It seems like all the cool kids here at Adventist Today are talking about women's ordination and the emerging church. I kind of feel like I should, too, so maybe I'll make a perfunctory statement on these matters and then talk about something that actually interests me.
Women's ordination: I'm not a fan of gender inequality, but I'm also not really a fan of Adventist ordination practices for men. So while ordaining women seems to be the obvious answer, I think it glosses over the underlying question of why and how we ordain ANYONE, what ordination means in the Bible, and the origin of our existing ordination practices. Those are the conversations we should be having.
Emerging church: I rather suspect that Dr. Douglass would label the church I attend as an "emerging church." We like candles. We're passionate about prayer and personal spirituality. Our mission statement is centered around relationship, as are our church ministries. His description of the emerging church movement places it in contrast to "distinctive Adventism," and seems to suggest "emerging churches" disregard doctrine and obedience. I'm a little perplexed, then, by the enthusiasm with which he greeted my initial blog post articulating the centrality of relationship to my very distinctly Adventist faith. In fact, my local church was founded by three families who felt compelled to obey God by moving across the country for the express purpose of planting a distinctly Adventist church within the Adventist denominational structure. I don't see the dichotomy he suggests. It seems to me that many of the characteristics he calls "emerging church" fit ideally with the character of God as understood in Adventist theology.
But it's been pretty hard for me to concentrate on these topics long enough to write that much. I certainly haven't read all the back-and-forth comments on everyone else's blogs about them. You see, people I know and love are battling depression, anxiety, stage four cancer, eating disorders, and a host of other medical conditions. Others are trying to get out of abusive relationships, care for aging parents, raise children with special needs, and keep their kids in school. Some don't have a home, job, parents who care to invest time in a relationship with them, or enough money to obtain the education they desperately want.
I don't think that these people particularly care whether those supporting and coming alongside them are male, female, Jew, Greek, slave, free, ordained, or un-ordained. Mostly, what matters to them is that someone takes the time to notice, care, and at least try to make a difference.
I'm trying very, very hard not to be too judgy about this. I recognize that there are different personalities and that people who think about theological issues do play an important role in the body of Christ. Still, I have to admit, the thought has crossed my mind more than once that if the best thing you have to do with your time is debate these points on the AToday website, you are extremely fortunate, living in some kind of cocoon, or both.
Accurate theology, proper hermeneutics, and careful biblical interpretation ARE important because they impact the picture of Christ that the church understands and shows to the world. But if they are the sole purpose for our existence as a church, we have utterly missed the point. If an accurate picture of God's character does not lead us individually into actions that make his love visible in our families, workplaces, churches, and communities, then our faith is dead (James 2:17-18).
There may well be an end-time generation which God brings to perfection of character; I wouldn't put it past an omnipotent God to be able and willing to do that for people who cooperate with him. But the point won't be to make them perfect so THEY can get into heaven after probation closes; the point will be to show a watching universe the tremendous power of Christ's transformational love in a sinful world.
If there is a perfect generation at the end of time, I doubt very much that they will be the generation who compile a checklist of "perfect" behaviors and mark off every box. They probably won't even be people who think they are perfect. Ellen White tells us that "[t]he closer you come to Jesus, the more faulty you will appear in your own eyes; for your vision will be clearer, and your imperfections will be seen in broad and distinct contrast to his perfect nature" (Steps to Christ, p. 64).
Instead, a perfect generation will be the people who grow so close to Christ that He can scrub away the smudges and stains of sin and selfishness, allowing his light to shine clearly through their utterly transparent lives. They will be the people whose eyes are so fully replaced by the eyes of Christ that every trace of the ruin caused by sin will wring their hearts with the same sorrow that wrings his. They will be the people who are so busy being Christ's hands and feet and voice in the world that they won't have time or desire for the sins that so easily beset the rest of us.
I don't really know, nor do I care all that much, if I should be ordained as an elder in my local church or if I can be translated sinless to eternity. What I do know is that there are people in my life whom Jesus loves, and there is something I can do today to show them that.
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