In which I am still emerging

Someone asked me why I call my blog "Emerging Mummy". That's a fair question.

It's sort of a double entendre: one part because I am a fairly-new Mum, therefore just emerging as a mummy still. You'd be forgiven for thinking that was the only reason: I write about my tinies almost to the exclusion of everything else.

But the other reason is because I am part of the Emerging Church community.

(For the uninitiated, from Wikipedia...The emerging church (sometimes referred to as the emergent movement) is a Christian movement of the late 20th and early 21st century that crosses a number of theological boundaries: participants can be described as evangelical, post-evangelical, liberal, post-liberal, charismatic, neocharismatic and post-charismatic. Participants seek to live their faith in what they believe to be a "postmodern" society. Proponents of this movement call it a "conversation" to emphasize its developing and decentralized nature, its vast range of standpoints and its commitment to dialogue. What those involved in the conversation mostly agree on is their disillusionment with the organized and institutional church and their support for the deconstruction of modern Christian worship, modern evangelism, and the nature of modern Christian community.)

The emerging church has been a lifeline for me even as I wrestle with them. We are no denomination. We have no statement of faith. We are a loose collection identified only by our self-identification. We have a village or cohort where we hang out but even that is on its last legs, I hear. We have a bad habit of identifying ourselves by what we are NOT. We are incredibly diverse, hard to pin down, a bit stubborn, sarcastic and loud. We encompass most of the movements you've heard of recently: missional living, new monasticism, social justice, postmodern Christianity among others.

I came to the conversation back in 2001-ish. By the time we went to the National Youth Workers Convention in St. Louis, Missouri in 2003, it was on. That event was very transformative for me (which is funny since I'm rather anti-attractional and event-driven spirituality....I figure it's Jesus calling my bluff, keeping me on my toes). I found an entire community of people that were grappling with similar questions, doubts, expressions and dreams. It felt a bit like coming home. (Brian never really identified with it as strongly as I did. Even now, he's a missional guy, staying local and idealistic.) The conversations that I was a part of during that season gave me a new breath, it gave me hope.

And most of all, it helped me to realise I was not absolutely crazy. Or if I was, then a lot of other people had beat me there.

Since then? A lot of people showed up. A lot of people dropped out. We got bogged down in a lot of doctrinal and theological pissing contests. A lot of preachers and established churches decided we were very dangerous. Churches were planted. Some of them "failed". Others sold out. Others stayed true. Some gave up altogether. I did a lot of listening for those years because I was never one with a real "voice" in the conversation. I read. I prayed. I showed up. That was about it. We never planted a church. I never even really went to a church that most would consider "emerging."



And nowadays, sometimes I felt like the other end of a bad short term mission trip. You know how it is - the spoiled, rich kids show up in a barrio in Mexico for a while, paint an orphanage, get diarrhea and go home talking about what a difference they made and how deeply they have been changed (that sounds cynical but I don't mean it quite that way). But this time, I started to feel like the other side of it. All of these charismatic personalities showed up. They gave me a glimpse of something. And then they went home, leaving us - excited, hopeful, energetic, waiting - here.

Post-colonial, indeed.

They preached great stuff. I was excited that things were changing or going to change. We talked scripture and worship, deconstruction, culture, location, expressions of creativity, social justice, mercy, love and that God was doing a new thing (or nu-thang, for all those DC Talk groupies out there). Then some people didn't like it. And others even wrote books all about how wrong we were. And then they all went home. Dan Kimball packed his bags for new friends. YS decided it was getting too edgy. Pagitt is running for some office in politics. Andrew Jones declared the word "emerging" dead and went back overseas. Mark Driscoll turned into a neo-Reformed guy and then everyone took aim. Tony Jones went to Beliefnet and evidently took too many theology classes. Brian McLaren wrote a lot of books and got roped into doing a Green Bible.

All the over-educated white guys packed up after their mission trip and went home.

"Is the Emerging Church even around?" said a few people. "I thought that was over."

I'm still here.

Still emerging.

So now what?

I think a big part of this is terminology. The mission is the same. The word EMERGING or EMERGENT became too heavy, too weighted down with preconceived notions. We're all still emerging but it's with a little "e" now.

I am hopeful actually. I am kind of hoping that without the rockstar personalities that the organic leaders will rise up. I'd like to see the dream of what we talked about - like minorities and women rising up to take their place. I'd like to see a connection between the emerging dreams with the current expressions. I'd like to see the sarcasm go away. (Which is saying something since my second language is sarcasm and I've even written an article or two with my tongue in cheek.) I think the decentralization is the very nature of what we were talking about. An organic, community driven expression. But most of all, I'm hopeful that, once again, it won't be about labels. It won't be about minutiae or politics or TULIP (vs. BEERS), candles or iPods. I pray that perhaps the coming evangelical collapse and the current stalemate of emerging church turn our eyes towards Jesus and (with the risk of sounding schmaltzy) that we might look full on his wonderful face, that the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.

I'm still Emerging Mummy. No one publishes my books. I have no podcast. I have no voice beyond this blog and the hollering about theology that my husband and I like to do on occasion. I am a charismatic non-denominational girl with a deep and abiding love for high church rituals. I am a creative. I'm a bit of a pluralist. I'm certainly not Reformed enough for any of you. I write about my tinies a lot.

But I love Jesus. I love Him. I yearn to follow Him and be more like Him.

And I love His church, his bride. I love them like they're family. I love even the crazy uncles and the cool kids that think I don't belong at the lunch table. I love it. I even love the imperialists that capitalised on our questions, packaged them and sold them back to us in marketing-speak.

I thought I might leave church altogether for a while there. So many hurts. But the Emerging Church gave me that gift: it gave me new eyes to see the truth, the beauty of this crazy family, the Blood that runs through all of our veins. It helped me to reconnect with the truth of it all, beyond the culture of Christianity, the culture that made me want to stop even calling myself a Christian for a while because that term was too weighted for what I experienced.

They are through me like wine through water, colouring every aspect of me into something deeper and more profound than I could imagine otherwise.

The emerging church helped me hold onto that.