I’m growing increasingly bored with the “emergent church”. Yes, bored. Possibly a strange choice of words, I know, but there’s no other way to say it. It’s just boring. I listened to a message yesterday by Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, MI, and though Bell is obviously a very gifted teacher, I got very little out of it spiritually. In fact, I thought the entire premise of his message was a textbook case of “missing the point”. I’m beginning to wonder if the entire “emerging conversation” is missing the point.

The point of the church emerging was to leave behind the modernist dogma and narrow-minded judgmentalism and “circle-the-wagons” fundamentalism that had wrecked havoc within the evangelical church, while also eschewing some of the bland, consumerist comfort of the seeker-sensitive movement, and find a new radical path that would resonate with the postmodern community and the creative misfits of society. The point was to get unchurched people in love with Jesus and to get people’s lives aligned with the sacrificial mission of Jesus. The point wasn’t to start telling us to save the planet with good deeds and end all conflict with nonviolent peace movements. And I’m not even against all those ideas (to a point). But when I see the emergent movement devolving into yet another liberal theology/social gospel movement that thinks that every single thing evangelicals ever thought up must be abolished, I just want to hang my head down and whimper.

I think the thing that really gets my goat and chaps my hide is that the emergent church is becoming so utterly wimpy. The reason I thought church was boring and didn’t really care a fig for it years ago was because nobody seemed to believe that God had the power to actually do anything. It was just a big social club where people could come to feel spiritual. The emergent church has rejected the social club aspect, but all they’ve done is replace it with community service. Look, I’m all for giving the poor a leg up, cleaning up the neighborhood, helping widows and orphans, and so forth. In fact, it’s a Biblical commandment to help those in need. But the God we serve is so much more powerful than that.

I wonder what Rob Bell would do if a man with a withered hand came up to him and asked him to proclaim healing over his useless limb? I wonder what Rob Bell would do if a couple came up to him and told him that thirty years of marriage was unraveling because of the wife’s haunted past history with horrific Satanic and sexual abuse? I wonder what Rob Bell would do if he were on mission to Africa and came across a witch doctor who started casting spells over him and commanding demonic principalities to destroy his person and his family? I wonder what Rob Bell would do if a poor mother came up to him and asked him to pray for her dead, mangled child to be resurrected from the dead?

And thus the emergent church brings us back to where we already were with the mainstream evangelical church — professing a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. I’ve been waiting for some time to see if the emergents would “get it” and start realizing that their message of the Gospel of the Kingdom is a supernatural message of life-transforming power. Rather, all I’m hearing about is a kingdom where everyone joins hands and prays for world peace in a spirit of brotherly love, and heaven and hell are simply states of mind here on earth. I’m sorry, but I don’t buy it. Humans are too screwed up. We just can’t follow the good teachings of a rabbi, no manner how divine he might be, and expect to enter into a new age of enlightenment. Ain’t. Gonna. Happen.

So, while I applaud what Rob Bell and others are attempting in this grand experiment of the emergent church, and while I still hold out hope that they’ll find a useful niche in the larger Body of Christ, I am going to have to put my foot down and say that their view of the future of Christianity is not for me. I want to follow a God of love AND wrath, a God of mercy AND judgement, a God of forgiveness AND lawfulness. And, more importantly, I want to follow a God of supernatural power and strength who can raise mountains, lower valleys, heal the sick, cast out demons, raise the dead, and, of course, preach the good news to the poor. As Adrian Warnock would say, I want it all!