work with the individual members.)

First, there is Father work called stewardship. This includes activity like working the earth and taking care of it. It involves community-building work like forming families, businesses and other human structures.

Second, there is Son work called Kingdom ministry. Succinctly, it is the furtherance of the gospel and God’s kingdom purposes in the world. Clearly a few believers like the apostles put aside typical occupations to have “the privilege of being supported by others,” as Stevens puts it. “Where such support is not forthcoming the believer is clearly ‘called’ to support themselves with ordinary work!” (120) Stewardship and Kingdom ministry are not alternatives to each other or things that we do in separate compartments of our lives. They are integrated and inseparable aspects of a Trinitarian call. But there is a third integral part to work.

Third, there is Spirit work called giftedness and empowerment. Stevens notes that Luther tried to address the elevation of the vita contemplativa over the vita activa by secularizing all calls. Drawing on the work of Miroslav Volf, Stevens makes that case that instead, all aspects of human work are sacred because our work is done as images of God in response to God. The Spirit gives gifts not only for ecclesial purposes but to do all aspects of human work.

I love his summary paragraph for this section:

What is the work of God? God’s work includes fabricating work, maintaining work, love work, restorative work, gospel work and leading work. Who does God’s work? All the people of God (the laos) and, without their knowing it, most not-yet-believers. Where is God’s work done? In the church and world including the physical creation, the home, society and community, politics, culture, education and finance realms, all the ‘worlds’ which we are making and mending. Why should we work? The Bible’s answer is that God invites us to have communion with him as co-workers while God brings the world to its consummation in the new heaven and new earth. Human work is a duty and a godlike activity. (123)

This Trinitarian view of work is one of the most important things I have learned from Stevens' work. It give’s us the ability to see different aspects of work without the destructive compartmentalization that is so ubiquitous within our culture and sadly within the Church.

Have you thought about work in this way before? How does Stevens’ take strike you?

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The Other Six Days: C5 - Work in the Bible

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 5 - Doing the Lord's Work

Work in the Bible

Stevens gives a cursory overview of the idea of “work” from scripture. He catalogs a number of metaphors that describe God as a worker including builder/architect, teacher, composer and performer, metalworker, garment maker and dresser, potter, farmer, shepherd, tentmaker and camper. He highlights the fact that, according to Genesis 2:15,  “…the world was not made for human beings; human beings were made for the world.” (113). The nature of work has been corrupted because of human rebellion, but the vocation human beings being created for work and created for the world is still exists.

Stevens says that based on his read of scripture, “There is not deprecation of manual labor in the Bible, no exalting of ‘creative work’ over manual labour.” (115) The Wisdom literature points to the futility in finding ultimate satisfaction through work but it does value work that is that is done with the context of a relationship with God. Where we begin to the devaluation of labor is with writers in the intertestamental period like Ben Sira who had become heavily influenced by Greek values.

In the gospels, Jesus is portrayed as a carpenter or an artisan worker. While there is little said directly in relation to work Stevens suggests that “work,” that which we do in our daily lives, becomes transformed into to work for the kingdom of God as we accept Jesus Christ and Lord. Paul builds on this theme as well. How we conduct ourselves in the transactions of daily living and work today have an impact on others and on eternal matters.

Finally, Stevens points out that not only will we receive our reward in heaven but we will also receive more work. We were made for communion, community and co-creativity. In the New Creation, all of these will be fully restored.

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The Other Six Days: C5 - Work in Historical Perspective

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 5 - Doing the Lord's Work

Work in Historical Perspective

For the purposes of this book Stevens defines work as “…purposeful activity involving mental, emotional or physical energy, or all three, whether remunerated or not.” Stevens reminds us that the nature of work has changed in recent years. With the progression from agricultural to industrial to information based economies, the role work plays in our lives and in our identities has changed. While work was something we once did in community with neighbors and families, it has now largely become disassociated from those connections. With communication technologies and other technological innovations, work has become evermore intrusive and all-encompassing. Our work environment is where most of us directly wrestle with the “principalities and powers” of our age. Our new work configurations present a host of issues that would be foreign to people of the biblical era.

In addition to changes in the nature of work, Stevens observes that the Church has particular problems when it comes to thinking about work. Concerning Christians he writes:

Their commitment to serve and love their neighbor leads church people to exalt those professions that have an obvious direct impact for the kingdom of God. As we have seen, missionary is at the top of the list. In most circles, the missionary is roughly equivalent to the martyr in the second century. Next to the missionary is the pastor. Then down it goes in descending order of ‘Christian’ value: people-helping work, intellectual work, creative work, physical work, political work. The trades are not highly esteemed but they offer ‘clean’ work. Then comes business, which involves getting one’s hand ‘dirty’ even though business is probably the best hope of the poor of the world. This is followed by the questionable occupations: law, stockbrokering, sales, advertising, the military. (109)

While the order in which occupations might be listed may change over time, the ranking of work has a long history.

Manual labor was despised by Greek citizens as something befitting only slaves. Aristotle considered slaves as instruments endowed with life. Stevens does not address the Roman context but the situation was similar. Roman citizens merited prestige by their extensive agricultural land holdings and the number of people working for them. Trade and commerce were seen as vulgar and disreputable ways to amass wealth. This Greco-Roman perspective worked it is way into the church during the early centuries. It was supplemented with the sacred/secular divide where only the contemplative life and spiritual matters were of ultimate consequence, and “…productive work that meets the need of the body had no lasting significance.” (111) At the Italian Renaissance, with the revival of Greek philosophy, the new contemplatives became the artists and the intellectuals who did not trouble themselves with manual labor. The Reformation was partially a rebellion against this devaluation of everyday labor.

With the Industrial Revolution came the specialization of labor and relocation of labor outside the family/community context, creating a greater distance between the labor of the individual worker and the final product produced. The idea of work as a holistic expression of life in community done in service to God gave way to other ideologies. Karl Marx suggested that we would find personal fulfillment by contemplating ourselves as we engaged in productive labor. Sigmund Freud saw work as a “tragic necessity” because it interferes with our innate pleasure-seeking disposition.

Stevens summarizes the first half of this chapter with this paragraph:

It is not hard to see the connection between these historical trends. Work in society, so it is thought, has no intrinsic value; the work of ministry lasts forever (Greek dualism). Full-time pastoral or missionary service is the vocation of vocations (medieval monasticism). Physical and manual labor is less worthy than ‘creative’ and religious work (Renaissance). One ought to be able to find personal fulfillment in one’s daily work (Marx, the Renaissance autonomy of the person, the individualism and privatism of postmodern man). So this is the world of work. But, to obtain a theology of work we must also listen to the timeless Word of God. (112)

I think Stevens presents a very good brief analysis. Everything I have read of economic history seems to agree with his assessment. Does this very cursory description ring true for you?

