It’s been a while since we posted one of Gerhard Forde’s inspired rants. This one comes from his essay “Radical Lutheranism”, which you can read here. The identity crisis to which he refers is that of confessional Lutherans in the late 1980s America, but the insights apply more widely:
“What shall we be? Let us be radicals: not conservatives or liberals, fundagelicals or charismatics (or whatever other brand of something-less-than gospel entices), but radicals: radical preachers and practitioners of the gospel by justification by faith without the deeds of the law. We should pursue it to the radical depths already plumbed by St. Paul, especially in Romans and Galatians, when he saw that justification by faith without the deeds of the law really involves and announces the death of the old being and the calling forth of the new in hope. We stand at a crossroads. Either we must become more radical about the gospel, or we would be better off to forget it altogether.
We should realize first of all that what is at stake on the current scene is certainly not Lutheranism as such. Lutheranism has no particular claim or right to existence. Rather, what is at stake is the radical gospel, radical grace, the eschatological nature of the gospel of Jesus Christ crucified and risen as put in its most uncompromising and unconditional form by St. Paul. We need to take stock of the fact that while such radical Paulinism is in itself open to both church and world (because it announces a Christ who is the end of the law, the end of all earthly particularities and hegemonies), it is, no doubt for that very reason, always homeless in this age, always suspect, always under attack, always pressured to compromise and sell its birthright for a mess of worldly pottage…
We must realize there is not just external reason for our identity crisis but deep theological and, for want of a better word, existential reason. It lies simply in Lutheranism’s fateful attachment to the Pauline gospel in a world whose entire reason for being is opposed to it. All who adopt such a stance will find themselves constantly on the defensive not only before the world but especially before the religious enterprises, not to say the churches, of the world…
If we are to probe to the root, the radix, of our identity crisis, however, we must dig beneath even the world’s general disapproval. Theological anthropology, the understanding of human existence itself before God, is perhaps the place where the crisis becomes most apparent. The fact is that the radical Pauline gospel of justification by faith without the deeds of the law calls for a fundamentally different anthropology and with it a different theological ‘‘system’’ (if there be such!) from that to which the world is necessarily committed. The radical gospel of justification by faith alone simply does not fit, cannot be accepted by, and will not work with an anthropology which sees the human being as a continuously existing subject possessing ‘‘free choice of will’’ over against God and/or other religious goals. The radical gospel is the end of that being and the beginning of a new being in faith and hope.”
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8 responses to “What Shall We Be? (According to Gerhard Forde)”
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Sigh. How I wish the face on contemporary Lutheranism were not Gerhard Forde. The radix of his radical Lutheranism is not the Radix Jesse, therefore his theology is neither radical nor Lutheran, nor even Christian in the most basic sense.
If only interested in Lutheran theology interacted with Chemnitz, C.P. Krauth, Gerhard, Luther . . .
“The radical gospel of justification by faith alone simply does not fit, cannot be accepted by, and will not work with an anthropology which sees the human being as a continuously existing subject possessing ‘‘free choice of will’’ over against God and/or other religious goals.”
At the risk of sounding like a complete fool here, why not? And how exactly is Forde’s “anthropology” practically different from that of the scientific materialists?
I think, clearly, without grace there is no salvation, no liberation from the bondage of sin, no true calling towards and capacity for love, yada yada yada… You can’t really do what’s “right” in any sustained way unless you feel the nudging of the Spirit, which makes us love what is right more than what is wrong. For that matter, there is no anything without grace. But I just don’t buy the “grace alone” explanation of the whole process. The real-to-life process is more like one of participatory grace. The alcoholic still has to show up to the AA meetings and make the effort to work the steps, even if God is nudging him/her and dragging him/her all along the way, and indeed giving him/her the very strength and will to work the steps. Plenty of people don’t show up, don’t work the steps, never get sober. Are we to blame their plight on God for not nudging hard enough? And with that, all the evil and suffering of the world? Or do we blame His counterpart the devil? Isn’t it the height of hubris to remove all measure of agency from human beings?
