Rating: 
Summary: Postmodernism's effects unpacked in New Kind of Christian
Review: If either Daniel Poole, Dr. "Neo" Oliver, or for that matter Brian McLaren pastored a church near me, I think I would love to be a member. In a New Kind of Christian, burnt-out traditional church pastor Poole is revived and invigorated by his dialogue with post-traditionalist, former pastor, "Neo" Oliver. The dialogue begins at a junior high rock concert as the depressed pastor seeks information concerning a possible career change to high school teaching, the trade that "Neo" has practiced for several years in the aftermath of his years as a pastor. This fictional setting serves as the framework for McLaren's unpacking of the problems, emotional, philosophical and theological, faced by Christians in the transitional phase between the "modern" and the "postmodern" era. In conversation and eventually by e-mail, these two become friends helping each other along on their spiritual journey. The burnt-out pastor moves from depression to revitalization in his work and life. The high-school professor moves toward a return to the pastoral ministry he had left years before. McLaren's "neo-Christian", Neo serves as the guide to postmodernism's ins and outs. McLaren's device, a fictional dialogue, turns what could be dry essayism into something alive and, for me, well worth reading. I'm sort of a simple guy. I must confess, I haven't read a book by a single postmodern philosopher, I only know about relativism and deconstructionism because I have heard others, more well read, speak and write about these subjects and their implications for the Christian church. Of course, this makes a kind of poetic sense, don't you think? That the publisher of a widely-read web magazine that deals almost exclusively with the problems facing the church because of the cultural and worldview shift that has occurred in the most recent past, has not had an original thought on the subject? I identified with pastor Dan Poole, and with Neo. I am a former pastor and continue to be pretty burnt-out on "normal" church. I just wish that either one of them were pastoring a church near my home, I think I would feel right at home struggling with them on the spiritual journey. In the meantime, I enjoyed meeting them in the pages of A New Kind of Christian, and would highly recommend it to those interested in exploring the new paradigm and the new theology that will flow from it.
Rating: 
Summary: It can only get better the second time around
Review: I found the book interesting and hope that as I outline the book I will be understand postmodernity better. It challenges the seminary mind. It made some generalities that I had a problems with. I would love to talk to Neo and clear up the problems. His evaluation of the church is right on. I do not think to many evangelist would recommend the book. Nice Job, Brian
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Summary: Moderate Christian - An Oxymoron
Review: .Moderates want you to believe they are the "Sensible Christians" But upon opening their mouths they have never done anything other than prove they are not "Christians" at all, not in the biblical context anyway. I think even they are realizing this and so here we have a book whos title hints that the term "Christian" itself needs to be revised. That in a long and roundabout way is the authors entire message. Not what a Christain should be according to God, but what a Christian should be to appease everyone but God. Biblical/Historical Christian - To Follow Christ. Now any rational person who took on that title would need to at a minimum: 1. Know what Jesus said about Himself and the Scriptures 2. Knowing Believe and Believing Entrust 3. View the scriptures with 1 & 2 in mind! So the only thing I was looking for in this book was even a glimmer of why the Author would consider himself a Christian, or an authority on telling the rest of us what one really "Should Be" The Label "Christian" in this book has little to do with following the Christ of the Bible, instead simply ignores Jesus as he goes along, to the point where He fades into background noise at best. This then is the trap into which the Author has fallen, and attempts to drag other marginal believers or interested parties into, becoming a Christian without a Christ. Using fiction of course is a good way to do this if you were so inclined. Your character will ask all the right questions. You will just happen to have answers to these straw man questions. No disconcerting follow up questions or troubling rabble rousers arise. Uncomfortable contexts that you do not choose are avoided. You are free to treat the entire work as if everything has been wrapped up in a neat and tidy package, but such is not the case of course. This author, like so many in this genre want us to believe that we can create a "Democratic" God, one who will change his own nature to suit our ever changing cultural perceptions of who He SHOULD be, according to US. In order to do that they must remove the authority of scripture and transfer it to themselves. "Moderate" Christians (?Kinda Sorta Like Christians?) would like you to believe that many parts of the Bible are "Cultural" references not meant to apply to "Modern" man at a direct level. They view "Christianity" as a loose philosophy, or perhaps a "Social Framework" generally guided by "Outlines" vaguely glimpsed in scripture, but not to be taken too literally or too