For What it’s Worth…

If you’re interested in church planting, you’re quite possibly aware that the Church Planting Center at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York has launched a blog.

The RCPC Blog, currently labelled as “beta,” is home to reflections from Tim Keller, Scott Sauls and others from the Redeemer staff team as well as members of their church planting network.

In one of Keller’s first blog posts, maybe even his first, he brings John Frame’s tri-perspectivalism to bear as a tool for analysing the phenomenon that is Willow Creek Church.  (Incidentally, I have Frame’s The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God, sitting on my desk which I’ve started reading about 5 times and never managed to quite get through it!)  It’s an interesting read, although I think that viewing tri-perspectivalism as the silver bullet with which to harmonise the various threads of broad evangelicalism  is probably misguided.  That said, I don’t think Keller is saying it is the silver bullet, but others around the blogosphere seem to.

My invitation to World Vision’s “An evening with Brian McLaren” arrived in the post today. The nicely recycled-looking brochure didn’t do anything to alleviate my surprise at the partnership between this organisation (of which I happen to be a former employee) and McLaren, the “speaker, thinker and activist.”  I think I was at least expecting some acknowledgment of his position on the fringe of Christian orthodoxy, but none was made.

It is helpful to hear from people from outside our own “stable.”   We appreciate it when people are well-read and able to see past our own cultural blind-spots.  And as someone preparing to plant a church and seeking to engage the community around me with the gospel of Jesus, the opportunity to hear from one of the leaders of the Emerging/Emergent Movement definitely has some appeal.   As a pastor though, I believe there are good reasons for me to politely decline the invitation.  It’s my privilege to spend my time with people who wrestle daily with all sorts of issues, including many which are staple fare in McLaren’s writing and speaking.

Hi there – I thought that again the more silent partner should speak…

I would like to recommend two books that have helped me in recent times.  

The first is Atheism Remix by Albert Mohler Jnr.  Mohler is the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in the US of A and is a theologian who likes to mix it with issues raised by the intersection and clash of Bible and culture.  In this little book [only a bit more than 100 pages, and small ones at that] Mohler goes head to head with the New Atheists – guys like Richard Dawkins [The God Delusion] and Christopher Hitchens.  He looks at the emergence of the New Atheists and why they are different [and more of a threat] to the older variety.  He looks at their arguments and two notable critiques of their ideas.  This is a very helpful little book as it lays out the debate in a simple, understandable manner.  Recommended for those rub shoulders with those who have read [or seen - "The Root of All Evil" showed as a documentary] Dawkin’s especially.

Registration forms available now!  Download.

Who are you?  Really?  Come on a journey through the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Ephesians and get to the bottom of your real identity!
Basement Camp 09 is for students in years 8 – 12 at school and costs  $140 per person.
Please make sure your registration form is returned with your money by Sunday April 12.
See you at Encounters Conference Centre, Victor Harbor at 1:30 PM on April 20th!

If you’re learning our memory verses with us, you might like to use the computer desktop images we’re producing to help keep the Bible passages in front of you
Our first passage is Philippians 4:8.  Download the desktop image for your computer below.

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My copy of Ancient-Future Time was given to me by Lyndon Sulzberger, Rector of Christ Church, North Adelaide.  I think  Lyndon was politely trying to suggest my education in matters such as the ecclesiastical calendar is somewhat lacking!

Robert E. Webber (who died in 2007) was Emeritus Professor of Theology at Wheaton College and seems to have been motivated in his writing by the conviction that contemporary Evangelicalism is impoverished due to its insufficient rooting in early Christian traditions.  Indeed, it was this conviction that led him to take part in issuing “The Chicago Call” in 1977 stating that evangelicals had lost touch with church’s liturgical roots.  Here he seeks to take Christian spirituality back to its origins in Jewish spirituality which he feels will enrich the life of the modern Christian; “For the Jew to commemorate the past is not merely to recall it as a past event but to commemorate it in such a way that it gives the present new meaning.”  The book is therefore a call to what Webber calls “Christian-year” spirituality, where God’s saving action is presented to us time and time again through the practices of the Christian year celebrated by the church in its first centuries; in Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week, Easter and Pentecost.  The discussion of each of these historical events concludes with a prayer from one of the Church Fathers or the Book of Common Prayer.

If we are actually speaking truth … why isn’t anyone listening?

I’ve been reading Branding Faith by Phil Cooke.  To some in the church, the idea of branding is anathema,  but I suspect this is mostly due to misunderstanding the concept.  Branding is part of the reality within the church exists.  Cooke quotes a study which found that one in four babies, speaks a brand name as their first word!  This study, by British Market Research Bureau  is also quoted in a slightly alarming 2003 article in the SMH.

At the heart of the challenge laid out in the book is Cooke’s distillation of the definition of marketing: The art of surrounding a product, organisation or person with a powerful and compelling story.  The gospel of Jesus Christ is a powerful and compelling story, we don’t need to find it, or create it, just tell it!  The task seems to me to be local churches finding answers to the question, “how do we tell the powerful and compelling story of the gospel of Jesus Christ in our communities?”

Tomorrow night at 5 PM Church I’ll be baptising Jemima, one of our youngest 5 PMers!
What exactly is it that we’ll be doing?

At the very end of Matthew’s gospel, we read the Jesus’ words “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” (Matthew 28:17 – 20) There are approximately 100 uses of the group of “baptism” words in the New Testament. What do we make of this somewhat strange little process?

Baptism is part of being a disciple of Jesus.
Don Carson says of Jesus’ words in Matthew 28, “the New Testament can scarcely conceive of a disciple who is not baptised or who does not receive instruction.” Wearing a fire-proof suit and a helmet won’t make me a racing driver, but if I’m a racing driver, I’ll wear a fire-proof suit and a helmet. That is to say, while someone isn’t made a disciple of Jesus simply by teaching them what Jesus has said and baptising them, someone who is a disciple of Jesus will be taught about Jesus and baptised.

Pastor and author Kent Hughes tells the following story: A number of years ago, a church in Dallas, Texas suffered a terrible split. Each of the two factions into which the members had drawn filed a lawsuit to claim the church property. A church court assembled to hear the case.
During the hearing, it was revealed that the conflict had begun at a church dinner when one of the church elders had received a smaller slice of ham than a child seated next to him. Sadly, this slight was reported in the city’s newspapers. Imagine how all the people of Dallas laughed about that situation! Such a display of disunity brought great discredit not only to what was left of that church, but also to Jesus Christ.