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The public square organizations, by contrast, try to include people from all the major Evangelical streams: Pentecostal, Dispensationalist, Reformed, Wesleyan, Holiness, and so forth. As a result, the expectations of its members are less defined. Bock cites the ETS as an example: it doesn't have a doctrinal statement, as such, and was founded with a single item as its "doctrinal basis"—biblical inerrancy. Thus the ETS becomes a kind of public square—a Hyde Park-ish speakers' corner where people can differ on a wide variety of issues, as long as they bring primarily scriptural arguments to their debates.

The purposes of circles and squares differ: A denominational seminary is designed to train pastors to minister within a particular tradition. The ETS, by way of contrast, is designed to stimulate scholars professionally, to make them think more sharply and argue more biblically. Thus the extra latitude in a public-square organization.

Bock's circles-and-squares schema parallels, but does not equal, one proposed by Roger Olson in a Christianity Today article entitled "The Future of Evangelical Theology" (Feb. 9, 1998).  Olson wrote that "since at least the mid-1970s, [the evangelical] glue has been gradually losing its binding power." He deplored the combative nature of the same controversies Bock catalogs. Olson's article described evangelical traditionalists as envisioning the movement as a "bounded set." They "tend "to specify who is 'in' and who is 'out' of the community." And they think the only way "to avoid the slide into debilitating relativism and pluralism" is "to recognize firm boundaries."

The other group, which Olson called reformists, envision the movement as a "centered set." That is, the boundaries may be fuzzy, but the center to which evangelicals are bound is clear. That center, Olson wrote, includes "the unique inspiration of Scripture and salvation by Jesus Christ alone through God's grace alone." Olson advocated this clear-center-with-fuzzy boundary thinking as a step toward "a vibrant future."

Bock, too, is helping us think our way toward "a vibrant future." Like Olson, he deplores divisiveness. His "public-square" organizations resemble Olson's "centered-set" thinkers. Both men emphasize the role of the Holy Spirit in that vibrant future. Both are open to the periodic need to actually draw lines between those who are in and those who are out. Both advise a careful, slow, and deliberate process for evaluating "new light."

But here is the difference: Olson calls us to avoid slipping back into fundamentalist boundary-drawing for the sake of fellowship. Bock expresses similar concerns, but with a concern for mission. Wise leaders know that groups do not experience community by trying to achieve community. They experience community as they face challenges together and help each other meet crises. The social scientist's phrase for this is the principle of the superordinate goal.  

Thus, for all Bock's and Olson's appeals share, Bock's has, I think, a greater chance of cementing evangelical unity.

Bock's major call for joint theological effort is in the area of Jesus studies. Recent years have seen a rebirth of old-style skepticism mixed with new-fangled speculation about who Jesus was and what he taught and did. The media-savvy Jesus Seminar is the best known embodiment of this approach. When popular TV programs, such as a Peter Jennings special on Jesus, began spreading this highly speculative scholarship, more traditional scholars were not positioned to respond. Bock thinks this is a travesty. And while he doesn't blame intra-evangelical squabbling for the unpreparedness of New Testament scholars, he does think that at this point in history, they should be focusing their energies on helping an unsuspecting public regain their confidence in the Gospel-writers's accounts of Jesus of Nazareth.

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February 2003, Vol. 47, No. 2