What's a Dissertation, and how do i get one?

This post will attempt to answer the question(s), "Are you REALLY writing anything, and what’s the dissertation about anyway"

Today’s post is a little shameless self-promotion. I figure if I’m up front about it, rather than being sneaky, it’ll be ok. It’s also a little attempt to keep myself on track, by blabbing to the world that I’m doing this thing. Perhaps some folks will be interested. If not, return to the Manning-to-Denver threads.

You may know that for unexplained reasons, I was mysteriously admitted into a Ph.D. program in Systematic Theology at Marquette University in Milwaukee, WI. Marquette is a Jesuit Catholic school of high standards, consistently ranking as one of the top research universities in religion in the states. No, I cannot explain, other than a momentary lapse of good judgment and taste (perhaps that sardonic Jesuit humor was in play?) how they let me in.

Regardless, (btw, please note I did NOT use the word “irregardless” because it’s not a real word. Nor should you. Unless you find it whimsical, as I do, and use it purposely to annoy the grammar Nazis, in which case it is perfectly acceptable)  I wandered through the program, often went to classes, wrote papers, took tests, which eventually culminated in them declaring that I had achieved “Ph.D. Candidate” status.  Which means that all I have to do now is write this incredibly boring really long paper, basically a book, give a brief presentation about it, answer a series of incredibly difficult, unfair, and tangential questions about it, and hopefully several distinguished scholars throw their little red beads in the hat and BANG I’m a doctor.  (which won’t make all that much difference, really, because I will continue to pay the  bills by working in I.T.) 

So what is this paper about, you ask. I’m SO GLAD you asked. I affiliate with a particular tribe of folks called the Association of Vineyard Churches. This has been my religious tradition of choice for about 18 years. The vineyard is a relatively new group, and pretty small, so if your unfamiliar you can read more. 

 

 So, in the vineyard (founded, like many other aberrant practices, in southern California by a musician of some renown)  we have this idea that the primary message of Jesus was this concept called the kingdom of God. Now, this is not exactly a startlingly new idea…in Protestant theology, for example this has pretty much been the consensus for ohhh...180 years or so. Big deal, might you say. 

Well, here’s where we think we might have a little different take on things.  Some of the early leaders in the Vineyard Movement took a good hard look at the Gospels (not of Thomas…nor of Peter…)  and found something quite interesting. The Jesus of the Gospels, contrary to the Jesus of the Scholars,  not only just talked about the kingdom of God, but he actually DID STUFF that backed up the talk. (In the extremely technical sophistry of the vineyard, we refer to this phenomena as “Doing the Stuff”) Furthermore,  upon even further examination, it’s almost as if the Gospel records are a textbook of sorts- that it, this continued pattern re-appears: Jesus talks about the kingdom of God, and then, does kingdom of god-like stuff. Sometimes the pattern is reversed: the stuff happens, and then Jesus does some explaining on what just happened- usually to his executive team/padawans but sometimes to the astonished crowd as well. And then, get this, not only does he seem to be teaching his team how to both proclaim the words AND do the works of the kingdom, it seems quite obvious that the guys who wrote all this down had a similar goal- they wanted to capture the dynamic so others could follow the example of proclamation/demonstration AND…..(TA DA!!)  TEACH OTHERS AS WELL!  

So in this sense, we say that Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom of God was “Inaugurated” that is, it had a beginning in the story of Jesus. And, it continues to this day.

However, there’s more. There is a big piece of this that indicates that in this “inaugurated” kingdom there is a taste of something bigger. It’s like a small appetizer that gives you just enough of an idea of the coming feast to not just water your mouth, but make you long for the feast, even while you are enjoying the delicious garlic-shrimp-on-a-cracker. It’s like the future is partially here now. I taste the shrimp, I taste a bit of the quality and quantity of the coming feast, in which there will not only be more garlic shrimp, but other culinary delights as well.  In kingdom terms, we talk about “the presence of the future”, which in my mind, would be a great title for a book.  

The powers of the future, when “all will be all in all” are here, in a limited and provisional way, yes, but enough for us to see where this is going. So in this, we say, the kingdom is also Eschatological  which is a .25 theological  word for “pertaining to the end of the age”. SO, the kingdom of God is inaugurated, and eschatological. And cause we attempt to DO the works of the kingdom, in a real sense it’s also ENACTED.

So again say you, big deal, don’t all churches think like this? To which we reply, “well, yes…yes, many of them do.” 

OR DO THEY? OR DOES THE VINEYARD? DOES THIS MATTER?

So, another interesting quirk about the vineyard is cause we are so new, we haven’t had a chance to really work all this out yet in much of a systematic form. SO, for example, when well-meaning folks from other religious traditions ask us a question that begins with a “What does the Vineyard think about X?” we often have to say,

 “…well, uhhh…umm, we do the stuff, see, and we’re mostly good practitioner’s, and we have some kickin’ music, and uhhh..there’s some guys at Yale who…”

ONE OF THESE big questions we often get is about what we think of the Holy Spirit, that is, in technical terms, the third person of the Christian Trinity whom the tradition refers to as “The LORD and giver of Life”.  Now we mostly think what every other Christian group thinks of the person or being of the Holy Spirit. Nuthin’ new here. However, when it comes to the job description or what this person actually does, and how she makes herself known in the cosmos, we say with the preacher:

I have a lover
a lover like no other
she’s got soul, soul, soul sweet soul
and she’s teaches me how to sing
shows me colors, when there’s none to see
gives me hope, when I can’t believe,
and for the first time
I feel love 

Often however, this isn’t good enough, and so folks ask more questions. In short, my whole dissertation is an attempt to answer some of these questions, most specifically;
“What is the relationship between the inaugurated, enacted, eschatological kingdom of God and work of the Holy Spirit in the Vineyard movement?”

Hold on for more….

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