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The Other Six Days: C4 - Human Vocation

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 4 - Calling in a Post-vocational Age

Human Vocation

I have written in the past two posts about personal vocation and Christian vocation. Now we come to what I consider to be the missing ingredient in most discussions about vocation: human vocation.

Stevens begins this section observing that when we talk about vocation, two mandates usually surface: The Creation Mandate (Gen1:27-30) and the Great Commission (Mt. 28:19-20). He notes the tendency of denominations to prefer one over the other. Mainline denominations (the National Council of Churches crowd) and European churches prefer the Creation mandate with its emphasis on “civic responsibilities like earthkeeping and engineering.” Evangelical churches, as evidenced by their name, emphasize evangelism and saving souls. Stevens uses the word “tragic” here. Tragic indeed.

Stevens suggests that:

Salvation is both a rescue operation (recovering our lost vocation in Eden) and a completion project (preparing for the final renewal of creation at the second coming of Jesus.) Eschatology (the end times) is critical to understanding our vocation as Christians in this world.

The last thing we is the first thing we think about. … (90)

If you have read guru Stephen Covey, you know one of his axioms is that we “begin with the end in mind.” It is a very biblical idea. So what is the “end” we are to have in mind? We find the “end” both at the beginning of the Bible with Genesis and we find it in Revelation. There is the covenant between God and humanity at the beginning of creation. The covenant is broken by humanity. A new covenant is initiated by God. The story ends with the consummation of a New Creation.

Stevens relates three aspects of the original covenant mandate. Communion with God is one. Stevens writes:

The practice of the presence of God is not the exclusive vocation of professional ministers and cloistered monks. Nor is it a sacred interlude but woven into the warp and woof of everyday life. It is part of our calling. (92)

Concerning the second aspect Stevens writes that “God makes humankind innately social and inevitably sexual.” Again quoting Stevens:

Adam and Eve were called to live in grateful awareness of the cohumanity of life, male and female being the image of God together and not alone (Gen. 1:26-28), each sex evoking the other’s sexuality, and together enabling humanity to be a mysterious expression of God’s own love (Eph. 5:32). As designed by God, male and female are equal partners and heirs of the grace of life, complementary and side by side, rather than senior and assistant.

The family becomes God’s prototype community on earth and is part of every person’s vocational calling, whether one remains single or gets married. People-making (Gen. 1:28) gives Adam and Eve the further privilege of making people in their own likensess (Gen 5:3) as God made them in his. … (94)

The marriage relationship is the embrace of that which is other than oneself and serves as the grounding model for other centered love in broader community. The basis of work, whatever our occupation, is about sustaining and enriching the community building mandate given to us by God and in a very real sense it does not matter what particular occupation we use individually to earn our living as we build community.

A third aspect of the creation covenant is co-creativity. God created humanity to exercise dominion over the earth; to bring it to full fruition. Stevens alludes to Micah 4:3 where it is prophesied they will beat “swords into ploughshares and their spears in pruning hooks.” We often latch on to the destruction of war implements facet in this passage but don’t notice what the instruments are transformed into: tools for work and economic production.

At the end of the chapter Stevens asks, “How is our sense of vocation enriched by a trinitarian understanding of God?” He offers three responses.

• First, we experience communion by becoming co-lovers of God...
• Second, through community building we become lovers of one another....
• Third, co-creativity draws us into God’s love for the world. ... (103-104)

To tie all of these pieces together Stevens presents the following chart on page 101.

COVENANT MANDATE
	Creation One		Creation Two
	Design	The Fall	Substantial Salvation	Final Salvation
Communion with God	grateful awareness	bitterness alienation	access adoption	full communon
Community-building	relationality holy sexuality family	homicide broken sexuality alienation	neighboring church redeemed sexuality	garden city bride of Christ
Co-Creativity	world-making stewardship	earth-raping manipulation	Redeemed work subcreativity	beauty fulfilled creativity work and sabbath
	Gen. 1-2	Gen. 3	Eph. 2-3	Rev. 21-22

I think this is one of the most critical sections in the whole book. My take is that a large portion of the Western Church (mainline Christianity) sees its mandate as civic service on behalf of the existing world order, essentially baptizing the status quo. Others within this community see their work as social justice, but it is largely justice predicated on modernist/Enlightenment notions of justice, dressed up in God language. Another large portion of the Church sees its mandate to “winning souls” and gettin individuals right with God. Many within this camp have grown uneasy with the narrowness of this and want to include social justice, yet just like their mainline cousins, their emphasis tends to be more about modernist/Enlightenment notions of justice.

Lost from all of this is any clear eschatology. The issue is not evangelism versus social justice. The issue is the creation covenant and how do we participate in the restoration of that covenant as God’s New Creation until the consummation of the new covenant at Christ’s return. The issues are greater than evangelism, greater than social justice, and greater than the two of them combined. Evangelism and social justice are only two aspects of Christian vocation. Christian vocation should have as its ultimate vision the restoration of the human vocation. The Christian vocation is temporal. The human vocation is eternal.

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The Other Six Days: C4 - Christian Vocation

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 4 - Calling in a Post-vocational Age

Christian Vocation

Yesterday I reviewed Stevens’ thoughts about personal vocation. Today we look at the middle tier of Steven’s “vocation cake,” Christian vocation.

Stevens sees a difference between “calling” in the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Hebrew for call is qara, which means “called out.” Stevens writes that it is “…a summons that implies sovereignty through naming.” The process of naming transforms the called into being something distinct and new.

Stevens’ writes that the “…‘call’ language in the Old Testament is used primarily for the people of God who are summoned to participate in God’s grand purpose for the world.” (84) When people like the patriarchs, judges, and prophets were called, they were called to a task, not to an office. Certainly God led people like Joseph, Daniel, and Esther into powerful positions but they were not “called to an office.”

The Greek word kaleo means “to call” and klesis means “calling” or “vocation.” Regrettably, we sometimes read a secular/sacred split into the “call narratives” of scripture. When passages speak of call, they are speaking of a call to salvation and transformation, not of leaving a “secular” life to go into “sacred work” or “full-time Christian ministry.” It is true that some who Jesus called took on special roles (like the disciples) but most stayed in their pre-call circumstances and lived differently (like Zacchaeus). This highlights one of the key transitions between the Old and New Testaments. “Call” in the Old Testament greatly emphasized the people as a unit. The New Testament emphasized individual calls to people who were gathered into a new community.

