Theological Art of Talking to Ourselves

Written by: Warren Wiersbe

Theologians who practice their theology too far from the common haunts of workaday laymen soon acquire the habit of talking to themselves. Seminary in-house conversation is thought of as scholarly, but it follows a line that the peasant-carpenter Son of God would never have used. To assist those who may suspect themselves of having fallen into the trap of talking to themselves, let us parallel the words of Christ with that elitist tongue known as Seminaryese:

Jesus: I am the light of the world.
Autolalia: Christ is the pneumatic enlightenment of our existential arena.

Jesus: I am the vine, ye are the branches.
Autolalia: The incarnational event is the trunk of faith relationships.

Jesus: A city that is set on a hill cannot be hid.
Autolalia: Urbanization at certain altitudes cannot prohibit its own self-disclosure.

Jesus: I am He.
Autolalia: My Messiahship is volitionally revealed.

Jesus: Go ye into all the world.
Autolalia: Your disjunctive sociology must dissolve into a cross-cultural matrix.

Jesus: I go to the Father.
Autolalia: My transcendence will shortly be absorbed into the ground of all being.

Jesus: If I go away I will come again.
Autolaia: Ascension is but the preface of eschatological event.

Jesus: Who will cast the first stone?
Autolalia: Whose projectiles will be preliminary?

Jesus: Ye must be born again.
Autolalia: It’s umbilically urgent that you pass the birth canal of transcendence.

Jesus: Behold, I come quickly.
Autolalia: Immanence is characteristic of this post-Pannenberg event.

©WWW. Used by permission.

2ProphetU

2ProphetU is an online magazine/website, started by Warren Wiersbe and Michael Catt, to build up the church, seek revival, and encourage pastors.