Bell, Trampolines, Bricks and Youth Work
Have you read the book by Rob Bell called Velvet Elvis? It's a great read and it will certainly get you thinking. This article is my personal reflection on some of the issues he explores in the first chapter. If you've read the book I hope this article will help you think about how it relates to the youth work you are involved in. If you haven't read the book, don't stop reading - this article will make sense in its own right.
Velvet Elvis doesn't try to hide the fact that it is attempting to be ‘cutting-edge' book. It's therefore interesting, and I believe extremely positive, that the central subject in the first chapter is doctrine! Now, this is hardly what appears to be the most ‘cutting-edge' subject for the beginning of this ‘cutting-edge' book. The word ‘doctrine' can be a rather daunting word, a subject that many consider dated and dull. It's certainly not a word that you are likely to put on your youth group publicity leaflet! However, Rob Bell's approach to the subject is anything but ‘dated and dull' – he attempts to approach the subject in a fresh way and seeks to give doctrine a facelift.
It's about time someone did this. After all a Christian doctrine is a summary statement explaining what Christians believe the Bible says about a particular topic. This means that exploring doctrine shouldn't be dull; it should be vibrant, dynamic and life changing.
Springs or Bricks?
Rob Bell encourages us to think of doctrines as being similar to the springs of a trampoline. The springs are crucial, however, they are not what it's all about – they simply hold the mat in place so the jumping can take place. He says, “The springs are statements and beliefs about our faith that help give words to the depth that we are experiencing in our jumping. I would call these doctrines of the Christian faith.”
Rob Bell explains that the problem is often doctrines are considered to be bricks rather than springs. He gets us to imagine each core doctrine of the Christian faith is represented by a brick, and together these bricks form a wall. He points out several problems with this idea.
How flexible are the springs?
Bricks are very set; they're not flexible, there can be no movement and if you begin to doubt or question one of the bricks there is a chance that the whole wall will collapse. You may be thinking that this isn't a problem; after all, doctrines don't need to be flexible because they are very set, after all as it says In Malachi 3:6, “I the Lord do not change.” At this point we need to remember that, in this illustration, the bricks and springs DO NOT represent the truth about God and who he is, which is unchanging, they represent our belief about God and our understanding of God – and this should be dynamic, it should be subject to change and development. That's one of the exciting things about being a Christian; we keep growing and developing in our understanding of God. God is surrounded by mystery; he's reveals bits and pieces to us, but certainly not everything. Therefore, static bricks just aren't a good picture, dynamic springs are.
This means that discussing doctrine should be dynamic. This is not to say that we divert from the historic doctrines of the Christian church, but it is to acknowledge that doctrines were created and put into practice through discussion. People throughout the centuries have read the Bible, interpreted it, sought to apply it to life, discussed it and created summary statements (doctrines) to communicate it to other people. Rob Bell uses the Trinity as his example. The word doesn't appear in the Bible, it's a doctrine that has been developed to help us understand God. As he says, “It is a spring, people jumped for thousands of years without it. It was added later. We can take it out and examine it. Discuss it, probe it, question it. It flexes and is stretches. In fact, its stretch and flex are what make it so effective. It is firmly attached to the frame and the mat, yet it has room to move. And it has brought a fuller, deeper, richer understanding to the mysterious being who is God.”
We need to encourage young people to investigate the springs of the Christian faith. We need to provide opportunities for them to discuss the springs and wrestle with their questions (acknowledging that many of them will go unanswered). It's as this process takes place that the springs get connected – that Christian belief makes a difference in their lives.
The invitation to jump
Another problem with brick walls is that they usually end up keeping some people in and other people out. If we are not careful we can quickly end up with a ‘them' and ‘us' mentality. The people who believe the same thing as us are ‘in' and those who don't are ‘out'. It's then the job of the ‘in' people to bring the ‘out' people inside the brick wall by convincing them to believe the same things they do. Just think for a moment about the way Jesus worked…it wasn't like this. He invited people to spend time with him and experience what was going on. Then they began to explore the ‘doctrine' and decided whether they wanted to stay ‘in'. In other words they came ‘in' first, before they believed.
