Living Under the Reign of God: Gospel, Church & Culture in a Postmodern Context Baptist Bible Seminary December 2004

Current Major Theological Issues 1.The Openness of God 2.New Covenant Theology 3.The New Perspective of N. T. Wright Concerning Paul and Justification 4.The Redemptive Movement Hermeneutic 5.Post Foundational Theology 6.The Emerging Church

The Enlightenment: 17 th to the Middle of the 20 th Century 1.Immanence takes precedence over transcendence... 2.Light of reason dethroned the church as the source of authority… 3.Revolution in philosophy - Bacon, Descartes, Kant… 4.Revolution in science - Aristotle overturned, Copernicus, Galileo, Newton...

Modernity/Enlightenment 1. Era of conquest and control 2. Age of the machine 3. Age of reason/analysis 4. Age of secular science – process and progress 5.Aspired for absolute of objectivity

Modernity/Enlightenment 6. Age of critical evaluation 7. Modern nation-state organization 8.Age of individualism/autonomy 9.Age of Protestantism institutional religion 10. Age of capitalism/consumerism

The Gospel and Modernity Reflection/Discussion 1.Identify the different ways that we have accommodated the Gospel to Modernity! 2.What forms were adopted in order to present theology & Gospel to Modernity? 3.What have we accomplished by means of this adaptation? 4.“The Church is In an Enlightenment Captivity and Needs a New Reformation!”

Postmodernity Early Nineteen Sixties to the Present 1. Universe Not Self-Contained * 2. No Basis for Morality and Values 3. Progress Not Inevitable * 4. No Basis for Truth * 5. Language of Public Debate Lost * 6. Meaning of Written Texts Lost 7. Limited Autonomy/Process

Multiculturalism - Pluralism 1. Diversity - Tower of Babel to the final rebellion under the lawless man Tolerance - aspect of common grace that renders community/society possible… 3. Postmodern - rejection of standards to make truth judgments about culture, religion, values...

Crisis in America’s Worldview 1.The Death of Modernity – the death of the positive dynamic of the Enlightenment has been in process since the mid 1960ies 2.The Rise of Postmodernity – the impact of the new worldview taking over the soul of America 3.The Present Crisis of Terrorism & Moral Disintegration

Impact of Terrorism & Multiculturalism 1.September 11 – optimism lost 2.War in Iraq – circa 1,271 dead 3.San Francisco – circa 4,000 same sex marriages 4.Debate in Massachusetts, New York, Oregon –same sex marriage 5.Mayor Daily of Chicago, Mayor Bloomberg of New York 6.Gay Episcopal Bishop

The Issues in the Cultural Crisis 1.American culture has slipped both of its moorings: the Enlightenment and Christian Theism The ship of culture is listing badly – it is foundering: it is time to bail… 3.The right wants to save the ship by adding more weight in legislation… 4.The left wants to add more rights and entitlements to the liberal multicultural democratic society… 5.The irony is both want a culture of choice… 6.The issue is no longer what kind of culture? It is rather culture is collapsing…

Postmodernity 1.Multiculturalism - new agenda, social pragmatism... 2.Globalization - every culture has its story…no overarching story to bind all the cultural stories together… 3.Mass Media - agenda of the media elites… 4.University - ensconced at all levels... 5.Political Arena - agenda for education...

The Gospel and Postmodernity Reflection/Discussion 1.What are the dangers in accommodating the Gospel to postmodern culture? 2.What new opportunities do you see for the advance of the Gospel given the collapse of the Enlightenment? 3.What would seem to be the most useful disciplines of theology to address the Gospel to Postmodernity?

Living Under the Reign of God: Gospel, Church & Culture in a Postmodern Context The End Session One