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God Talk
by Wesley J. Wildman , Stephen Chapin Garner

One of our liberal-evangelical heroes, J. B. Phillips, once wrote a book with a title that we love: Your God Is Too Small . Phillips’s message was right on target, for his context and also for ours. It doesn’t matter how smart you are, how good you are, or how attractive you are. It doesn’t matter how much you read the Bible, how much you pray, or how much you give to church and charity. It doesn’t matter what your culture is, what your gender is, what your skin color is. It doesn’t matter who your relatives are or who you know, where you went to school, or where you live. Your God is too small.

Like many difficult truths, the people who cannot easily accept this fact of human life are also the people who need to hear it most urgently. Some people make God so small that God actually vanishes from their lives. These people assume that, since it seems unlikely anything conclusive could ever be known about God, if God even exists, it is best not to bother trying to get to know God at all. In Christian circles, it is more common to encounter people making God too small through believing that they fully understand God and God’s motives. They create or absorb an image of God that is probably related to the Bible and reflective of their local community’s culture of Christian belief. But then they allow this image to take the place of the actual God, relating to the image exclusively rather than using the image to relate to a God who breaks all images. Worst of all, they often speak proudly about who God is and what God wants, as if they were the one speaking from the eye of the storm. And they sometimes speak in a way that is desperately limited by superficial understanding of the Bible and very limited self-awareness.

The Bible’s striking images of God collectively express a persistent refusal that God can be captured in a consistent set of human concepts. They also affirm the spiritual practice of imaginatively engaging God through diverse images-sometimes heartwarming and sometimes disturbing.

God is likened to various parts of nature such as a whirlwind, a cloud, and a pillar of fire and to such animals as a hen, an eagle, and a lion. God is pictured as a tower, a shield, and a garment. God is described using social roles and activities including creator, potter, shepherd, father, birthing mother, and bridegroom. God is assigned human qualities and responses such as intelligence, will, memory, anger, and forgiveness. God is spoken of as possessing human form, with eyes, arms, and hands, as walking around, and speaking with a voice.

We are drawn to particular images at certain times and for certain reasons. There is an important difference between rigid attachment to particular God images and the changing psychological realities of the developing human life. When we are young we need concrete images of God to make the divine reality tangible; that is quite appropriate. Throughout our lives we rely on images to articulate and nurture our relationship with God. Such limitations are not a problem in themselves. Picturing God in such a way that we can relate to God is what makes religious life important. God is a loving father or mother, in that we believe we can trust ourselves to God completely. God is a friend or confidant in that we believe God knows our thoughts and needs before we utter them, and it is safe to share our deepest longings with God in prayer. God is judge and avenger, in that we believe that the sin and injustice of the world will encounter a divine reckoning. Our working images of God are tailored to our particular needs for God and to our creative, yet limited, ability to imagine that which we believe but cannot fully conceive. Thus, it is developmentally appropriate and psychologically intelligible to use God images to engage the incomprehensible and image-breaking divine reality.

The problem arises when we begin to think that our favorite image of God is the only one or the best one. We lose track of the contrast between God’s infinity and our finite humanity. This tendency may be part of the human condition, but it is a trap that mature Christians in every generation learn to avoid. Unfortunately, the history of Christianity is filled with examples of people, sometimes very influential people, who have not reached this level of maturity. Liberals, evangelicals, conservatives, biblical literalists, fundamentalists-all of us-tend to assume we have the inside track in a race to understand God. The Jehovah’s Witnesses are certain they are right. The Southern Baptist Convention believes it has the truth well in hand. Bishop Spong knows he is right. The Jesus Seminar thinks it is right. David Koresh believed he was right.

It is a common failing of liberals to feel so socially and educationally superior that any conservative who derives his or her faith principally from some external authority must be a simpleton who refuses to accept reality. Likewise, conservative evangelicals commonly regard those who disagree with their favorite image of God as spiritually defective and morally impure. We all run the risk of reducing God to a size that fits comfortably into our small lives.

