This video is a helpful distinction point by Marc Driscoll on the difference between “Emerging” and “Emergent”. For the many who ask me the stance of the Institute Of Contemporary And Emerging Worship Studies, I’ve had to make this distinction many times.
Drawing from many emerging streams, including some rich ideas in all 4 quadrants Marc mentions, The Institute focuses on emerging Church ideas in additition to its emphasis on culture, ancient-future faith and the role of the artist within and outside of the Church.
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Thanks for posting this up Dan, I’ve been reading Mark’s book, “Reformission rev” and getting into some of the Mars Hill resources. Whilst I don’t agree with all of his points of view, I really like him, seems like a good guy.
Tom Sine has a similar list in his book New Conspirators. But I think reality is more a blending of Mark’s list and Sine’s. I finished my masters work on the emerging church and had to be very careful how I defined that. This whole thing is now even more complicated because of Bruce Sanguin’s “The Emerging Church” which has nothing to do with the evangelical emerging church conversation.
There is one other really good effort, that I know of, to present a more nuanced view of the emerging church. The introduction to Len Sweet’s Church in Emerging Culture does a rebuild of Neibhurs Christ and Culture paradigms. What becomes useful is the idea that the emerging church is far from some monolithic entity ready to take over the whole evangelical church. Really it is a disperate group of, primarily evangelical thinkers/practitioners, in a variety of denominational settings, trying to figure out this thing called church. In that definition the emerging church is something we’ve always had (and I think always will have) at the edge of our movements. It is something we should always be aware of, because we need it as much as it needs us. We have the history and the roots, but it has the new patterns of growth and the ways to overcome our tendency to status quo. Every healthy plant has new and old growth, when it works together you have a thriving organism.
Thanks for the video Dan!
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