Stevens identifies four ways in which Paul uses the word call in his writing: (1) salvation in Christ, (2) living in a Christian way, (3) the interface of Christian discipleship with our life situation, and (4) Paul’s own experience of anointing as an apostle of Christ. Being “called,” as related to these first three connotations, has an impact for every aspect of our life. Stevens gives a pie chart divided into six pieces to help us reflect on the dimensions of Christian vocation.

• Congregation (in ministry)
• Family (priesthood and service)
• Personal (spirituality)
• Sabbath (rest, play, worship, celebration)
• Society (stewardship and mission)
• Neighbor (service) (87)

With regard to the fourth connotation of call Stevens’ listed, he writes:

It is, however, questionable whether one can make a doctrine of calling to a specific ministry from such scanty references. What can be affirmed from the New Testament is the desire of God to lead each believer. (87)

Finally, Stevens writes that the call of God is threefold. We are called to:

• Belong to God.
• Be God’s people in life.
• Do God’s work.

Stevens begins to build his case that service or ministry is not just about evangelism, edification or social justice.

The Christian vocation summons us to take up the human vocation in its totality. We are not redeemed by Christ to become angels preparing for an immaterial heaven, but saved to become fully human beings serving God and God’s purposes in the world through the church. So it is crucial to understand that for which we were originally formed and called by God. (88)

Amen. Stevens turns now to the bottom tier of the vocation cake, human vocation.

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The Other Six Days: C4 - Personal Vocation

The Other Six Days

Part Two - Summoned and Equipped by God: Chapter 4 - Calling in a Post-vocational Age

Personal Vocation

Chapter 4 is pivotal in how Stevens unfolds the idea of ministry later in the book. The focus of this chapter is calling in a post-vocational age. Vocation simply means “to be called.” And to be called means that someone is doing the calling. Stevens emphasizes that we are “…called to Someone before we are called to do something." Stevens wants us not to confuse occupation with vocation. Our occupation may be a specific outworking of our vocation but it is not our vocation.

Stevens spends considerable time at the start of this chapter discussing what he calls “personal vocation.” He gives his three layer wedding cake analogy on page 73. The bottom and broadest layer is “human vocation,” which is includes things like the call to “keeping the earth.” The second layer is “Christian vocation.” This involves those works we are called to do in continuing Christ’s work in the world. The top and narrowest tier is “personal vocation.” This call deals with the call that God has for each of us individuals.

In the centuries leading up to the Reformation, a bifurcation emerged in the church with regard to the people of God. Monastic living was equated with answering a "call of God" as opposed to “remaining in the world.” The Reformers, like Luther and Calvin, revolted against this thinking. However, they were also in tension with the Anabaptists who were tending to form what the Reformers perceived as a new kind of monasticism, secluding themselves from the rest of society. Consequently, they championed the idea that each person could and should stay within their station in life and serve God from that position. 

Regrettably, their teaching, morphed in later generations into a justification for enforcing class status and human hierarchies. What began in the Reformation as an attempt to set the people free for ministry ended up as a straight-jacket. (It is well evidenced today in the strong instance on carefully defined hierarchies and roles within conservative Christianity on issues like women in ministry.)

Stevens believes there is a personal call for everyone in at least four different ways.

• The effectual call of Christ to become a disciple.
• The providential call.
• The charismatic call.
• The heart call.

God calls us into discipleship (effectual). God actively participates in the events that shape who we are and what we encounter (providential). God gives us gifts that we are to exercise for the common good (charismatic). It is in his discussion of the charismatic gifts that Stevens writes this powerful observation:

The Father gives us the cultural mandate to subdue the earth. The Son calls us to discipleship and summons us with the Great Commission. The Spirit equips us for a task: ‘Now to each on the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good’ (1 Cor. 12:7).  (81)

Finally, Stevens writes that there is the heart call. Quoting Greg Ogden, Stevens writes that there are three dimensions to how we experience individual calling:

• We experience an inner oughtness.
• It is bigger than ourselves.
• It brings great satisfaction and joy. (82)

Stevens laments that “guidance-mania” that pervades too much of evangelical Christianity and I concur.

There is no need to be ‘called’ through an existential compelling experience to an occupation in society. God gives motivation and gifts. God guides. Work, family, civil vocation and neighboring are encompassed in our total response to God’s saving transforming call in Jesus. (82)

Stevens articulation of three types of vocation and the Trinitarian nature of community and ministry are two of the most helpful things I gleaned from this book. It also strikes me that recovering a clear sense of what vocation is, is core to the question about how to function as the church. Without adequate appreciation for what disciples are called to do we end up building institutions and structures that distract us from ministry, not equip us for ministry.

The next section will reflect on Christian vocation.

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The Other Six Days: C3 - The Trinity and the Nature of the Church

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 3 - One God - One People

One God – Three Persons

...Like their God the people of God have ministry that is both creative (making) and restorative (mending); ministry is both unitive (connecting) and curative (correcting) – thus challenging the common evangelical preoccupation with the Great Commission (Mt. 28:19-20) as the exclusive definition of ministry, as important as that mandates is.

To this rich understanding of peoplehood and ministry each of the three persons of the Godhead contributes. The Father creates, providentially sustains, and forms a covenantal framework for all existence. The Son incarnates, mediates, transfigures and redeems. The Spirit empowers and fills with God’s own presence. But each shares in the others – coihneres, interpenetrates, co-operates – so that it is theologically inappropriate to stereotype the ministry of any one. But that is exactly what is done. (57)

Stevens offers this grid on page 58.

	PEOPLEHOOD	VOCATION	LEADERSHIP
FATHER	Covenant Community	Creational Stewardship	Hierarchical
SON	Kingdom Community	Christocentric Service (continuing works of Jesus)	Servant
SPIRIT	Charismatic Community	Exercising Gifts Empowerment	Charismatic

Stevens observes that denominations tend to favor one aspect of Trinitarian ministry over another.

• Father-denominations emphasize reverent worship and stewardship. (This would loosely correspond to the traditional mainline denominations like Methodist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, UCC, Episcopal etc.)
• Son denominations stress discipleship and evangelism thus furthering the work of the Kingdom of God. (This would loosely correspond to more Evangelical denominations.)
• Spirit-denominations promote gifts and graces. (This would loosely correspond to charismatic denominations.)

