Towards Understanding of the Practice of Proclamation: The Core Element of Russian Baptist Worship, Timofey Cheprasov, 2015

ceiving the Church as an agent dealing with matters of spirituality, thus being immune to the issues of powers, which are seen relevant to such areas as politics or economic.” Stassen makes an important observation regarding this problem of dualism as he addresses the question of Christ and Culture, The result is an extensive dualism, a compartmentalizing, in which we are blinded to the social dimensions of the spiritual realm and the spiritual forces in societal matters. Furthermore... Christ has tended to be relegated to the realm of inner spirituality, and culture is thought of as something social and ° Ibid., pp 146-147. 6° See also Douglas Harrink, Paul Among the Postliberals: Pauline Theology Beyond Christendom and Modernity (Grand Rapids, Brazos, 2003), pp 118-119. ° Yoder, Politics of Jesus, pp 150-151. ® Glen H. Stassen, “A New Vision,” in Stassen, Yeager and Yoder, Authentic Transformation, p 214. 179 external. The result is a powerless Christ, and a blindness to how culture powerfully shapes the inner lives of persons and churches.°° Throughout history, there are many examples when the Church failed to fulfil its task of freeing persons ‘for authentic struggle by replacing toxic ideas and images 764 Churches through the vision of a counter-reality capable of improving their lives. were guilty of genocides, of apartheid, of promoting slavery — of embodying the evil structures that Christ came to defeat. Therefore, one of the most important tasks for the church is to continue to identify the fallen powers and to engage them (not allowing any complacency), whether they are outside of the church or right at the centre of its convictions and practices, which is a revisionist theological task.” This discussion of the concept of power once again brings out an important conclusion, whilst continuing to witness to the world about redemptive power of Christ, being His prophetic voice, the Church must be aware of the dangers of her practices and teaching turning into one of those self-glorifying powers that Christ defeated on the cross. In the next step | am going to turn to the concept of powerful practice, which combines Mclintyre’s concept of constructive practice that results in virtues with the notion of fallen powers. Powerful practices Macintyre maintains a very positive view of practices — they are concerned with the goods internal, they result in virtues — in other words they produce good results. However, he leaves a cautious note: there is a difference between “practices” and “institutions.” For him, institutions are concerned with external goods. ‘They are involved in acquiring money and other material goods; they are structured in terms of power and status, and they distribute money, power and status as rewards,’ in order to sustain themselves and 766 practices ‘of which they are the bearers.’”” Institutions are an evil, though a necessary one, °3 Stasse