Of course, I buy the “low anthropology” Mbird is selling. It just makes sense. Low, yes, but not zero. This Calvinist-Arminian false choice gets tiresome to me. It’s like saying you can either be a capitalist or a socialist, as though either were really possible in any pure sense. We are bound and yet free. We are weak and yet strong. We are blind and yet far-seeing. We may be justified by God and yet still sin. These kinds of contradictions at the heart of human nature are not going to go away just because we want them to, or need them to. We still make choices, though they are extremely limited. Biology/culture/luck/grace/etc. influence everything, but determine nothing. We still consider different possibilities, exert effort in one direction or another, for better and worse. We simply aren’t automatons. We still possess some mysterious kind of autonomy we call consciousness, self-consciousness, moral consciousness, alive-ness, human-ness, whatever. I don’t claim to have this all figured out, obviously. I’ve never even taken a religion/theology class or a philosophy class, but I’ve taken enough English, Art, History, Gender Studies classes to feel some resistance towards any attempts to simplify human nature.
I think, as Christians, we have to learn to live with this contradiction of bound yet free, saved yet sinner, confident yet humble, striving yet waiting. As is often discussed on this blog–the more we rely on ourselves, believing in our own independent insights and capacities, the more likely we are to fall flat on our faces. Good things come to those who wait on the Lord. Bad things come to those who try to “seize the day” for themselves. But we live with the tension of choosing for ourselves, of striving, seeking, and yet still allowing God to choose for us, to strive through us, to seek us seeking Him. Right?
Anyway, sorry for the epistle. Cheers.
Ben
Ben, I’ll reply to your epistle with another…. The quote from Forde you cite seems to be pretty close to Paul’s rhetorical questions in 1 Cor. 4… “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?”. So, sure, there is agency involved, a “reception”, but I tend to find that even speaking of the agency one exercises in the reception of grace quickly nullifies the very idea of gift/reception since you are trying to identify what you put in the equation. Paul seems to think everything the Corinthians have received is a gift and to suggest that they “have ” something which is their own, apart from the gift, is boasting.
“Either we must become more radical about the gospel, or we would be better off to forget it altogether.”
This is only possible if the gospel message you understand is freeing and brings a smile to your face. The performance gospel being preached today in most churches has the opposite effect.
Performance churches say “Come help us save the world!” That makes me tired.
Jesus says come rest.
Forde was spot on.
If there’s anything at all that we must do…then we are toast.
“Christ is the end of the law…”
That’s enough for me. Is it enough for you?
Thank you for the Forde article. As a former Lutheran, this gives me hope for the truth to be preached. It has been hidden for so long. Jesus continues to be radical and invasive in our lives. He has to be, to manage his church which is made up of a bunch of sheep.
“If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”
Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
“Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me.”
This is the radicalism of Jesus. We blunt this radicalism when we teach these as almost illusory demands, jumping post haste to a formulaic recital that every demand has been met by Jesus in our place, teaching that these saying are only designed to show a “low anthropology”. Jesus was not so eager to give a pat “pastoral” answer. When a Christian feels guilt and shame in the face of these demands, is she merely not fully understanding the gospel, which has no demands? Or is there a place for true guilt and shame, true sorrow and remorse, falling in weakness and fear at the feet of him of whom we are not worthy? Is it only then that we are lifted to our feet, and walk away justified? The Prayer Book seems to think so. For Forde, however, this God of judgment and love, working repentance and true faith in the heart of the believer, simply does not exist. This is why Forde’s “radical gospel” cannot accept that “Christ died on the cross for our sins” unless it is reinterpreted to rob it of anything hinting of God’s judgment against sin in the person of His son. Jesus was crucified, according to Forde, because of the human refusal to acknowledge that God was all forgiveness. It had nothing to do with Jesus suffering the just punishment for our sin, because God is love, not judgment. This is Forde’s “radical gospel”.
Michael Cooper: Thanks for calling attention to Forde’s problems.