Stevens writes, “…we respectfully confess that the unit of the Holy Trinity is neither a homogenized unity that blurs the distinctions, nor a collective.” (59) He is concerned that we remember the concept of perichoresis of the “being in one another” aspect of the Trinity. Just as we can talk of three inseparable persons of the Trinity, we can also talk of three inseparable calls to be a covenant, Kingdom, and charismatic community.

Communion or Union?

In the final section of chapter three, Stevens emphasizes that we are in Christ but we are not lost in Christ. Christ is in us but we are not Christ. Similarly, the church, is not a collection of individuals but a community. Yet we are not lost in, or consumed by, community. Stevens makes these following observations about a perichoretic church:

• First, there is not such thing as an individual member…. (There is interdependence.)
• Second, there is no hierarchy of ministries….
• Third, all members of the laos of God belong to one another, minister to one another, and contribute to the rich unity and ministry of the whole. The church is not composed of those who minister and those who are ministered ‘unto.’… (63-63)

This chapter concludes Part 1 of the book “People without ‘Laity’ and ‘Clergy.” These first three chapters have framed the problems we face and how we inherited them. In the three chapters that make up Part 2 we examine what it means to be “Summoned and Equipped by God.” Central Stevens thinking in these coming chapters is the “backdrop” he has given us about perichoresis and the Trinitarian way of viewing looking at community and vocation.

Many theologians I have read in recent years have lamented the virtual eclipse of Trinitarian theology over the last few centuries. It strikes me that recovering a healthy ecclesiology is interconnected with a healthy view of the Trinity. 

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The Other Six Days: C3 - Two Peoples or One?

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 3 - One God - One People

It is widely acknowledged that pastors are facing an identity crisis, a crisis which may be deepened by the pastor-as-equipper emphasis now being promoted by many, including myself. Simply put, if there is no single activity that is the exclusive prerogative of the pastor, including equipping, is there anything left? John Stott calls this aclericalism. At least those in a sacramental tradition can cling to their officiating role a baptism and the eucharist.

Being ‘unnecessary’ may be a gift. It may enable one to become truly counter-cultural*, to go deep with God and to become a true counter-cultural, to go deep with God and to become a true pastor – nurturing people in the faith, directing people Godward so they are dependent on the Head of the church. I may also help one to envision a God-sized ministry for the whole people of God, to identify giftedness in others and to empower the people to love and serve God fully. (51)

[*In a footnote here, “It can be argued that this less counter-cultural in a post-Christian, postmodern age.]

Stevens divides this Chapter 3 into the following three sections.

1. Two Peoples or One?
2. One God – Three Persons
3. Communion or Union?

Today I focus on the first section.

Two Peoples or One?

Stevens identifies three common responses to the issues of clergy and laity.

• Clericalism – Domination of the “ordinary” people by the “ordainded.”
• Anticlericalism – Domination of the “laity” and rejection of ordained church leadership.
• Co-existence – “…two peoples separated by education, ordination, function, and even culture.”

Stevens argues the community is the more biblical term to describe the relationships between leaders and others.

Each member contributes to others in a diversity of functions that contributes to a rich social unity, like the loving unity through diversity found in the triune God in whose image the church, the laos tou theou, is created. (53)

Stevens catalogs several images of the Church given in the Bible beyond “the people of God.

• The church (the gathered)
• Saints (people dedicated to God)
• Chosen ones
• A royal priesthood
• The household of God
• The Israel of God
• The body of Christ
• A holy temple in the Lord
• A colony of heaven / God’s commonwealth

Stevens notes New Testament metaphors that highlight the relationship of the Church to God.

• Vine and the vinedresser.
• Flock and Shepherd
• Household and Father
• Temple and Builder
• Body and head

The emphasis is on God as the authority and equipper, and the people in a more or less horizontal relatedness, not a hierarchical chain of command. Stevens suggests that Paul was struggling with some of this hierarchical baggage that was similar to the clergy/laity divide. For instance, he fought the idea that Jewish law observers were a higher form of Christian than the gentiles. Paul had to dig deep beyond these surface distinctions and get to the core of what God intended for the people. Stevens believes that the starting point for a discussion of the communal nature of the church is the Trinity. More on that tomorrow.

Is Stevens on to something here? Do you agree the lessons he pulls out of the metaphors for the church?

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The Other Six Days: C2 - Emergence of the Clergy

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 2 - Reinventing Laity and Clergy

Emergence of Clergy

Stevens identifies three influences that led to the emergence of clergy in the church:

1. Imitation of the secular structures of the Greek-Roman world not unlike the professional-lay distinctions in the modern world.
2. The transference of the Old Testament priesthood model to the leadership of the church
3. Popular piety which elevated the Lord’s Supper to a mystery which required priestly administration. (39)

Stevens gives a brief recount of how the idea of clergy began to emerge in the thinking of the early church fathers. Heresies and doctrinal confusion in the last third of the first century put pressure on the Christian leaders to find some way to keep order. That led to increasing institutionalism. Old Testament and Greco-Roman structures were their primary frame of reference and models from these cultures began to permeate the Church’s thinking. These developments were combined with an increasingly mystical interpretation of the Lord’s Supper, which required someone of mystical qualifications to preside over the event.

Cyprian, writing around 250 AD, wrote a model for church order which was explicitly based on the civil orders of the rulers of Carthage. Characteristics of Cyrian’s church order were:

• He makes a distinction between the ordo of bishops and the laity.
• He sacralizes the priesthood according to the Old Testament model of the sacrificial priesthood.
• He establishes a monolithic episcopate which is the same for all of Africa.
• He links ministry to sacrifice, again in the image of the temple priesthood.
• He shapes the church as a clearly defined institution of salvation.
• He models the bishops in the image of Roman senators, thus excluding women.
• He consolidates the ruling powers and bishops through numerous episcopal conclaves. (41-42)

The conversion of Constantine and Christianization of the Empire just a few decades later in the fourth century merely solidified the transition that had been happening for the previous two centuries.

Stevens then highlights some of the major developments that transpired in the period from the fourth century to the sixteenth century.

• The Bishop of Rome came to be regarded as the head of the Church on earth.
• The language of worship ceased to be the language of the people.
• The clergy dressed differently and were prepared for ministry in the enculturating seminary.
• Ordination became an absolute act so that congregations were no longer needed for the celebration of eucharist.
• Clergy became celibate and thus distant from the normal experiences of the laity.
• The cup was removed from the laity in the eucharist.

