The Politics of Witness: The Character of the Church in the World [Perfect Paperback]

Allan R. Bevere (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 20, 2011

As the body of Christ, the church has a prophetic role in the world. Prophets have always spoken clearly to people in power. They have been willing to challenge the decisions made by people who thought they were not accountable to anyone. Sometimes the prophets were respected, sometimes persecuted, but they were never ignored or regarded as irrelevant. So why is it that the church today cannot speak truth effectively to power? In The Politics of Witness, Dr. Allan R. Bevere asks these questions and proposes an answer. The church has come to depend too much on temporal power and has thus forgotten its divine authority. In finding this answer he goes back to the founding of the church and how it first became dependent on the state. He examines those who have followed, mostly building a political theory that takes the responsibility of ministry from the church and gives it to the state. You'll find some names in this that might surprise you. Any discussion of Christianity and the state will involve Emperor Constantine, but what about his modern lieutenants, such as Locke, Jefferson, Franklin, and others? While the theology applies to the church in any country, Dr. Bevere takes a particular look at the peculiarly American view that the United States of America is somehow God's chosen people, a nation of destiny in accomplishing the gospel mission. This book balances brevity with a broad intellectual and historical reach. You will be taken from the founding and foundation structure of Christian theology today to a proposal for how we, as the Church can reclaim our prophetic witness.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Allan R. Bevere is the pastor of First United Methodist Church in Cambridge, Ohio and a Professional Fellow in Theology at Ashland Theological Seminary in Ashland, Ohio. He received his Ph.D from the University of Durham, U.K. He has written two books, Sharing in the Inheritance: Identity and the Moral Life in Colossians and All Is Not As It Seems: Random Reflections on Faith, Ethics, and Politics, and is currently working on several more. He has published sermons and has contributed articles to a Bible Dictionary. Bevere engages in a teaching mission in Cuba with the Methodist Church. He is married and has four children.

Product Details

• Perfect Paperback: 92 pages
• Publisher: Energion Publications (June 20, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1893729818
• ISBN-13: 978-1893729810
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,547,047 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #37 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Religion & Spirituality > Religious Studies > Church & State
  • #39 in Books > 4-for-3 Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Theology > Ecclesiology

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars A Much Needed Understanding of Church and Politics, September 15, 2011

By 

Joel L. Watts "Joel Watts" (Charleston, WV) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Politics of Witness: The Character of the Church in the World (Perfect Paperback)

A timely book, Dr. Allan R. Bevere, a Methodist pastor and a professional fellow at Ashland Theological Seminary, issues a call to the Church to regain the position of prophetic witness. To be sure, this small book has salvos against both the Left and the Right, and equally so the uninvolved, which must lead to a choice - either we ignore Bevere or we heed him. The author knows his limitations, both in space and the cultural situations, but he is able to provide a firmly grounded piece which addresses the involvement of the Church today, and calls it from the pride of place and the sidelines to a place that protects its prophetic mantel.

He presents this work, some 62 pages along with a few more for the always helpful, "Further Reading," in seven succinct chapters. In doing so, he is able to tackle various issues, such as chapter two, entitled Jesus and the Reconstitution of Israel: The Church as the Chosen Nation. Note, that this is not supercessionism, but takes the narrative of Israel and the manner in which it sought to be a political force instead of doing what God had commanded and applies that to the situation of the Church, so that Scriptural Authority is maintained and theological heresy is avoided. After all, the Church often seeks a seat at the Table of Political Discourse, and often aligns itself to one political issue or another. And sometimes, seemingly, to one Party or another. And this, this issue of Left and Right, for a lack of a better word, dominionism, is something else that Bevere tackles. This, admittedly, was a rather difficult chapter to deal with, since I usually view the work of Wallis as not exactly equal in intent to the workers on the Right. After all, Wallis is not bent on taking over the American Government in the name of God. But, Bevere makes several salient points, in that taken for what they are, both the Left and the Right have the same goals, to reshape the U.S. into a Christian society through the Government, albeit with different visions of what that society and government should look like. I'll have to ponder this more, but if Bevere is correct, then his (Not So) Modest Proposal in chapter seven becomes that much more enticing.

Interesting to those of us who constantly rail against Constantine and stand in favor of the separation of Church and State, is chapters three and four, which deal, respectively, with the Right and the Left, again. In doing so, he exposes the flaws in the argument that the Enlightenment helped to end Constantine's rule and that the United States, following Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, helped to take Government out of Religion. To the author, noting could be farther from the truth. And to the reader, it becomes apparent that some of the Founding Fathers were indeed, as Bevere writes, the Modern Lieutenants of the ancient Roman Emperor. After all, and I'm trying to not reveal too much of the argument, when religion is separated from the Government, but the Government continues to rely upon religion to produce model citizens, the idea of the separation of Church and State becomes little more than propaganda. These chapters feed directly into chapter six, in which he discusses the limitations of the American Church.

And this is his problem. The subtitle of this book is "The Character of the Church in the World" but more often than not, it is about the American Church and the Church in America. Granted, we see European models beginning to develop based on the work of the American Church, but to readers who are not American, the focus on the American Church may seem a little disingenuous. Of course, rarely do we see in other parts of the world, the contention between the Church and the Political Realm as we do in the United States, whether it be from C. Peter Wagner and the descendents of Jerry Falwell on the Right or Wallis and others on the Left. Indeed, often times, as he discusses in chapter five, Americans confuse this country with Ancient Israel (I note that history records the dangers of British-Israelism), and the dangers of this viewpoint. Perhaps if the Church is to recover a proper place, it might start in the United States.

In the final chapter, Bevere gives his proposal. While this is a review, I am still hesitant about giving away the details. After all, if you were to read them here, why go and purchase the book? But, they are ideas worth considering in light of what the author wrote in the preface, "Until Christendom is abandoned by Christians, the church's mission and witness in the world will be seriously undermined." One of the proposals, which struck me the hardest, was his words on our materialism. In this, I'll have to ponder how to personally respond to this, not because I think he needs it, but he is speaking prophetically, and I believe he is correct. So then, to ignore his words here may do me injustice. Indeed, Bevere has been prophetic in most of his work here. It is not easy to digest all of it, and upon doing so, there may be pieces that may be undigestable; yet, whether or not one agrees with his eventual proposal completely, his lead up and many of the facets of the proposal are sound and should be heeded.