January 2012
1 post
December 2011
1 post
4 tags
Top 10 Albums of 2011 →
My top ten albums of 2011.
November 2011
5 posts
6 tags
Gay Marriage: A Ministerial Conundrum (Part 1)
This question was recently asked on a friend’s Facebook feed in response to a video on gay marriage:
…I have some friends who are a happily and legally married gay couple. Though I am so encouraged by everyone’s comments about inviting homosexuals to church I have to ask, what would your opinions be about this specific situation if this couple came to your church? Would your...
9 tags
Joe Paterno, Riots, and the Gospel
I’ve been thinking a lot today about the riot in State College, PA last night after the firing of Coach Paterno. Honestly, I’m sad to see him go. I love college football and during my lifetime he has always been the coach at Penn State. It’s surreal to think of the Nittany Lions without Joe Pa on the sideline (or at least up in the booth). That being said the students at Penn...
6 tags
“If I ask how you know you’re right before God & your first words are...”
– David Platt at Secret Church
7 tags
“Love your wife not because of who she is but because of who Christ is.”
– David Platt @ Secret Church
“Do not fret because of evil men or be envious of those who do wrong; for like...”
– Psalm 37:1-3
October 2011
1 post
Sermon: God's Ultimate Purpose for Our Lives
Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of...
September 2011
1 post
I'll Never Forget Labor Day
The cords of death encompassed me; the torrents of destruction assailed me; the cords of Sheol entangled me; the snares of death confronted me.
In my distress I called upon the Lord; to my God I cried for help. From his temple he heard my voice, and my cry to him reached his ears.
Psalm 18:4-6
Labor Day has never meant very much to me, just another minor holiday that was a day off from...
August 2011
3 posts
A Movement in Morgantown?
Yesterday I had the opportunity to meet Scott, a church planter who recently moved to Morgantown. He and his team are planting Frontier Community Church. Is was great to meet a brother who’s passions and vision so closely match my own, but it was even greater to see what God is doing in Morgantown. If what Scott told me is true, the spirit is definitely moving in this place.
Scott told me that...
Superman, Demons, and Grant Morrison
Over the past week I’ve been reading Grant Morrison’s new book Supergods. I picked it up because I wanted to read his view on the history and philosophy of comics as well as get a glimpse into his creative process. I’ve continued to be engrossed by it because it may be the best look into the dark side of spiritual warfare that I’ve ever read. I’ve you want a first hand description of what it is...
What Part of The Body Are You?
Throughout his letters Paul compares the church to Christ’s body. The following passage from1Corinthians is probably the most well-known:
Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even...
July 2011
24 posts
6 tags
Check These Out 7/28/11
Multi-site Mistake?
In my own circle of friends, the predominant majority seem to be encouraged by this model and enthusiastically endorse it as a viable method of Kingdom advance. You can count me, however, as among those who are not necessarily a fan. I realize that taking this position puts me at odds with men who I have long considered heroes, not to mention a number of those whom I consider...
8 tags
Check These Out 7/27/11
John Stott Has Died
Stott believed in the mind as a gift from God. In an evangelical world tempted to rely on proof texts and emotive stories, Stott drilled down deep into Scripture to display its power. Many people, hearing Stott preach for the first time, said they had never heard the Bible expounded with such clarity and depth. His passion was to learn what God said, and to let it shape life....
5 tags
Check These Out 7/26/11 (U2 Edition)
Magnificent
Justified, till we die you and I will magnify
Bono on grace, Jesus, and the power of the cross
My understanding of the Scriptures has been made simple by the person of Christ. Christ teaches that God is love. What does that mean? What it means for me: a study of the life of Christ. Love here describes itself as a child born in straw poverty, the most vulnerable situation of...
9 tags
Check These Out 7/25/11
How Do I Think About Tweeting? - A Response to John Mayer (John Piper)
My experience of publishing three Tweets a day (usually written and scheduled a week or two ahead of time) is different. Mayer said, “I couldn’t have a complete thought anymore.” To me this is almost the opposite of what happens. But that may depend on what we aim to do with Twitter.
