Wednesday, October 03, 2007

Walter Brueggemann's 19 Theses

One of the most influential Old Testament scholars still alive today is Walter Brueggemann (former OT professor at Columbia Theological Seminary). He is a prolific writer with profound ideas in relation to human beings living in subversion of and alternative to the lies of the Empires that we live in. His book The Prophetic Imagination is the best book I have read on the OT prophets (see my March 2007 Blogs about the "Posture of a Prophet"). His most recent book, Mandate to Make a Difference is a collection of essays/sermons and the last one "Some Theses on the Bible in the Church" is interesting. I'll just quote Brueggemann's theses:

1. Everybody has a script.
2. We are scripted by the process of nurture, formation, and socialization that may go under the large rubric of liturgy.
3. The dominant scripting of both selves and communities in our society, for both liberals and conservatives, is the script of therapeutic, technological, consumer militarism that permeates every dimension of our common life.
4. That script promises to make us safe and happy.
5. That script has failed.

6. Health depends, for society and for members of it, on disengagement from and relinquishment of that script.
7. It is the task of the church and its ministry to de-script from that powerful script.
8. That task is undertaken through the steady, patient, intentional articulation of an alternative script that we testify will indeed make us safe and joyous.
9. That alternative script as an offer of a counter-metanarrative is rooted in the Bible and enacted through the tradition of the church.
10. That alternative script has as its defining factor the Key Character in all holiness, the God of the Bible who is variously Lord and Savior of Israel, Creator of heaven and earth, and is fleshed in Jesus, we name as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

11. That script of this God of power and life is not monolithic, one-dimensional, or seamless, and we should not pretend that we have such an easy case to make.
12. The ragged disjunctive quality of the counter-script to which we testify cannot be smoothed out and made seamless, as both historical-critical study and doctoral reductionism have tried to do.
13. The ragged disputatious character of the counter-script to which we testify is so disputed and polyvalent that its adherents are always tempted to quarrel among themselves.
14. The entry point into the counter-script is baptism.
15. The nurture, formation and socialization into the counter-script with this elusive, irascible Key Character at its center constitute the work of ministry.

16. Ministry is conducted in the awareness that most of us are deeply ambiguous about this alternative script. 17. The good news, I judge, is that our ambivalence as we stand between scripts is precisely the primal venue for the work of God's spirit.
18. Ministry, and the mission beyond ministry, is to manage that inescapable ambivalence that is the human predicament in faithful, generative ways.
19. IF what I have said is true, then it follows that the work of ministry is crucial, pivotal, and indispensable; as in every society, so in our society.

What do you think?

12 comments:

brad brisco said...

Mark, I love Brueggemann's 19 theses and what a great book. Thanks for reminding me to go back and revisit it and thanks for the link to my blog.

Unknown said...

I may have to read the book to better understand all the points but it reads as a very complicated list of coded ideas. Christ was able to reach both fishermen and tax collectors with His message of redemption. I question if our conversations about Jesus and his relevance to us and our communities today get too confusing for many to understand and thus they turn away from the conversation.

Anonymous said...

In just briefly reading Brueggemann's 19 theses, I would agree with much of what he is saying. The whole idea that society/culture/etc is pulling us away from "covenant" and into "exile" both horizontally and vertically (human-human and human-God relationships respectively) is one that I have spent a lot of time reflecting on lately. I think that awareness is crucial for the church today. Unfortunately we don't seem to think critically enough...or maybe we do but do not act on the conclusions we come to. I can't help but wonder if we have spent too much time focussing on being "relevant"; consequently our alternative script is one that does not look so entirely different - so radical.

I also want to comment on the idea of ministry (our presentation of a new script). I have been so convicted lately about our seeming negligence of the relational aspect to this ministry. If we talk about the church's purpose as being the fulfillment/pursuit of this ministry, it seems that we expect the church to create a means, a program, through which to do that. A "worship service" is not evangelism. It could be, but that is not its primary function. To loosely quote Marva J. Dawn, worship is the language of intimacy and evangelism is the language of introduction. We have lost the sense of individual onus, individual responsibility (and yet still as members of a corporate body), to pursue this ministry of presenting a new script.

Anyways, I should leave it there.

Mark Clark said...

To Dave,
i agree that Brueggeman's categories are rather complicated if people are not schooled in his brand of theological language. Thus I offer this as the beginning of the flow of ideas...

I would agree with you: I think the first thing people like us need to do is to interpret these things and put them into our own language/context. Once we have done that we can then move forward to probbing them; seeing they are true. And then, and this is the hardest part, living the subversive story out from day to day-- the "alternative script" as he calls it.

