Citing
and sourcing from John Howard Yoder, Romand Coles says in his essay “The Wild
Patience of John Howard Yoder,”
I would even guess…that all forms of
such invulnerable privileging of one's own church and community, no matter how
internally dialogical and differentiated, no matter how generously "for
the nations" they seek to be, no matter how much they eschew practices of
warfare—will, finally and in spite of themselves, slide toward postures against
and at war with outsideness as such (Coles, “The Wild Patience of John Howard
Yoder,” 307).
A
stance of invulnerability in dialogue between faiths, churches, denominations,
and communities produces “outsideness” regardless of intention. A vulnerable
stance within the church is fruitful for discourse and growth, whereas narrow
methodologism is a hindrance to conversation and development. Yoder has shown
this in his writings, and I will be citing his thoughts on shared axioms
between church and otherwise and the give and take therein, working in the
reality of pluralism, and God’s constant movement and eschatological victory in
history.
Give and Take
In
his essay “Walk and Word,” John Howard Yoder says, “The worst form of idolatry
is not carving an image; it is the presumption that one has – or that a society
has – the right to set the terms under which God can be recognized” (“Walk and
Word,” 89). Yoder rejects Constantinian methodologism – that any group of
people can reject Biblical realism; that any community sees themselves as
having the corner on the market of God’s revelation of God’s self to the world.
Yoder advocates for a vulnerable give-and-take between communities. Coles says,
regarding Yoder, “He interprets the binding centrality of the lordship of
Christ as the opening of dialogical relations between the church and the world
in which giving and receiving is possible, nay probable, in both directions”
(Wild Patience, 307). Yoder believed deeply that discourse can and should
happen between secular and Christian communities, and that both had moral truth
to offer the other. The church should have a stance of receptive vulnerability.
Jesus is the Lord of all the earth – not just the church. To refuse to seek
middle axioms between the church and world is to doubt the reality of Christ as
Lord of all. Coles says, again sourcing Yoder, “In recent centuries, many
Christians, waking up to the violence wrought by their own a priori
condemnations of non-believers, have sought to cultivate more charitable
relationships with those outside the church” (Wild Patience, 305). These
charitable, open relationships open the gates of dialogue and growth and cut
off violence and ostracizing toward non-believers. Yoder explicates this
reality:
Assuming that our position is the
correct position, we must recognize that it has often been represented
inadequately or even unfaithfully, by persons whose claim to represent it has
therefore decreased its credibility, including ourselves. Sometimes these
inadequacies were mere human frailty… Other times (e.g., empire, paternalism,
sexism, the abuse of office, racism), they were worse than that, and call for
outright condemnation and for repentance in the full sense of the term (Yoder,
“Patience as Method in Moral Reasoning,” 120).
The
church, historically, has had need of condemnation, reconciliation, and
shaping. To trust only in itself as a structure to self-correct is dangerous
and destructive, and ignores the moral middle axioms that exist between the
church and the world, which the world had the ability to name and enforce.
Pluralism and Reformation
Harry
Huebner says in his essay “The Christian Life as Gift and Patience,” “Just as
Yoder rejects the notion of a fundamental starting point derived from the work
of abstract reasoning, so he rejects the ultimate unification of all knowledge.
There is no fundamental rational starting point and there is no ultimate
rational ending point either” (The Christian Life, 27). Christian thought has
experienced significant reform in the past, and likely it will again. “Although
we have good grounds (if we have adequately studied a matter) to believe that
in its main lines the things we are sure of are worthy of that assurance, we
must always keep open spaces where sometimes our ignorance and at other times
our sinfulness will have kept us from seeing all the truth” (Yoder, “Patience”
as Method, 120). Christian thought must remain vulnerable; significant periods
of being closed off to outside thought will lead to the possibility of the
prevention of necessary reformation. God is constantly working in history;
vulnerability will allow God’s processes to move freely through the church. “In
the "perennially unfinished process" of reaching back to discern
scriptural accountability, the church cultivates a "readiness for
reformation": an expectation that, "the Lord hath yet more light and
truth to break forth from this holy Word"… that the church ought to move through
history as "a continuing series of new beginnings" (Coles, Wild
Patience, 313-314, quoting Yoder). The church, as a structure, is fallible. By
default, the church should remain self-critical and open.
In
reasoning together in the Spirit, the vulnerable church can remain clarifying
and attentive. The church may be able to see what was previously invisible as
revealed in a pluralistic setting. Yoder sees hope, not despair, in pluralistic
discourse:
Pluralism as to epistemological method
is not a counsel of despair but part of the Good News. Ultimate validation is a
matter not of a reasoning process which one could by dint of more doubt or
finer hair-splitting push down one story closer to bedrock, but of the concrete
social genuineness of the community’s reasoning together in the Spirit (Yoder,
Walk and Word, 83).
Christ’s Ultimate Victory
“When
Christians cease to engage outsiders with receptive generosity, they cease to
let the church be the church, they lose sight of Jesus as Lord” (Coles, Wild
Patience, 307). The church is called to trust that God is in control of history
and will achieve ultimate victory. The church is bigger than the visible
earthly structures. Yoder talks repeatedly about the idea that – specifically
pacifism – is not rooted in efficacy; just because something is not seen as
effective in every earthly situation does not mean that it is not a part of
God’s cosmological plan. Victory was achieved in the cross of Jesus Christ, and
that is reality in which we live. It is not up to the church to manipulate or
decide the direction of history. “According to Yoder, the faithful witness of
the church involves giving up the Constantinian assumption that it is up to us
to guarantee that history comes out right” (Huebner, How to Read Yoder, 108). Our
place in the moral direction of history comes in our obedience to the One who
is truly sovereign. Yoder calls this the “”apocalyptic” patience of waiting in
hope” (Patience as Method, 123).
Yoder
says, in a nerving way, “The only way to see how this will work will be to see
how it will work” (The Priestly Kingdom, 45.) The history of narrow methodologism has shown
that preoccupation with “making it work” has proven to do just the opposite,
often resulting in clear atrocities only visible in hindsight. To be open and
vulnerable, naming Christ as Lord of all, is to be open to reformation,
correction, and righteousness.
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