seriously. This is not historical "Christianity" and the author should simply start a new religion and leave ours alone. If your looking for a book to justify your non-conformance to Historical Christianty, while retaining the title (why do you even bother?) or are struggling to ignore the meaning of the word "Christian", or trying to play games with scripture then you might like this book. But be forwarned it brings no fresh ammunition to your cause. If you are a Historical Christian trying to fathom the twists and turns of logic that "Moderates" and "Liberals" go through to deny scriptual truth it might be of minimal value, but I doubt it. In truth they just oppose what God says in scripture and want to feel good about doing wrong, simple. If your a non Christian might I suggest reading CS Lewis, "Mere Christianty" to get a look at a major outline of what it means to be a Christain in a Biblical Context. At the end of this book one feels that the author and his followers do not even realize the ironic position into which they have fallen by attaching the label "Christian" to themselves. The author presents a powerless confused God and by proxy claims to be a powerless confused follower, so why should we even bother considering anything he has to say? To the author I would simply say: The biblical God declares "I AM WHO I AM" think about that for a little while before you so boldy try and tamper with the word "Christian"
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Summary: Brian McLaren- Gutsy man, gutsy message
Review: I admire Brian McLaren's courage in asking hard questions about entrenched American evangelical piety in A NEW KIND OF CHRISTIAN. His creative dialogic framework between Dan and Neo not only serves as a vehicle for some very provocative ideas, it models a new way of learning. Not too many pastors/theologians are admitting that entrenched evangelical expressions of "the faith" are far more a product of modernism run amuck than they are "good Bible teaching." I appreciated McLaren's honesty, humility, and refusal to attach value to eras, i.e., modern bad, postmodern good. His other books REINVENTING THE CHURCH and FINDING FAITH are challenging as well.
Rating: 
Summary: Has some well-written parts, but flawed premises
Review: There is one good thing to be said for this book: The author starts making his mistakes right up front, so you're not in suspense as to whether this book is worth the paper it's printed on. I'm skipping over his ignorant denunciations of radio and TV preachers ("There I hear preacher after preacher be so absolutely sure of his bombproof answers and his foolproof biblical interpretations ... his crisis of the month [toward which you should give a "love gift" if the Lord so leads]" and, for the moment, of "church people." This is old stuff and you can read page after page of denigration of media preachers and "old-style church people" all over.
More interesting are his philosophical mistakes. For example, on page xvi: "You see, if we have a new world, we will need a new church." (He's quoting an earlier book of his in explaining where the impetus for this book came from.) This idea seems to underlie his philosophy of the world and of "religion" and is detailed throughout the rest of the book. Depending on interpretation, I suppose his proposition may be logically valid.
But there are two problems with this statement. First, having to do with the truth of his antecedent: *what* new world is he talking about? How is the world any different than it has been for at least 4,000 years of recorded history? People are still the same as they ever were: there is goodness in most everybody, evil in everybody, and varying levels of faith and trust in God. There are people who believe in the God of the Bible; people who believe in another God or gods; people who believe in no god at all; people who don't have the courage to believe one way or another, but simply to remain on the fence; people who want to know what to believe but are looking for somebody to tell them. (I am sad for those who end up talking to people like the author of this book, who essentially tells them to make their god in any image that fancies them for the moment.) There are wars, poverty, pestilence, prejudice, and hate. Sounds like the same old world to me.
If there is no new world, as I think is plain, then there must be some other good reason for McLaren's rejecting what Christianity has always taught. Another reason given in the book are the "19th century" attitudes (also old stuff - read John Shelby-Spong and you'll get an earful of it, and better written though more biased and ignorant) of typical hide-bound "church-goers." The author makes a major mistake in assuming that objections to his new religion come from his stereotypical "church goers." This is clearly a mistake. To take my own example, I am no hide-bound "church goer" who just can't bear to part with my cherished traditions: I am a relatively recent convert to Christianity, having gone through a "church goer" phase while growing up, followed by an I'm-sure-there's-a-God-but-he's-not-a-part-of-my-life phase, an agnostic-and-I-don't-care-because-a-god-would-get-in-my-way phase, an atheist phase, a Buddhist phase, a liberal "Christian" phase, and now a real Christian phase (although in a completely different kind of church from where I was brought up). If I haven't seen it all, I've seen a lot of it: and I still don't like what I see here.
