Considerations on Church-Renewing Movements 4
Over the past few weeks we have been pondering movements and programs that promise to renew the church. We have been using William J. Abraham’s book, “The Logic of Renewal”, to think in a deeper way on this subject, especially his list of six concerns. If you are just now joining us, it will be good for you to look back over the three previous posts, “ Considerations on Church-Renewing Movements 1 ” and “ 2 ” and “ 3 ”. Abraham takes the medical analogy mentioned in the last post and goes a step further, “4. Our extended use of the medical analogy prompts a fourth consideration. Renewal can go wrong in all sorts of ways. It can go wrong because of original misdirection, because of misdiagnosis, or because the doctor has prescribed the wrong medicine. In all these cases, the quest for renewal can be disastrous ( . . . ). ( . . . ) but we must surely acknowledge the possibility of unintended side effects in proposals for renewal. Again and again, leading personalities or major ...