Can We Talk? About John Winebrenner?
I know a troubled 20something man whose existence is defined by two realities.
1. He has never seen his father.
2. His mother, who has issues with men, instantly burst into tears when the doctor announced, “It’s a boy!”
Those realities have defined him from day one. No matter what he may become, those realities will always be a point of reference.
People and groups of people are who they are because of how they began.
As I look around the CGGC, I’m not encouraged by what I see.
I see a body in decline.
Churches are closing at a rate far faster than we can dream of planting new ones.
Many other congregations are going to seed. George Bullard, who has consulted with us twice on Renewal issues, describes a large number of our congregations as unsavable. The people who attend many of our churches are elderly, sweet people who have no influence in their communities. Their financial resources are dwindling. Many are struggling to pay their pastors. Some can’t even afford to maintain their property. And, kingdom impact? Well, of course, they would if they could—but now they simply want to keep the doors open.
How has our once vibrant, strong, expanding moment come to this?
One reason has to do with the connection between our present and our past. Like my 20something friend, what we are today connects to how we came into existence.
The Church of God is what it is because of who its founder John Winebrenner was. We are connected to Winebrenner even if we don’t know his name, even if we hate everything that he stood for.
John Winebrenner was a radical’s radical.
At the first meeting of the Church of God Eldership in 1830, John Winebrenner preached a sermon casting the vision that defined who we were. My favorite Winebrenner quote comes from his outline of that sermon. (That sermon, by the way, serves as the basis of the Mission Statement the General Conference Administrative Council recently adopted.)
Winebrenner said the Church of God was formed in part, “To establish and build up churches on the New Testament plan.”
His last statement in making that point is my favorite Winebrenner quote. The statement encapsulates Winebrenner’s radicalism.
He said, “To accomplish all this will require another great reformation. But, under God, it can be achieved.”
Another Great Reformation.
Here’s what comes to my mind when I read that:
The great Protestant Reformation has failed. We need to go beyond Luther and Zwingli. The Church of God’s vision is to move forward. We come together to be God’s church in a way that is new, separate and distinct from Protestantism. We commit ourselves to being something as revolutionary as what Luther put into motion when he nailed his theses on the chapel door—something that transforms Christianity as radically as the Reformation. We dedicate our body to creating something new and purely biblical. And, with God’s blessing, we can succeed.
That’s what Winebrenner meant when he launched the Church of God with the words, “To accomplish all this will require another great reformation...”
And, there’s another very important formational reality about what Winebrenner said. The whole movement embraced it. No one objected. When that meeting ended the Church of God was formed. Everyone in the movement supported the vision. Winebrenner wasn’t a lone whacko. We were a movement of whackos.
My 20something friend’s first moment of existence was crowned by the sobs of his mother over the fact that she’d just born a boy. Our first moment was crowned by our unanimous belief that we must begin a new Great Reformation.
My 20something friend’s existence to this day is defined by his mother’s attitude toward the fact that he is a male and the fact that his father has never shown any interest in him. Whether we face up to it or not, ours as a church is defined by the bodacious radicalism of John Winebrenner and all of our founders.
My 20something friend would have liked his mother’s tears to be tears of joy, not tears of despair. And, some of us may not want to have been raised with the kind of thinking that formed us but we have no choice. Who we are is connected to how we came into existence.
We are dysfunctional today. We will never be anything but dysfunctional until, in honesty, we acknowledge the truth of our past—even if we choose to jettison it.
Considering how Winebrenner felt about the first “Great Reformation” can you now appreciate what it says about us that, before he listed the twenty-seven realities that define our faith and practice, he composed these two ridiculously radical sentences:
“The Church of God has no authoritative constitution, ritual, creed, catechism, book of discipline, or church standard, but the Bible. The Bible she believes to be the only creed, discipline, church standard, the test-book, which God ever intended his church to have.”
My friend Ben has made the assertion that we are already a creedal church. And, I will continue to discuss with him his thesis that our creedalism is a good thing.
What I want to say now is this: Perhaps our greatest failing is that we have never engaged the truth that our healthy days were days in which our core ideas were that the Protestants failed and that we have no authority but the Bible.
Today, we sport the notion that we are about the task of building healthy churches.