Liberal-evangelical theology combines humility and passion. We believe in God, and we also believe there is more to God than we could ever know. We follow Christ trusting that discipleship helps us by grace to craft lives that are pleasing to the God who is both known and unknown to us, and in fact is known partly as unknown. Our images of God are not the same as the reality that the images help us to engage. Liberal evangelicals speak passionately and openly about God, all the while actively listening and watching for how the God who surpasses all understanding does not fit our precious ideas. Liberal evangelicals treasure their God images, but they also know their images of God are too small, and they believe that God is big enough to forgive all limitations.

It is important to acknowledge that we often hurt others with our small images of God. Christians have often pictured God as a man, which has reinforced sexual stereotypes and greatly retarded cultural recognition of the true equality of spiritual dignity between men and women. In fact, Christian churches needed to be rescued from this great sin by a secular liberation movement-clear evidence for Christians that the Holy Spirit works outside as well as within the churches. Similarly, white Christians have typically pictured God as white, which helped them rationalize their enslavement of black Africans. Slavery was often seen as a divinely mandated elevation of the supposedly “subhuman” estate of native Africans. It is impossible to believe that white Christians could have reasoned this way had they pictured God as black.

The fact that our small images of God are so socially potent is one of the sources of great evil in the history of human civilization. It is one of the reasons why idolatry is not merely a matter of poor judgment or spiritual immaturity or theological insecurity. A lot can ride on culturally embedded idolatrous God images. Liberal-evangelical Christianity is primed by its humble expectation that God surpasses all images to be alert to the terrible side-effects of idolatrous attachment to any images of God.

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Adapted from Found in the Middle! Theology and Ethics for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical by Wesley J. Wildman and Stephen Chapin Garner, copyright © 2009 by the Alban Institute. All rights reserved.
As a follow up to Lost in the Middle?, Found in the Middle! offers a foundational approach to the theology and ethics that undergird a congregation where moderate Christians can thrive. Wildman and Garner serve as helpful guides on a quest for a humble theology, an intelligible gospel message, a compelling view of church unity, and a radical ethics deeply satisfying to most Christians with both liberal and evangelical instincts.

Lost in the Middle? Claiming an Inclusive Faith for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical
by Wesley J. Wildman and Stephen Chapin Garner

There exists a deep and broad population of Christians who feel the labels of “liberal”and “evangelical” both describe their faith and limit their expression of it. By working to reclaim the traditional, historical meanings of these terms, and showing how they complement rather than oppose each other, Wesley Wildman and Stephen Chapin Garner stake a claim for the moderate Christian voice in today’s polarized society.

Lost in the Middle? guides readers through a process of diagnosis and articulation, offering complementary perspectives on the phenomenon, problem, and promise of Christians with both liberal and evangelical instincts. The authors show how individuals and institutions alike can reclaim and celebrate the highest virtues of both liberal and evangelical Christianity, and how doing so can lead to the creation of authentic and vibrant communities of faith.

Pastors, congregational leaders, seminarians, and all thoughtful Christians will learn how truly moderate Christianity can unite the compassionate openness and social activism of liberal Christianity with the magnetism and spiritual fervor of evangelical Christianity. You may feel lost in the middle, but you are not alone there. The middle may be the place where you find yourself living most authentically.

Praise for the Book

“In this important new book, Wildman and Garner have done a real service to all people of faith who are looking for an alternative to the worn-out and unhelpful polarities of liberal and conservative. They describe a middle way is not a bland compromise but a vital and alluring expression of the Christian faith.” -Martin B. Copenhaver, Senior Pastor, Wellesley Congregational Church

“It is tremendously comforting to pick up this book and discover companions-other liberal evangelicals who have felt lost in the contemporary church. And it is thrilling to see that some wise predecessors have found their way and charted a path for others to follow. Wildman and Garner have laid out a trail of bread crumbs that not only lead but provide nourishment along the way.” -Brandon Daniel Hughes, Publisher of LiberalEvangelical.org