It's not surprising to see other reviewers of this book making the same mistakes as McLaren. Anybody who would say something like "Don't read ... if you're convinced that if Jesus were here today he'd be a right-wing, fundamentalist with lots of Jewelry and his own tv show" not only has no clue, but has let his liberal bias show in an appalling manner. I expect many of them will mark my review "non-helpful", but I guess that's the price I pay.
In summary, I commend anyone who wants to learn more about Christianity, and to some extent even those (...) who want to to modify its natural parts (music, liturgy) to better suit modern people. But modifying what Christianity is all about is something different. Creating a new religion is all well and good, but please don't call it "Christianity." It confuses those who can least well distinguish between it and the real thing.
Rating:
Summary: Christianity's Last Hope?
Review: Have you ever questioned your faith? Wondered why some things that you are taught in Church just don't make sense? Fasten your seat belts and get prepared for one of the most eye opening, life changing reads you may ever encounter.
As most of the world moves into the Post-Modern era, people are loosing their trust in science and turning to spirituality for fulfillment. The author explains why the Post-Modern population is starting to loose interest in the neatly packaged Modern version of Christianity. It shows the reader what the Bible is really about, and lots of other reasons why the Modern Church is fast failing in a Post Modern world. All 'Christians' need to read this book and learn how to integrate the ideas presented into their own lives, if they want to continue having a strong faith and being a strong witness.
After reading this book, you will probably find yourself thinking, "Wow, he answered all these questions that I had inside my head, but just couldn't put into words".
This book has come along just at the right time in History. If the Modern Church does not start changing, it will definitely fail, as we can already see happening all around us. Buy this book, buy two, buy as gifts, the word needs to get out so peoples eyes can be opened, discover their own shortcomings and live life as Jesus would have wanted them to.
Rating:
Summary: Solid Book on Postmodern Christianity
Review: This book is one of the more interesting books I have read on Postmodern Christianity. The conversational style of the book is a bit difficult to get used to but it does enhance tone of the book. At times, the style does seem to get in the way of the message. It's not hard to image this book written in a more traditional style but it would definitly detract from the message.
More disturbing to some is the entire premise of the book. McLaren does not outline the framework of a new understanding of the Christian faith but he does call into question many of the assumptions of modernism as it is incorporated into Christianity.
The book makes no pretenses about nudging the faith along but to where, seems to be anyone's guess. But that seems to be the point. Faith is ultimatly about a journey, not just planting yourself at a theological location and defending it. If you feel that you have "arrived" at faith, you will probably be offended by this book. However, if the prospect of adventure, mystery and discovery entices you, you will find this book a breath of fresh air.
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Summary: The right book at just the right time...
Review: With all the strife in this country after the recent election, and many evangelicals touting "we got him elected and now he owes us," I had found myself profoundly saddened at the division in this country over perceptions about those who were "moral" and the rest of us who clearly, in their eyes, weren't. This book was like a healing balm for me, and put so many issues into perspective for me. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is feeling a bit unsettled about what it truly means to be a "Christian" today. How can we all be so alike and yet so different? Years from now, when these ideas expressed by Brian McLaren are not considered radical at all, we'll hopefully be a nation more concerned with inclusion and love, which is what Christ called all of us to be. Transition in thinking is never pretty or painless, but the struggles will be worth it in the end. Thank you Brian McLaren for "un-furrowing my brow" and infusing me with hope.
Rating:
Summary: Refreshing!
Review: On the verge of leaving organized Christian after 23 years of devout service, most recently as a long term missionary in the South Pacific, McLaren's musings, as the cover so symbolically captures, served as a light out of an ever darkening tunnel of doubt and dissatisfaction.
