Evangelicals and the Early Church

Recovery, Reform, Renewal

Kalantzis, Tooley

• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Year: 2011
• ISBN:
  9781621899105
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

In this volume noted Evangelical historians and theologians examine the charge of the supposed ahistorical nature of Evangelicalism and provide a critical, historical examination of the relationship between the Protestant evangelical heritage and the early church. In doing so, the contributors show the long and deeply historical rootedness of the Protestant Reformation and its Evangelical descendants, as well as underscoring some inherent difficulties such as the Mercersburg and Oxford movements. In the second part of the volume, the discussion moves forward, as evangelicals rediscover the early church-its writings, liturgy, catechesis, and worship-following the temporary amnesia of the earlier part of the twentieth century.Most essays are accompanied by a substantial response prompting discussion or offering challenges and alternative readings of the issue at hand, thus allowing the reader to enter a conversation already in progress and engage the topic more fully. This bidirectional look-understanding the historical background on the one hand and looking forward to the future with concrete suggestions on the other-forms a more full-orbed argument for readers who want to understand the rich and deep relationship between Evangelicalism and the early church.

part one

Evangelicals and the Early Church: A Movement in Search of Roots?

1

Evangelical Inattentiveness to Ancient Voices

An Overview, Explanation, and Proposal

Christopher A. Hall

Eastern University

Possible Roadblocks to Engagement
with Ancient Voices

I begin by initially drawing our attention to the general issue of inattentiveness, before focusing on the more specific question of “evangelical inattentiveness to ancient voices.” Or put differently, to explore adequately our overarching theme, we must first examine three related topics: first, the nature of inattentiveness and attentiveness; second, “evangelical” characteristics that might engender inattentiveness to ancient perspectives; and third, the particular characteristics of “evangelical inattention” to ancient Christian viewpoints. Evangelical inattentiveness, for instance, may be quite different from a theologically liberal inattention, or, surprisingly, more similar than we might ever have imagined.

Ponder for a moment the last time someone said—probably impatiently or angrily—to you, “You’re not paying attention.” Ouch! Why weren’t we listening? What may have caused our failure to pay attention? If we weren’t listening to the other, whom were we listening to?

A number of possibilities present themselves. Perhaps we were distracted by an idea, issue, or concern that was occupying our attention and preventing us from effectively listening to our interlocutor. Our concentration was diverted or scattered.

In the context of this essay’s topic, we could then ask, “Have evangelicals—some directly and some more indirectly or subconsciously—been distracted or diverted from ideas, themes, and practices that were extremely important to early Christians?” My response is “yes.” If so, within a moment or two, we will need to explore the possible causes of our distraction.

Distraction, however, may not be the sole cause of our inattentiveness. Occasionally we fail to pay attention to others because we don’t recognize the relevance of what we’re hearing to our own life or situation. “What you’re saying doesn’t relate to me. I can’t see how it applies.” And so we discount the other’s words as irrelevant or inapplicable. Irrelevance and a perceived lack of importance seem clearly linked. And so we ask, in relation to this essay’s theme, “Why might evangelicals consider the history and theology of the early church as irrelevant, inapplicable, or unimportant for our life as Christ’s apprentices and followers today?”

A third possibility for inattentiveness relates to the issue of error. For one reason or another, we judge another’s perspective to be simply wrong. Our judgment, of course, may be correct or incorrect. Yet we are sure of one thing: the person speaking to us is dead wrong. When we reach this point—“you’re clearly wrong and I’m right”—we stop listening.

The question, certainly, is whether the judgment we have made is correct. On what is it based? Are the sources or viewpoints we have relied on to make our judgment wise and reliable? Have we taken time to carefully sift through the evidence before making our decision?

Some evangelicals, for example, don’t attend to ancient perspectives, largely represented in the writings of the church fathers, because they believe the fathers are profoundly mistaken and misleading. Some may be disturbed by the fathers’ sacramental worldview. Others may be repelled by the tendency of at least some early Christians to interpret the Scripture allegorically.

A corollary problem to evangelical inattentiveness relates to the evangelical tendency to reject the whole because of error in the part. Suspicions of particular perspectives or practices too easily lead to blanket rejections of the whole.

Both Michael Casey and Allan Bloom identify other key cognitive attitudes and behaviors—some of which I’ve already mentioned—as noteworthy roadblocks to attentiveness that we should also keep in mind as we examine evangelical inattentiveness to ancient sources. They include: judging too quickly that an argument or example is irrelevant; considering something trivial that is actually important; branding the initial inaccessibility of a text or its seeming irrelevance as boring; dismissing a text too quickly because we refuse to create space in our own cognitive framework or intellectual landscape for it, fearing that it will significantly challenge or rearrange dearly loved ideas or ways of framing reality, God, and so on; unconscious, ingrained resistance and intolerance for a different point of view, a resistance we project onto the text—in this case the voices of the ancient church—and then peremptorily dismiss.1 For example, are there specific texts you—and I—have too quickly dismissed, not because they are not worth reading, but because, perhaps on a subconscious level, they have challenged us too deeply?

To be fair, though, evangelical inattentiveness to ancient voices may also be linked to what has been—until the last fifteen years or so—the general inaccessibility of patristic sources to evangelical theologians, pastors, and lay people. Many English translations of the church fathers—some produced in the nineteenth century—are wooden, flat, dry, and in some cases well-nigh unreadable. Try your hand at making sense of the English translation of Chrysostom’s homilies on Matthew in the NPNF and my point will be clearly demonstrated.

