Many people in Korea say that post-modernism is very dangerous because it denies God’s Word and God’s existence. So I have some negative viewpoints about post-modernism. However when I attended this class, I found my thinking about post-modernism was wrong. Even if post-modernism has a negative aspect, we (as pastors and preachers) need to understand and accept people who should live in the post-modern society or context. The truth of God cannot be changed, but the ways of expression or delivery methods need to be changed. In this point of view, Steve’s teaching was very useful and helpful for me to change thinking about post-modernism. Therefore, as a pastor, I need to connect between the Word of God and people who live in the 21 century.
When Steve was teaching in the class, he used many items including films, sounds, movies and so forth. It was very helpful to understand the feature of post-modernism context. If the passages of the Bible can be shown to people, they can understand the meaning of the Bible clearly. Jesus Christ also taught using metaphors and parables which have the effect to show images. As like that, owing to many images and metaphors in the Bible, we need to show for people to understand and imagine the text in post-modern context. In this meaning, the DJing was very interesting, because DJing was a unique approach to use sounds. Steve took one example in the Bible. It was 1 Peter 3:1-7. Peter was DJ to remix the sounds of society in that time. I can find other example in psalm 99. This psalmist made chorus sound “He (God) is holy” in the verses of 3, 5, 9. It amplifies the meaning of the Bible. The most important issue in the Old Testament must be ‘holiness’, because Israelite was selected to be differentiated by God. Therefore, they should be holy and they need to remember the character of God, ‘Holiness’. This DJing viewpoint helps me to read the Bible extensively.
In addition, I have much interesting in ‘Imagination’. Sometimes some Korean pastors mention that when people read the Bible, using imagination is very dangerous. However I think that God gave us ‘rationality’ which can think and imagine. Therefore, when we read the Bible, we need to use my brain to imagine the context and situation of the Bible. As a preacher, I often used to preach as narrative style. It was storytelling. At the moment, many people do not want to listen to traditional style sermon, for example, 3 main-points sermon and instructive sermon. Therefore a preacher needs to help all people to imagine a story to understand and keep in mind. Storytelling style sermon is very useful for people to concentrate on it. Especially, in children case, to help imagination is very important. For example, to make similar feelings as like Israelite people when they lived in a tent in the desert, we can build up a tent in the front yard. All children can stay in the tent for a while. We can explain the story of the Bible. Children can imagine how Israelite people were felt in that time. Therefore, helping imagination is very important bridge between the Bible and people. In this point, Steve’s teaching and resources which are he find will be helpful to think this issue.
Last Sunday (05/10/08), I had the opportunity to have a sermon to children who were from year 1 to year 6. I preached using ‘power point presentation’ including some sounds and a short film. It was the first time to use them. After finishing my sermon, many Sunday school teachers gave a feedback to me. They were surprised that all children were very calm and they could concentrate on my sermon. I can catch that all children are familiar with multi-media. When a pastor preaches in oral mode, they cannot concentrate on the sermon in a long time. However when they watch or hear the short film and sound, they can imagine the story of the Bible and have much interesting in the sermon.
In my opinion, to make me to think not individual but community is also important issue. I should remember that the Bible is the result of community. God wants to call not a person but people. To be sure that salvation is up to person, however living and growing is up to community. Especially, people in the 1st century are totally different from people in the 21st century, because the environment of community is changed. Therefore, we need to be careful to adapt the text of 1st century.
In addition, ‘storytelling’ is very interesting issue. When I learned narrative therapy, storytelling is one of important keys in narrative therapy. All human being have their own story. We are the writer of my own story. This thinking makes people to live their life according to their own will and purpose. As like that, the Bible has many stories from many people in the Bible. However they maybe can be one voice from God. I think it is the conflict between God’s story and people’s story. For example, there are two kinds of ‘oneness’. One is oneness in art. The other is oneness in music. If we mix all colors, we can find ‘black’ color. However, if we sing a song according to all parts (soprano, alto, tenor, base), we can find ‘harmony’. I think that the story in the Bible is similar to harmony. We need to find all peoples voices, but we don’t miss God’s voice.
Finally, I enjoyed making post-card and engaging case studies. I was surprised at Steve’s preparation for Christmas in his church. Making post-card, many different topics in his sermon which help people to prepare coming Christmas and many activities are impressed. I can see his passion in that. As a pastor, I need to have much passion to connect between the Bible and people, even though I am still struggling.
