Blogging Systematic Theology - A New Adventure

I was having an email conversation with Michael Patton (you can check him out at his blog here) regarding the conflict that often occurs between Armenians and Calvinists. In my estimation, he made some very wise statements (which you can read here) and I sent him an email thanking him for his post. In that email, I told him about a plan that I had to start a conversation involving systematic theology from an Armenian/Wesleyan perspective here at Radically Altered and invited him into the conversation.

Well, I have waited to do this long enough. This blog post is my invitation to you to join in the conversation.

Here is the plan:

1) every week I will put up a post that shares with you a portion of my credo from systematic theology. I will put it up unaltered from the way in which it was submitted with one exception---because some portions of the credo are longer than others (the portion on the Character and Nature of God vs. Prolegomena, for example), some portions of the credo will be broken into several submissions over several weeks.

2) after the initial posting, I will do reflection postings involving the content of the original post. I am doing this because we were limited in how much we could write in the actual credo we turned in in seminary...but experience has shown me that there is much more to say in many of the areas that the credo addresses. These reflective postings give me the opportunity to expound upon what was originally written...taking into account other things I have studied since that original writing, and things that you all will be sharing in the comments.

3) I will reserve the right to extend an existing conversation over posting a new segment at the beginning of the week if the conversation is still moving along in a healthy manner.

4) Your part in this is to share your thoughts and ideas in the comments section of each post. This is where everyone (myself included) has the opportunity to see varying perspectives and grow in the continual development of our own.

Why am I doing this, you might ask...well, quite frankly we share a rich Christian heritage and sometimes we simply forget about the things we have in common in light of all of the differences that we choose to debate. My hopes is that there will be some connection to one another as brothers and sisters in Christ regardless of our denominational or theological affiliations. Also, I love to learn. I am hoping that in sharing our comments and own conclusions with one another, that we can each grow in the process. I am not out to convert anyone to my way of thinking...and I am not seeking to be converted. Instead, experience has shown me that authentic dialog with integrity grows us as iron sharpens iron. I have left similar conversations in the past, not converted to a new way of thinking, but with a better understanding of why I believe the way that I do to begin with.

With that said, I need to lay out a few ground rules:

1) I am going to leave comment moderation off to begin with...please do not abuse this fact...I keep a very close eye on my blog...if things get out of hand, I will immediately institute comment moderation.

2) Do not pick fights or call people out. If you do, you will be blocked from further interaction.

3) Please note that this does not mean that we have to all agree---I expect that many of us will not. This is simply an expectation that we can have dialog with integrity and in an adult manner. At the end of the day, we can agree to disagree.

That's it. It is really simple. I look forward to our discussions and to growing from the interaction.

I will get the first post up by tomorrow evening.