The fathers’ lively and bracing Greek and Latin—for most evangelical readers a linguistic reach at best—have too often been disserved by their translators. The sad result is the frustration, confusion, and disappointment of many eager to explore the world and thoughts of ancient Christians. “This text is so dry it’s like drinking sand,” readers may reply as they attempt to make their way through a stilted translation, and any desire to further explore the ancient church dries up. Happily, recent translation series of patristic texts such as Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture and The Church’s Bible now provide English bridges to the ancient Christian world through accessible, readable translations. Healthy sales to Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Anglican, and evangelical audiences indicate both a growing desire in Christ’s followers to appropriate ancient sources and the possibility that our inattentiveness has been significantly connected to a basic issue: you can’t listen well to someone you can’t understand.

Yet a basic question remains: have we as evangelicals offered our conversation partner—in this case, the ancient church—an attentive, empathetic ear? Generally speaking, we have to respond, “no.” Is our inattentiveness related to a need for evangelicals to deepen their listening skills in general? Most assuredly yes. John Sanders—whom I have debated publicly and in print on the issue of open theism—occasionally commented to me on the poor listening skills of the evangelicals who opposed his position, demonstrated by what John viewed as a tendency to name-call, employ guilt by association, highlight the weakest arguments of their opponents, or portray tangential aspects of an argument as the main point. John felt that Wolterstorff’s Rule—formulated by Nicholas Wolterstorff, formerly of Yale University—would aid evangelicals in more empathetically and wisely listening to and engaging those with whom they disagree. Consistent application of this rule would surely, I think, help us understand and engage the early church more effectively.

Thou must not take cheap shots. Thou must not sit in judgment until thou hast done thy best to understand. Thou must earn thy right to disagree. Thou must conduct thyself as if Plato or Augustine, Clement or Tertullian, were sitting across the table—the point being that it is much more difficult (I don’t say impossible) to dishonor someone to his face.2

It is genuinely difficult to listen attentively, deeply, and fairly to others, particularly when we feel those speaking to us are not trustworthy. We discount the value of what we are hearing—but not listening to—because we don’t trust the person or persons speaking. In the past this person—or the group the person represents—may have hurt us or misled others and we are reluctant to release the suspicion and mistrust our pain and disillusion have engendered.

Our mistrust may quickly morph into guilt by association. Because our interlocutor uses expressions or engages in practices similar to our perceived enemies, we are reluctant to listen. If, for instance, we are suspicious of Roman Catholics and their sacramental theology, we may transfer our suspicions on to the early church because of the fathers’ sacramental realism.

Lurking behind mistrust—invariably it seems to me—is fear of some kind: fear of becoming tainted, fear of slipping into unorthodox—or unevangelical—manners of thinking and living the Christian faith, fear of the unsettling discomfort cognitive dissonance produces, fear of change. “What,” we ask ourselves softly, “if they’re right and I’m wrong? How could I face the fact that I may have been mistaken for so many years? If I change my opinion, what will my students think? My peer group? My church? My family? My friends?”

Lack of attentiveness, then, is linked to a variety of factors: distraction, questions of perceived relevance or lack thereof, judgment calls as to value and importance, mistrust, guilt by association, and fear. Other aspects of inattentiveness may come to mind as we proceed to a closer examination of the specific question of evangelical inattentiveness to ancient voices.

My hope is that as we analyze more thoroughly why evangelicals have largely been inattentive to the ancient church, we can formulate cogent, coherent proposals for wisely and discerningly appropriating our ancient Christian heritage. Among other things, we can learn to overcome our lack of attention by developing new listening skills, skills that do not require us to abandon our evangelical heritage, but rather may actually enrich it as they enable us more effectively to enter and engage another’s world.

The Evangelical Mind and Inattentiveness
to Ancient Voices

I now proceed to a more focused and direct examination of evangelical inattentiveness to the ancient voices of the church. Are there particular characteristics of the evangelical mind and movement that might serve as predictors of evangelical inattentiveness to Christian exegesis, theology, and history before the time of the Reformation and—in the case of this essay—significant voices, themes, movements, and practices from the second to seventh centuries? Perhaps an autobiographical comment or two may prove helpful as we explore these questions together.

You’re reading the thoughts of an old Jesus freak. During the time of the “Jesus Movement,” a lively and powerful revival that rippled across college campuses from the late sixties to the late seventies, thousands of college students were drawn to the wonder of Jesus Christ. At the time I was a student at UCLA, and at the end of my sophomore year began attending Wednesday night meetings at the “Light and Power House,” a fraternity house that had been transformed into an unaccredited Bible school. A group of ex-Campus Crusade leaders had founded the school and Hal Lindsey became the best-known teacher of the group, though not necessarily the most influential in students’ lives.

The leaders of the Light and Power House possessed the gift of communicating the gospel to young people in a clear, accessible, exciting way. Since most of these teachers had come out of a Campus Crusade background, they had learned to package key tenets of the faith in a form that students with little church background could readily respond to in a matter of minutes, and many did.

We learned that God loved us and had a wonderful plan for our lives. Yet God was also righteous. Our sins necessarily—because of God’s righteous character—separated us f...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Contributors
• Introduction
• Prologue: Going Deeper into the Bible
• Part 1: Evangelicals and the Early Church: A Movement in Search of Roots?
• Chapter 1: Evangelical Inattentiveness to Ancient Voices
• Chapeter 2: John Wesley and the Early Church
• Chapter 3: The Use and Abuse of the Christian Past
• Chapter 4: The Chicago Call and Responses
• Part 2: Evangelicals and the Early Church: Recovery • Reform • Renewal
• Chapter 5: Why Study Early Christian History and Literature
• Chapter 6: Evangelicals and the Public Use of Creeds
• Chapter 7: Evangelicals and the Rule of Faith
• Chapter 8: Evangelicals, the Bible, and the Early Church
• Chapter 9: Evangelicals
• Epilogue: The Radical•ness of the Evangelical Faith
• Bibliography