The Doctrine of Chubbhander

It feels like something is happening within Christianity right now. A groundswell of the dissatisfied within the Church is rising during our generation, a gathering of Christians eager to question and stretch our faith in order to save it and breathe life back into it. (Phyllis Tickle and others have labelled this “The Great Emergence” - It’s too early to tell if this name will catch on but, if it does, you heard it here first!) The most refreshing thing about this movement is that it feels ok to voice concerns about some aspects of Christianity which have been handed down to us but which don’t feel in sync with Jesus, who He was and what His priorities were. Where in previous generations questioners or doubters may have been labelled troublemakers or heretics, now there is room in many churches for people to be able to say,”I have problems with this. I don’t understand where this has come from. Does anyone else have problems with this? Let’s talk it through.”

Where I work, someone had passed a quick Mensa question around where you could make two words out of the letters A,C,D,E,I,I,I,L,T and S (this is my insurance in case you regret reading this article, at least you’ll have got a little game out of it).  While some were beavering away at trying to work out the answers, I got chatting to another guy about different types of people and how they react to games like this.  I was saying how I used to be totally OCD about such things (some might say idealistic) and how the old me couldn’t have gone to sleep that night until I had the answer but that I’d managed to kick that habit a few years ago so the new me can now look at it, not get the answer and, after a few moments, simply walk away from it.

He then told me a story of how he and a few mates from university regularly got together on Saturday mornings to do the Daily Mail Big Crossword.  They rarely got close to completing it but this one Saturday they were on a roll.  They were knocking out answers all round them, 100, 150, 199 clues answered and only one more to go!  By this point they were borderline delirious due to a heady mix of exhilaration, fatigue, caffeine, destiny and the fact that they all had to head off to other engagements pretty soon.  The final clue was “Held in suspense”, the answer was ten letters and they already had C——HAN-ER.  They could taste victory, immortality waited for them on the other side of this final answer but it just wasn’t coming.  Finally, an epiphany came to one of them as he proudly announced, “I’ve got it!  It’s Chubbhander”.

Chubbhander?  They all looked at each other, wanting to believe.  The letters all fitted in perfectly, it sounded great and rolled off the tongue like a dream but they just didn’t know what it was.  Chubbhander, chubbhander, chubbhander… the more they said it, the more it existed.  But what was it?  After much intense deliberation, they agreed that it was some type of a bridge, which answered the clue exactly.  They weren’t 100% sure but one of them agreed to go check his Encyclopaedia Britannica when he got home (this was in the early 1990’s before you could Ask Jeeves stuff).  They all went home very satisfied.  They had finally conquered the Daily Mail Big Crossword after all those failed attempts.  But, as each of them went their separate ways, they knew, deep down within them, that Chubbhander just didn’t feel right.  It hung over them all weekend until they got their hands on the answers to Saturday’s crossword in Monday’s Daily Mail.  As they had suspected, they’d got it wrong.  “Held in suspense” was actually ........................ Cliffhanger!  The answer, the truth was cliffhanger but, due to those precise circumstances, the exhilaration, fatigue, caffeine, destiny and time pressure, they created the word Chubbhander instead of the truth.

Chubbhander was perfect for them for that moment in time.  It had exactly the right amount of letters, it fitted in with the letters they definitely knew were already there and it definitely sounded like a word even if they weren’t totally sure what it meant.  They were able to go home with their heads held high, knowing that the crossword had been conquered.  But Chubbhander wasn’t truth.  It had become their truth, but it wasn’t truth.

Immediately, it hit me.  I got a picture of what, on occasion, has happened in the Church for hundreds of years.  Some Christian ideas, behaviours, even doctrines were Chubbhanders!  They were close enough to the truth to initially appear truthful and they fitted a specific need at a specific time for a specific reason.  But they were Chubbhanders nonetheless.

Imagine if the crossword guys had not investigated further (no Chubbhandergate, as it were).  Imagine if they had continued to live their lives basking in the glory of Chubbhander.  Imagine how it might have escalated:

1st generation create the Doctrine of Chubbhander.  They are the Founding Fathers.
2nd generation are so proud of their fathers for founding Chubbhander that they preach it far and wide, to anyone who will listen.  They are the Sons of Chubbhander.
3rd generation gets properly thorough and intense about it.  This generation takes Chubbhander way beyond what the Founding Fathers had intended it to be.  What in the 1st generation was a specific answer for a specific scenario at a specific time has now become an eternal truth.  Chubbhander has always existed, it just hadn’t been revealed to us.  Belief in Chubbhander becomes a prerequisite for church membership.  Chubbhander Theological Seminaries sprout up worldwide.  Chubbhander has gone global.
4th generation doesn’t even know they believe in Chubbhander, it’s so woven into their religious DNA.  It’s not up for debate anymore: no Chubbhander = questionable faith.
But the sons and daughters of the 5th generation start to whisper to each other that Chubbhander doesn’t ring true to them or to the people of their generation.  There’s very sketchy evidence for it.  It feels like a word because you can say it and people have been saying 
it for generations but you can’t find it in the Bible at all.  They start to probe, start to question, look back to that 1st generation, see how the Doctrine of Chubbhander came into existence. They do a little digging. They discover the crossword clue, find the letters they knew were definitely right and it becomes clear to them that the truth was cliffhanger.  Chubbhander has been exposed and must go.  The 4th and 3rd generations are furious.  They have their Old Testament verses ready and will defend Chubbhander from their marauding children and grandchildren who have betrayed the historical Christian faith and the inerrant Word of God.

The Word of God is inerrant but some Christian ideas, behaviours and doctrines aren’t.  I think we are the generation who will and must put elements of our faith to the test.  If it is truth from God, it will survive the most rigorous of tests.  If it is Chubbhander, it will be exposed and it will collapse. 

With most Christians living in a bizarre little religious sub-culture where holiness comes from not cursing, not drinking and having the next Hillsong DVD pre-ordered, we have somehow managed to turn the compassionate and dangerous Church of Jesus into an anaemic private members club for the irrelevant.  And I think Chubbhanders have contributed enormously to this chasm between the world and the Church.

There is much work to be done if we want to turn the tide of opinion against the Church and I think a good start is to acknowledge our Chubbhanders and cut them loose.  Mine will have to go.  So will yours.  It might be exhausting and it may take some time but the more we strip away the Chubbhanders and the closer we get to living out basic core Kingdom principles, the more authentic and appealing our faith will be to the world.  And who wouldn’t want that?

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