As a part of my dissertation I am researching some Fresh Expressions of church. I phoned up someone yesterday who heads up a FE and had a great conversation. Great that was until he asked, '..where do you stand on this...? What's your theology?' Now this is the question I've been dreading. In fact Hazel and I had been talking about this just the day before. I have been doing a lot of talking lately at meetings and churches and have often mentioned my conservative evangelical roots, especially my formative years at Bromley Baptist and Honor Oak Baptist churches. I remember them and the leaders with great fondness, putting me on a very stable road to pursue my christian life. So when someone asks me what my theology is I find it hard to reply. I am now a Methodist minister and have been exposed to a lot of different theologies, from conservative evangelical to pentecostal to Third Wave Charismatic to liberal and that includes the House Church movement and New Frontiers (Heaven help me!).I told the chap I was talking to that I was probably a Post Evangelical (after Dave Tomlinson's book. He needed some clarification on this which I didn't want to give. I am forever trying to get away from labels because they don't say who I really am. Jonny Baker makes this point on his recent blog. Here he suggests he is more Catholic (I presume it's with a big 'C' 'cos everything he types is in trendy lower case. I expect there is some deep theological reason behind it) than he thought. Today I picked up a book by Rob McAlpine called Post Charismatic? which does a good job of describing me too.
In truth what I have found is that, rather like a bendy bus, I am having to flex and be remoulded rather than try to force God into my pre-determined doctrinal box. This is a painful process and as yet I can't say what I am. Does this make me a wishy-washy Methodist who doesn't know which way up he is or a faithful disciple who is waiting on Jesus for the next instalment to be revealed? Don't answer that!
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