by Bishop Bill Gohl
No one can argue that the church, let alone society as a whole, is experiencing a crisis. The continuing plagues of racism, xenophobia, misogyny, homophobia; a lack of consensus on the role of the US armed forces in “policing” the world, increased violence - especially in places perceived of as “safe,” the vitriol in the political arena, strained relations between communities and law enforcement, the continued threat of terrorism and the benign apathy we feel toward those – at home and abroad – who are living through disaster; these are symptoms of a society that does not have a clear vision of its past, present or future.
The followers of Jesus were experiencing a similar upheaval shortly after Jesus’ death and resurrection. The inherent corruption of the Roman occupation apparent in every level of life in community. Just like the small, but growing, group of Jesus’ followers who were confused about the future, many others were searching for something that would make sense out of their experience of human life. Paul would be the one who helped develop a strategy to move the Christians into their first period of making an impact on society.
Paul used the tools of communication available in antiquity and harnessed their power to spread the Christian message. Specifically, he used the Roman road system, and he wrote manuscripts that were duplicated by hand. The result of his work was that people throughout the Roman Empire could know and live into the life changing message of Jesus.
Scripture says this was an extremely contested issue, with Jesus’ followers taking different sides; that it was impossible for Paul to simply take the practices and teachings of the Apostles and push them out in his networks of communication - he needed to rethink some of the teachings to make them work with his overall approach. To that point, he did not expect the Apostles in Jerusalem to pay the costs of his bold moves of taking Christianity into the future. Just the opposite, he developed his own system of support as a tent-maker to support not only himself but the expense of his work; and still, he continued to be concerned about the economic welfare of the Apostles in Jerusalem, sharing his financial resources with them. Paul’s goal was not to destroy the older form of the church that existed in Jerusalem. Just as it was important to Paul that the people he led to Christianity did not follow the Jewish customs, yet he was perfectly willing to have the Christian communities in Jerusalem practice Jewish customs – and he even participated fully with them when he visited Jerusalem. Faithful, yet changing.
Martin Luther introduced, or in some cases reintroduced, bold new ideas. He translated Scripture into the vernacular (as radical then as Eugene Peterson’s The Message is today) and arranged for its publication and far-reaching distribution. Luther wrote extensive commentaries on the scriptures and encouraged everyone to read and study them for themselves. Luther proposed new roles for church leaders and advocated the radical notion of the priesthood of all believers. Faithful, yet changing.
Just as the cultural transformation we are experiencing today is extremely complex, the period of the Protestant reformation was a complex time of changes for Christianity. There were changes in economic systems, governmental systems, and family organizations. Luther’s experience was that church structures and teachings of the fifteenth century were not workable or sustainable in the early sixteenth century. That rings familiar in my ear, even today.
The Protestant reformation is often presented as if it were a religious reaction to the Roman Catholic Church. Certainly the reformation resulted in Protestant and Catholics taking different paths forward. However, it is more helpful and more accurate to see the reformation period as a time when Christians participated in a cultural transformation that was driven by the proliferation of printing “technology” into European culture. When Luther posted his famous 95 Theses on the door of the castle church in Wittenberg in 1517, printed books and pamphlets were already well-established as a dominant medium of communication, and so word spread fast and a movement within the church was born. Faithful, yet changing.
Today, the Church faces the challenge of responding to a culture that has been radically transformed by new ways of communicating. The global community is adapting to this technology at a rate that can only be compared to the way printing was adopted 500 years ago. Like Paul, we are faced with sharing Christ in new, if not daunting, ways. The question is not: How can the church use technology? Rather, how can we be faithful to the message of Jesus in this new technological day? Like Luther, we are confronted with embracing new mediums of communication – or like the institutional church of that time, resisting them.
As I live into this new call, there are some questions that come up again and again as I read, reflect and pray. Are we bold in sharing the unchanging message of God’s grace and mercy in Jesus Christ even in ways that challenge the way we’ve shared that message in the past? Are we able to live into the new reality that unity doesn’t necessitate uniformity? Is our church “tent” big enough for bold and creative leaders who are living into this “new thing” while still supporting those bold and creative leaders who tend our heritage and steward our inheritance?
I am privileged to stand in a place where I can see that these questions are being answered and are producing vitality for the church in many unexpected and surprising ways across our Delaware-Maryland Synod – some very experimental and new, and still others deeply rooted in our rich traditions. I sense we are standing at the intersection of history and hope, and by God’s grace, it is a good place to be – together – faithful, yet changing.