The Reformation came in the sixteenth century but it failed to fully recover the “priesthood of all believers.” Some of the factors involved were:

• “The Reformation was more concerned about soteriology (salvation) than ecclesiology. …”
• “The preacher replaced the priest. The sermon became the central act of Protestant worship (the Protestant ‘Christ-event’).” Much as the priest presided over the ‘Christ-event’ of the eucharist.
• “Inadequate structures of renewal.” Stevens notes that even denominations with radical reformation roots “… have now ‘gravitated’ to the pre-Reformation clergy-lay distinction.”
• “The seminary system was eventually adopted. …thus guaranteeing [pastors’] enculturation in a clerical culture.”
• “Kingdom ministry has been almost totally eclipsed by church ministry. Ministry is viewed as advancing the church rather than the Kingdom. The letters are the primary guide; the gospels have been eclipsed.”
• “Ordination is still retained almost universally for the full-time supported church worker; no adequate recognition of lay ministries in society exists….”
• “An adequate lay spirituality had hardly ever been taught and promoted. …Protestant spirituality has mostly focused either on charismatic and ‘mystical’ experiences or the deeper life of outstanding Christian leaders, rather than exploring the holiness of the ordinary Christian in the totality of his or her life…”

I realize there are lots of lists in the post but through these lists I think we can see the impulses that have taken us away from the vision of the Church in the New Testament.

Is Stevens on track here? Are there aspects that trouble you that are not mentioned?

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The Other Six Days: C2 - Ministry in the Old and New Covenants

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 2 - Reinventing Laity and Clergy

Ministry in the Old and New Covenants

Stevens gives a wonderful comparison of the differences between ministry in the Old Testament and ministry in the New Testament.  Here are twelve shifts he identifies on page 33, with the OT Covenant first and the NT Covenant second:

Limited Word ministry (Jer. 31:34)
Unlimited Word ministry (Acts 2:18)

Externally motivated ministry (“on tablets of stone”; 2 Cor. 3:3)
Internally motivated ministry (“on…human hearts: 2 Cor. 3:3)

Temporary and fading (inspiration; 2 Cor. 3:13)
Permanent and continuous (transformation; 2 Cor. 3:18)

Priestly caste and tribe (Ex. 28:1)
Unlimited priesthood (1 Pet 2:9-11)

Sacredotal mediation of preists (Ex. 30)
Total/life priesthood (Rom. 12:1-2)

Occasional and exceptional spiritual giftedness (Ex. 31:3)
Unlimited spiritual giftedness (1 Cor. 12:7; Eph. 4:7

Unique and special “calls” to service (1 Sam. 3)
Unlimited call to service and ministry (Eph 4:1)

Limited ordination (Lev. *:21
Universal “ordination” to the ministry by baptism (1 Cor. 12:13)

Occasional gift of wisdom – the wise person (1 Kgs. 3:16-28)
Wisdom available to all (Jas. 1:5)

Special representative of the rule of God in judges, prophets, priests and kings (Judg. 3:9-10)
Unlimited experience of the power, sovereignty and rule of Christ (the Kingdom of God) by all believers (Mk. 1:15; Eph. 1:19-22)

Cultural separation (circumcision diet, etc.; Deut 17:14-20; 1 Kgs. 11:1-6)
Apostolic ambassadors (“all things to all men”; 1 Cor. 9:22; 2 Cor. 5:20)

National focus (Jews and proselytes; Zech. 8:20
World mission (disciples of, to and from all nations; Mt. 28:18-20

Stevens gives several examples in which the OT anticipates ministry as it will be in the NT. For example, there is Exodus 19:6 where God charges the people to be a “kingdom of priests,” and Joel 2:28-32 where it is prophesied that God will pour his Spirit on all humanity and everyone will prophesy. Stevens also notes that even with the priestly distinction in the Old Testament the Israelites were still distinct from the surrounding cultures. Their neighbors had active priests and passive recipients but God’s vision for Israel was of the whole people participating in covenantal ministry. Defense of the priest-people distinction in the Church to this day often draws on the OT testament but the results end up looking more like Israel’s neighbors than what God called Israel to be.

I love Stevens’ closing paragraph in Section 2:

Few business people, for example, think of themselves as full-time ministers in the marketplace. Fewer still are encouraged in this by their churches. Hardly any one gets commissioned to their service in the world except foreign missionaries. It is a heretical state of affairs. Christians in the first century would have found such a state of affairs anachronistic – a throw-back to the situation before Christ came when only a few in Israel knew the Lord, when only one tribe was named as priests, when only a select few heard the call of God on their lives. How could such a gracious revolution (under the New Covenant) be reversed, leaving us with essentially Old Covenant practice? (39)

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The Other Six Days: C2 - Laity and Clergy

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 2 - Reinventing Laity and Clergy

Stevens partions Chapter 2 into three sections:

1. A People Without 'Laity'
2. A People Without 'Clergy'
3. The Emergence of the Clergy

Stevens disconstructs these terms and explores how the laity/clergy framework emerged. I will take a brief look at the laity/clergy distinction in this post.

'Laity' and 'Clergy'

Who are the “lay” people? Stevens shows that we most typically define “lay” people by what they are not:

• Function - Does not administer the word or the sacraments.
• Status - Does not have a “Rev.” title.
• Education - Not theologically trained.
• Remuneration - Not full-time or paid
• Lifestyle – Not religious but occupied with secular life.

Stephens recounts the results of a survey question asked of United Methodists. It said:

Laypersons are

1. Members of the people of God called to a total ministry of witness and service in the world;
2. Those who are ministered to by the clergy who are the true church;
3. People in part-time Christian service;
4. Non-ordained Christians whose function is to help the clergy do the work of the church.

The top response was number four with 59.9%. In other words, laypersons are assistants to the pastor instead of the other way around! As Stevens says throughout this book, the widely shared perception is that the laity are the people who receive ministry and the clergy are the ones who give it.

The word “laity” comes from the Greek word laikos (not laos as is so frequently claimed.) Laikos means “belonging to the common people.” It is absent from the New Testament. The first mention of the word in Chrisitan literature comes at the end of the first century when Clement of Rome was writing to the Corinthians about worship and was making an analogy to circumstances in the Old Testament.

A Greek synonym for the laikos was idiotes. It is the root of the English word “idiot” and means someone who is not an expert or a specialist. It is used once in Acts 4:13 when the Sanhedrin was amazed at the teaching of these (Paul and John) “unschooled and ordinary men.” It is used again in 1 Corinthians 14:2 to refer to the uninitiated who come into a Christian meeting.

