Leadership Structures in the Bible
April 3rd 2008
Two articles on Biblical leadership teaching, both (in spite of their names) focused primarily on leadership structures::
Archive for the ‘Church’ Category
Planning and Goals: Is There Room for the Holy Spirit? An Introduction | www.markdroberts.com
March 6th 2008
Mark D. Roberts begins a series on planning and goal-setting in Christian ministries:
Can we make plans and formulate goals and still leave room for the Holy Spirit?
Should churches and other Christian organizations have formalized processes for clarifying vision and setting goals?
Can the Spirit of God speak to us in the midst of a goal-setting process? If so, how?
What can we do to let God guide our strategic planning processes?
[From Planning and Goals: Is There Room for the Holy Spirit? An Introduction | www.markdroberts.com]
Golden Compass - Golden Opportunity
December 14th 2007
So the next time you hear an earth-shattering announcement about Jesus from the media, don’t get angry. Rather, take three deep breaths, sit down with your Starbucks coffee, and watch how the announcement is treated on blogs and other media. Above all, prepare yourself for the opportunities it presents.
That was how Darrell Bock closed his article in Christianity Today on popular media challenges to Christianity. He’s right on the money. Last night I completed the second of two book discussions based on The Golden Compass. The turnout was small, but I believe there was groundwork laid for growth. The people who came–especially library directors–are people who can encourage others to come.
At any rate, it showed me how these challenges can really be opportunities. Do you desire to share your faith? Do you want others to know more about Jesus Christ? What’s the hardest part about that, usually? It’s getting started, raising the topic. They’re raising the topic for us!
Thank God for that, and take advantage of the opportunities.
Keith Plummer has further insight on this.
Technorati Tags: Books, Message, Darrell Bock, Media
Not Another!
December 9th 2007
2 Shootings in Colorado at Christian Sites - New York Times:
A gunman killed two people at a training center dormitory for young Christian missionaries early Sunday after being told he couldn’t spend the night, and hours later four people were shot outside a church in Colorado Springs.
It was not immediately known whether the shootings, about 65 miles apart, were related.
Technorati Tags: Persecution
Historic split for U.S. Episcopals - Yahoo! News
December 8th 2007
Historic split for U.S. Episcopals - Yahoo! News:
An entire California diocese of the U.S. Episcopal Church voted to secede on Saturday in a historic split following years of disagreement over the church’s expanding support for gay and women’s rights.
This group actually switched affiliations to the conservative Anglican Church of the Southern Cone, based in South America. They didn’t go off on their own. Still this disunifying of the U.S. Episcopal Church is tragic, but it’s hard to see how these splits can be avoided while the main decision-makers of the church continue to move in unbiblical directions.
Unexpected Global Lessons
December 4th 2007
How Short-Term Missions is Becoming a Two-Way Street
If you define “mission” as crossing cultural boundaries for the sake of the gospel, the global church is engaged in mission on a scale that would have been unimaginable to previous Christian generations.
Yet…
Perhaps this is one thing we need to learn, and unlearn: Even the shortest cross-cultural mission trip is fraught with opportunities for God to make himself known—and with the real potential that we will unwittingly misrepresent him.
Technorati Tags: church growth, missions
Barna’s 2007 Year in Review
December 3rd 2007
A New Bearing on “The Golden Compass”
November 24th 2007
Yesterday morning, before the parades and the food, I finally finished the trilogy His Dark Materials. I guess that means it’s time for me to Pronounce my Judgment on the series, which includes the book at the basis of the controversial Golden Compass movie. But I’m not going to do that. I’ve stated my opinions along the way, and I’ve already linked to two excellent overall analyses by Jeffrey Overstreet and Mars Hill Audio. What I’d like to do instead is to show some major points of agreement Biblical Christianity has with Phillip Pullman’s vision. There will be some surprises here.
Technorati Tags: Books, Golden Compass, His Dark Materials
Yes, Ministry Leadership Is Complex | LeadershipJournal.net
November 20th 2007
Yes, Ministry Leadership Is Complex
Technorati Tags: Christian Growth, church growth, Leadership, Methods
unChristian?
October 21st 2007
Book Review
I’ve lost several hours of sleep over David Kinnaman’s and Gabe Lyons’s book, unChristian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity And Why It Matters. James Emery White, in his Serious Times email newsletter, said* in response to this book, “Christianity has an image problem.” With all due respect to Mr. White, one of the authors I most respect, I disagree. Christianity has a reality problem. The problem is shallow discipleship, and the rest of the world sees it for what it is. It’s a disturbing picture.
Technorati Tags: America, Barna, church growth, Methods, Research