thanks, Jonathan, for the excellent thoughts. You've identified the real problem and solution and given us good application of that. Thanks for helping us stay focused.

I am an associate pastor whose responsibilities include our church’s small group ministry, so your article got my attention. I appreciate the research and thought that you put into it, but I would like to push back at you a bit.

Plug anything into the formula "[Blank] is the problem, [Blank] is the solution" where the first is not sin and the second is not Christ, and you could make the same point. However, I'm not sure that identifying this confusion invalidates the concerns, in this case, about individualism and for community, though it should serve as a caution for how we speak about them, and how much blame/hope we are placing upon them. I can find this kind of nuance and qualification in your article, but the overall tone seems to be “Let’s not talk about individualism and community, let’s talk about sin and repentance.” Am I hearing you rightly?

We could just as easily rail against a formula "Adultery is the problem, a good marriage is the solution." But even though it would be wrong to elevate these things to a level that demands definite articles (THE problem, THE solution), and wrong to see anything solved or even helped apart from Christ’s justifying work and the Spirit’s sanctifying work (both rooted in Christ’s death and resurrection), I don’t think it helps to homogenize various sins with the label of "disobedience." Yes, if there is adultery in a person's life, he needs to see it as a sin/disobedience that he needs to repent of and find forgiveness in the cross. But, it is also important for us to think about the particulars of adultery, such as the issues of the heart, cultural pressures, and other circumstances that led to this sin. It is also worth thinking about what contributes to the health of the marriage and encourage that believer to pursue that with God's help and to His glory. That's why I still think it is worth talking and thinking about our culture's drive toward individualism and why a healthy congregational life is the biblical alternative (alternative, yes… corrective, no). We just need to do it in a way that is rooted in Christ, dependent on the Spirit, and defined by the Scriptures. With biblical discernment, we will talk about sociological/cultural issues, but not in ways that make anthropology and sociology the masters of theology and soteriology.

I appreciate the concern that we not lose the gospel, but I think we must be careful not to think that we just “get ‘em saved” and then everything else just works itself out. Yes, the Spirit works only in the redeemed, and it is his work of transformation, not ours, but we are still called to teach, guide, discipline, and lead.

In order to have a “deliberate church,” our pastors/elders will have to teach and lead our people to live congregationally. We will have to plan our church life and structures in ways that promote, rather than inhibit, this relational way of discipleship. We will need to declare the spiritual fact that believers are part of a body whether they recognize it or not, and we will have to exhort them to live out that reality in their daily and weekly schedules, habits, and routines. As a congregation, we will then pursue local church life as an expression of a redeemed race, a holy nation, a kingdom of priests, a chosen people, not as a collection of religious individuals.

Bruce,
My article is not responding to people who are emphasizing the importance of congregational life. That's what 9Marks is all about. Rather, it's responding to a school of writers and leaders who are subtly reshaping the nature of the gospel through a more complex conversation involving the ontologies of "being" and "person."

Thank you for helping me to clarify this point.

Thanks, Jonathan. I am with you in wanting to promote the life of the people of God (true community) while not losing personal responsibility and accountability (individual guilt and individual repentance).

Thanks Jonathan for your research, and Bruce for the clarification. I cringe at statements like "___ is the problem ___ is the solution" except for the qualifications given by Bruce.
I recently returned from a two year mission trip to Papua New Guinea (PNG) where I saw group culture in action. I lived in villages for three weeks at a time and found life in PNG hard but the pace satisfying. It taught me the technologies we in the west hold so dear, with a few exceptions have not added to the quality of life. I suppose many would disagree.
But I also learned much about my culture through being immersed in another very different culture. I cannot explain the shock when I returned to the US. I was not sure if our culture had changed dramatically, or had I?
But let me get to my point. I now see many aspects in our culture at odds with the New Testament concepts of Christianity and community. Individualism is just one issue, and part of that is our cultural concept that self is the final authority (a generalization, but is the core issue of Jonathan’s paper). Our task-orientation over relationships, education over wisdom, materialism (and accumulation) over generosity, goal-orientation over process, performance over discipleship, business model over body model (in our churches), and technological advancement over kingdom advancement all contribute to diluting the impact we should have in a fallen world.
I have come to realize at every point where I do not act on what the Bible tells me – I deny the Lordship of Christ. Somehow the church in the US has adopted a view that to stand out is offensive to God. Yet in the New Testament I see just the opposite (not that being different is the goal). One current author puts it this way: when Jesus left, He placed His reputation in our hands. The concept is weighty and shocking considering church history: “We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.” (2Cor. 5:20 NIV)