Stevens notes that after Clement of Rome’s one time use of the laikos, it did not begin to appear again until Clement of Alexandria and Tertuillian used it. The word is absent from the writings of Justin Martyr and Irenaeus writing in the second century. It appears that the idea of laity began to emerge in the second century and the concept widely took root by the end of the third century. (For more on the development of laikos see the beginning of this article by Hans Ruedi-Weber.)

Stevens' bottom line is that neither laikos or idiotes were used to describe “the people of God.” The Greek word in the Bible is laos, which meant “the crowd” or the “the people as a nation.” There are only the people of God (laos tou theou) among whom there are leaders or a subset of the “the people,” not a group that exists in contrast to the people.

The emergence of “the laity,” was joined by the emergence of its mirror image “the clergy.” Stevens identifies four dimensions he believes are common to our contemporary understanding of “clergy”:

• The Vicarious Function – “Service is rendered representatively not only on be behalf of but instead of.”
• The Ontological Function – Person becomes a priest by virtue of ordination not character, and is, therefore, clergy for life without resignation.
• The Sacramental Function – The idea of priest or sacerdos, borrowed heavily from the Old Testament.
• The Professional Status – Well trained professional who can “do it” better than an amateur or volunteer.

The word "clergy" is derived from the Greek kleros, meaning a “lot,” “share,” or “portion assigned to someone.” It is always used in the New Testament to refer to the whole people of God but by the third century it comes to stand for people in ecclesiastical office, in contrast to the common Christian, the laity.

Stephens explains that while the concept of Israel as the people of God (laos tou theou) carries over into the New Testament of the Church as the people of God, the nature of leadership undergoes a radical change in the New Testament. We will explore that change tomorrow. But for now it might be interesting to reflect on what it would mean if there were no laity and clergy, or more accurately, if all disciples were clergy.

Let me anticipate a concern that is always raised when I get to this issue. We have not said that the Church is a radical democracy and that there should be no leaders. Many quickly leap to the conclusion that the above is advocacy of anarchy. (i.e., No clergy = no leaders) Leadership will be addressed in the next post but if this is your concern, I invite you to examine more closely what has been said above and examine why you think this suggests no leadership.

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The Other Six Days: C1 - Beyond Academic Theology

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 1 - Doing People Theology

Beyond Academic Theology

The first two sections of this chapter have called for us to move beyond clericalized theology and beyond unapplied theology. In this last section of chapter 1, Stevens focuses his attention on theology's captivity to academia. One of my favorite lines from the book is, "The theological task is not only to exegete Scripture but to exegete life, and to do these together." (17) Stevens quotes Alister McGrath who rather boldly states:

Theology must come down to earth, to serve the church and its mission to the world - and if it will not come down to earth, it must be brought down to earth by so marginalizing academic theology within the life of the church that it ceases to have any relevance to that church, in order that a theology oriented toward the pastoral and missiological needs of the church may develop in its wake. (17)

Many of the early church fathers were non-clerical, non-professional theologians. Steven's lists Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Socrates, and Sozomen as examples. Reformation icon John Calvin was not a professional theologian as was true of other reformers. The Eastern Church has had a far less clericalized history with important theological chairs being held by laymen over the years.

The reality is that as all of us move through our lives, we are repeatedly pressed to reflect upon on questions about identity and about what story we find ourselves living in. People are doing theology every day of their lives but there is a significant chasm between the theology that is done in daily life and theology done in the academy.

Karl Barth claimed that "irregular dogmatics" (dogmatics done in response to a critical issue) has been the norm throughout history. Stevens points to Athanasius and Luther as examples of this, in contrast to Melanthon and Calvin who did "regular dogmatics." In fact, Barth says that the impetus for the complete theology of regular dogmatics always has its origin in the issues raised by irregular dogmatics.

Stevens advocates that theology must be done by the whole people of God as they live out their lives in the congregation, the home, and the marketplace. The primary arena is daily life not "in-house service." Stevens is careful to point out that he sees a critical role for the professional theologian. There can be a tendency for communities to elevate certain aspects of God's work in the world to the exclusion of other aspects. Professional theologians are needed to keep us in touch with the whole story and keep is in dialog with other theological voices present and past. Stevens' primary concern is this this:

In contrast to the dichotomizing of theology and practice in the theological academy today, the New Testament presupposes a community in which every person is a theologian of application, trying to make sense out of his or her life in order to live for the praise of God's glory: Theology of, for and by the whole people of God. (21)

I wonder how Stevens' thoughts here might impact how seminaries work? I wonder how it might affect how theological reflection and education is done in the life our congregations?

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The Other Six Days: C1 - Beyond Unapplied Theology

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 1 - Doing People Theology

Beyond Unapplied Theology

“To most ordinary people formal academic theology seems abstracted from life, a matter lamented by Lesslie Newbigin who notes how the work of scholars makes it appear to the ordinary Christian that no one untrained in their methods can really understand anything the Bible says. ‘We are,’ he says, ‘in a situation analogous to the one about which the great Reformers complained…’ What would recovering a theology for the whole people of God mean?” (10)

This is the question Stevens explores in this second section of Chapter 1. He offers three major observations.

First, Stevens points out that we have come to perceive theology as a “delivery mechanism.” We persuade people of the truth and then of their need to act on it. You learn the theory, bank up some knowledge, and then go out and apply it.

Stevens argues for joining doctrine and ethical practice. “The only theology that is truly Christian is one that has been applied…” and you can’t truly do theology without engaging yourself in the love of God and neighbor. Stevens points out that the Hebrew word for ‘know” and for ‘intercourse’ are the same word and it is only at this relationally intimate level that we can truly do theology.

Second, Stevens observes that the split between theory and practice has been a relatively recent development. He summarizes a concern of Ellen Charry by saying, “She calls for a recovery of ‘sapience’ – engaging God in love so that knower and known are connected emotionally, something largely lost in modernity when theology became the intellectual justification of the faith.” (11) Stevens says that theology in the primitive Church, up until the twelfth century, “…related to practical issues and questions arising from the liturgy and life of the people of God. It was a practical habitus – the disposition of the soul, lived truth, phronesis – practical wisdom. It did not separate theory and practice."

