Rising from the Ashes by Becky Garrison

Hello there! If you are new here, you might want to grab the RSS feed or subscribe via email to receive updates on this topic and many others!

Becky Garrison’s Rising from the Ashes: Rethinking Church is an interesting little book. It reads less like a book and more like some sort of loose compilation of reproduced conversations gathered from various and dynamic forms of correspondence. There is surely a more appropriate name for such a compilation, but for now, and according to the restraints imposed by time, “book” will simply have to do.

The content (reproduced conversations) was gathered through numerous interviews facilitated by Garrison. The resultant exchanges are the products of face to face dialogues, phone discussions, e-mail trading, and excerpted blog posts. The overarching topic addressed in each conversation is “rethinking church.” This topic also happens to be the subtitle of the book, lest anyone consider the point of the work ambiguous. The people interviewed are renown for either their personal thoughts on church change, or representation in Mainline Protestant circles. The names of the people attached to thoughts included in this work: Phyllis Tickle, Diana Butler Bass, Martha Grace Reese, Nadia Bolz-Weber, Kester Brewin, Jonny Baker, Ian Mobsby, Tony Jones, Brian McLaren, Troy Bronsink, Spencer Burke, Shane Claiborne and N.T. Wright. There are others, but those names should paint a picture for you regarding the nature and scope of this work.

Basically, Becky Garrison feeds a few questions concerning the present and future states of church to the aforementioned people and records and reproduces their responses. The book’s content is the commentary offered in response to Garrison’s questions. The commentary is obviously intended to not only inform the reader of coming changes and shifts, but also enlighten and encourage by introducing change already embraced and practiced. Some of it is extremely helpful, other parts are not as helpful. The reader will have to discern between the two for his or herself. Helpful and helpful aspects of the book aside, it can not be said that this book is static. It’s a dynamic read, as a result of the content’s structure around conversations.

Two of the most important questions and responses have to be those asked and answered by N.T. Wright and Martha Grace Reese. The cited sequence follows:

N.T. Wright is asked, “How do you respond to those who interpret Scripture using the lens of personal experience?”

N.T. Wright: Experience is a slippery slope philosophically and spiritually. It’s a fog in which all sorts of worlds can bump together. Now, no one wants to go to extremes. Some lines are drawn in the sand. For example, no one in their right mind would endorse mass murder. But we need to follow a path of wisdom and have standards. When you come into the life of church, there is a way of life followed there. There are codes of conduct. It’s like when you come into someone’s home. You take off your muddy boots when you enter the house. You don;t take tea and pour it down someone’s back. There are standards in how we live together. Experience needs to be affirmed, redirected, and rebuked by God’s authority. Because of our propensity to self-deception, we constantly need to check against Scripture whether we are allowing the word of God’s grace in the gospel, and God’s reaffirmation of us as made in his image, to validate what is in fact idolatrous and distorted form of humanness. When, through letting Scripture be the vehicle of God’s judging and healing authority in our communities and individual lives, we really do “experience” God’s affirmation, then we shall know as we are known” (55).

Martha Grace Reese is asked, “What concerns do you have with the emerging church?”

Martha Grace Reese: Any time there’s some rapidly growing ministry, there are all sort of contentions, struggles, distractions, confusions, crashes, and burnouts. We all need accountability. We need relationships with dear friends with whom we can be honest. Some emergent pastors are in really high-octane ministries. Some have had little formal ministry training (which has its pluses and minuses). It’s easy to lose perspective. Our tendency as human beings is to split reality, especially when we’re under pressure. I get some hot idea and then I want to split off from those idiots who don;t get it. We need to keep some connections with other people so we can avoid having a “Ground control to Major Tom,” floating off into space (David Bowie) moment. One of the worst things that would happen to traditional mainline churches is to let emergent churches drift off to their own planets. And the worst thing for the emergent church is to float off onto their own little planets. We need each other” (14).

The above two excerpts by themselves are worth the price of the entire book, which fortunately includes more than a few equally spectacular insights and thoughts.

Related posts:

• March Book and Resource Reviews Coming Soon!

• The Blue Parakeet by Scot McKnight

• The Future of Emergent Village

• Emergent Motivational Posters

• If God Disappears by David Sanford