“From the perspective of a clergyperson who has worked with church groups grappling with current issues, I have found that Lost in the Middle?gives moderate, thoughtful Christians a position from which to speak, as well as a great sense of relief to find that theirs is a definable stance that characterizes many Christians. Finding that their positions have strong historical precedents adds legitimacy and power to their voices.” -Vaughan McTernan, Priest-in-Charge, St. David of the Hills Episcopal Church, Woodland Park, Colorado

Found in the Middle! Theology and Ethics for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical
by Wesley J. Wildman and Stephen Chapin Garner

As a follow up to Lost in the Middle?, Found in the Middle! offers a foundational approach to the theology and ethics that undergird a congregation where moderate Christians can thrive. Wildman and Garner serve as helpful guides on a quest for a humble theology, an intelligible gospel message, a compelling view of church unity, and a radical ethics deeply satisfying to most Christians with both liberal and evangelical instincts.

Book Preface for: Lost in the Middle – Claiming an Inclusive Faith for Christians Who Are Both Liberal and Evangelical

Preface

We write this book for Christians who feel theologically and spiritually displaced. There are plenty of them. They feel lost in the middle between the noisy extremes of religion and politics and long to feel right at home right where they are. They sense that it is possible to ignore the oversimplifications of left and right and, instead, move deeper into their faith. But they are not quite sure how to do that. They know the path they seek has something to do with love because they understand the power of love to unite people of different kinds, to overcome alienation, and to bring about transforming forgiveness. If only they could understand their situation clearly, perhaps they could plot the path ahead.

This book speaks directly to such Christians. It is a guidebook to help them learn how to describe their moderate location in a positive and compelling way. It will stretch and educate, and it needs to do that, because this is not one of those problems with an obvious “silver bullet” answer. But for the person who identifies with the sketch in the opening chapter, this is probably the book for which you have been waiting.

It is easy to understand the pain of displacement, of feeling lost amid everyone else’s certainties. Christians are often lumped in coarse ideological categories that don’t mesh with the texture of an individual’s or a church’s faith convictions. Protestant Christians and churches are generally sorted into four stereotypes: liberal, evangelical, conservative, and fundamentalist. People of faith are, by and large, aware of these categories. Fundamentalists typically insist the Bible is the inerrant and historically accurate word of God. Conservative Christians tend to have an intense interest seeing their faith-based morality formed into legis lative action. Evangelical Christians appear to be all about loving, serving, and having a personal relationship with Jesus. Liberal Christians frequently focus on issues of social justice and inclusion.

So, if you believe God literally created the world in six days, you must be a fundamentalist. If you want to take your local school system to court in hopes of having science teachers add creationism to their curriculum, you must be a conservative Christian. If you believe Adam and Eve were created so Jesus would need to be born into the world, you must be an evangelical Christian. If you believe Adam and Steve have as much right to be married as Adam and Eve, you must be a liberal Christian.

People rarely look just like their caricatures. There are liberal Christians who love Jesus. There are evangelical Christians who care about protecting the environment. There are conservative Christians who embrace their gay sons and daughters. There are fundamentalist Christians who have no interest in reviving the biblical practice of having men and women stoned on the town square for adultery.

Overlaps and tensions between these labels further complicate matters. Some fundamentalist and conservative Christians would claim the evangelical label, and some liberals wish they could. Yet there are plenty of evangelical Christians who would consider themselves neither conservative nor fundamentalist. Liberalism is similarly diverse, and the divisions are almost as pointed. Liberal Christians tend to be wary of evangelical, conservative, and fundamentalist Christians alike, and that feeling is reciprocated. Likewise, many Christians are suspicious of fundamentalists, and that suspicion is returned in spades.

In short, we have created a mess where Protestant Christians of all persuasions are at odds with each other. Perhaps we should not be surprised when these faith categories are often used carelessly or contemptuously. Humans are social and territorial beings who need to feel their world makes sense and their values are reflected in the patterns of social life. We readily fight for what we believe, and we defend our moral and religious territory with as much vigor as we protect our physical space. These are the undertows beneath the tides of contemporary as well as ancient culture wars, and the wellspring of divisive religious categories.