This book isn't for everyone. Most conservative evangelicals and reformers will find it borderline heretical and somewhat divergent. It's not systematic theology or meant to serve as an apologetic or a treatise on a new creed or worldview. What it is, however, is the story of two seekers, like myself, who have become disillusioned with the confines of institutionalized American Christianity and are seeking authenticity and openness in their faith journeys. Openness to ask frank and sincere questions which tend to ruffle the feathers of the frozen chosen; and courage to pioneer into new ways of seeing the Gospel, where right belief takes a back seat to a right relationship with God and with our fellow human beings.
So before you leave the church in frustration, give this book a read. It's not a cure all but it can serve as a starting place for a journey characterized by honest dialogue and a humble pursuit of God.
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Summary: Brian McLaren Doesn't Know Anything
Review: Brian McLaren doesn't know anything. That's not an indictment regarding his lack of
knowledge - it is a summarization of his philosophy. And this is why he is seeking, as the title of his book declares: A New Kind of Christian. He is looking to help other Christians join the ranks of those who do not know anything. At least anything absolutely. For Postmodern thinkers like McLaren you see, one doesn't really posses objective truth. All truth is so helplessly bound up in our modern grids, cultural frameworks, personal biases and institutionalized thinking, that the only thing we really CAN know (though one wonders even about this) is that we really don't know anything - except perhaps - our own "stories".
McLaren is "the founding pastor of Cedar Ridge Community Church" just outside of Washington DC. He is a sought after conference speaker and author of several books on the impact of post-modernity on the Church. A topic crying for serious reflection by the Church. This book, A New Kind of Christian, is ostensibly "For all those who want to be spiritual without being "religious"'" (as the inside front flap reads). It is the fictional account of a series of conversations and emails between a High School science teacher ( Dr. Neil Edward Oliver - Neo throughout) and pastor Dan Poole, with some additional side lights with Poole's wife Carol and youth minister Casey B. Curtis. And since story telling is (apparently) both McLaren's and Post-modernism's preferred method of communication - it is, a story. We are led to assume (at least by the Introduction), that ANKOC is at least the semi-biographical account of McLaren's own journey through sorting out some of the ramifications of post-modern thinking and his own Christianity and ministry. It is in some ways, his story.
If you are not familiar with Postmodern parlance, stories are what postmodernists prefer to either history or truth. Since truth really can't be known, and since history is typically merely the version the winners tell, stories (it is argued) are meant to be retold and passed on and used to serve as markers - but they really shouldn't be taken too seriously. After all, stories are blends of interpretations and slants and revisions. No one gets bent out of shape if you retell a story a little differently - like they do when you try to re-write history. Ultimately, you can know something of other's stories, but mainly you have the best grasp on your own story. So if you want to tell it a little differently each time - have at it. Who's to say? Stories as a framework then lend a great deal of flexibility. One doesn't really have to be worried so much about accuracy or truth. One merely needs to be able to tell their story.
What makes this line of thinking so very attractive, is that in your story, God is who and what you want Him to be. Hell may or may not really be at all. You can be what you want to be. Men may or may not really need to be justified before a holy God, but it really doesn't matter because - its your story. You get to tell it the way you want to - and somehow, by some freakish particularity of our created or evolved universe (depending on your story) - everybody's story get to be true no matter how much it contradicts anybody else's. What's true, is what's true for YOU. Not really what's "true". Except for some.
Who are the ones who have the pipeline to real reality? The Brian McLaren's of the world. As the book explains, it is a very narrow group who understand these concepts and their import. In one email, Neo relates to pastor Dan that he had a dream about him. He repines that "in the dream, you were exhausted and worn to the bone, struggling to shape a church that was meaningfully expressing the gospel in this new world we've been talking about. I asked God why you were so tired, and this answer came to me: there are so few working on this exploration of faith in postmodern territory, and all of those are exhausted because it is so difficult. It seemed like God's heart was pained at how few are exploring beyond the edges of our modern maps and at how exhausted those few are." Here then are the new elite of postmodern churchdom. These are the few who have God's heart's pains. The rest of Christianity is summarily marginalized. Here are the new Prophets.
