The Church, Remembering and Hoping

Since it’s Friday and all of our minds are so full of energy, chew on this quote from Jürgen Moltmann’s book, The Church in the Power of the Spirit:

“In the light of the eschatological person of Christ, the church does not live from the past; it exists as a factor of present liberation, between remembrance of his history and hope of his kingdom. …It the eschatological orientation is lost, then remembrance decays into a powerless historical recollection of a founder at the beginning of things. The church can then itself take the place of hope, setting itself up as the prolongation of his former incarnation, and the aim of its growth as being his parousia. If, on the other hand, the christological remembrance is lost, then the church is filled by other hopes, visions and aims, taken over from non-Christian movements, or Pentecost pushes out Easter, and new experiences of the Spirit push out Christ” (p. 75).

Your thoughts? 3… 2… 1… Go!

One response to “The Church, Remembering and Hoping

  1. That is the truth. Why did everything focus on history like in depth studies of Paul’s missionary journeys? I must concur that the discussion of Pentecost occurred in at least three sermons in four while Easter and the resurrection was only mentioned once a year, never on Easter Sunday, except when the preacher told everyone they had to believe in the death, burial, and resurrection. I never remember Jesus’s name being mentioned. I guess that would have been too catholic.

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