Beginning with Aquinas, theology become increasingly speculative and dominated by rational formulae. Theology began to fracture into systematic theology, applied theology, ethics, missiology and other sub-topics. It largely took theology out of the hands of the people. One impetus of the Reformation was to restore theology to the people. (Stevens quotes Luther “True theology is practical … speculative theology belongs to the devil in hell.” (14)) However, Stevens says the divide between moral theology and pastoral theology was made by the eighteenth century and by the nineteenth century “…clerical captivity of applied theology was almost complete.”

Third, Stevens points to signs that we are recovering the idea of theology as phronesis – practical wisdom. He points to the emergence of the liberation theologians and their attempts to “live” their way into a new theology instead of “thinking” their way into a new theology. Without necessarily endorsing all that these theologians stood for, this aspect of their communities is evidence of people beginning to reorient theology in this way. Stevens asks:

If all the disciplines of the theological academy were consistently taught in the direction to which the Bible points – faith active in love – with theory and practice interdependently linked, rather than merely placed in a linear way, would there be any need for a separate discipline called applied theology? (15)

In short Stevens says that a theology that is for the People of God “…explains and empowers the life of the ordinary believer in the world. …it sees acts of faith as not only applying but discovering doctrine.” (15-16)

It strikes me that these issues are at the very heart of the Emerging Church conversation. When I look at the state of most congregations and Christians in our culture, no matter what the stripe, I think it is this disconnect between “theory and practice” or “knowing and doing,” that has delivered theology into the hands of a caste of “degreed” Christians and devastated the effective witness of the Church in our world.

What do you think?

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The Other Six Days: C1 - Beyond Clericalized Theology

The Other Six Days

Part One - A People Without 'Laity and Clergy': Chapter 1 - Doing People Theology

Beyond Clericalized Theology

Stevens’ original title for this book, when it was first published in the UK in 1999, was “The Abolition of the Laity.” I like that title but I suspect it didn’t play too well in some markets. Still, it gives you some idea of the over all issue Stevens is getting at.

Stevens Divides the book into three parts with three chapters each. (Is this guy Trinitarian or what?) The three parts are:

• I. A People Without ‘Laity and Clergy’
• II. Summoned and Equipped by God
• III. For the Life of the World

The first chapter is titled “Doing People Theology,” which is broken into … you guessed it … three sections:

1. ‘Of’ the Whole People of God: Beyond Clericalized Theology
2. ‘For’ the Whole People of God: Beyond Unapplied Theology
3. 'By’ the Whole People of God: Beyond Academic Theology

I think it might be good to devote a post to each section. So let us look at what Stevens has to say in the first part of Chapter 1.

Stevens opens the chapter by writing:

This book makes an outrageous proposal. Should the laity be abolished? Can it be? … Throughout almost all of its history the church has been composed of two categories of people: those who ‘do’ ministry and those to whom it is ‘done.’ Lay people are the object not the subject of ministry. They receive it, pay for it, promote it and perhaps even aspire to it. But they never quite become ministers for reasons that are deep in the church’s soul… (3)

Stevens goes on to say that:

Most efforts at recovering the New Testament vision of every member ministry are half-measures. They focus on the Christian in the church – lay preachers, lay pastoral care-givers and lay worship leaders. What is needed is a comprehensive biblical foundation for the Christian’s life in the world as well as the church, a theology for homemakers, nurses and doctors, plumbers, stockbrokers, politicians and farmers. (4)

From here Stevens takes us into the first section of this chapter, “Beyond Clericalized Theology," where he identifies four persistent misunderstandings that must be addressed.

First, there are the terms “laity” and “clergy.” The Greek word for laity is laikoi and it is found nowhere in the Bible. Clement of Rome first used the term in Christian literature at the end of the First Century. Stevens will elaborate more on this in the next chapter.  Laos is the Greek word used to refer to “the people” in the New Testament. It is never used as “the people” in contrast to some other more select group like the “clergy.” Clergy comes from the Greek word kleros, which means the ‘appointed or endowed’ ones. It not used in scripture to talk about the “leaders of the people.” The whole people are the appointed and endowed ones. Kleros always refers to the whole people of God. There is no clergy and laity distinction in the New Testament.

Second, Stevens laments that because of this laity/clergy conceptualization, almost any theology of the so-called laity has tended to be a compensatory thing, with the laity somehow being elevated at the expense of a special group called clergy. Stevens writes:

So a theology of the whole people of God should neither be clerical nor anticlerical. What we should embrace is a-clericalism – one people without distinction except in function, a people that transcends clericalism. (7-8)

I simply quote Stevens for the last two issues:

Third, a theology of the whole people of God must encompass not only the life of God’s people gathered, the ekklesia, but the church dispersed in the world, the diaspora, in marketplace, government, professional offices, schools and homes. …(8)

Finally, a theology of the whole people of God must take the contemporary situation seriously. The work of theology is never finished. It is elliptical in nature with one focus on the timeless word of God and another on the context. So today we must consider the end of Christendom and the prevailing postmodern culture. (8)

Stevens quotes Ellen T. Charry:

Now that Christianity is disestablished and the general populace more familiar with secularism or modern expressions of paganism than with Christianity, theologians should undertake to demonstrate that the apostolic faith has resources for and presents the promise of a version of human selfhood that is both dignified and honorable. In other words, knowing and loving God should again locate people in the world. (8-9)

I find all four of these to be central issues I have wrestled with all my life as I have struggled to get a handle on God and God’s mission for the Church. Do any of these connect with you?

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The Other Six Days: Why Discuss this Book?

Why discuss this book? Before jumping into a discussion about this book I thought I would offer a word of personal testimony about why I value this book so highly.

Most of you know I am Presbyterian. What you may not know is I wasn’t raised in that tradition. The first half of my life was grounded in the Wesleyan-Arminian , Pietistic, Holiness, mostly Evangelical world of the Church of the Nazarene. The second half of my life has been grounded in the mainline denominational world Presbyterian Church (USA). However, since shortly after college I have always had one foot in communities or institutions that were outside traditional church structures and hence my respect for, and attraction to, the Emerging Church conversation. A common thread for my experiences as I have sojourned with all these communities has been to ask what is the purpose of God in the world and where do I fit into the picture.

If you grew up in an Evangelical Holiness tradition like I did, during the time I did, then you know there are lots of people out there who call themselves Christians you are to be suspicious of. The high church “bells and smells” folks were certainly a questionable crowd. Those licentious “once saved always saved” Baptists and Calvinists were also of concern. But the ones you really had to watch out for were the Social Gospel types.