Two aims drive my writing of Tweets: One...
13 tags
Check These Out 7/22/11
On Being Practitioner Guides
I think one of our temptations is to think that we can lead people to become well-formed disciples by merely teaching about the vision of the kingdom or preaching the need for embodied spiritual disciplines. But you and I cannot lead people to a place we’ve never been ourselves. In the documents of the early church, a leader was someone who “spoke the word of God”...
6 tags
Check These Out 7/21/11
6 Big Things That Divide Christians
One of the dominant attributes of Christianity today is that its adherents can’t seem to agree on much; or at least, we fight about things more loudly and publicly than we agree about things. This is sad, but probably inevitable. Since Christ’s time on this planet, his followers have been arguing about almost everything. It’s nothing new, though certain...
10 tags
Check These Out 7/20/11
Just Say You Want to be a Pastor
If you are reading this and you believe God may be calling you to pastor an existing church, even the type of church you would consider to be dysfunctional or unhealthy, I hope you will be cautious in the language you use to describe your ministry desires. The church is not a problem to be solved, but the Bride of Christ for whom he died. No church is perfect,...
5 tags
Check These Out 7/19/11
The Untamed Tongue of Mark Driscoll
Driscoll has a history of saying things that are seemingly designed to belittle people who are markedly different than him. When I took issue with Driscoll’s imbalanced comments about videogames, the reaction of many of his supporters was to cite all of the good things he has said and done in the past. I felt a certain amount of deja vu when I read this post...
Check These Out 7/18/11
Christ Died For The Sins Of Christians Too
Melancthon’s experience is common among many Christians I know today. Many of them, such as Melancthon did 400 years ago, are looking for assurance of their salvation in all the wrong places. They tend to think that their standing before God-now that they are Christians-is based on their own obedience and their own righteousness. They have forgotten the...
9 tags
Check These Out 7/15/11
Balancing Community With Mission
When you run a Missional Community gathering where people come to grow closer to God, to one another, and pray into their missional context, some ideas to consider include:
Food – ideally sharing a meal together
Socializing/ laughing/ having fun
Breaking bread and sharing Communion
Story-telling (i.e. testimony), especially of things people are grateful to...
9 tags
Check These Out 7/14/11
Obedience Reduces the Resistance
When we understand salvation in this more holistic sense, biblical commands start to make more sense. If we are called to participate in the life of God by following Jesus, we need the power of God to flow through us like it did through Jesus. Because we are “in Christ,” the unlimited power of the Spirit is available to us in the same way it was available to...
4 tags
Mark Driscoll's Response →
Since I posted some links discussing the latest Mark Driscoll controversy yesterday I thought I should post a link to his response.
I had a recent conversation with a stereotypical, blue-collar guy who drives his truck with his tools, lunchbox, and hard hat to his job site every day. He said he wasn’t a Christian, but he was open and wanted to learn what the Bible said. In that conversation, he...
7 tags
Check These Out 7/13/11 (MMA Jesus Edition)
Effemigate
In His divine wisdom and providence, God chose Jacob the mommy-loving kitchen boy and He did not choose Esau the uber-hairy deer-hunting red-neck.
More Churches Promote Martial Arts to Reach Young Men
Mr. Renken’s ministry is one of a small but growing number of evangelical churches that have embraced mixed martial arts — a sport with a reputation for violence and blood that...
11 tags
Check These Out 7/12/11
The Turning Point of Francis Schaeffer’s Life and Ministry
I searched through what the Bible said concerning reality as a Christian. Gradually I saw that the problem was that with all the teaching I had received after I was a Christian, I had heard little about what the Bible says about the meaning of the finished work of Christ for our present lives. Gradually the sun came out and the song...
6 tags
“Our ability to practice the way of Jesus is shaped by our understanding of who...”