One side benefit of infighting among Protestants is that their traditional suspicion of Roman Catholics has abated somewhat. Not many decades ago, a Protestant marrying a Catholic was often a difficulty of Romeo-and-Juliet proportions for both families. That’s not as common these days. But there is a balancing disadvantage. In our era, a religious conservative marrying a religious liberal may be even more difficult for some families to accept. And that scenario can happen within the Jewish and Muslim faiths as easily as within Christianity.
Meanwhile, countless Catholics are deeply disillusioned with the Mother Church’s patriarchal authoritarianism, with its condescending attitude toward women, and with its sometimes shockingly protective approach to the perversity of sexual abuse of children and young adults by Catholic priests. In despair, many of them have migrated to Protestant churches in search of another spiritual home, while other Catholics forsake Christian worship altogether. The resentment is fierce among both those who leave and those who stay.

Sadly, these patterns of hostility are becoming increasingly obvious. Within Protestantism, the quiet majority is stirring uneasily. They recognize the liberal or evangelical labels don’t apply neatly to them. They know from long experience that noisy, anxious people magnify rather than solve problems, often rushing past simpler, calmer solutions on their way to name-calling and inflammatory behavior. They believe the church should model for the world a kind of community that rises above territorial instincts and insults, one that stresses love and acceptance more than social identity and security.

This quiet majority includes uneasy evangelicals, troubled liberals, uncomfortable conservatives, and disillusioned Catholics-but probably not fundamentalists or extreme liberals. These folk feel confused by what is happening and want guidance. They want to know whether it is possible to be a Christian with both liberal and evangelical instincts. They long to feel at home rather than lost in the middle.

Do you long for a Christian faith that takes the Bible seriously while recognizing that God has yet more light to shed on the world? Do you desire a Christian faith that can proclaim Jesus Christ unapologetically while embracing the diversity and mystery of God’s creation? Do you ache for a Christian faith that is passionate and personal while at the same time intellectually robust, gracefully generous, and globally sensitive? Those are the longings of a liberal and evangelical Christian faith. Those are desires we address in this book and seek to cultivate in our lives and work and in local churches.

We are convinced that discerning Christians and churches can choose to transcend the liberal versus evangelical conflict. We also contend that for the Christian church to be authentic, vibrant, and socially relevant in the future, individual people of faith, and the institutions that nurture their faith, must find ways to celebrate and practice the highest virtues of both liberal and evangelical Christianity. Our efforts are intended to help pastors, pastoral leaders, seminarians, and thoughtful Christians unite the compassionate openness and social activism of liberal Christianity with the corporate magnetism and spiritual fervor of evangelical Christianity.

That longed-for unity is far from easy or obvious. It requires patient work grounded in reliable knowledge and inspired by confidence in the power of love. To that end, we have tried to observe how the liberal-evangelical church manages diversity. We have endeavored to comprehend the principles guiding its decisions and the narratives structuring its identity. We have pondered why some Christians feel strongly called to embrace its corporate life as their context for Christian growth and discipleship. We have also made an effort to grasp why some people find this kind of church unattractive or a betrayal of Christian truth. Not everyone wants to find unity among Christians of different stripes, especially across the liberal versus evangelical divide. But it is important to see that such unity is possible for those who choose it, especially when they have the right kind of support. For discerning moderate Christians, this feels like a better way and a higher calling.

We have been tempted to leave behind all of these labels and strike out in a new direction, simply laying out a satisfying and challenging vision of Christian faith and church. We have also been tempted to follow the trend of inventing new labels, trying them on to see if they fit. If conservatives can be compassionate and liberals progressive, then maybe simultaneously liberal and evangelical Christians can be “Progressives for Jesus” or “Radically Inclusive Bible Believers.” Or maybe not! We have resisted these temptations, despite urging from some readers, especially out of loyalty to our imagined audience. The silent majority needs help where they are, in the terms that they know. To them, new labels merely repackage a problem. Truth in advertising should be paramount.