Someday I will have to write some short posts about the history of the evangelism versus Social Gospel debate. In short, for the 20th Century Evangelical world, evangelism and “saving souls” was everything. The “Social Gospel” was a catch all to describe the spiritually bankrupt character of mainline types (Methodists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Episcopal, etc.) and their “sellout” to works righteousness that was devoid of God. Evangelism = good. Social gospel = bad.

For reasons I won’t recount in detail here, I grew up asking questions about the social order and the nature of justice in the world. As I came into adulthood I found the questions I was asking weren’t even on the radar of the people in the church community I was a part of. I found myself largely disinterested with Church.

Then, while in graduate school immediately after college, I came into relationship with people from a broad range of Christianity. For the sake of brevity, I won’t go into a lot of details here, but I ended up connecting with a Presbyterian Church (USA) congregation and I have had at least one foot firmly planted in that world ever since. But as I spent more of my time in the PCUSA, I began to discover a strong theme about evangelism existed there as well. In the mainline world, social justice and evangelism were frequently equated as the same thing. Doing the justice work of the Kingdom is the visual telling of the Good News of the New Creation. All good and well except that for others to make the connection between our actions and the larger narrative of God requires some articulation and conversation, something which I noticed that Presbyterians are highly reticent to do. One of my favorite jokes is “What do you get when you cross a Jehovah’s Witness with a Presbyterian?” The answer is “A knock at the door from someone who has no clue what to say.”

Years ago I read something by Ron Sider where he suggested that rather than seeing evangelism and social justice as antithetical that we should instead see them as two wings of the same bird. Without either wing, the bird can not fly. I liked that metaphor. It wed both aspects into an organic picture. To this day I find that sharing that analogy is meaningful to many people. But there was still something missing.

In retrospect, I realize the question for me has been that if evangelism and social justice are two wings of bird then what does the body of the bird look like and where is the bird flying? So much of what has been called evangelism and social justice is defined by a set of actions one does rather than a destination one sojourns toward. Evangelism and social justice both have transformation as essential elements. What is the nature of this transformation and what are we being transformed into as individuals and as a community?

What Steven’s book did for me was to bring together a number of disparate pieces together into framework that gave me a better lens through which to view these questions. Wrestling with the issues Stevens addresses in this book, combined with a narrative hermeneutic regarding the Word of God, have probably been the two most transforming influences in my life. This book has been essential for me in getting a better grip on the nature of the “bird” and where it is going.

Over the next several weekdays, I am going to blog through this book chapter by chapter, lifting out pieces for discussion and emphasis. There are nine chapters and I expect I will have multiple posts on each chapter. We will just take it slow it see where it goes.

In wrapping up this first post, I wonder why you are here reading this post and why this book might have caught your attention. If you haven’t read it, what about it has an attraction for you? If you have you read it, what makes you want to discuss it?

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"The Other Six Days" Book Discussion

If you are like me, every so often you come across a book that really “brings things together” for you and opens new horizons. One of those books for me is a book by R. Paul Stevens called The Other Six Days: Vocation, Work and Ministry in Biblical Perspective.

Two years ago I lead a book discussion group at church using this book and two years later people are asking me about questions this book raised for them. I recommended it to a friend who is nearing retirement age a few months ago. He got the book and it sat on a shelf for months before he began to read it. He pulled me off to the side after church a couple of weeks ago and explained to me how for the first time he understood what significance his work had in God’s eyes. As I relate Steven’s ideas in other settings I nearly always see light bulbs going on.

These experiences provoke deep emotions in me. First, I have struggled with issues like vocation, the nature of the Church, and the meaning of everyday practical living, my entire life. Steven’s work has clarified and connected a number of things for me and it is a joy for me to see the light bulb go off in other people’s heads as I share what I have learned with them. Frankly, I think Steven’s has a clearer idea of where the Emerging Church needs to go than most people who are lauded as Emerging Church leaders.

The second emotion that these experiences provoke in me is anger. Yes, anger. It makes me angry that the universal call of God to humanity to be creation stewards (i.e., making creation and human existence more bountiful through co-creative work with God) has been made a peripheral concern. The central mission of the Church is neither evangelism nor social justice. The central mission of the Church is an earth filled with God’s image-bearers exercising creation stewardship in community with God and with each other.

Evangelism and social action are tools toward realizing the vision of restored shalom. The institutions of the Church are temporal tools that will fade when Christ returns to consummate his work in the world and fully establish the New Creation. Yet we have moved that which is secondary (evangelism, social action, and institutional preoccupation) to the center and moved that which is central (living as stewards of creation in community) to the periphery. We have all sorts of measures for “souls saved” and justice marches attended, but where are the measures that say someone has moved closer to becoming a creation steward living in community with God and with others? In fact, some segments of the Church actually work to marginalize creation stewards. “Full-time” Christian service is what someone with credentials from a seminary does. The work of an accountant, sales clerk, delivery driver, business owner, or homemaker are all work we do that is somehow either disconnected from serving God or is merely conceptualized as a staging ground for evangelism and social action. Because of this, countless Christians are shut off from seeing the place of their daily labors in light of eternity and paralyzed from being able to help others make the connection in their daily lives.

I have decided to blog my way through The Other Six Days. I never tire of revisiting this material and I hope maybe I can encourage others to confront the challenges Stevens raises. I expect to start sometime late next week. I will do multiple short posts on some chapters instead of lengthy chapter summaries like I have done with some past book discussions. I also expect to do a post that is a personal testimony about why I think the issues in this book are so important. If you are so inclined, I you will drop in now and again for some discussion.

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Maybe Developing Nations Are Not Emerging but Have Emerged

New York Times: Maybe Developing Nations Are Not Emerging but Have Emerged

IN the old developed world, this is an era of solid but moderate economic growth. In the new world, the so-called emerging economies is where most of the growth now resides.

The chart shows the most recent annual real rates of increase in gross domestic product in six major developed economies around the world: the United States, Britain, Canada, Australia, Japan and the Euro-zone, the countries that use the euro as their currency although they remain politically independent.

The leader in the group is the United States, with a year-over-year growth rate of almost 3 percent. That is hardly soaring, but it is respectable.

Then the chart shows the rates of 26 developing countries in Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Chile, with a growth rate of 2.93 percent, grew just a bit slower than the United States, but every other country on the list did better.

The star, to no one’s surprise, is China. But there are 10 other countries on the list, including Peru and Bulgaria, that grew at least twice as fast as the United States. ....

.....

Mr. Rotenberg expects this to continue. “What the global economy has experienced over the last few years is just the start of a major wealth shift from developed economies — that is, from less-skilled labor in developed economies — to emerging market workers,” he said.