In conclusion, I found that the most important role of pastor or preacher is to connect between the Bible and people, between the society in the Bible and the society of 21 century, and the people in the Bible and the people in post-modernism society. I appreciate all colleagues and Steve to give much helps, insights and passion.
프로필
- Daniel Lee
- Tusmore, Adelaide, Australia
- I am serving the Korean Presbyterian Church of Adelaide as assistant pastor. I am interested in counselling, specially Narrative Therapy.
댓글 6개:
Hi Daniel, I really connected with your reflections. I agree with what you were saying about how as Pastor’s presenting the living text we need to connect between the word of God and people. We need to be open to explore various approaches to presenting the text and I like how you emphasised the importance of Dj’ing and images is to this process. Both Steve Taylor1 and Jonny Baker2 discuss the need to ‘sample or mix’ gospel and culture using the DJing method. An important mix of gospel and culture is key when presenting the text to a post modern community.
I also really connected with your reflections on images and the concept of bringing one’s imagination to the text and how there is image or colour in the text. Like you, I had not thought much about this before the course and I was thoroughly challenged and encouraged to begin to explore this more. I am encouraged by Steve Taylor (p. 60) and how he writes that “a theology of creativity starts with the Spirit of God”. When we connect with the living God we can access abundance creativity which will firstly transform us and secondly help us to present the text in a way that encourages others to explore the colours and images that are in the text.
All the best Daniel as you continue to grow in your practices that engage others in the living text,
Mike
1 Steve Taylor, The Out of Bounds Church?, Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2005.
2 Jonny Baker, “Preaching – Throwing a Hand Grenade in the Fruit Bowl. Something has to change,” http://jonnybaker.blogs.com/jonnybaker/text/Preaching.pdf
Hi Daniel,
I was interested to read your comments about the distrust of postmdernism in the Korean church because of belief that it denies God's Word and God's Existence. Whele they may be partly true that is not where our focus needs to be. We have God;s Word and its message which postmoderns needs to hear. How we can to that needs to be our our focus. Your are right when you say that truth cannot be changed but the expression of that truth can be, for we need to connect with the culture in which we are ministering.
You are rifht, too, when you say imagination can be dangerous, but it can also be a very sharp tool in the hands of the Holy Spirit. We saw that during our week together. Imagination is important for children but ca be very helpful for adults too.
You are rith. The Bible is the result of community. It was put together by community and it is the stroy of God's community. I imagine community would be understood in the Korean culture better than it in Australia. Plrease help your people keep it or find it again if they need to, for it is a very rich part of our faith.
Case studies are useful and you could find them a very good tool as you try to use what you learnt. Congratulations on you power-point presentation. Keep it up.
Yes, Steve was a good example for us. Through his studies, which we did not see, we only say results of sutyde, and his passion, which we did see, we spent a week with a very good role model.He connected with the message and witu us in the way we need to commect in our ministry. May God help us to use what we saw in practice.
Jerome W. Berryman, Godly Play: An Imaginative Approeach to Religious Education. New York NY, Augsburg Fortress Publlishers, 1995, 24-41.
Steve TAylor, "Participation in an atomized world." In Proclaiming the Scandal of the Cross, edited by Mark Baker, Ch. 17, Grand Rapids, MI, Baker Academic, 2006
Lucy Atkinson Rode, Sharing the Word: Preaching in the Roundtable Church. 1st Ed. Louisville, KY, Westminster John Knox Press, 1997, 1-10, 121-131.
Dear Daniel,
Thanks for your deep and meaningful reflections; I really enjoyed your thoughtful responses. It showed a depth of understanding that even more remarkable as English is not your mother tongue. This just highlights that post-modernism that dominates our Western way of thinking has to be re-interpreted through the cultural framework of non-Western cultures. Culture provides a different set of interpretive frames by which any ideas need to be filtered.
I found it interesting that Korean culture places such a negative emphasis on post-modernism, because it seems to undermine what is considered to be “truth”; regarding many issues, including what is considered to be the right way to interpret the Bible. Cultures like yours seem to reinforce the battle between the “meta-narratives” (Johnson 2003:121-2)as depicted in modernity, which emphasise the value of the leader/pastor, and that of post-modernism that considers multiple voices as the healthy option. However, the traditional Korean cultural characteristics go back much further than modernity and are therefore even more entrenched with pre-conceptions that they bring to the text.