In fact, we think the words “liberal” and “evangelical” are quite poorly understood. Both are wonderful words with impressive heritages. Understanding them well makes it easier to see how they fit together naturally, how they both can be important features of a vibrant faith and a radically inclusive church community. We know these labels can become caricatures, so we use them advisedly. But they are ingrained in contemporary Christian life, and we need them to express the richness of a profoundly traditional vision of Christian faith and church life.

Of course, we have met extreme liberals and rigorous evangelicals who are convinced that trying to nurture a moderate identity for liberal-evangelical Christian faith and church life amounts to a sellout. They say moderates are simply muddled and should pick a side and fight for its vital principles rather than seeking to transcend the conflict. But these advice givers don’t grasp the situation of moderates.

Moderates might feel lost in the middle, but they are not confused about what they believe. If forced to pick a side, which side should moderates pick? Moderates are uncomfortable in either wing of the polarized religious environment. They appreciate principles and practices on both sides of the liberal versus evangelical divide. They are frustrated by the conflict and eager for a principled way of speaking about the moderate, inclusive, passionate kind of Christians they have become and are becoming. Moderates are quite capable of fighting for what they believe. But we think the fight moderates are invited to join by extreme proponents of both sides is the wrong fight.

The more important battle for moderate Christians is with a society that lives far beneath the radically inclusive message of Jesus Christ. This battle is also, gently but definitely, with Christians who are so attached to fighting each other or so comfortable with strangled decay or blind togetherness that they have forgotten how radical, how challenging, how joyful the Christian gospel really is. Moderate Christians of the liberal-evangelical type may have been formed as liberals or evangelicals, mainliners or independents, fundamentalists or Pentecostals. But they have migrated to where they are now in search of something else, something more difficult and more rewarding.

This position does not reflect any lack of faith or conviction, despite the criticisms of the extremes. Rather, moderate Christians find distasteful the reduction of theology and morality and politics to black-and-white contrasts. They are difficult to budge because they sense that their moderate ways are wise. But they know firsthand that it is not easy being true to their moral and religious instincts, or even identifying them, when prevailing social conflict means that the loudest voices always articulate somebody else’s views.

Understandably, most people struggle to express their reasons for rejecting the extremes of Christian theology and political ideology. Many of them do not even have a label for what they are and seek to become. Yet they speak movingly about their intuitive reactions, negative and positive; to their political and cultural environment; and to the churches they have visited and to which they have belonged. Perhaps this mix of graceful speech and inarticulateness is to be expected of moderate Christians trying to construct a progressive, inclusive, passionate, Christ-
centered faith identity. They have to react to what is already well defined around them. To us, this everyday fumbling for words is an invitation to present a way of thinking about Christianity that may help seminary students, pastors, and lay church leaders with both liberal and evangelical instincts become more eloquent about their own commitments.

This is not a book you will read in one sitting. It is a guidebook for people with a purpose in mind when they read it. It will make you think and stretch you in new directions. But it does deliver what we promise. For those who feel lost in the middle but feel sure they are in the right place anyway, this book offers a way of understanding their situation, their heritage, and their choices. It will help them learn how to claim their liberal and evangelical instincts with articulate confidence.

In closing these prefatory remarks, it may help our readers to know more about us, particularly because the act of commending a vision of Christian faith and life is such a personal one, for us and for our readers alike.

We are both liberals and both evangelicals-though we know liberals and evangelicals who would deny us these labels in their senses of them. Both of us are white men, husbands and fathers, pastors and preachers, and lifelong learners. We are friends and collaborators. But we are quite dissimilar in some ways. One of us is more conservative in Christian doctrinal matters, while the other is more conservative in moral convictions. Our spiritualities are quite different. One of us is a thinker and the other a doer. One of us is a homegrown American, while the other is an immigrant. One of us can play table tennis, and the other merely thinks he can. And that brings up another similarity: we are fond of expressing affection through gentle teasing.

If our dissimilarities mimic some of the diversity in contemporary American Christianity, then our shared feelings and common views, as well as our friendship, express the possibilities inherent in putting liberal and evangelical back together, which is where we think they once were, where they sometimes still are, and where they always properly belong.