Pfft.
Do you suppose that my 20something friend will ever be healthy until he faces up to the heartbreaking realities of the first moments of his existence?
Do you suppose we can be healthy without acknowledging the radical ideas that formed us?
Healthy Churches? How about Honest Churches as a first step?
So, can we please talk? About Winebrenner?
Can we, for a few moments, take him seriously?
Can we respect him enough to say to his memory that we now reject what he believed about the church and the Word, if that is what we must say?
Or, better yet from my point of view, can we say to him that there is much in who he was and what he did that we have strayed from but want to reclaim?
Can we be honest?
Can we recognize that we can’t be healthy until, with honesty, we come to grips with our childhood?
posted by bill Sloat at 8:24 AM
22 Comments:
Bill,
I, for one, am a deep appreciator of Winebrenner's heart and mindset. If anyone is interested in my take on Winebrenner and how I think the CGGC has drifted from him, go to the yourlifespring.org and click the link to my booklet on it ("Rise Up, O Sleeper").
I think that the sociological reality is different now in the CGGC than at it's beginning, and that makes it difficult to get back to a CGGC marked by radical Christianity. Winebrenner rallied people around a very specific vision of New Testamant Christianity. It was what he articulated, not a committee or a board of elders, or a seminary. Over time, groups become more diverse in the views held by those who are part of it. A strength of the CGGC at present is that we tolerate people with variant views (not least me!), but the weakness is that we do not have a common picture of something better than either historic Protestantism or even contemporary evangelicalism.
Our greatest need is for a fresh and captivating understanding and experience of what it means to know and follow God. To follow Winebrenner's spirit, we will have to be willing to give up many of our notions of what it means to be CGGC (because that is NEVER the question-- the question is about Jesus and His way).
I'll say again that I'm not opposed to "statements", but maybe, like Winebrenner's, they shouldn't just be doctrinal. maybe they should say what our hearts burn with.
Fran,
I know that you appreciate Winebrenner.
I think I'd benefit if you'd broke down for us what you mean when you say that the sociological reality is that it is difficult to get back to a CGGC marked by a radical Christianity.
I think I agree--sort of.
I'll repeat to you terms that you and I heard not long ago in the Holy City:
"Disruptive Innovation"
"Fringes"
and
"Barbarians."
Is there anyone besides me who heard those teachings, accepts them and is committed to carrying them out? Or are we just going to continue the decades old approach to doing church articulated so perfectly by Rodney King: "Can we all just get along?"
We jointly acknowledged that our body as a whole is in serious decline? To quote a band of Illinois' finest: "Does anyone really know what time it is? Does anyone really care?
Can anyone but me see where we will be in ten years if we don't make some serious about-face changes yesterday? (You saw the life of an organization chart that we marked up as a group? What was the point of what we were saying to ourselves?)
Are you saying that you think the answer to the question, "Can we please talk about John Winebrenner?" is, no?
I hope not.
One of the saddest realities about life in the CGGC for me is that many people in the CGGC think we are being true to Winebrenner. They honestly think that 2.0 is a fair representation of what Winebrenner would have written were he alive today. They have no idea what he really believed and they have no sense of the spirit of the ministry he conducted. My guess is that even those who have passed our History and Polity course were unfamiliar with the "another great reformation" quote.
I think we should put 2.0 under a heat lamp and begin to ask some essential, searching and honest questions about who we are and after we repent of some thing--one thing or the other--then, with clarity and focus, put together a document that flows from genuine self-understanding.
We should either acknowledge, as Ben does, that having moved beyond Winebrenner's core thoughts is a good thing and write us the best dern creed we can.
Or, we should acknowledge that Winebrenner got it right, that we have strayed from our founding vision, commit ourselves to a 21st century version of that founding vision and put together a brief document describing our faith and practice pro bono publico (i.e, for the good of those outside the movement, not as a creed for those inside it).
I'll repeat the question: Can we please talk about John Winebrenner?
Disruptive Innovation.
Fringes.
Barbarians.
I heard those clearly from the Roths at The Gathering, and I'm all for them. In fact, I would humbly suggest that I've been doing a lot of that and have caught my share of crap for it (which is fine with me-- we barbarians consider that part of the fun and adventure).
