De-Scripted: Responding to Jesus’ Alter-native Call

Recently, I came across Walter Brueggemann’s “19 Theses,” which he presented at the 2004 Emergent Theological Conversation. Although I didn’t follow all he said, and disagreed with some of what I did grasp, his use of “scripting” and “de-scripting” nonetheless riveted my attention. At about the same time, I heard (via iTunes U) Ellen Charry lecture on Augustine’s psychology. After some reflection, I began to devise a few theses of my own, intertwining my thoughts with those of Brueggemann and Charry. I presented these 13 theses during the opening service of our 2008 church retreat.

1. Each of us is a divided self. We find ourselves always already “at war against our undoing.” This division is the effect of that power the Christian tradition names as Sin.         

2. Each of us lives by a script. This script was imprinted on our unwitting psyche by the forceful processes of socialization, and is the collobarative work of “sinsick” (socio-economic, political, cultural, and religious) institutions and persons (our families, friends, and neighbors). 

3. Ironically, the script (which in fact proscribes our autonomy) promises us security and happiness if we mature by being for ourselves, by reordering the world around our own ambitions and choices.

4. The script finally fails to bring us either security or happiness. It only tragically deepens our dividedness. The more closely we follow the script, the more divided we become.

5. It is the work of the local church to de-script us (that is, both to un-script and re-script us). The church accomplishes this by offering an alter-native script, by helping us narrate ourselves into God’s story, which counters the received narrative. 

6. Not every local church accomplishes – or even attempts – this work. Many (perhaps most?) even fail to recognize this as their calling.

7. Only the church that engages in meaningful theological instruction/conversation can help. This is done by, inter alia, preaching and instruction (education); enactment of liturgy and practice of spiritual disciplines (encounter); spiritual direction and modeling (embodiment); and social action and hospitable fellowship and service (embrace). 

8. Only the church in which each member contributes meaningfully can hope to do this work effectively over the long haul. Without an ample diversity of gifts, and a complex ecosystem of supportive relationships, this kind of counter-cultural living proves unsustainable. 

9. When we’re taught to reflect theologically on the meanings of the Gospel for our lives, we learn how to define ourselves theologically rather than experientially, and we find ourselves equipped to de-script ourselves (i.e., to faithe in God’s word as truer than our own), and the long process of the healing of our dividedness begins. 

10. Following the alter-native script does not guarantee security or happiness for us in this life. It does promise ultimate satisfaction and absolute perfection in the coming Kingdom when all things will be put to rights and God will be “all in all.”

11. No one of us can even begin this healing process in isolation from the church. We can’t find authentic autonomy without genuine heteronomy. 

12. Maturity comes not by individuation or by being-for-ourselves, but only by sub-mission and pliability. We only become truly ourselves when we are being with and for others, for that is what we were made for. We must (allow the Spirit to) reorder our lives around Jesus, who calls us to -and to be – the church. 

13. We will live all our lives in the tension between the scripts. Therefore, the church’s work must be consistent, persistent, and lucid, and our commitment to the local church must remain unshakeable, for it is there that God’s work in us is carried out.