Christianity is not theology. Christianity is Christ. This distinction is vital, but quite often missed. Indeed the failure to grasp it can be destructive to true faith. But few conservative Christians, especially if they love theology, bother to wrestle with this adequately, assuming that a grasp of "right beliefs" equals living and active faith.

Make no mistake about it-Christianity will lead thinking worshipers to form and write theology. It is the result of pondering the faith and considering the biblical witness to Christ. But we must never assume that correct theology equates to living and vital Christianity. Creeds and confessions have always helped the church mark out serious dangers. They have articulated and protected vital truths. But by embracing a confession of faith we do not actually live by faith. It would be like loving the poetry of a spouse without loving the spouse who wrote the poetry. Or it is like loving to study and embrace theory about flight without ever getting into an airplane and flying.

Faith Precedes Understanding

Fundamentally, theology must always be understood as an intrinsically human enterprise. It is our reflection upon God, upon his divine revelation, and thus upon the gift of Holy Scripture. Good theology employs the use of reason and logic but it rests, ultimately, upon the incarnation and the divine revelation, not logic. The Word will always lead us to ponder our theology, but pondering and reading our theology does not, in itself, lead us to worship and to know the Word. I missed this quite badly in my early years as a Christian, and later as a pastor of two churches. The results of my errors are increasingly evident to me as I've grown older.

Paul counseled the earliest Christians to receive Christ by faith. He then told them that they must live their lives by faith in Christ alone. Thus, faith is not logic. And faith is not based on intellectual ability. If this were true then only intellectual people would have mature and deep faith, a claim that is patently and obviously false. Here is how Paul put it:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.
(Colossians 2:6-7)

There are two metaphors Paul uses here. The first is agricultural. We are to be "rooted" in Christ, that is we must be planted in the soil and draw daily nourishment from the One who is the living Lord. The second metaphor is human, or even architectural. We are to be "built up" in Christ. Just as a building is designed and constructed to withstand storms and earthquakes, so our lives are to be "built up" through faith in Christ. Have you noticed how both of these metaphors are used repeatedly in Scripture? I believe the first emphasizes the dynamic character of our faith. I believe the second stresses the necessity of making sure that we never fall down or fail in our faith.

Note further what Paul says is the context, or the atmosphere, in which we should exercise this faith-"thanksgiving." And not just any thanksgiving will do. We should live in an atmosphere of "overflowing thanksgiving." We should be extravagant. The great Swiss theologian Karl Barth wrote over and over that the only fitting response to grace (charis) was thanksgiving (eucharistia). This is the reason that, in the Reformed tradition, worship reminds us of God's grace through the preaching of the gospel and then leads us to extravagant thanksgiving, culminating at the Lord's Table.

The Problem with Modernity

The modern Western enterprise has given us many blessings, both economic and social. Western Civilization, with all its extravagant excesses, brought great blessings to many. But the modern Enlightenment influence on the West has resulted in some very negative influences upon Christian faith. For example, many theologians, both liberal and conservative, insist that Christian truth claims should be subjugated to the universal principles of human reason. And this process is most often one that follows a scientific procedure that is deeply rooted in human wisdom, not divine revelation. (Take a careful look, if you wish, at some of the most important written and academic systematic theologies of the 19^th and 20^th centuries. What you will discover is that almost every single one of them follows a logical, scientific order in how they arrange the subject matter and reach certain conclusions, as if the Bible was a well laid-out textbook. Why do they all, or so it seems to me, follow the same method in how they lay out the study of theology?)

I believe that we should affirm the positive contributions of reason without situating Christian truth in abstract scientific "truth claims." A better starting point, one that leads us to deeper faith, is to begin with Jesus Christ, the incarnate-God-man who is the living Word revealed to us by the Holy Spirit through the sacred Scriptures.

The Postmodern Turn

Various definitions of postmodernism are being tossed about broadly today. Whatever it is, it is clearly a way of thinking and living that follows after modernity. Some think that we are living in a late-modern age since modernity still clearly influences those who call themselves postmodern. Others believe a radical shift is taking place in the West and modernism is collapsing under the weight of postmodernism. They see this postmodernism as a dangerous enemy of the faith, as if modernism did the Christian faith any real favors. Yet still others think postmodernism has already come and gone, like another ephemeral fad. There is an element of truth in all of these reactions, but none is adequately balanced.

Sadly, the widely-used term postmodernism is almost without meaning in most "popular" evangelical contexts. Preachers denounce it and hardly know what they are talking about in most instances. And if you don't condemn it then you are seen as too liberal in such circles. In other contexts if you don't embrace the whole postmodern enterprise, and reject the modernism of the Enlightenment, including the scientific, social and political gains made since the 17th century, then you are suspected of favoring a theology that is not rooted in the Bible.

I concur with many who have written that we should not privilege systematic theology or propositional truths. They are both helpful, in the right place, but we are better Bible readers when we embrace the biblical story, as well as the use of image and metaphor as we see them clearly used in the Scripture. The text which must guide our thought process can be seen in John's prologue:

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
(John 1:14)

We have not seen God, nor can any of us fully comprehend him. To create a human system that pretends to contain the truth, and nothing but the truth, in a fixed and final form is a huge mistake. It also misses the point the apostle makes here about Christ, which is precisely why I noted earlier that this direction can be dangerous to real faith. Listen to how John puts it:

No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known (John 1:18).

The God who is-"I am who I am"-has graciously turned toward humanity in Jesus Christ, becoming humble. This is why Karl Barth put it this way: "God is not proud. In his high majesty he is humble." You cannot deduce Christ from innate human insight. Christ is revealed to us as a result of God's gracious self-revelation. Scripture is the place where this happens, and it always happens by the Spirit's work. A contemporary Welsh theologian understands this correctly when he concludes:

This revelation possesses its own logic and rationale which, although not in opposition to unbaptized human reason, challenges it radically at crucial points. Human reason, like everything else, functions best in its own sphere: in order to operate properly in the realm of our knowledge of God, it must be judged, justified, redeemed and set free by the gospel of Christ.

If Christian truth claims are to make sense at all, the attitude of faith must precede human understanding. This was how the early church understood it and this is part of the reason why some evangelical postmoderns are reminding us of this truth in our own time. Our attitude, says D. Densil Morgan again, "must be one of trust, obedience and humility and a sincere desire to understand."

CONCLUSION

What I believe we desperately need today is an approach that is gladly willing to affirm the truth claims of the Christian revelation-if we are convinced of their truthfulness. What we have had, among many conservatives, is a recovery of the older creeds and confessions without the life-giving power of the Spirit. Before we can meaningfully ponder Christian doctrine, and the church desperately needs to do this now more than ever, we must begin at the beginning. The beginning is where faith truly meets Christ. This is where God graciously reveals himself to us, not where we become smart enough to figure out the truth. This will lead us to the place and purpose of faith.