So far in my life--the living it out has been the hardest part.

Mikey,

Some great thoughts. I love the Marva Dawn idea--"intimacy and introduction..."--of course the first thing to ask is whether we need to create a large chasm between the two or whether they can be done together... are they mutualy exclusive categories? It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on comapring her approach with Sally Morgenthaler's ideas of "worship evangelism."

Good discussion!
Thanks Guys for journeying alongside...

Anonymous said...

Briefly in response:

I don't think we need to create a chasm between worship and evangelism. I think worship done well is evangelistic. But I think worship with the purpose of evangelism is problematic.

I didn't mean to get into this aspect in my comment, but I was trying to paint a bit of the big picture. The point I want to emphasize is the "lost idea" of relationship in terms of our ministry (personal ministry). Relationship means time and commitment, two things we have a hard time "sacrificing" for the sake of others.

Anonymous said...

also curious about "Sally Morgenthaler's ideas of "worship evangelism."

Mark Clark said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Mark Clark said...

Mikey,

Interesting enough, Morgenthaler's has an aticle in The Ooze (which I have as a link on the right) side of my Blog...here is the exact link. Under the NEXT WAVE section...

Let's talk after you read it! I would like to get others thoghts on it as well (Dave, Brad). Actually John Broadhead gave me this very paper after hearing what I was speaking about a few Sunday mornings ago. Thus I have it in hard copy somewhere and if you want it I can send it to you...

Anonymous said...

I just finished reading the article, and she touches on some really great points.

She points out (in my opinion) one of the largest issues facing worship in churches today: a lack of understanding as to what true worship actually is.

In making reference to megachurches with the "best" worship services who have little impact on the unchurched in the community, she is iillustrating the disconnect that exists between the "worship" that occurs inside the church walls (Sunday morning), and the "worship" that occurs outside the walls. Worship is about lifestyle, it's about service, it's about living in Spirit and Truth. We have so severly limited our understanding of worship that we've lost the awareness of/sensitivity to the worship that can occur during the week outside of the music, prayer, preaching format. Worship is not simply about the songs that we sing on a Sunday morning. As I was suggesting earlier, if we are living in Spirit and Truth, our daily lives should be an act of worship...this includes service! I could go on here, because I believe this poor definition of worship is what leads to so many church battles over worship style, but I think you understand what I'm saying. We've truncated worship.

I also really liked what she was saying about songs of despair, anger, hurt, pain, etc. She's right in saying we don't address these issues in church. The Psalms (as she also agrees) are really an example of human expression. They are freedom/permission/etc for us to address the issues of real life. I began to speak to this issue that one Sunday morning before I played "come and rest". I talked about the idea that so many people say "leave your troubles at the door" when you come to church. But I would argue that church is exactly the place where you should be bringing those issues because church should be a safe community in which you are supported. I aree with her that we do not see enough of this expressed in our worship. We often lack authenticity (this is a bit of an understatement). This has been such a huge issue for me to grapple with over the past year.

Again, this issue (which I think she gets) is that there is a disconnect between Sunday morning and the rest of the week. I think it's largely due to dualism and that type of gnostic thought; this idea of "sacred vs secular". So my struggle as a worship leader is how do I begin to teach people what true worship is? I feel like I make small attempts here and there, but at the same time it's a process that must be done with much care and consideration...and it will take time. We're talking about undoing hundreds of years of dualistic thought.

Anyways, I could really go on a long time in regards to this topic, but I am taking up a whole lot of space with my comments. I hope my one quote of Marva did not cause you to "pre-judge" what she is about. She has written some really mind-blowing stuff on worship. Some of her books include: Reaching Out Without Dumbing Down, and A Royal Waste of Time. I think Sally is more in tune with Marva than my one quote suggests (Marva was speaking directly to song selection in Sunday morning worship services).

Right, I'm going to let other people post now.

Thanks for the article.

mike.

Anonymous said...

Mikey,

Misrepresent Marva! No way. Any Regent Prof is good enough in my books! I think what you are addressing is important-- I think we have done lament/reflection well in our sunday night community--You and Jer have led well in this area especially with your own songs!
I think we struggle more with celebration (a point we have talked about before)...as for you thoughts on all of this: what is stirring is a night where you and Jer discuss a theology of worship...i wi interview the both of you to explore some of these things--especially the stuff about a lifestyle!

Blessings

brad brisco said...

Mark

I posted on Morgenthaler's comments a couple of weeks ago, as you have already notice there is much to talk about here:

http://missionalchurchnetwork.com/rethinking-worship-evangelism

Mark Clark said...

Mike,

the anonymous was me (I don't know why it did that). HA,

Mark