Threads from Henry's Web

Tag: biblical

  • Suicide Recovery at Church

    Suicide Recovery at Church

    This video is my interview with Dr. Veronica Sites, author of the newly released book Love Me to Life: Suicide Recovery at Church. I was particularly pleased both to publish this book and to do this interview because suicide is often ignored or swept under the rug in the church. This results in harm to just about everyone, those who contemplate suicide, those who survive it, family, and friends.

    Veronica takes this issue head-on and discusses it seriously. There are many practical points in the interview, pointing to even more practical materials in the book. I think any pastor or church leader would benefit from a serious study of this. Don’t be caught off guard!

    Do you know where you can refer someone who is contemplating suicide? Do you know how to listen? Are you going to add condemnation to the burdens that person is already bearing?

    Love Me to Life will help you respond faithfully and positively to those who are very much in need.

  • Biblical vs. Unbiblical

    Morgan Guyton has a very strong (and, in my view, entirely justified) reaction to the abuse of the term “biblical.”

    … In how many other “Bible” churches out there has “Biblical” become a code-word for an ideological platform that serves a purpose completely foreign to God’s mission but cherry-picks verses out of the Biblical text to justify itself?

    Good question! (Of course, his question follows an example.)

    Nonetheless I want to sound another warning: Let’s watch out about the abuse of the word “unbiblical” as well.

    Declaring something unbiblical also requires a view on what the Bible does and does not require, but instead of declaring a particular view in bounds, it declares it out of bounds. It can be abused in the same way. The word “biblical” is a positive adjective which tends to lead people to accept a statement, even if it has no biblical warrant. “Unbiblical” is a negative adjective (in most churches) which tends to make people reject an idea, even without biblical warrant.

    So am I saying one can never use the adjective “biblical?” No. What I am suggesting is that many of us use it, and its opposite, too much. We use it as a sort of shorthand for “you ought to believe this” (or not), rather than as a statement backed by the appropriate study and research.

    Instead, I suggest that we skip the adjective and do the work. If you provide a sound backing from the Bible, appropriately interpreted, for what you say, others can apply the adjective “biblical” to it. If not, well, not so much!