New Methodist Blogs Weekly Roundup
Allan Bevere has posted the first edition of his new Methodist Blogs Weekly Roundup, numbered #93 in succession from Locusts and Honey. Check it out!
Denominational vs Non-Denominational
My wife and I have had several discussions recently about apportionments in the United Methodist Church. For those of you who are not Methodist, apportionments are funds paid by the local church to their conference or other higher authority to support the work of the broader church. Many of these funds go to administrative functions…
The Most Wasted Piece of Architecture
As I was driving with my wife yesterday, I made a comment that had been bugging me all day. “You know,” I said, “A church sanctuary is the most wasted piece of architecture you’ll see on the landscape.” Now my wife knows not to go wild when I say things like that. She didn’t ask…
Reasons for Belief
It seems that this week’s MBWR has produced an excellent crop. Bruce Alderman, whose blog is also in the Moderate Christian Blog Aggregator, wrote a post titled Why I Believe. His approach is strongly but not exclusively experiential, and in many ways resonates with my own. It also ties in with the current book discussion…
Don’t Judge Discipleship by Numbers
This post is to call your attention to a post by Beth Quick, Mark Driscoll, Mainline Churches, and The Numbers Game (Hat tip: MBWR #82, with strong second to the Best of the Methodist blogosphere! note). I’m also closing the comments here so that any additional discussion will be centered around her blog. I want…
Free Speech, Gay Rights, and the Bible
I want to call attention to this post and to the story behind it. An evangelical Christian was arrested in south Wales and charged with using “threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour.” Ed Brayton said: I am obviously a staunch advocate of gay rights, but some of the people who claim to be on…
Squaring the Wesleyan Quadrilateral
One of the things that originally attracted me to the United Methodist Church was the quadrilateral, in the form in which it is presented in the discipline. Since becoming a member I have found out that most members of United Methodist congregations have no idea what this is, that some members use the quadrilateral to…
Working in your Call
And YHWH spoke to the fish, and it spit Jonah up on dry land. Then YHWH’s word came to Jonah a second time, saying, “Get up! Go to Nineveh! . . . ” — Jonah 2:11-3:2a I knew a man who almost got a law degree, but dropped out during the last year of law…
Unity, Diversity, and Confusion
Recently I wrote a couple of entries, first on diversity and liberalism, and then on the Together for the Gospel statement. The issues I discussed in those two posts raise quite a number of questions about truth, unity, and Christian fellowship. Many might decide from my comments thus far that I don’t care about truth…