But in some ways I think you are trying to get people in the status quo to agree to return to barbaric living. I have tried this at times also. The problem is that the very nature of barbarism is to not ask anyone to agree, but rather to go do what God calls us to do whether other leaders (and especially institutional folk) like it or not. And not for the sake of rebellion, but for God's glory and to bear fruit. There is no "consensus barbarism".
If the CGGC survives and even becomes vital overall again, it will be because the barbarians go do their thing, the CGGC chooses not to kick us out along the way, and when the dead have buried their dead they look at the barbarians and say, "You are all that's left."
The barbarians will be pioneers-- they will plant churches and they will pioneer new Kingdom expressions of mission. They will write to express a deeper and better kind of Christianity. They will train and send new leaders (whether anyone wants to credential those leaders or not). And a few may transform existing churches that were in institutional decline.
And what I meant when I said that the sociological reality is different now is this: Winebrenner was a barbarian of sorts, who stood up, painted a picture of vital faith in Jesus, and said, "Now who is with me?" But today those who are part of his CGGC legacy are not unified around a burning picture; at best they together nod to the barest essentials of doctrinal orthodoxy. To try to unite them around a fresh picture that burns hot is like trying to rake leaves in the wind (to steal a Phil Telfer metaphor).
I am not at all advocating giving up on the CGGC. Ed is working change from his end, and we barbarians must do what we must do as God calls us. But there will be no committee where we all agree to re-embrace barbarism and vote for a disruptive innovation.
Guys, what a great discussion. I hesitate to join only because I may be quite naive, having not had the education and years of ministry and leadership experience that you have. But I care deeply about God's church and the Churches of God, so I'll offer my $.02 and see what comes of it.
I think Fran hit the nail on the head when he said:
"Our greatest need is for a fresh and captivating understanding and experience of what it means to know and follow God."
But I wonder if we don't need to apply that from the ground up instead of the other way around. Here's what I mean: I tell people all the time that what our church (my particular church, of which I am not the pastor) needs in order to grow is radically transformed lives. It has been my experience that when people, whether existing congregants or others who God brings to us, let the power of God free in their lives, it calls attention to itself. Others recognize it as out of the ordinary and become curious, and the cycle continues.
Bill, you mentioned the studies that have diagnosed some of our congregations as beyond hope of turning around. Yet, we have countless examples in the Bible of situations that were completely hopeless, but God made the impossible possible. Have we forgotten the supernatural nature of our God? Do we think that councils and creeds and policies can really trump the power of God let loose in people's lives?
Now, don't get me wrong...I believe in the necessity of agreement among the body and the leadership. I'm not educated enough to be able to have an opinion on whether having a creed is detrimental to the CGGC, but I will say that IF the Bible is to be the only rule and guide, it has to be a practical thing. As it stands now, how many of our congregations read it on their own enough to be able to use it in that manner? Probably not many.
So, my rambling point is: are we who are in ministry making the intake of the Word by individuals and the subsequent literal living out of it the first priority among those to whom we minister? I mean, we SAY you should read your Bible and do what it says, but we know that it doesn't happen. What if the "church experience" literally became this? What if, instead of "God is here to help you through the rough spots in your life", it became "you are here to become what God has created you to be and we're here to help you, now let's get to it"? If this happens, could we not begin to see radically transformed congregations? If we begin to see radically transformed congregations, might it not attract the attention of other congregations, thus returning us to the movement from which it all started?
Simplistic, I know. Naive? Probably. But I'm just wondering what would happen if we tried a bottom-up strategy of returning to the Bible as the only rule without haggling over creeds and doctrinal statements at the leadership level.
Fran,
I think that we all need to carry out our unique brand of barbarism. I believe that, for each of us, that will come out of our callings. You barbarism is apostolic in nature. Mine is prophetic.
When I wrote that sentence about something times I think I'm the only one, I realized that I had an Elijah thing going on.
But, here's the thing. IMO, if we let this WE BELIEVE come into existence in anything close to this form, we will be putting our stamp of approval on everything you and I agree needs to change.
A WE BELIEVE in the form of Winebrenner's 27 points of faith and practice could be our first disruptive innovation.
We can't let this thing--this document that is all about orthodoxy and nuthin about orthopraxy--come into existence.
