Sam Storms has written a multi-part review of Don Carson’s recent book on the Emergent Church, very much agreeing with the concerns that Carson expresses in the book. Storm’s site is becoming a very useful resource with new articles being added regularly. And as a fellow reformed charismatic, I find myself agreeing with the majority of his writings.

I feel like I ought to do a bit more background research on the Emergent Movement before I head off to this year’s New Wine. The last two years they had alternative meetings for the 20s-30s called “Em Gen” (Emerging Generation) and last year “Em Church”. Personally I found them a bit trendy for my liking and mainly attended the meetings with the oldies. I don’t know whether the “Emergent” part of the name is emergent with a capital E or not, but this year I hope to find out.

If you’re wondering what the meetings were like, the worship was partly contemporary rock with some liturgical elements, but also had some more DJ style electronic music with video backdrops of candles and stuff. There were lots of tables round the edges where you could sit and observe the worship while you eat cakes and drink tea (which I confess to doing both times I went). The only sermon I heard there was from Amy Orr-Ewing of the Zacc trust who last I knew were anything but postmodern in their approach (in fact are quite likely to run seminars explaining postmodernism and critiquing it).

Back on the subject of Don Carson’s book, I’ll balance out Storm’s review with one here by someone from the London School of Theology who really didn’t like it. He reviews one of McLaren’s books first, and as you will see from the opening paragraph, is clearly a convert.