I am saddened and frustrated over the manner in which so many people
appoint themselves as judges of the only proper theology that they call
“orthodox” theology. Their judgment is often followed by an attack on the faith
of professed Christian believers who hold a perspective divergent from their
“orthodox” view. This judgment goes so far as to exclude people from their
worship and to divide Christians setting them against one another.
Their approach demands inspection because they claim implicitly
or explicitly a unique and collective understanding of the relationship between humanity and
God. The next several posts are a
continuation of several previous posts that explored the theological grounding
of Viola Larson who has leveled such attacks against other Christians. These
posts have little to do with the person of Viola Larson; but have much to say
about the use of the “orthodox” theology she advocates and informs the judgments
against other Christians.
This series begins with a consideration of “What is worship?”
The answer to that question forces us to take a few steps backwards and ask
“Why should God shape our behavior?” Both questions force us to talk about the
importance of personally understanding why we believe what we believe; that is,
why a personal theology is critically
important and informs a collective theology that one might more accurately chose to think is “orthodox” theology.
The position of this discussion is that practical theology
historically has enjoyed a superior rank of over academic theology. Most of
this “orthodox” theology is thoroughly rooted in a rational, Greek view of the
world that defines all “things” concretely, often described as an “either-or”
worldview. We must appreciate how such a world-view
subliminally delimits the “orthodox” theological perspective and hinders
practicing real-world theology.
The so-called “orthodox” theology may in fact share an
overwhelming portion of a practical theology, but the current theological
perspective called “orthodox” does not adequately encompass practical theology
that informs our daily living.
Some ideas of Greek rationalism are so tightly intertwined with
theology we must discuss them at least briefly to understand how self-appointed
defenders of “orthodox” theology think.
Some of these are transcendence, immanence, immutability, the source of
evil, pantheism and panentheism. (Some one asked me to explain what the Fall
really meant, maybe we will get to some ideas about that in a subsequent post “Why do we Worship?")
I hope to challenge you to think deeply on your personal
theology and discern the degree of importance of the academic ideals of
self-labeled defenders of “orthodoxy” in the face of the practical world of
misery that surrounds us all. You may object, saying, “I don’t live in a
miserable life, I’m well off.” I will
reply, open your eyes and look around at both you and your wealth, and those
around you who have little or no hope.
Warning: Your
theology is worthless if it simply adopts mine without evaluating yours.
No comments:
Post a Comment