The problem is, no matter where we are in the world and the culture to which we belong, we cannot escape the influences of Western post-modernism as it is carried along by the vehicle of globalisation. Steve Taylor (2005:29), quoting Ritzer (1993) refers to this phenomena of homogenisation of world cultures as “McDonaldisation” recognising the impact that Western (American) post-modern culture has on the rest of the world. This being said, individual culture and context is important, and has the capacity to shape how post-modern culture is presented in any given context. Taylor (2005:36) develops this concept of “culture from below” based on the work of de Certeau (1984) who determined that culture was never stagnant, but always changing, always evolving always combining with new input to create something new.
The problem with culture that attempts to control the way that God can speak or the ways that truth is revealed is that it will often be confounded by what it considers foolish. Yet this is often the way that God works (see 1 Corinthians 1:27).
Therefore, the cultural context needs to be named and examined to unlock the metaphors that bring fresh application to the Biblical text. These metaphors rise from within our context and provide the keys to communicate in such a way as to engage our heart, soul, mind and strength with the truth of God’s word. Just as Jesus used metaphors that connected with his primarily agrarian civilisation, so we need not just limit ourselves to God’s word of two thousand years ago, but engage with the living text that has real application to our modern day circumstances, regardless of our cultural heritage.
Thanks again for sharing contextual struggles.
Bless you,
Tim Winslade
References
Johnson, W.S., “Reading the Scriptures Faithfully in a Postmodern Age”, in Davis, E.F. & Hays, R. B., , (eds)“The Art of Reading Scripture, ” Eerdmans, Grand Rapids,MI, 2003.
Ritzer, G “ The Mcdonaldisation of Society: An investigation into the changing character of Contemporary Social Life” (1993) in Taylor, S., “The Out of bounds Church – Learning to create Community of Faith in a Culture of Change”, Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Mich. 2005
Taylor, S., “The Out of bounds Church – Learning to create Community of Faith in a Culture of Change”, Zondervan, Grand Rapids, MI. 2005
# 2
Dear Daniel,
It took me quite a while to work out how to get my comment onto you BlogSpot. Partly it was that some of the words were in Korean and partly because I had to work out what was my user account and password. You see, I had forgotten what they were, and no matter what I tried I could not find the solution. I had almost given up in frustration when I decided to go back to the beginning and renew my account details and with those fresh in my mind I was able to bridge the communication gap.
I hope you did not mind hearing my story. But then we are all story tellers and in my pastoral experience talking about their own story is the favourite topic of most people that I have met. We are also creative and multi-sensory beings (Baker), yet as Steve said it is funny how we only use our ears when it comes to worship. I commend you for trying PowerPoint and DVD presentations for the first time. I am sure that you were a little nervous beforehand. However, the more we practice the techniques and tools that we learnt in this intensive the more they will become integrated into our lives.
I see these techniques like tools in a tool kit, which we have at our disposal for when the need arises. Like tools, each technique has specific uses and the more familiar we become with them, the easier it will be. However, Rognlien (2005) encourages to attempt to do all the creative things by ourselves, but to draw together a team of people help stimulate creativity and create even better multi-sensory experiences around the biblical text that will help to bring God’s word to life for your church.
It is a good place to start, connecting with children who are use to fast pace “sound bites” of information(McSpadden 2003), because the children have permission to use their imaginations in your context. However, the text will be gradually introducing other creative methods like storytelling, godly play, dialogue and visual arts to engage people with the living word in an adult community that still upholds the place of the preacher as singular voice that presents the “truth”. (Rose 1997)
I know that you have the vision and desire to see real change. I hope that others will capture that vision and come alongside you.
Bless you,
Tim Winslade
References
Baker, J “Preaching – Throwing a hand grenade in the Fruit Bowl. Something has to change”, http://jonnybakerblogs.com/jonnybaker/text/Preaching.pdf
McSpadden, C. “Preaching Scripture Faithfully in a Post-Modern Age.” In The Art of Reading Scripture, edited by Davis, E., & Hays, R. Eerdmans Grand Rapids, MI 2003.
Rognlien, B, “Experiential Worship”, Colorado Springs, Navpress, 2005.
Rose, L.A. “Sharing the Word – Preaching in the Roundtable Church” 1st ed., Westminster John Knox press, Louisville, KY., 1997.
