I think that's a great analogy. Along with being gentle, patient, not condescending, and not dismissing it seems that we are also to be giving a hand up to help folks get to the next rung on the tower.

Laura, I think it is too! Good call!

Initiative. Great word! It ties into another word that has been bouncing around our community at Grace Chapel for a little while: intentional. I wonder what would happen if intentional and initiative ever got married? That would be a movement!

Wow. Could you imagine if the church's problems and the problems of its community were the same? That's called effectiveness. Then you add in the necessity of the crucified and risen Lord? Dang.

I can see Brueggmann's perspective. But, I think that it is more than that. An aspect of the Scriptures is the collective memory of God's people, for sure, but it is just an aspect. The Scriptures self-testify as being breathed out by God. I think that we cannot look past their own claim of being being God's words (unless of course we are trying to set aside their authority because we don't like authority).

I agree with you that the Bible goes back and forth in perspectives but I think it's more like an author who is also functioning as a narrator. We would be foolish to disconnect the author from the non-narrator aspects of the story. I disagree with you that progressive revelation and the evolving perspective are two sides of the same coin. I disagree because the latter does not authentically take into account God's transcendence. Why does God progressively reveal himself? I do not really know. My best guess is that he does so because he is transcendent and infinite and we are finite.

I like how Paul puts it, "“For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly”
(Romans 5:6 ESV). It was at the "right time" that Christ died for the ungodly. There is a progression in God's self-revelation and quite honestly I know not the mind of God.

That's my take, most likely I am wrong. But, for now, I have not seen anything that would change my perspective.

Thanks Andy! I appreciate all the interaction on these posts. It's really helpful.

I think he may be right. That being said, it is a shame, because it points to the fact that the greater Christian community is no longer able to have an appropriate good/bad split. This book has so much to offer and many will miss it because he is not "orthodox".

I wish he was espousing Christus Victor, if he was then the case can be more easily made for some aspect of atonement. I think he is moving towards a liberation theology. Have you read "The Atonement Debate"? It did a nice job of framing the debate. McLaren seems to line up most closely to Steven Chalke, although he doesn't go as far (at least not blatantly).

You got it!

I really hope it's just balancing the scales. The atonement is one of those big deals.