Unity is strength.
Knowledge is power.
Attitude is everything.
bonar crump
husband - father - reader - runner - picker - grinner - lover - sinner
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Baby boomers flood seminaries
Actually, my prediction is that this trend puts an exclamation point on the prevalent description of organized religion as DYING, ANTIQUATED, and IRRELEVANT. I've got nothing against the boomers. It just could not be more ironic that the "hippies" who rejected the modern modality of their own youth have turned around to drive what's left of organized religion into the dirt.
With grey-hairs in the pews and grey-hairs in the pulpits, is it any wonder that the 40 and less crowd has abandoned ship? The boomers are bringing back the church of the '50s.
Beaver Cleaver is back! And he's wearing a robe!
~ B
With grey-hairs in the pews and grey-hairs in the pulpits, is it any wonder that the 40 and less crowd has abandoned ship? The boomers are bringing back the church of the '50s.
Beaver Cleaver is back! And he's wearing a robe!
~ B
My Faith: Suffering my way to a new tomorrow
Editor's Note: Rob Bell is the Founding Pastor at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. His latest book and DVD are called Drops Like Stars.
By Rob Bell, Special to CNN
By Rob Bell, Special to CNN
"This truth, about the latent seeds of creativity being planted in the midst of suffering, takes us deep into the heart of the Christian faith. We are invited to trust that in the moments when we are most inclined to despair, when all appears lost and we can't imagine any way forward - that it is precisely in those moments when something new may be about to be birthed.
Jesus hangs naked and bloody on a cross, alone and abandoned by his students, scorned by the crowd, and yet defiant, confident, insistent that God is present in his agony, bringing about a whole new world, right here in the midst of this one.
This is a mystery, and one we are wise to reflect on it, because of the countless disruptions we experience all the time.
God is in those moments, grieving with us, shedding tears with us, feeling that pain and turmoil with us, and then inviting to trust that something good can come from even this.
* * *
So keep your eyes and your heart open. Be quick to listen and slow to make rash judgments about how it's "all going to turn out," because you never know when you'll find yourself miles from home, laying in a hospital bed with a bad case of brain squeeze, all of your plans crashing down around you, wondering how it all went wrong, only to discover that a whole new life is just beginning."
Friday, February 11, 2011
The Pain of Ministry and Its Implications for Parenting and Leadership
February 11th, 2011 // posted in Family, Leadership by George Barna
"While working with Matthew Barnett on our new book, The Cause Within You, Matthew’s selfless service to others caused me to reflect on my typical reaction to other people’s pain and suffering.
For most of my life I have sought to develop solutions to the problems that have caused human hardships while remaining personally removed from others’ pain and suffering. I have attempted to identify with people’s need by studying it but without experiencing it alongside them. Even through all the work I’ve done with homeless people over the years, it has been my wife who has gotten down and dirty in the midst of their pain, diving into their circumstances, while I studied it and sought to create prevention mechanisms or remedial options. I have glibly written off the difference in our approaches to her extroversion and my introversion, or to her management skills versus my analytic abilities.
Matthew’s bold and consistent action has caused me to see the error in my assumptions."
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