New Year's Day - Deeper thoughts

In "The Shaping of Things to Come" by Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch I see a fresh perspective from the authors and the inclusion of several thoughts by from Philip Yancy. "As Philip Yancy says in His remarkable book, 'The Jesus I Never Knew', In church we affirmed Jesus as 'the only begotten Son of God, begotten of His Father before all worlds...Very God of Very God'...But these creedal statements are light years removed from the Gospels' accounts of Jesus growing up in a Jewish family in the agricutural town of Nazareth."

Frost and Hirsch continue, "It is our contention that by focusing on developement of the speculative doctrines, the early church lost the vital focus on the historical and practical implications of the faith. Mission and discipleship as such became marginal to theological correctness. Orthopraxy gave way to orthodoxy..."

"What is more interesting is that none of the creeds get to talk at all on right living, the very topic the Bible cannot seem to talk enough about. In its Hellenistic bent, doctrine shifted from acting right to thinking right. This has been referred to as the distinction between orthopraxy and orthodoxy. Orthopraxy is a system that believes that right living provides the context for us to embrace right thinking... The reverse is called Orthodoxy. It assumes that if we change a person's thinking, we will change the way he or she lives."

Let me add: This has something huge to do with why we have a "going to church" over "being the Church" mentality in America. We go to church and sit facing the front while our pastor shares a one way dialogue/teaching with us. So often we teach more but aren't leaning more because we are not doing what we have been taught. If you don't believe me tell your congregation they must own the Great Commission in their actions. You'll find that many if not most church members would rather "live to learn" rather than "learn to live". Perhaps this is why the average church member can quote the Great Commission mandate - but it is rarely if ever seen in their actions.

Hirsh & Frost say, "We have to recover a sense of the ultilmate meaning of our actions if we are going to become a truly missional-incarnational church."

Let me add another few thoughts for reflection: The Hellenistic influence in the creeds could be part of (or is) the culprit. In my ministry I fought hard to get"truth in action" but members were often content with just filling their minds with new truth. The older we live inside the church the more we fill our heads with knowledge. Living to Learn has largely replaced Learning to Live. By the way, did you know that Hitler knew the Bible inside and out? He knew Truth very well but it never showed up his life. He used his knowledge of scriptures to gain credibility with the church even thought he never applied all his head knowlege.

Do we really believe knowing Scriptural truth is enough? Do the Creedal statements really leave out the orthopraxy or "being and doing scriptural truth in our actions?

Is it true that we have become a teaching church so much so at the expense of being the Church by living incarnationally (by representing Jesus) in the world?