One of the most fascinating and untenable self-contradictions that arise in the book, is the critique of the Modern mindset. Neo wistfully states that "in the postmodern world we disabuse ourselves of the myth that theory precedes practice". This however appears near the end of a discussion theorizing about what seminaries should look like once postmodernism has its way. The self-contradiction emerges as we listen to the postmodernists theorizing about how to get us to where we no longer theorize. In no other discipline (other than certain branches of Art perhaps) would such a notion be looked upon as credible. Pilots for instance learn all about flight techniques and the theories of aerodynamics before they ever dare to take the controls of a jet liner. Rightly so. Even when they have mastered their craft, they file flight plans before they set out, follow detailed and proscribed pre-flight procedures, and keep up on-going training and education. You and I think about where we're going and how we're going to get there even before we set off to the grocery store. How much more when we begin to delve into the eternal verities that impact the destiny of our very souls?
To be sure, McLaren is razor sharp at times when he slices and dices the caricature of Christianity that so often prevails in the marketplace of American pop-Christianity. But at the same time, he seems to want little to do with our historical moorings. His approach is about blazing new trails, not relying on the tried and true ones handed down to us. All that came before us is uncertain. Twenty centuries of "Christian universes." Jude (1:3) feels compelled by "necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints." But McLaren's concepts are more about forging new paths. So it is that the students in his non-theorized theoretical seminary would be helped to "construct their own model of reality." This of course forces one to reject the very notion that God has a reality and that that reality governs all that there is. It subtly yet certainly indicts God as being either unable, or unwilling to communicate objective truth or reality to us in any meaningful way. Or at least that He is unable to help us understand it with any more accuracy than that of a re-told story.
McLaren too is dead on when he criticizes the oft-too-tolerated notion that mere theological knowledge or doctrinal precision can be traded off against a genuinely Spirit-led and godly lifestyle. At the same time, he completely disregards the fact that the Bible owns no such aberrant Christianity as genuine either. Sadly (and alarmingly) his answer is to jettison theological precision altogether. But the cost is too great. It is at least as intolerable, if not more so, to try and correct such an ill at the expense of Biblical authority, the Gospel message - and quite possibly men's eternal souls. Sure, there are licentious abuses of the grace of God. Scripture condemns them by itself. The corrective is truth - not the eradication of it. McLaren, I fear, doesn't want to speak post-modernese so that he can communicate the Gospel to postmodernists, he wants to BE postmodern. He wants a postmodern gospel. A storied Gospel.
Well, what does this new Kind of Christian look like? First, he has a Bible, but it is not God's infallible, inerrant Word. In place of it, the NKOC takes the view that God has only managed to leave us with "a pre-modern text, emerging from a people who believed that truth is best embodied in story and art and human flesh rather than abstraction or outline or moralism." As such, it is NOT authoritative as much as it is "useful." It is not a God-breathed production, but a human emergence. Nor does the NKOC study the Scriptures in something the like the Historical-Grammatical method. Interpretive science is exchanged for "a grid of decency." He himself, the reader is the ultimate arbiter of truth. He sits in judgment upon Scripture rather than Scripture sitting in judgment upon him.
The New Kind of Christian has grown past such passé exercises like daily Bible reading and prayer in order to cultivate his personal relationship with Christ. For him, these are far too constrictive activities. They engender quota type thinking. How much should I read, how often? How long should I pray? etc.. Journaling is one of the suggested replacements. Listening to one's own heart and mind supplants listening to God in His Word and then relating to Him and casting yourself upon Him in prayer. These older methods carry too much of the Modern. In fact, in some ways (he would argue) they can be downright selfish and individualistic. There is no question of course that men can and do abuse such things and make ends out of them rather than the means they were designed for. But once again, we are met with a tendency rather to abandon than to correct.
I want to say this carefully, but yet frankly as it is portrayed in the book: The impression one gets (and I am willing to be corrected here - but at least what I came away with) is that the NKOC wouldn't dream of having his heart broken over the thought of loved ones perishing in a Christless eternity. Even if he COULD know that such a thing as Hell really exists, he takes the stance that "It's none of your business who goes to Hell", as the title of chapter 14 boldly declares. There appears to be no room in his paradigm for the gut-wrenching agony we see in the Apostle Paul in Romans 9 ("I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh"). The NKOC falls back on each just having a different story. I could not help but seriously wonder what the NKOC would say at the death bed of a loved one? And what does this do for evangelistic zeal? The Biblical concepts and language of dire concern for the souls of the lost is entirely defanged.