– Mark Scandrette Practicing the Way of Jesus: Life Together in the Kingdom of Love, p.22
I’ve been reading this book over the last few days and this line has really stuck in my head. He is saying two things here, which from what I have read so far are the crux of the book. First, in order to...
8 tags
Check These Out 7/11/11
Christ Is The Point
The good news is that our salvation is not dependent on our success at making right choices, even the right choice of faith. In fact, the Bible regularly reminds us that we cannot consistently make good choices with our corrupt wills. As Paul puts it, “I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I...
6 tags
“The motto of all true servants of God must be, ‘We preach Christ; and Him...”
– Charles Haddon Spurgeon, 1876
5 tags
Check These Out 7/8/11
How To Abandon Your Family Without Really Meaning To
So your kids are a priority. Fantastic! But can you identify with this? Ever confuse being in the same room with being connected? I do. And sometimes I have to watch that I don’t abandon my family without meaning to.
Life is trying. And the longer you live, the more you realizing it’s also a bit exhausting. Especially for parents. Sometimes...
8 tags
Check These Out 7/7/11
All Great Spirituality is Subversive
So when we follow Christ, everything about us becomes subversive. We have the audacity to stand in the middle of the world and weep over the false idols of culture, the power, the money, the sex, the fashion. And we do the same within the church. We say to the religious that their rules will not redeem them, to the performers of ritual that their actions have...
5 tags
WatchSo…what do think?
15 tags
Check These Out 7/6/11
Adultery Nation
Following revelations of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s adultery and Anthony Weiner’s sexting comes news that the state of New York will legally recognize the “marriage” of homosexuals. While the legal modification of marriage continues the not-so-gradual removal of nuptial boundaries, heterosexual marriage is likewise undergoing a transformation. Veteran...
10 tags
Check These Out 7/5/11
Book Review: Erasing Hell by Francis Chan and Preston Sprinkle
One of the big questions in the Love Wins controversy centers on whether or not Christian universalism and the opportunity for post-mortem salvation is defensible from Scripture. The authors quickly move through a handful of the major proof texts offered in defense of universalism to focus on to the larger issue of post-mortem...
7 tags
Check These Out 7/4/11
America, the Arrogant?
I do think America is great. In our sinew and our spirit, we are a great people living in a great nation. That’s why countries look to us when drafting constitutions and forming governments. That’s why we spend so much time debating immigration, not emigration. This is a wonderful place to live, and many citizens of other nations are clamoring to come here...
6 tags
Check These Out 7/1/11
6 Things The American Church Is Doing Well
I often coach people in our Learning Communities that what we need is EVOLUTION not REVOLUTION. If we try to revolutionize the church over night (either on a macro or micro level), everyone winds up dead. It’s not spiritually responsible in how we are forming people and suggests that somehow the Spirit of God hasn’t been at work previously. We may not...
June 2011
12 posts
8 tags
Check These Out 6/30/11
The Gospel, Evangelism, and Discipleship
Is becoming a disciple of Jesus the natural way to say ‘Yes’ to the gospel I preach?
This question has been revolutionizing my understanding of the gospel, evangelism, and discipleship. For example, if we see the main message of the gospel as “Your sins can be forgiven,” it does not naturally lead to becoming a disciple of Jesus, because once you’ve got...
4 tags
WatchI just found out about NURU today, and am extremely excited about what they do, and about finding ways that I and First Baptist can partner with them. The church has already partnered with them by giving them office and meeting space in our building, but I hope to see that partnership grow.
Eliminating poverty is a huge part of the mission of Christ’s people. Partnering with NURU is one way...
9 tags
Check These Out 6/29/11
Rep. Todd Akin: Liberalism Hates God
“One of the main differences between liberalism and conservative ideology is how basic rights are viewed,” Taylor told POLITICO Tuesday. “One, it’s (Akin’s) belief that in conservative ideology, our rights come from God and it is the role of government is to protect those rights. It is his belief that liberalism emphasizes that rights come from government and...
