The 30 Commandments of the Emergent Church

Greetings ladies and gentlemen!

My name is Dr. Heresies Maximus and I’m a leader here in the Emergent Church. It’s great to have you all with us today.

Thanks so much for taking the time to form part of this mega hip intensive course on ‘How to Plant an Emergent Church’. If you wanna pass this first part of the module, brothers and sisters, you’ve gotta learn our 30 Emergent Commandments off by heart and impose them on the new churches you plant.

Sound good? First thing tomorrow I’ll be setting you an exam on the list.

So, you guys all ready? Here are our most sacred Commandments...

1. Being cool, relevant, well-dressed and having your hair well-combed shall be more important than being biblical.


2. Experience shall always be more important than doctrine.


3. Spirituality shall always be more important than truth.


4. Numbers shall be more important than theology.


5. Theology, truth and doctrine shall be unto you as fundamentalist cuss words.


6. Music shall be more important than preaching.


7. Dialogue shall be more important than preaching.


8. Preaching about your experiences, testimonies, personal opinions, jokes and visual images shall be more important than expounding the Word of God.


9. Music shall depend more upon rhythm than on the content of the words.


10. The volume of the music shall be more important than the congregation’s voice.


11. Multi-coloured lights shall be more important than solemnity in worship.


12. God shall be more chummy than King.


13. Jesus shall be more boyfriendishy than Lord.


14. The Spirit shall be more butterflyishy than holy, holy, holy.


15. Holy, Lord and King shall be unto you as fundamentalist cuss words.


16. Living in holiness shall be considered as legalism.


17. You shall replace the word ‘sin’ with ‘ethical question’.


18. Secular ethics shall be more important than biblical holiness.


19. Preachers shall be more interested in socio-political justice than in the salvation and sanctification of souls.


20. You shall openly mock anyone who professes faith in the plenary inspiration of Scripture, esteeming such a person as a brainless and dim-witted fundamentalist.


21. You shall preach upon heaven but not upon hell.


22. You shall offend no one, unless that person is a brainless and dim-witted fundamentalist.


23. The world shall be your friend not your enemy.


24. You shall accept and embrace all world religions in the name of divine love.


25. You shall never define love biblically but according to the whims of your heart.


26. You shall never speak against abortion or divorce! Do not so much as utter one word against homosexuality!


27. Laughter shall be more important than reverence.


28. Subjective Bible interpretation shall be more important than what the text really says.


29. You shall mention none of the hard words recorded in Scripture.


30. You shall suck up to every fat cat you come across (whether he/ she be a believer or an unbeliever). Fat cats mean money, success and influence.

If you follow hard after these 30 Emergent Commandments, my dear friends, I assure you that you will gain the whole world and all will speak well of you, just as they do of me.

Look at me. Now I am a friend of the great politicians and business people on a national scale. I never used to be anybody. I was a full-scale no body! So follow our list of specially crafted Commandments. Thus your churches will be full to the brim and you will know of a surety that the Lord is with you. After all, wherever we come across numbers, pounding music and multi-coloured lights, there is the presence of our precious heavenly Daddy. Am I right? Or am I right?

Ok. It’s time to go. I’ll see you here tomorrow for the exam.

Dream big things because you are so unimaginably important and valuable for God!

See you!