blog.worship.com

Message For Those In Ministry

Must-hear message from Matt Chandler delivered recently at SBTS to seminary students.  All pastors and aspiring ministers should find time to hear this one.  MP3 available here.

Twitter Theology: What Do Tweets Tell Us About What Pastors Really Value?

From Scot McKnight, on pastor tweets:

...there are observations to make about what we see from pastor tweets. Over time I’ve noticed that many pastors tweet links to business people and leadership gurus, Seth Grodin being the most common. We discover plenty of emphasis news items, especially controversial ones. Pastors often became “green” in the recent Iranian student revolution. Pastors tweet a lot about sports. There seems to be a near obsession in pastor tweets with terms like “creativity” and “innovation,” and a corresponding neglect of our great tradition or our heritage in the Church.

Pastors tweet quotes from their reading, and inform us of what they are reading. Sunday tweets tend to be gratitude tweets. We also regularly discover who is meeting with whom (and the “whom” is always a notch above the “who”), or where someone is traveling. We hear about accomplishments but almost never any failures or disappointments, making the Twitter world largely a happy face community.

I have seen some gospel in Facebook updates – some tweets about Jesus, his life, death, and resurrection, but very few about how Israel’s story came to its goal in Jesus. Very few, in fact, about the Old Testament at all. There is some theological orientation. Even if it is hard to reduce theology to 140 words, the limit of a normal tweet, it can be done and it has been done well. The issue is how infrequently pastors and religious leaders provide such theological orientation and how often they link us to such concerns. Oddly, there is an absence of short prayers for others or ejaculatory prayers for God’s help in a tough situation. In fact there are almost no prayers at all.

Preaching versus Worship

Writes Jeff Purswell:

...My friend Bob Kauflin recently invited me to speak at the WorshipGod09 conference and to address an audience populated by faithful servants engaged in leading worship, singing, and serving musically in diverse ways. These are gifted people and we benefit from their example, leadership, and service each Sunday in our local churches.

But as much as I appreciate what they do, I told them the following: What you do each Sunday is important, but it’s not most important.

Musical worship is inspiring, informative, and a wonderful privilege, but there is nothing more central to Christian worship than the preaching of God’s Word. Notice I did not say preaching is a great and necessary follow-up to worship, or that preaching is an optional extra in worship. Preaching is central to worship each Sunday....

...Why? Why so much preaching? Why all this talking? Because the primary way we encounter God in worship is through the preaching of the Word of God.

Think about it this way. Normally, in what we call “worship,” we spend significant time—perhaps the whole time—addressing God, singing to him, praising him, extolling him, praying to him. Wonderful! But in preaching we are no longer addressing God; he is addressing us. Nothing is more important than this moment. And this is why the most important worship leader in your church is your pastor.

That really gets to the heart of preaching. The Bible is not simply a book that we talk about. When God’s Word is faithfully preached, God is addressing us. God is speaking. We hear not merely a man’s voice. We hear the voice of God. \

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How to Identify a Reliable Preacher

Our friend Tullian Tchividjian offers biblical insight into making wise decisions regarding the preaching one chooses to listen to. 

Going rate to kill pastor: $250

And we think we are persecuted in the U.S....

Rewards offered for murdering Christians, destroying homes, churches

Hindu extremist groups are offering money, food and alcohol to anyone who murders Christians and destroys their homes.

The violence is nothing new in Orissa, India, where India's Communist Party estimates that more than 500 Christians have been killed by Hindu mobs in Orissa since late August, 12 times more than official government claims of only 40 homicides.

But now the stakes are even higher – and pastors have a bounty on their heads.

Faiz Rahman, chairman of Good News India, said Hindu militants are targeting Christian leaders, the Christian Post reported.

"The going price to kill a pastor is $250," he said.

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The Gospel Gap and Preaching

Greg Brewton writes:

The first challenge for pastors is to make sure that our worship services are full of the Gospel.  We then need to make sure our people see the connection of how this Gospel should permeate our lives.  Are we helping our people prepare to face life on Monday when we are opening and sharing God’s Word on Sunday?  I’m not talking about a list of 10 things that will make your life successful.  We do not need more self-help lessons.  We need to hear about the life changing Gospel and how this impacts our lives 24/7.

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Mama's Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Pastors

Mama's Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Pastors...a satirical look at the demands of the pastorate.

Sixsteps and Passion: Past, Present, Future

Christianity Today reports on sixsteps records and the future of it's parent ministry, Passion.

Many have wondered through the years about why sixsteps has resisted expanding its roster of only four artists for so long. Most with the label note the importance of relationship, and the limitation of time and resources. According to Tomlin, however, things might be expanding very soon. "I think we'll be developing some new worship leaders down the road, in the coming years that I'm very excited about," reports Tomlin. "We're in the process of that now."

