Church

Plant Jesus Not Churches

/ Martin / Leave a comment

Two posts on Facebook this afternoon have got me animated…..

The first was a friend who posted a link to an article on Tall Skinny Kiwi’s blog entitled ‘9 reasons NOT to plant a church in 2012‘.  The other was the posting of a YouTube video from NewForms Media, via Mission Britain/ SimpleChurch UK, called Dandelion Wind (see below):

What TSK writes makes a lot of sense, and I think we, the church, need to take notice of his warning.  I especially think this is the case over here on the right hand side of the Atlantic pond, specifically as far as I am concerned, here in the UK.

If the vision that is given in Dandelion Wind is to happen in this increasingly post-modern and post-Christian culture, then I feel we need to accept that ‘church’ planting, as in setting up a bunch of Christians as a new church in a new place to be a catalyst to reach the surrounding community, just doesn’t work in the same way that it used to do.

Unless, of course, you are satisfied with occasional addition rather than dandelion multiplication…..

We need to think again.  We meed to find a ‘new’ way to communcate the love of God in Jesus to our increasingly God-less nation.

The answer?

How about we focus on planting Jesus into people’s lives as TSK suggests and then see what happens….who knows, we might see ‘Dandelion Wind’ multiplication after all….just in a way that we didn’t expect.

Thoughts?

Scot McKnight: Christianity as Country Club

/ Martin / 1 Comment

An interesting article has been published on the Huffington Post written by Scott McKnight considering the difference between a ‘salvation’ and ‘gospel’ culture:

Christianity sometimes presents itself as a country club. It presents itself this way even when it doesn’t want to, and sometimes it doesn’t even know it. I grew up loving to play golf but I played on the public course. I had friends who played at the local country club. When I visited the country club I felt like a visitor even though the members were wonderfully hospitable. Members felt like members and visitors felt like visitors, and knowing that you could “visit” only by invitation made the difference clear.

Many experience the church this way. Members know they belong, and visitors know they don’t. Well, after all, we might reason, the Christian faith is a religion of salvation, and Stephen Prothero’s recent book, “God is Not One,” depicted Christianity as a faith concerned with the “way of salvation.” And if you are saved, you are a member; if you are not saved, you are not. You might visit, but until you get saved you will know you are not in the club.

Christianity has been powerfully effective at creating what might be called a “salvation culture.” Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, Protestant mainliners, Protestant evangelicals and other families in the church like Pentecostals only offer slight variations on this salvation culture. This message of salvation is that God loves us but God is holy so sin must be dealt with; Jesus Christ died for us and through his death salvation can be found, but to find that salvation one must trust in Jesus Christ and his death. Those who do are both “in the club” and will spend eternity with the club members with God in heaven. In essence, this is Christianity’s salvation culture. It is a good message, but it is not the whole message.

I want to suggest that the country club image for the Christian faith, its salvation culture, no matter how historic and vital to the Christian church’s identity, inadequately frames what might be called its true “gospel culture.” If a salvation culture builds a country club, a gospel culture creates a story — one with a beginning in God’s shalom and one that aims at God’s shalom. And a gospel culture is not identical to a salvation culture…..

…….A gospel culture focuses on the Jesus Story, the Story that God is at work among us — the incarnation. In other words, the essence of a gospel culture is a Jesus-shaped and Jesus-centered Story of God at work among us. It is not just a country club, but the Story of life-giving, self-sacrifice and hope that God can take ruins and create monuments of love, peace, justice and joy — and Jesus told us that Story is now taking place among us.

Brilliant stuff.

Any comments?

Read the full article here

The deadly sins of evangelicalism

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I saw this post at Jon Reid’s blog, ‘blog one another‘, and thought is interesting:

You’ve heard of “the seven deadly sins” taught by Roman Catholicism? For your edification, here are The Six Deadly Sins of Evangelicalism. These not only mark you as “not one of us” — they call your very salvation into question:

1

Supporting gay marriage as a civil right

Laws should never be shaped by culture.
If we made Bible passages into laws, we’d be better off.

 2

Affirming “practicing gays” as legitimate people

Sexual “orientation” is not a problem, as long as you remain celibate.

 3

Finding middle ground with pro-choicers

There can never be any middle ground.

4

Walking away from the institutional church

God ordained hierarchy and institutional structure.
So-called “organic” churches are just hippie Bible studies, not real churches.

5

Treating evolution as fact

It’s just a theory. They even call it a theory!
I get my facts from the Bible.

6

Questioning substitutionary atonement
as the right story for our culture

This is the complete and perfect explanation of why Jesus went to the cross.
Don’t bother me with your alternative “theories of atonement.”

We expect non-Christians to act like heathens, so they have an excuse. But if you run into someone who commits any of these offenses while still professing to be a Christian, just use this phrase: “We are deeply concerned about you.” If you still need to make your point stronger, try sounding biblical: “It grieves my soul.”

(By contrast, here are the traditional seven: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride. Boy, these are wussy!)

Any thoughts?