I'm sure that Winebrenner has been spinning in his grave since at least 1925. And, I think that matters.
We can't put our blessing on 2.0. Not if we care about the CGGC.
IMO.
Bill, you mentioned the studies that have diagnosed some of our congregations as beyond hope of turning around. Yet, we have countless examples in the Bible of situations that were completely hopeless, but God made the impossible possible. Have we forgotten the supernatural nature of our God? Do we think that councils and creeds and policies can really trump the power of God let loose in people's lives?
John D.,
What I did was describe the condition of many of the congregations I'm familiar with.
And, I also cited the assessment of George Bullard, who we've brought in twice to lead us in the area of Renewal. I was in the room both times when he described the sort of congregation that cannot be renewed and I disagreed with him both times.
But, the guy knows his stuff. So much that we sought him expertise. We've ignored--both times--but we've sought it.
As far as the countless examples in Scripture in which God transformed the hopeless, I acknowledge that with God all things are possible.
But, what I also acknowledge it that the Word describes situations in which God loses hope.
Jesus warned the Church in Ephesus, "If you do not repent, I will remove your lampstand from its place." And, he said to Laodicea, "I am about to spit you out of my mouth."
I've been in many of our congregation in which I see lovelessness of the type that Jesus describes in Ephesus and I've seen lukewarmness of the Laodicean type. And, I take the word seriously that if repentance doesn't take place, the Lord cuts those congregations off.
And, I think we'd be foolish to ignore that reality. We, of course, need to do it with the greatest humility and after much prayer, but the teaching of the Word cannot be denied.
Fran,
One more observation.
As I pointed out, our new Mission Statement is based on that radical Winebrenner sermon in which he called for another great reformation.
We are delusional. We think we are going back to our roots. We think we are picking up where Winebrenner left off.
We are schitzophrenic.
That Mission Statement is all about being Winebrennerian. You know that it is.
That's exactly why we need to talk about Winebrenner.
We need either to throw out our new Mission Statement or be radical. We have to have a talk that we are willing to walk. Either we change the talk or we change the walk. We can't be functional like this.
It's bizarre.
We can't have it both ways.
Bill,
I'm not sure what to say. I think they will do the new We Believe, and I guess I see it as not that relevant to what needs to happen. People didn't live and die by the last We Believe, and they won't by this one.
I agree that it would be great to have a document that is more centered and radical, like Winebrenner's original, but since the CGGC is now composed of people who think a lot of different things about what matters, how would that happen?
You keep saying you want to talk about Winebrenner... so start the conversation.
I agree with Fran - let's talk about Winebrenner and others who have inspired and continue to guide our interpretation of our faith.
A side comment/question - this entire discussion is built upon the unstated assumption that the past still matters when making decisions today.
Does everyone here really believe that? Bill, you've taught enough church history to know that many people truly believe that if something is new then it is better. Many also believe the reverse, if something is from before 1980 it no longer has relevance.
My guess is that there are some who participate in this blog who aren't convinced that Winebrenner's ideas have anything to teach us anymore.
So...before getting to Winebrenner, perhaps it would be a worthwhile detour to make a case for studying the past as a guide to the future.
Fran and Brent and everyone,
I'm trying to figure out why I care so much about this and no one else seems to.
I have some thoughts.
1. The first book I read after sensing a call to ministry was Kern's biography of Winebrenner.
I was 20 years old at the time. I knew nothing. I had no context. I was new to the Churches of God and I knew nothing at all about church history.
I loved the book and the Winebrenner that Kern presents so much that I formed a love of the disciple of church history so passionate that it energized my pursuit of a Ph. D..
(Since then I met the Winebrenner presented by George Ross in 1880 and I love that guy even more.)
Anyway, when I read Kern's book I became a Winebrennerian and have always been since. Winebrenner is one of three historical mentors in my life. The others are Soren Kierkegaard and August Hermann Francke. Wierd combo, eh?
I have always been convinced that a return to Winebrenner's radical dependence on the authority of Scripture is the answer to our problems. I believe that more passionately today than ever.
2. I still have the hope that repentance will take place across our body.
I have a colleague nearby whose had a long history of involvement in CGGC leadership at the GC and Regional levels who, it seems to me, has lost hope.
