Scaffolding: A Metaphor For Doing Theology

Or, how not to be a jerk when making theological critiques

Scaffolding along Park Avenue | Photo by Clay LeConey on Unsplash

I love New York City. My family and I live within an hour of Manhattan and take every opportunity to spend time in the five boroughs whether to visit family and friends, or taking our daughters to some of our favorite spots. (“Train up a child,” as they say!) One thing you will always see in the city (because it is THE city for those who live here), is building construction. There are always building projects, renovations and restorations at work. It is almost as if there is an unspoken promise between the buildings and the city’s inhabitants that there will always be scaffolding.

In reality, it is the vastness and scale of the city which require a constant process of build, rebuild, restore and replace. With so many neighborhoods, ever changing in their contexts, there will always be scaffolding somewhere. Once a building or neighborhood has been adequately attended to a new building or neighborhood must be fixed.

To facilitate these projects, scaffolding provides the framework for thinking about the building and attending to it’s structure in an appropriate manner. Scaffolding can also offer itself as a helpful metaphor for understanding how to do theology well. Any metaphor can be pressed to its breaking point so be patient with me as I attempt to tease this out a bit without breaking it too much.

A framework for thinking about God

Good scaffolding serves a very specific purpose. It surrounds the building so the building can be attended to. It gives workers the means to move side to side, up and down the structure’s edifice in order to give each space the appropriate attention. This means, 1) that the scaffolding is not the building. And 2) The scaffolding sometimes needs to be adjusted in order to better attend to the building itself.

Good theology works in similar ways.

First, theology is a framework, not the thing itself. This almost should go without saying, but alas, too often theology has become the god we worship instead of the language and framework that gives us the ability to move side to side, up and down and around our understanding of God. Theology, like scaffolding is not God, but rather, it gives us the means to speak and think well about God. All language is limited, therefore we do our best to use language to rightly speak of God while understanding that all language pales in comparison to God.

This means…

Second, theology adjusts to God, not the other way around. Because theology is not the thing itself, we will need to be willing to concede our theological framework and language (or at least parts of it) at times when it is not serving God. Just like scaffolding that may be too far away from the structure, or be unsafe for workers to navigate around, theological scaffolding must be adjusted to serve God.¹

Unfortunately, I’ve been in one too many rooms with people who were, shall we say, theologically arrogant; pressing a theological agenda based on preferred language that may not be helpful or a “this is how we’ve always done it” kind of attitude. (I’ve even been in spaces where I fundamentally agree with what is being said, but the way they got there has created some dangerous ‘scaffolding’ for those who may walk on it later).

Theology is a big undertaking! It is a lot of work and the ‘edifice’ with which we are working will never be fully known or understood until Christ returns (and perhaps not even then!). That should encourage some humility especially when others agree it might be time to adjust some of the planks we’ve grown accustomed to walking on.

Shifting Scaffolding: Two Examples

Two historic examples might be helpful to illustrate what I’m describing.

The early church adjusts the scaffolding

The early church’s theology regarding whether Gentiles could be included in the family of God, created a number of arguments in the first century. In Acts 15, there was on the ground evidence of Gentile reception of the Holy Spirit, yet it seemed unfathomable that this could happen, especially, and here is the kicker, because the Gentiles were not honoring the food purity laws, among other things.

The theological issue at stake, really did not have to do with the people, the Gentiles, as much as it had to do with the Jewish theology around the application of food laws. This required the early church to adjust their understanding of what God was doing through those food laws. They landed on the decision to advise non-Jewish believers to abstain from food that had been sacrificed to idols. In a recent piece critiquing a new academic book, one of my teachers at Northern Seminary, Beth Felker-Jones, makes this point when she says, “Perhaps it is not food laws that are essential, but instead it is whatever identity markers speak to the renunciation of idolatry.”

Applying the scaffolding metaphor, the early church’s vast work of understanding God and God’s world, required adjustment at this point. “Ah, we see!” says the early church, “It is not the food itself but the idolatry associated with it that is the issue here!” Thus, the scaffolding is adjusted to better attend to the truth of who God is and what God’s desires are for creation.

