Chris… Perhaps you are right. A similar comparison may be made between the paradigm of Starbucks and corporate America versus that of Emmerging Church and traditional evangelicalism. The efforts of Starbucks to do something revolutionary, relational and relevant become swallowed up by their success. Thus they become the corporate america they were pushing against.

The difference with the church is that she(we) often reverse engineer success (ever since the days of finney). Thus it is more likely that the mainstream evangelicalism borrows ideas and theological developments from the emmerging communities rather then these emmerging communities developing and morphing back to broader evangelicalism.. or even growing to a size where traditional church structures and formalities are needed. Concerning the borrowing of ideas, we are already seeing this phenomina in Dallas where several large churches are owning missional and emmergent elements as core values.

Whatever she wears, may she remain faithful.