I’ve been leaving comments quite a bit lately on other people’s blogs .. I thought I’d just share some while linking the original posts.

On A Question of Church (1)

while I was driving to work today .. my mind was thinking about how all this may translate in Malaysia.

Karen does wonderful job highlighting the incarnation and the trinity. I lean along the same lines.

I was thinking how I found it helpful to start with Jesus – thus incarnation – life, death, resurrection and ascension.
then consider the Spirit especially in the creation of the church. And then back into how all this is realized in the world and benefits the world – thus like going full circle back to the Creator. It’s walking through the apostle’s creed but starting with the second article, then third and then back to the first.

am I making sense or just rambling? 🙂

On A Question of Church (2)

I agree that history is important .. much has gone before us. My concern in a place like Malaysia for example that there are some who advocate a “calvinist” or “reformed” agenda maybe too tighly (as if it’s timeless) where as I’d prefer to respectfully engage whether it’s our Lutheran, Reformed or methodist heritage (that came with the missionary package)not that rigidly taking seriously the timeliness of the context of the reformation for example.

I think then I don’t have to uncritically accept everything, and not throw all of their insights out and act as if I’m starting from scratch. because the reality is I’m not!

On Emergent divergence
Sivin Kit said…

This is another crucial point, I’d shout yes! My first intro to Brian McLaren was “The Church on the other Side” and some personal emails. Then after having better online access, I discovered a much wider discussion on the “emerging church” – like in Australia and New Zealand, and of course UK. I think being “conversant” with the others like Dan Kimball (liked his charts!), Andrew Jones (awesome blogger), Tony Jones (enjoyed his practical theology bent), Doug Pagitt(I’m less familiar until I read his book) is paramount … then there’s Jason Clark in the UK (who has become a personal friend). I find the dynamism of having them as “conversational partners” to be very helpful. At least, to keep the global feel of my personal reflections.

But then again, because of the profilic publishing (traditional as well as internet) in the west, we hear more of you and you hear about what we think here in Asia, Africa or South America 🙂 Hopefully that will change soon.

another spot on observation!

On Missional and holistic
sivin kit said…

Thanks for your excellent interaction with Carsons’ upcoming book. As an Asian (more specifically Malaysia Chinese) 33year old pastor in a mainline Lutheran denonimation 🙂 I was first drawn into the emergent & wider emerging church conversation because of the “missional” & “holistic” emphasis and posture. I was aware of the “postmodern” context discussion and I’ve eavesdropped quite a while and found it helpful. But when all is said and done, the discussions on epistemology though are important are not what I relate to the most. Thus, I think your point in this post is spot on!