Sunday, June 17, 2012

A Postscript to Don Miller's blog

Perhaps you've never drunk-dialed. 

This is the rather recent (historically) phenomenon whereby, in course of a lively evening involving dubious amounts of alcohol (and yes, one drink for some is plenty dubious), you feel the cellphone beckon from your side pocket.  "I should call _____ - right now!" says the evil leprechaun in your head. (Why is he dressed like a Spartan?)  The _____ often are ex-girlfriends or boyfriends (or soon-to-be ex's, after this call you're about to make), though past employers and close relatives also easily fit the bill.

Why spend time describing something I've never experienced (ahem.), flies against wisdom given in Proverbs (23:35 among many), and certainly don't suggest you try?  Only to make a point about human behaviour.  Our inhibitions get lowered, and things we've only been thinking about saying are suddenly said.  The filters fall away, decorum goes out the window, and then it's..."wow, did I really say that?  To all those people?"  Alcohol may make this much more likely to happen, but it happens in moments of seriousness and sobriety as well - perhaps these moments are more worth paying attention to?

Donald Miller was undoubtedly not drunk when he wrote this post.  Miller suggests here that scholars lead the church, and have in essence hijacked the church by making it into an intellectual institution.  According to his post, the disciples were not academics but were tradesmen - fishermen, tax collectors, revolutionaries.  In regards to Jesus' disciples, Miller writes:

    "I wonder what they would have done if they had been professional scholars?  My guess is they would have talked the command (The Great Commission) into a tailspin, dissected it into a million pieces, then divided themselves into different intellectual camps, and built a bunch of schools to teach their various interpretations."

Miller concludes by expressing his frustration at academics and their endless posturing.  Doctrinal fights aren't helping us do anything.  Intellectual discussions led by proponents of the ivory tower don't feed the hungry:

    "Is it worth it that you are divided against other denominations because scholars picked up their ball and stomped off the playground?  If you are tired, then be the church.  I'm not kidding; you don't know everything, but you know enough.  Be the church and be united.  Let the academics go to an island and fight about the things that matter to them, and we will be united based on the things that matter to us."

Now.  What say you?  The volume of rebuttals or responses online to the original post is staggering, some supporting Miller's admonitions but most seem to be critical of his stance.  For reasons unknown, the original blog post (originally found here) has since been removed from Don Miller's official blog.  Was this done due to a change of heart?  Or perhaps the buzz and critical response was simply too great?  Some have suggested that Miller wrote this piece after the response to Rob Bell's Love Wins got out of hand, and it was Don's way of expressing his frustration with the negative tone of the conversation.

I'll keep my comments brief.  At first I was incredibly angry with Miller's post, as an aspiring Biblical scholar might well be expected to be.  I think that now my anger has turned to confusion, though.  Scholars don't lead the church - many of the most influential voices in modern Christianity don't come from the proceedings of the Society of Biblical Literature conferences but from mega-church pastors and pop-culture book writers of Don Miller's ilk.  While I appreciate his opinion on the matter, so many statements in his blog post are simply wrong.  It's difficult to interact with an opinion when the facts behind the opinion are incorrect. 

I am among the first in a discussion to agree that intellectualism can go too far, in the church or elsewhere.  The schools of Pharisees in Jesus' day were prime examples, but we make a mistake in thinking that intellectuals and scholars do not have a prominent place in the church simply because education can be abused.  Lest we forget that Paul of Tarsus was highly educated in the Law and Prophets and was undoubtedly fluent in Hebrew and Greek and possibly Aramaic, maybe even Latin.  (Miller's lack of discussion on Paul in his post is unfortunate in this regard.)  God chose to use Paul to spread Christianity in fulfillment of the Great Commission in ways no other apostle was able to accomplish.  Paul was uniquely qualified as a passionate intellectual sold out to the service of Christ.

I'm not sure what motivated Don Miller to write this post, but something about it pushes me to believe that he really believes this anti-intellectual bent should be practiced in our churches.  This disappoints me greatly, not least because Miller has a large voice and influences many.  We need intellectuals as we need nurses and plumbers and janitors and pastors and coffee shop baristas in the Church.  Our intellectual pursuits should drive us towards good works and internalization of the Word, and I agree that scholarship simply for the sake of scholarship can lead down some murky roads. 

But this anti-intellectual stance provides its own problems.  Serious problems.  Misapplication of God's word due to ignorance or an incomplete understanding of the cultural and linguistic contexts can be as dangerous as a pastor or teacher twisting God's word to their own manipulative ends.  God's word is too rich and too complex to be disregarded in regards to further study.