Monday, October 20, 2008

the emergent shift?

"Preach the gospel to all creation," Christ said. Are we only now beginning to understand what he meant? I believe the unwritten melody that haunts this book ever so faintly, the new song waiting to be sung in place of the hymn of salvation, is simply the song of creation. To move away from the theology of salvation to the theology of creation may be the task of our time.
Vincent Donovan, Christianity Rediscovered, quoted in McLaren, A Generous Orthodoxy, pp. 100-101


One of those 'in a nutshell' statements--Heaven is traded for earth, salvation is discarded in exchange for saving the world, love of the world pursued.

Plus, I suppose we could ask, where did Jesus say to preach the gospel to all creation (as if either Donovan or McLaren were Creationists, we may wonder). Preach it to every nation, all peoples, yes. All of creation? Book, chapter, and verse, please.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Mark 16:15 has that the gospel should be preached to "every creature" or to "all creation", depending on the translation.

jazzact13 said...

All the other version have to do with taking the Gospel to people. As such, then, "creature" in reference to people seems most likely in Mark 16.