He's seen so many fads and so many big ideas come and go that he's given up hope for the body and just does his thing where he is as best he can and figures he can build the Kingdom and transform lives in his own backyard but that the CGGC as a body is a gonner.
I wonder if some of you feel that way. I guess I can say that, if you do, you have good reason to feel as you do. But, if you do, it would bless me if you'd just say that in so many words.
If that's where enough of us are, then, we'd probably be better off just stating the sad and tragic truth and spare our local ministries the 10% we pay to regions and the GC and devote those resources to Kingdom building.
I'm sure that neither of these theories hit the mark but they are in my mind.
In any event, I'm getting the idea that I'm out of step with the rest of you. I respect you all enough to take that very, very seriously.
This is important to me. Any insight you can give me would help immensely.
bill
Bill,
You are talking to a mostly fringe group of CGGCers about a core CGGC document that very few of us if any were asked to participate in its update. My assumption (though it is exactly that) is that core CGGCers were invited to make the update.
And perhaps that was incredibly wise not to take a barbarian who should be out trying to kill something for supper and instead set him in a room and ask for civilized conversation.
We now have a chance to have a say. I went to one of the local meetings and pointed out a few issues to Ed. This is because in Jared Roth's terms, I am also "a good citizen."
Barbarians only worry about a document once a movement is started and really not for some time after that. When did Winebrenner write out his points? (I have no idea).
Barbarians don't worry about documents much before the movement. You see much written about vision statements and mission statements but my experience is that in the early parts of a movement, these statements are often trials and ever changing until the right combination sparks the movement, and then they are written in stone.
Once the vision stops working well, due to whatever changes, the barbarians don't immediately throw away the core documents. They just ignore them.
You Bill are a prophet. Prophets talk to the establishment. The Apostles were out on the mission field and not available for such conversations. Once in a while the establishment repented and dug out their old original documents and found the fire in them.
Brian's observations about how barbarians relate to documents and the timing of those documents seems right to me.
Bill, it's not that I have no hope for the CGGC, it's that I don't think significant movement life will return to the CGGC via the right document. Nor do I think that you can gather a diverse CGGC into a unified repentance.
The disruptive innovations can only come in two forms: from the kingdom directions of barbarians on the fringe, or from bold and brave moves from a key denominational leader (ala Ed), although I do not think even there that a document is that kind of move.
Brian's observations about how barbarians relate to documents and the timing of those documents seems right to me.
Bill, it's not that I have no hope for the CGGC, it's that I don't think significant movement life will return to the CGGC via the right document. Nor do I think that you can gather a diverse CGGC into a unified repentance.
The disruptive innovations can only come in two forms: from the kingdom directions of barbarians on the fringe, or from bold and brave moves from a key denominational leader (ala Ed), although I do not think even there that a document is that kind of move.
Brian,
You Bill are a prophet. Prophets talk to the establishment. The Apostles were out on the mission field and not available for such conversations. Once in a while the establishment repented and dug out their old original documents and found the fire in them.
Wow!
Very perceptive.
Thanks you for that insight. It helps tons.
But, I must say that using the term 'good citizen' in reference to yourself brings new dimensions to its meaning. ;)
Fran,
The disruptive innovations can only come in two forms: from the kingdom directions of barbarians on the fringe, or from bold and brave moves from a key denominational leader (ala Ed), although I do not think even there that a document is that kind of move.
Wow!
I couldn't disagree more.
The root of the act of repentance is a decision to change the way one thinks.
The Greek word metanoia which was at the root of the proclamation of John the Baptist, Jesus and Peter means to change your mind.
It seems that the most likely place a change of mind would take place in the CGGC would be in the creation of this sort of document.
Bill,
I couldn't disagree more (just kidding, dude).
Of course repentance is changing one's mind, but you have this expectation that the very people who are most likely to protect the institutional status quo (not you, Ed, I know you're reading:) are going to create a revolutionary document. The revolution has to come first, and it will come from the barbarians, then when others start to catch on, they might say, "Holy Ghost Almighty-- we ought to put down on paper that this is who we are!"
That's the social difference. Winebrenner gathered out of people from various places. But here the gathering around the fire is people already part of an organization entrenched in certain ways of thinking.