How do you usually get people to jump on a trampoline? Do you talk to them about the springs or do you invite them to jump with you on the trampoline? What did Jesus do? Rob Bell certainly thinks the ‘invitation to jump' is by far the best approach and I would ALMOST completely agree.
I used to be a schools worker. Many of the lessons I did would include a component of question and answer. The young people would ask questions, and I would do my best to defend the Christian faith. I used to love it. It kept me on my toes, it was great to see young people thinking and wrestling with some of the big questions of life. I could tell you many encouraging stories, like the time when a 12-year old boy asked me to stop talking about Jesus because he was beginning to believe that it was true!
Last year I was taking a lesson, and as usual the young people were asking me questions and I was doing my best to defend the Christian faith. It then struck me that I might be doing more harm than good. I realised that there was a good chance that my ‘answers' were actually putting them off Christianity, not attracting them to it. It got me thinking. These young people needed to encounter Jesus FIRST. I realised that an apologetics session was not what they needed - they needed to be ‘invited to jump'. Perhaps they needed to experience Christian community at the local youth group so they could get a taste of what life with Jesus is like. They needed to discover the Jesus that is written about it the Bible. Then they would be more ready to investigate the springs that enabled the jumping to take place.
Earlier, I said I ALMOST completely agreed with Rob Bell, because I do believe there are exceptions. Most people, if they see someone jumping on a trampoline and are invited to jump with them would take their shoes of and start jumping – only later might they start asking questions about the trampoline. However, there are those who wouldn't get on the trampoline until they had inspected the springs. Likewise, there are those who would want to explore some of the key Christian doctrines before they began to jump.
Do you need to know about the springs?
When a child is jumping on a trampoline they probably take very little notice of the springs. Adults may take a little more notice, but still, they probably don't spend much time thinking about them. Perhaps this is where the usefulness of the trampoline model comes to an end. When it comes to comparing springs to our understanding of Christian doctrine taking an interest in the springs is very important because it effects how high we jump.
Another danger of the viewing Christian doctrine as bricks is that we can end up studying doctrine for the sake of it – because we want to know more. However, if we compare doctrine to springs, we can grasp a little of the reason we should explore Christian doctrine. Firstly, you don't want the springs to break while you are jumping and secondly the ‘better' the springs are the higher you can jump. Let's relate this to exploring Christian beliefs and wrestling with theology. Studying theology needs to be connected with life – we shouldn't do it simply to increase our knowledge, we should do it to strengthen our relationship with God and equip us as we serve him. The two greatest commandments are not, “read the bible and increase your theological knowledge”. They are love God and love others. Therefore if our reading of the Bible and studying of theology are not helping us to love God and love others more we need to start asking questions. It's essential that we enable young people to explore and get to grips with Christian belief so they not only stay on the trampoline (because they are not scared that the springs will break), but they can also jump higher.
Just like springs are connected to jumping, doctrine has to be connected to practice. Why do you think Jesus told us so many stories rather than giving us lots of concise doctrinal statements? It was to ensure that belief was connected to life. Stories have a way of impacting the whole person. Therefore, to communicate God's forgiveness he didn't give us a doctrinal formula, he told a highly emotional story about a runaway son returning to his father. This is not to say that concise doctrinal statements are not useful – they are. But they have to be placed in context to ensure they remain connected.
Healthy youth work
Hopefully, by now you have got a good grasp of this trampoline illustration. There are many other parallels you could make between doctrine and springs and the Christian faith and a trampoline. But I'll leave that for you to think about. Let me finish by asking a question:-
In your youth work are you jumping without springs or are you learning about springs but not jumping?
Both are problematic, a balanced approach is required to ensure that your doctrine is dynamic and your Christian faith is effective.
Read the book!
I hope this article has got you thinking. If you haven't read Velvet Elvis I suggest you do! I doubt you'll agree with everything Rob Bell says, but it will get you thinking and cause you to ask questions. Reading it revitalised my faith and helped me root my theology in the realities of everyday life.
Phil Green.
Article originally published on the Evangelical Alliance's *essential website.
