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So this morning our pastor preached again on Ruth, and brought up the concept of a “DTR” between Ruth and Boaz. When he said this, my wife started nodding her head in recognition, which usually means that I’m completely clueless on whatever’s being preached on. In this case, this was absolutely true. DTR stands for [...]
I recently read this post on another blog about mixed martial arts groups forming at church. And as usual people some people have an (albeit mild) problem with this. Generally you can state the problem as this: “oh sure, that’s a gathering…but it’s not a Christian gathering”. It bothers me to see this constant distinction [...]
Tim Challies has a post today that talks about iPods, Twitter, Facebook, etc. It mirrors some of Anne’s assertions from a few weeks ago: But the wise observer might ask, if I have 1600 friends, why am I so lonely? Shouldn’t at least one of those 1600 friends be available when I need help painting [...]
Here’s a great post from Albert Mohler. It’s encouraging to see this kind of thing from a leader of Southern Baptists. In particular, here is the best part: Twitter has changed my prayer life. More than any development in years, Twitter helps me to know what is going on in the lives of many friends [...]
Some posts out there in the blog world about Twittering in church: Should We Use Twitter During Church? John Piper’s take. An article from Christianity today. To me, this is pretty simple. Twittering is sometimes like talking, and sometimes like taking notes. You can tell if twittering is appropriate if it’s appropriate in any of [...]
In church today the teaching was about Baptism and Communion, and a good deal of the sermon spoke about differences in experience and why our church believes what it believes. I got to thinking about what I have learned in the last year or so as we left our home church to see what’s “out [...]
(heh, if you read that…it sounds like “moron facebook”.) More interesting stuff from Anne regarding Facebook, Twitter, and in the general online experience. I like Anne’s site because we both seem to have spent alot of time thinking through entirely different things about the same subject. She is processing what these online communities mean and [...]
My ‘official’ job and career is CTO of a financial institution….so I’m always studying how people use technology. Here’s a great article by a friend of mine on technology (in this case, databases) in the church. I thought I’d add a couple tidbits to Eugene’s very insightful analysis of databases. First, a good technology solution [...]
Anyone who’s read this site knows about my thoughts regarding culture vs. doctrine. That is, there is a substantial chunk of “doctrine” in our churches that is not sourced in the Bible at all. Rather it is sourced in western/democratized/capitalistic/industrialized concepts that have come to be synonymous with “church” and “being a Christian”. It’s hard [...]
Interesting…in Germany they want to (by law) give routine churchgoers/tithers preference in Christmas services attendance. Apparently, those churches can get pretty crowded and it’s pretty inconvenient. This is like one of those worksheets my kids get at restaurants. “How many things can you find wrong with this picture?” Where do you start? Of course what’s [...]
We were at HSBC over the weekend to see Praise 150, which was a really great time. It was great to hear such well-executed music performed in demonstration of God’s glory. We got to catch up with many folks we haven’t talked to in awhile. They were wondering where we’ve been…so since I know some [...]
Everyone should be involved in a church plant at least once. We’ve been involved in two, and the second has proven to be exceptionally inspiring. The problem is that needs change as a church grows, but more importantly resources change. And resources are what usually get us in trouble. I’ve heard two things in large [...]
The good news is that Michael Guglielmucci, the guy who had cancer and wrote “Healer,” is not sick. The bad news is, he never was sick. It’s not a miracle. He’s a fake. I don’t understand people who fake cancer. One, it’s a terrible thing to do in light of the fact that there are [...]
One thing I’m learning from these churches is that you really don’t know about a church until you set foot in the door. You can see things on TV, read websites, hear rumors, listen to criticism, and generally find out all sorts of things. But you really never know until you’re there. You don’t see [...]
Our fam visited Christian Life Church over the weekend, on the invitation from a friend. To put it in my daughter’s words, these folks are very enthusiastic. This enthusiasm included how they treated visitors. Everyone was extremely friendly, and we found total strangers answering our questions and giving us directions. The pastor’s wife, Gayla, noticed [...]
I’ve written about this before, but I love the Farmville Baptist blog. In the last year I’ve read hundreds and hundreds of church blogs Christian bloggers. This one has stuck in my reader. I’ve never been to this church, so all I know about it is via the web. When visiting a church, I am [...]
Here’s a great example of the Fundamentalist’s fundamental error: that of adding cultural tradition to the canon..then freakin’ out with Biblical authority about everyone who doesn’t do things their way. Check out this article on the “Gospel of Accomodation”. This is an excellent example of what I’m talking about. Look at the examples that David [...]
No, this isn’t the title of a new, trendy youth service. This is my prediction of where things are going in regard to churches and ministries if the world energy situation re-aligns (which I think it is doing right now). In the future, I think groups of Christians will meet in a more distributed, local [...]
Amazing. Check out manual on sabatoge from the O.S.S.. (The O.S.S. eventually became the CIA). Read the handy tips on page 28 or so. Remember that these are things they recommended to destroy and organization’s effectiveness. (11) General Interference with Organisations and Production (a) Organizations and Conferences (1) Insist on doing everything through “channels.” Never [...]
It would be easy to be critical of the more traditional and historical Christian denominations. Say…the one I grew up in who seems to be too busy contemplating its navel to realize that for the first time ever it’s not growing. And further, the implications of that lack of growth. But I won’t do that [...]
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