I said something in my last post (on June 7) on the community theologian and the theological community that I’d like to develop a bit.
“Christ dwelling in our hearts through faith is bedrock truth, and practical theology is Christology understood as transformative living truth embodied in discipleship and exalted in doxology. “
Christology as transformative truth lies at the heart of Baptist spirituality – not to the detriment of Trinitarian thinking but as the revelatory centre of our knowledge and experience of God. My personal commitment to community is inextricably linked to a profound conviction about the living presence amongst Jesus’ followers, of the Risen Jesus himself. We are the Body of Christ; when we gather in His name He (the defining theological centre) is in the midst of us as the Servant Lord, calling us through the Spirit to obedient living after the pattern of Christ, as revealed in Scripture. Christology not only requires orthodoxy in our thinking, but orthopraxis in the purchase what we believe about Jesus actually exerts on who we are. And who we are determines how we will live, and why – and that takes us back to Christ.
Now if a community theologian is seeking to accompany the community through faithful presence, and stimulate reflection and decision through their speaking, and encourage and heal through self-giving ministry, and both give and receive in the mutual costliness of love, then I begin to sense something quite deep is taking place. That last sentence is an extended paraphrase of two words – kenosis and paraclete – self-emptying and accompanying helper. When a community names Christ as its centre, the One dwelling in our hearts through faith, then that confession is also a surrender to the transforming grace of the living presence of the risen Lord. And if Christlikeness is about both practical imitation through Christlike actions, it must also be about convictions, attitudes, motives and ways of relating, through a Christlike spirit. And if I had to choose two words to help give a sense of what the spirit of Christ might be, I’d be pushed to choose better than kenosis and paraclete.
Do these two words both describe the role, and safeguard the style, of the community theologian? And if they were to become pervasive within the community, would they confer such evidence of authentic Christian lifestyle, relationships and personality, that it would be true to describe such a group as a community of theologians? Now I’ll want to pick up these two deeply Christian ideas, kenosis and paraclete another time – then I want to look at a couple of biblical stories – then I might have just about started to begin to get an initial idea of what a community theologian could, perhaps, look like – and more to the point act like!
Meantime here’s a quotation from a new book by Gabriel Fackre, Christology in Context. (Interestingly subtitled, A Pastoral Systematics – a combination of theological styles that I think is essential).
While mutuality means both enrichment and interpretation, it cannot be forgotten that these are movements from points of primary particular ministry. The “pastor and teacher” [for my purposes read community theologian] exist to equip the saints for their ministry, not to pre-empt it. And those called to the church scattered cannot domesticate their gift and claim it in the household of the church gathered. If the particularity of these ministries is neglected, the body is seriously crippled. That particularity is, as we have seen in our reflection on mutuality, not the monopoly by the ministers of identity and vitality of these functions, but their faithful stewardship of them. This stewardship entails seeing that the tasks get done by whoever can best do them, not by the steward’s compulsion to perform all of them by themselves. Particular ministry therefore is custodianship of those special ways that keep the body of Christ alive in its vitality and awake in its identity. (page 52)
That I think is a good description of the community theologian – and there are glimpses of my two chosen words, kenosis and paraclete…….going to think some more now……………
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