Again, the NKOC would never ever say that he is "right" about anything. Even about that - I would assume. Instead, the NKOC is only concerned about being good. Good, according to his story that is. Jesus may have told His version of the story that says there is none good but God, and that we need His goodness - but that does not directly translate to us. McLaren's Gospel seems to distill into "do your best, be nice, and God will accept you." The absurdity of how this fleshes out is obvious. Forgive the sarcasm, I use it only to illustrate - but could you imagine a student at the end of a math exam saying "Teacher, I know my answer isn't right, but it IS good"? How about imagining a postmodern surgeon who is more concerned about a good operation than a right one? "The operation? Oh, it went swimmingly! The patient died but the operation was SO good!" Beloved, if it were not so bankrupt, it would be laughable. Can one really imagine themselves before the throne of God arguing that they willfully ignored what God said and required, but that they lived up to their own story? We have a shocking warning about such skewed thinking in Acts 5 with Ananias and Sapphira. They concocted a story that worked for them. And it ended in God's immediate judgment upon them. They couldn't just decide to do it their way. Neither can we.
One assumes that the NKOC would consider Elijah's behavior on Mt. Carmel reprehensible as he mocked and exposed Baal and his false prophets. There is no room for such actions in the NKOC's story. No other religion should ever be treated that way. For him, the Bible "calls us to live as part of its own story, the story of a loving Creator who started something wonderful and beautiful that in spite of our many failures he will surely bring to a good completion. As we live by that story, we find followers of other stories interested in ours because our story, rightly understood, has plenty of room for them and for their stories too." Yet we must consider those words in light of the Biblical narrative. Scripture never paints the picture of a God has room for Baal or any other God in His story. One is forced to conclude that "You shall have no other gods before Me" should be considered narrow and Modern by McLaren's NKOC.
Note too that the NKOC would never "contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints." In the first place, he would not contend against anyone except Christians who say they actually know something. Secondly, he knows it is far too arrogant to suppose anything like "the faith" exists. Our story maybe. THE faith? No. Third, "once for all handed down" contradicts the idea that we need to create a new reality. A new story. "Once for all" just doesn't fit the paradigm. Ever new is the mantra. Being a "defender" is most certainly undesirable. Only being a seeker is kosher. Once you begin to think you've actually found something to defend, you've crossed the line. "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you" just does not fit the pattern.
Lastly, the NKOC knows nothing at all about a need for actual regeneration. Being born again is not actually being transformed inwardly by a sovereign act of God, making one into a new kind of creation. He just heard the story, liked this one best (for now) and came along. Now he's in transformation.
So let's recap: The NKOC has a good story; has no real need to pursue reading the Bible or prayer; considers too much time spent on a personal relationship with Jesus selfish and individualistic; refuses to consider that men might perish in a Christless Hell; doesn't know if he's right about anything - especially about God, Christ, sin, salvation or Hell; excludes no other religions; has no faith to defend and is not concerned about being regenerate. This really IS a NKOC! Because it isn't a Christian at all. At least not in the Biblical sense. It is a good old fashioned pagan. "Holding to a form of Godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid such men as these." (2 Tim. 3:5)
The NKOC is simply the same old guy that still has need of the saving grace of Jesus Christ. He isn't a "Christian" at all. He needs Christ.
At the end of the day, one wonders what the NKOC would really say while standing at the bedside of a dying loved one? It is here that absurdity and tragedy of such things comes painfully into view. Perhaps they might inquire as to whether or not the perishing one is comfortable with their story about what's next. Have they believed their story? Have they lived up to their story as much as they thought was good, when it seemed reasonable? As Neo put it in the closing prayer to his sermon on death: "Although I can't be certain or prove it scientifically, the second story we considered today makes more sense to me." Can we truly comfort them in death by assuring them that while nothing can be proved, at least they have a story that makes more sense to them? "Maybe there IS a Hell, but don't you like your story better?" How ghastly. What utter and total disregard for the souls of men.
The Apostle John said: "these thing I have written unto you...so that you may know." Brian McLaren has written to tell us that he doesn't know, and neither can anyone else. Who are you going to believe?
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