Edgework

In Part One of A New Kind of Christianity, Brian McLaren contends that the six-line narrative we usually draw from the Bible is more a Greco-Roman story line than a true, biblical revelation: Eden (a perfect place), the Fall (original sin), Condemnation (our dilemma), Salvation for a few (through faith in Christ), Heaven (a perfect eternal place for these few), and Hell (a place of eternal torment for the many). This story line has emerged, says McLaren, by reading the Bible backwards through the lens of Greek philosophy. This has created an unnatural dualism which assumes that God loves spirit, state and being and hates matter, story and becoming.

In the Greco-Roman narrative, God (Theos) is furious that his perfect world is spoiled and so intends to destroy everything. The only hope for human salvation is for this wrath to be placated. This happens by God torturing his Son in our place. For all who do not believe this, the wrath remains. Unable to destroy their immortal souls, he casts them into hell to torture them for all eternity.

This is the story line that traumatized me as a youngster. It was hard for me to comprehend that I was condemned to hell simply because I had been born. The fact that I had stolen a cookie proved that original sin had affected me and I was deserving of everlasting punishment. I sensed intuitively that there was something wrong with this story, but it has taken me nearly a life-time to discover  a more positive biblical narrative that comes by reading the Bible frontwards. I agree with McLaren that there is a more positive and dynamic story line that saves God from a Greco-Roman overlay, as well as humankind from a very dismal prospect for the future.

Perhaps the biggest challenge to the traditional narrative relates to the question of original sin. It seems to me that Christians have spent too much energy defending this doctrine when it is clear, according to  Steve Chalke, in The Lost Message of Jesus, that “Jesus believed in ‘original goodness’! God declared that all his creation, including humankind, was very good. And it is this original goodness that Jesus seeks out in us” (67). That is not to say that there is not evil in the world, but that God sees evil as a rejection of the original vision he had for creation instead of a fall into total depravity deserving eternal punishment.

In his book, The Story We Find Ourselves In, McLaren offers a refreshing, alternative story line compared to the six-line narrative that has come down to us through a Greco-Roman lens. In a sense this is an expanded version of what he is trying to say in Part I of this book. The story starts with Creation (1). The two creation accounts are not scientific records but rather poetic revelation that demonstrates God has created meaning in space and time and given humankind a sacred role to play in the emerging world. This is followed by Crisis (2) which comes by way of humankind going beyond its proper limits. But this doesn’t constitute a great “fall” from perfection, as Greek philosophy would have it, but rather a spoiling of something that had been proclaimed to be “good.” It does not eradicate the essential goodness of God’s creation. Again it is through poetic revelation, like the stories of Noah and the Tower of Babel, that we come to understand that God takes deviation from his vision seriously.

Then comes the Calling (3) of Abraham in which he and his descendants are chosen for special blessing so that they can bless the whole world. That is God’s continued call; allow yourself to be blessed by me so I can bless others through you. Mostly we forget the second part and consider ourselves God’s favorites, period. This then takes us to Conversation or Cycles (4) which records how, while humans keep failing again and again, God remains faithful. Through priests and prophets, poets and philosophers, God keeps trying to draw humankind back into his creative vision. God doesn’t let evil go unchallenged, but then repeatedly acts with surprising mercy. Gradually we begin to catch the truth that this is the story we find ourselves in as well.

Christ (5) enters this story, not to fix up a Greco-Roman mess. Instead Christ enters the painful human experience in order to offer new hope for a restoration of God’s creative vision. This Christ-event cannot be captured by any single atonement theory. Some modern Christians have tried to make “perfect sense” of Christ’s work, but it will always defy human logic. So we are free, as were the apostles, to seek various conceptual frameworks to begin understanding the work of Christ for us.

Christ then calls a Community (6) into being; followers of Christ who seek to live by the values of the “Kingdom of God,” or what we might call the “Revolution of God.” More than simply subscribing to a specific belief system, these followers of Christ enter a new way of life. Not so much pressing upon us from behind but coming from the future, this way of life represents the beginning of the Consummation (7). So this community keeps learning to live the way everyone will live in the future when all things have been restored and God will be all in all (I Corinthians 15:28).

McLaren concludes The Narrative Question, Part One by stating, “The wild, passionate, creative, liberating, hope-inspiring God whose image emerges in these…narratives is not the dread cosmic dictator of the six-line Greco-Roman framework” (65).

All I can say to this is, “Hallelujah!” This narrative of a good God who doesn’t give up on us in spite of all our failings is the ultimate hope for the future. It is the God of this narrative that I have chosen to lean on and follow.

For On-going Dialogue:

1. Is the six-line narrative described by McLaren the story line you picked up in your faith experience? How did it affect you?

2. What do you make of McLaren’s assertion that we must learn to read the Bible frontwards, not backwards through the various layers of church history and the influence of philosophies alien to the Bible?

3. If, as McLaren states, the doctrine of “original sin” is unbiblical, what implications does that have for our life and witness as believers?

4. What advantages or disadvantages do you see in the seven-part narrative McLaren proposes in The Story We Find Ourselves In as compared to the six-line narrative that has come down to us through the Greco-Roman lens?