We are a very isolated culture. We do everything alone! Research from just a few years ago revealed that the number one place that people eat these days is in their cars, alone. We work alone, eat alone, play alone, and end our days alone. Interestingly too is that we have made a habit of doing theology alone. What I mean is that most of us formulate and develop our thinking about God and the things of God in isolation from others. We don’t let the cumulative knowledge, experience, and understandings shape our thinking about God, it’s all based on and rooted in ourselves. The weaknesses of this approach to doing theology are many and therefore I propose that we look to the community to shape our theology.
It is of course true that each of us must wrestle with what we believe the Scriptures teach and come to Biblically informed theology. It is also true that there is no one who holds authority, or has cornered the market on interpretation and theology. The Bible alone has authority. Nonetheless our own understandings, experiences, and abilities limit our interpretations. None of us does theology from within a vacuum. All our backgrounds and preconceptions affect our theologizing. We needn’t be dismayed at this, as though this somehow prohibits us from ever understanding God and His Word truly. Rather by acknowledging this and then allowing others, with their own backgrounds and preconceptions, to help us do theology we can get even closer to the truth.
What this means is that I am not simply coming up with my own doctrine of God, as though my understand of Scripture and my own experiences are sufficient. Rather I am bringing my theology to the table and with the other people in my community I am looking at Scripture, reading it understanding it with their help and their fresh eyes, and I am letting their views on God help shape my view. This is only one of the benefits of doing theology as a community, there are other benefits to explore briefly too.
If our goal is to do theology in such away that it steers clear of mere academics, then community can help us do this. Tim Chester and Steve Timmis offer a good discussion of this point in their book Total Church. There they write:
As theologians together, our “subject” should be exploring the missiological implications of all theology in every aspect of the life of the local church and in every detail of the lives of believers (157).
A signficant part of the problem behind academic theology and biblical scholarship is the way in which it is, all too often, self-referential. Professional theologians often write about and for other professional theologians. In the New Testament, church leaders were responsible for guarding the flock from error (Acts 2o:28-31). They were, if you like, theologians-in-residence within the congregation (160-161).
The community helps us to keep theology localized and practical. My congregation need theology that hits where they live and helps them to understand the Bible better and serve Jesus more fully. Doing theology as a community provides us the perfect context, then, in which to do real theology. Again Chester and Timmis write:
If true theology is the fruit of engagement with the Bible set in the context of the local church, then much of what passes for theology is not theology at all (161).
In conclusion, then, we must continually remember that theology is FOR the church. That’s its primary context and primary focus. When we keep this in mind it spares us much useless banter and much detached academic theologizing.
Sparrow & Heart Soul Care 