Having said all of that... if you know how to see what you are describing happen, I'll be the greatest cheerleader. I just think it's unlikely to happen in the way you envision.
But then as Brian said, you are the prophet, and the prophet speaks to the institution. The apostles go pioneer.
Fran,
...but you have this expectation that the very people who are most likely to protect the institutional status quo (not you, Ed, I know you're reading:) are going to create a revolutionary document.
Not exactly.
I merely don't want to cede the conversation to the institutionalists.
Ed did that to a degree [I too know you are listening ;)] when he allowed a group consisting entirely or institutionalists and no 'movementists' to write this draft.
I'm merely advocating active, even urgent, participation in this conversation and not rolling over dead when the General Conference approves the final form of the document.
To participate in the conversation and to make headway will not win the war but I can't see passing up any opportunity that is before us.
Bill,
I agree with what you have written here. I do not know a single thing about the group that was gathered to write the new We Believe. Is it true that there were no "movementists" among them? If so, I would agree that the denomination is trying to write a document without the input of those most likely to forge its future in better directions than its failing present.
(I am very distant from this process, and was not able to attend any of the events related to it)...Has anyone asked Ed or whoever is overseeing it to have a conversation about it that includes prophets and pioneers who are theologically astute enough to be good contributors? I would show up for that conversation.
I still don't think it would be a major change agent for the denomination, but at least the perspective of the pioneers who want to see a Jesus movement more than protect the past forms and ways of the institution would have some legitimacy in the document.
There was a time when the movement we are part of was called the Winebrennarians. (I have a book from 1860 which so names it) Is that what we are now? Is that what is being advocated now? If so then let's dig up Winebrenner. Or are we, as he advocated, the Church of God? If so let's move in the spirit of Winebrenner and see where God wants us to go.
How like the 20something young man are we if we can't take on our own gods?
Just a thought.
Fran,
I believe that Ed asked the Regional Directors to put together delegations from their region. Here, I believe that our representatives were all from our Church Vocations Commission.
There was a picture in Ed's enews showing the group hard at work. There was nary a movementist in the picture. And, I doubt that the RDs would have thought about integrating the group in that way.
As far as what might be a major change agent, I'm not sure what that one thing will be. I'm thinking that many small victories will win this thing.
Lew,
I'm advocating honesty.
The fact is that significant portions of 2.0 articulate views that Winebrenner either knew nothing of or opposed. And, either no one knows that or those who do don't care.
I do care. This is important to me.
There is conversation that suggests that we want to return to our movement days. I don't think that we can be a movement if we continue to think like an institution.
2.0 is very institutional.
This has been some great converstions and comments. I have enjoyed it a lot. I would like to make a few comments. 1. Much of the new testament is a document wrote by apostles. These letters were wrote to answer differences in theology (legalism ect) the apostles creed was wrote for the same reason. 2, Winebrenner was a radical as a radical he started a movement. When we become winebrennerian then he becomes the end not the start and we destroy everthing he stood for. 3. If we don't study history we forget the things that led to success and repeat the failure resulting in a dead church. We must study church histry including Winebrenner. 4.The new testament church was a group of people who made disciples. Today it means a building. When a group gets together to start a church the first thing they focus on is a building. The only church building of the time was the temple and God destroyed it because it had became more sacred in the peoples eyes than God himself. The scriptures were also lost for decades at a time for the same reason, even the Arc of the covenant was lost. Nothing can ever replace God as number one without drastic consequences. The bible says if we hunger and thirst after Him, He will meet our needs, a building is a need not a sacured monument. In the new testament a church was in peoples homes, on a river bank, the market square and any place people gathered.
Winebrenner started a movement he did not create a box because radicalism, reformations and babarinism can't be contained.
I too have talked to one of the worlds formost authorities on church planting and when I told him about some of the churches in the cggc he interrupted and said close the doors because those people are so entrenched in their pews (boxes) that they will never move. The best we can hope for is to start another church in those buildings.
Winebrenner didn't set out to create a "we believe statement" He wanted a return to a new testement theology. The "we believe statement" was in response to poor theology. Poor theology is still taught today hense the need for updated statements to answer these teachings.
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