Yesterday I posted one of my short stories over on my Jevlir blog. For those who don’t read that blog (its readership is quite low), I wanted to write a couple of notes here. Many churches think they’ll find the solution to the problem of declining membership or financial problems by hiring just the right…
… at Beyond Belief.
At today’s church service there was something I wish I had caught on camera. I’m not really quick, even though I have a reasonably good camera in my cell phone. Our pastor, Geoffrey Lentz, was preaching the final sermon of his Summer in the Psalms series, this time from Psalm 150. He talked about exuberant…
… at Thinking in Christ. Find out about such diverse topics as Rowling’s ethics of magic and dating the synoptic gospels.
If you’re expecting me to do a rundown on the definitions of all of these terms, then you’ll be disappointed. There’s plenty of writing trying to define the terms. Jeremy Pierce wrote the key post discussing “dominionismism,” titled simply Dominionismists. In it, he compares those who are concerned about dominionism with Birthers and Truthers. On…
I’ve written a bit about this before, but it’s hardly my main area of expertise. Philip J. Long has written a very nice introductory series on the New Perspective on Paul. Here are the links: Basics of the New Perspective – An Introduction What Was the Old Perspective? Judaism as a Religion of Grace Was…
When I first started attending a United Methodist church, and the leadership figured out what my background was, I was soon invited to teach various classes around the church. I was fairly pleased with this, as I love to talkteach, and it gave me plenty of opportunities. My approach was to search for ever newer…
One of the great benefits of owning a publishing company is that there are always a number of smart people who will answer my e-mails. Thus, when I saw the brouhaha about Michael Patton’s post calling ‘Roman Catholic scholarship’ an oxymoron, I remembered immediately that I have just contracted Dr. Robert LaRochelle to write a…
There have been any number of Christian leaders who have fallen recently, and while the publicity makes it appear that there are more and more, I suspect this isn’t anything new. One major reason for a failure in leadership is that we put too much trust in people. We give a pastor a great deal…
No, this isn’t a topic I know much about, but I know that many past readers of this blog are either in part-time ministry or are (or have) considered it. There’s still space in tonight’s Webinar, Part-Time Ministry Call: Disappointment or Opportunity, by Energion author Bob LaRochelle. He’s author of Part-Time Pastor, Full-Time Church (Pilgrim Press,…