Another major upcoming change is the planting of a church in Atlanta involving Louie Giglio, Tomlin, and Redman. The latter two have already moved there, though the timeline for development is uncertain, as is the impact on the label. "I see songs coming out of the church," says Tomlin of the new plant. "I see Chris Tomlin still making records, but I also see Passion Church CDs , and that kind of thing. The reason I'm excited about that is we've never been in the same place: me and Redman and Louie."

This small (but maybe growing) family exists in a stormy industry but is committed to maintaining its original focus. "There is something I am confident of," declares Louie Giglio, "That the Church that Christ is building worldwide is on the rise. The whole Christian record industry could vanish, yet the Church will prevail and prosper. So I think our future is in being aligned with his movement, not ours, and in being linked to the process of building up the Church versus growing a label. After all, our songs are for that very Bride, designed to give voice to a new generation wanting to reach for God and stake their hearts on something greater than themselves. We will continue to work hard to restore, expand, create, and modify our approaches to delivering music to every listener on the planet, but we are hopeful because we are a part of an expanding Kingdom, not a shrinking industry. It's a tough time to be building a label, but a great time (maybe the best time ever) to be building the Kingdom of God."

Why German Christians Elected and Supported Hitler

Economy in a freefall.  Political rhetoric.  An apathetic electorate dismayed by the slide of their country into irrelevence.  Theological liberalism.  Doctrinal indifference.

America, 2008?

No.  Germany, just before electing Adolf Hitler to lead their country, with the apparent support of the majority of those who considered themselves Christians.

We're rereading a book written in 1995 by Erwin Lutzer (foreword by Ravi Zacharias).  In it Lutzer looks at the holocaust and the rise of Hitler and asks the question: where was the Church?  This book is a fascinating read, particularly in this time of economic upheaval and election year rhetoric.

Writes Lutzer, in explaining why he undertook this project:

...I determined to study how Hitler had captured the Christian church; I knew that 95% of the people in Germany were either Protestant or Catholic.  Now I wanted to know why the Christians in Germany did not condemn Hitler with one single, unified, and courageous voice.  I wondered why millions took Hitler's hakenkreuz (hooked or broken cross) and superimposed it on the cross of our crucified Redeemer.  Only later would I understand the extent to which this confusion of crosses beguiled the German church and invited the judgment of God....What clues were there in the history of Germany that prepared the country (and its churches) for such a mass seduction?  Could it happen again?  More to the point, is it happening now, even in America, albeit in a different way?  What signs should have alerted the church to Hitler's real agenda?

Did you know that Hitler was elected to power through a democratic process?  He only became a dictator after he had risen to power through the voting process.  And the people elected him in large part because they were convinced he would fix the deteriorating economy and restore Germany to the prominence and prosperity it had once enjoyed.  Writes Lutzer:

...he would give the appearance of being one of the masses, but in reality he would be quite another...At times he could be charming and forgiving...Privately (and sometimes publicly) he prided himself in his honesty, yet often he reveled in his abilty to deceive.  "The German people must be misled if the support of the masses is required," he mused.

And

Hitler holds a fascination for us because his dictatorship enjoyed such wide support of the people.  Perhaps never in history was a dictator so well liked.  He had the rare gift of motivating a nation to want to follow him.  Communist leaders such as Lenin or Mao Tse-tung rose to power through revolutions that cost millions of lives; consequently they were hated by the masses. Hitler attracted not only the support of the middle class but also of university students and professors.  For example, psychologist Carl Jung grew intoxicated with "the mighty phenomenon of National Socialism at which the whole world gazes in astonishment. 

Hitler arose in Germany at a time when the nation was a democracy.  He attained his power legitimately, if unfairly.  The nation was waiting for him, eager to accept a demagogue who appeared to have the talent needed to lead her out of the abyss.  The people yearned for a leader who would do for them what democracy could not.

Live Feed from National Resurgence Conference: Text & Context

National Resurgence Conference: Text & Context

Monday, February 25, 2008
2:00 pm Session 1 – Mark Driscoll – Text & Context: Humble Incarnational Ministry
4:00 pm Session 2 – CJ Mahaney – Text & Context: Pastoral Character & Loving People
7:00 pm Session 3 – John Piper - Text: Why I Trust the Scriptures

Tuesday, February 26, 2008
9:00 am Session 4 – Jim Gilmore – Context: Fear and Trembling in the Experience Economy
10:45 am Session 5 – Matt Chandler - Text & Context: Preaching the Gospel in the Center of the Evangelical World

1:00 pm Session 6 – John Piper - Text & Context: How My Pastoral Ministry Shapes my Pulpit Ministry

7:00 pm Session 9 – John Piper - Text: How Do I Distinguish Between Gospel and False Gospel?
9:00 pm Q & A with John Piper

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

10:00 am Session 10 – Jim Gilmore – Context: Decoding the Future, the Phoniness, and the Shifting Sands
11:20 am Q& A with Jim Gilmore
1:00 pm Session 11 – Mark Driscoll – Text & Context: Preaching Jesus Christ To Pagan Culture
2:15 pm Q & A with Mark Driscoll