4 tags
Watch
In this video, Neil challenges us to do more than start a few church now and then, and instead help the church imagine what living on mission together might actually look like and what we could possibly see if we as followers of Jesus actually made disciples and lived “on earth as it is in heaven.”
10 tags
Check These Out 6/28/11
Church Planting Myths P. 1
Myth: Building (planting) a church is sexy and cool. Truth: Foundations aren’t sexy. Concrete and ugly form board aren’t sexy. But neither is stopping to repair the crappy house you built too quickly without counting the cost. Myth: If you plant and water, God will cause the growth! Truth: You can’t deny the Law of the Farm. You can plant. You can...
8 tags
Check These Out 6/27/11
Planting a Church? Plant a Teaching Hospital
God didn’t save me so that I could be saved and go straight to heaven. He wants me to reproduce by telling others about Jesus and making disciples. Churches need to do the same. God has promised that “the gates of hell will not prevail against the church” but this great promise wasn’t intended to apply to every single local church or else the seven...
10 tags
Check These Out 6/24/11
Despite Horses And Buggies, Amish Aren’t Necessarily ‘Low-Tech’
It’s quite clear that Amish groups that monitor technology in a discerning way — with an eye to its effects on the community in the long run — do last longer and have more cohesion in their community. The group I was with had almost zero attrition in their members. They were very watchful of...
6 tags
Check These Out 6/23/11
Celebrate!
However, in the world that we live in today it seems perfectly normal for people to celebrate the performance of their favorite sports team (or even their preferred stock)…and yet when a church wants to celebrate all that God is doing they are, many times, looked down upon and spoken against…by other people IN THE CHURCH!
One SBC: Slightly Divided
By every cultural indicator,...
4 tags
Check These Out 6/22/11
Church Planting Recommended Reading
One question frequently asked is what should I read if I’m planting a church. Here are some of my reccomendations:
7 Promises We Should Make (And Keep) To Our Volunteers
We pastors often struggle to ask people to give their time and talent to Jesus. Perhaps we’ve been rejected before and don’t like to hear someone say “no.” Perhaps we don’t like...
7 tags
Check These Out 6/21/11
Super 8
In this, Abrams’ film reflects the curiosity of our contemporary YouTube landscape–where “raw footage” of whatever sort (disasters, news footage, celebrity gaffes, etc.) can be remixed, re-edited, and put to work to fit the fancy of any number of aspiring auteurs or opinionated pontificators. Like any media form, the moving image has proven to be skillful at both capturing reality as it...
4 tags
Check These Out 6/20/11
Shopping For A God
God wants to meet your everyday needs and provide you with wisdom to understanding life from His perspective. He wants to answer your prayers in the way that will be best for you. But he requires trust.
Doubt will always be with us; it’s a function of who were are on this side of eternity. But what bothers God is someone who can’t make up his or her mind who to trust for their...
6 tags
New City, New Church, New Blog
Two weeks ago the family and I moved to Morgantown, WV. So far I love it, but it’s very different from the deep south, where we’ve spent our whole lives. I am serving as the Pastor to Young Adults at First Baptist Church. We are going to be working to significantly change the culture of the church, bring in more young families, and reach out to the WVU campus.
Because of all these...
October 2010
2 posts
Jesus, The Underemployed?
I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate my job. I don’t get paid enough, and I can’t stand the work. I know I shouldn’t feel this way, but I do. I’m grateful to have a job; I just wish it wasn’t this one. The only good thing about it is that often I have the time, while stocking things, to listen to podcasts. Today I’ve been listening to Wayne Grudem teaching on Christology. It’s good stuff, you should...
Acts 1:8 ...no passport
A few days ago a friend, Billy Mitchell, posted this on Twitter: Can you live out Acts 1:8 without a passport? I’ve spent some time thinking about it and the answer is yes.
Ok, so now your thinking, it seems pretty easy to take the Gospel to Jerusalem, Samaria, and Judea without a passport; but how do we go to the ends of the earth. The answer is twofold, first the people groups have come to us,...