Hi Daniel
You did well putting what we have been learning into practice so immediately with the 'children's sermon' you gave since the course. The fact that the children were attentive and engaged as you and others in your congregation noticed surely backs up the value of being creative. I think it is not just children but also adults who will appreciate the creativity you bring to your communication. After all Jesus told us to become like children.
I want to pick up on your comment that in Korea many Christians think postmodernism is dangerous because it denies God and his Word, the Bible; And that many also do not encourage the use of the imagination when reading the Bible.
It does seem fairly clear to me that God regards the imaginings of the natural 'fallen' human heart as tending toward evil, but if we are regenerate God is sanctifying our imagination and will even glorify them in the end. I remember one time I was imagining Jesus cleansing me with light from his heart, it was almost like a 'word' to me and came as a result of a heartfelt prayer. I know I was imagining, but I also believe God was enhancing, participating, communicating to me his heart. It seemed no different than an insight coming after much thought which is both a result of the thought and a gift from God's transcendence. Both Saint Ignatius and Athanasius before him, and others have trusted their imaginations, when they are properly shaped in the Word of God (McSpadden, 2003:133,134).
Regarding postmodernism, I believe there is danger, but there has been in every World sourced world-view. In a sense postmodernism just describes our times and postmodernism itself is a term with a multiplicity of meanings (a post modern observation in itself). Where I would agree with your Christian countrymen in having a healthy fear of postmodernism's danger for God's word is in relation to linguistic epistemology. In a least one respect postmodernism's epistemology is affirming of Christian knowledge since it, unlike modernism's naturalism, acknowledges the transcendent and spiritual dimension of life. However, statements like McSpadden's one: "Reading the biblical witness as a living text acknowledges that passages of Scripture do not have a single meaning limited to the intent of the original author but are constantly open to new reading and understanding" (2003:135), I reject. Whilst a text may reveal a principle which applies differently in different situations, and whilst in the Bible at least (because of its special Inspiration), there can be a fuller sense (sensus plenior) so that David's thrown can mean both David's thrown in Israel about 3000 years ago and Jesus' eternal thrown (Vanhoozer, 1998:263-264), I do think that meaning is limited, anchored so to speak, by authorial intention.
Debra Cash's (1998: 17-22) conversational treatment of the Biblical account of the rape of Dinah (Gen 34) exemplifies the dangers well. Debra's interviewee reflects on reading the biblical account and says "it never seemed to me like a rape" (p.20). A bit later she refers to the man the Bible says, "took [Dinah] and violated her"(Gen 34:2) as Dinah's "lover" (p.20), and a bit later still her "husband".
To put it plainly I found the reading following a similar line of advancement that the one who said "Did God really say?" (Gen 3: 2) and later "You will not surely die" (Gen 3:4) did.
Cash, Debra, 1998, 'A Conversation with Anita Diamant' Living Text 3 pp17- 22
McSpadden, C., 2003, 'Preaching Scripture Faithfully in a Postmodern Age' In The Art of Reading Scripture, edited by Ellen F. Davis & Richard, B. Hays, 125-142 Grand Rapids, Eerdmans
Vanhoozer, K.J. 1998, Is There a Meaning in This Text?, Apolos, Leicester.
Hi Daniel. As we have many Korean students here at Worldview I have some understanding of your suspicions of post-modernism. I find it is difficult to get the students to interact or question because they have a high respect for the lecturer and are not used to interaction. They are used to listening quietly and maintaining a distance between the lecturer and student. To overcome this I share my philosophy of learning with them in which I explain that we are a learning community, that we share the journey of learning together and that I can learn from them as well. So if they do not share then as a community we are the poorer and do not fully benefit from what God has for us.
The sense of community is strong in the emerging church. Gibbs points out the move to effective team leadership and the need to teach people ‘what it means to abide in Christ individually and collectively’. The practice of Lectio divina is being rediscovered and used as part of community worship . The Godly play by Berryman shows the value of play, using imagination, getting the listeners to wonder and using objects to centre thoughts do not take away from scripture or erode the truth but rather assist in understanding and applying scripture. These methods involve the community in the scripture rather than impose the leader’s interpretation. A little scary both for those of us used to being the one up front and also for those of us used to being spoonfed.
Gibbs, 2005, Leadership Next, IVP, p97
Kimball, 2003, Zondervan, The Emerging Church, p164
Berryman, 1995, Augsburg, Godly Play,
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