Arius’ misplaced scaffolding

Another historic example, which speaks directly of God’s self, is the church’s struggle to create the language we know as the Trinity, and in particular the relationship between Jesus and the Father. Of course in places like John 14 Jesus’ own explanation that he is “in the Father and the Father is in [him]” (v. 11), become helpful to the church in their understanding of who God is. But it was through variously pieces of misplaced scaffolding that the unity between Father and Son became crystalized.²

When Arius, a leader in the church in Alexandria was trying to explain Jesus’ relationship to the Father, he began describing the Son as the first created being who then created everything else. Arius was attempting to be faithful to scripture like John 1 which described the Word as there in the beginning who created everything, while also trying to be faithful to Jesus’ submission to the Father as described throughout the Gospels accounts.

To again follow the metaphor, Arius was building scaffolding around who God is that was based on some accurate information: 1) Jesus submitted to the Father. 2) Jesus (the Word) created all things at the beginning. Arius assumed from this that Jesus must be lower than the Father since he submitted to the Father and thus surmised that the Word, Jesus, was the first created being who then created all things.

The problem quickly emerged, however, that if one were to worship Jesus alongside God then the Christian faith might have two gods! If these beings are not co-eternal, co-equal, and “of the same substance,”³ then, we have an idolatrous mess on our hands!

The adjustment to the scaffolding came in reaffirming Jesus, the Word’s, co-equal, co-eternal, and “same substance” status with the Father. But also created a helpful category to describe Jesus as the one who, while fully God, submitted to the Father in His human nature.

While these ways of speaking about theology are delicate and precise, they put us on firm scaffolding with which to continue to speak, think and worship well towards God.

Scaffolding ‘Tunnel’ | Photo by Michael Walter on Unsplash

The vastness of theology and community

Implicit in what I just described is that theology is not only vast but also communal. We are not working on these understandings and structures alone. Christian theology has been an undertaking in process for 2,000 years by many faithful Christians.

We stand on the foundations of so many brilliant women and men who have gone before us and all stand upon the foundation of Jesus Christ Himself. Thus, when we consider that our contributions are for but for a moment in history, it should help give us perspective on our role in this grand work we call Christian Theology.

We may need to move the framework provided by a previous generation or century to better attend to Godself. Or perhaps the way in which theologians needed to move about the ‘edifice’ in one generation is not the way that we need to move about it now.

This kind of humility allows us to enjoy God and not become “grumpy theology jerks” (I’m trademarking that!) who miss out on the joy of who God is as we seek to understand and know God better.

Enjoying the Skyline

I always enjoy walking around New York City, even with the scaffolding. That isn’t going away. The work will never be done because the city is vast. Theology, and God for that matter, is vast! It is foolish of me to think it will ever be “figured out.” We are often tempted into fortifying ourselves in theological towers believing the work to be done. But we must remember how vast and nuanced this work is so we can humbly approach the subject.

This way of understanding theology has helped me (slowly) develop a gracious approach to critiquing theological perspectives that differ from my own. To ask questions, and seek to understand why something exists in the first place before ripping it apart! (I tend to be overconfident, love a good argument, and love to win, so I especially need to get good at gracious theological critique!!)

Contradicting other theologians, I'm learning, is not primarily a work of "gotcha" or "rebuke" but rather a constant communal adjustment of the theological scaffolding that helps us think well about God. One theologian begins to place scaffolding that is very helpful, perhaps adding shape to what we had not been able to articulate previously. Yet in their helpful additions, they added a few pieces of scaffolding that are not needed, or they built upon other pieces which need to be removed, or reworked. Theology is a constant conversation of the church to say "Yes, And..." instead of "Yes, But..."

Scaffolding, like theology, is not the thing itself, but a way for us to move around what is actually important. A way for us to get up to the heights of God with mere human words, but not a replacement for Godself. When we pastors and church leaders can embrace good theology in the way in which I describe here, I believe we will not only do better work, but more gracious careful work in the process. Less lives will be lost as we navigate the heights and complexities of this breathtaking work. And we will be able to see glimpses of the beautiful God who loves us as we enjoy the skyline.

1. Another way of saying this is that God does not change but our understanding of God does.

2. It is important to remember that heresy is committed by people attempting to be faithful to Christianity, not trying to co-opt it. This means we are trying to do our best to think faithfully about who God is, but we’ve missed slightly. This is why it is important to do theology in community! A great book that has helped me understand heresy in this way is “Heresies and How to Avoid Them” Edited by Ben Quash and Michael Ward.

3. The idea, “of the same substance,” comes from the Greek word homoousia which was used as a way of describing Jesus and the Father both as the same God but different persons.