Excellent stuff from Howard Snyder:___
1. Interpret the gospel primarily through Romans.
2. Focus solely on "personal salvation."
3. Make heaven the goal.
4. The clergy/laity split.
5. Thinking economics and politics are not directly gospel concerns.
6. De-prioritize community.
7. Neglect the Old Testament.
8. Limit justice to personal righteousness.
9. Neglect intercession.
10. "Believers" instead of disciples.
11. Substitute heaven for the kingdom of God.
12. Faith just a part of life.
13. Disregard Genesis 9.
14. Divorce discipleship from creation care.
___
Snyder fills in the details here.
2 comments:
Allan,
Have a question for you. Twice in this post, there was some talk about heaven. I've been around mainliners enough to know we tend to de-emphasize heaven which I can understand; we are talking about the kingdom of God and not heaven. But that has left me at times wondering if the afterlife matters and even if there is an afterlife. I've read N.T. Wright's book about the afterlife and tend to agree somewhat to his view of what the afterlife and the final resurrection means.
I guess I wish pastors and theologians in the mainline church would at least address the issue of the afterlife instead of belittling it. I know I would feel better.
Dennis,
You are absolutely right, and in particular it seems to me that too many mainliners have denigrated the notion of bodily resurrection, which I often think to be strange. Surely, the God who created all life can bring life back again.
I think my concern is that when heaven is made the main goal, the current life and its injustices get neglected if not downright ignored.
So, we need to keep afterlife in front of us, but remember that God intends to redeem this life as well.
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