“In a dreary time we listen to two counsels of despair: the freedom from life and the freedom from love.” –G.K. Chesterton For the past few weeks, I have been trying to highlight Scot’s book A Fellowship of Differents, and to talk about how this book has shaped some of the ways I think and do local church ministry. One of the major points that Scot makes toward the end of his book is that, in America, we approach church... Read more

Just how did that come about? How did we get from a prophet, say Isaiah saying something aloud and publicly and sometimes at risk of his or her own safety, to the Book of Isaiah the Prophet? There were no tape recorders and rarely would folks have been taking notes. Did the prophets then go back and write their words out? Or do we now have the memoried deposit of what the prophets said or what someone remembered their saying? Aaron... Read more

On the Adventure That Is the Gospel By Allan Bevere To sleep under the stars, to drink nothing but well water and to live chiefly on nuts and wild fruit, was a strange experience for Caspian after his bed with silken sheets in a tapestried chamber at the castle, with meals laid out on gold and silver dishes in the anteroom, and attendants ready at his call. But he had never enjoyed himself more. Never had sleep been more refreshing... Read more

This is not a silly question, and neither does it emerge from some desire to keep the politically correct crowd happy. The answer is Yes and that’s why I asked the question. The more important question now comes clean: Does God want our world to be a man’s world? The answer to that question is No. But it is. Historically, men have had a monopoly on positions of power and leadership in the world. They have dominated the public sphere... Read more

This series on Deuteronomy is by my friend and professor at Lipscomb University’s Hazelip School of Theology, Phillip Camp. We need more not less Old Testament in the church today. Why? Read on. Phillip Camp is an Associate Professor of Bible in Lipscomb University’s Hazelip School of Theology and in the College of Bible of Ministry. His latest book is Living as the Community of God: Moses Speaks to the Church in Deuteronomy (CrossLink, 2014). Moses Speaks to the Church in Deuteronomy: Why... Read more

Think about how many — perhaps most [?I don’t know the statistics on this one.] — churches structure Sunday morning, which is a time-intensive event for most churches. 1 hour, maybe 1.5 hours. The Sunday morning service. There are two parts to most Sunday morning services: the “worship” part, which means singing; and the “sermon” part, which means one person preaching.  Sermons tend to be 30-45 minutes. There is no place in the Bible one can go that teaches us... Read more

CNA: Without food, the body quickly collapses; without spiritual food, the soul atrophies. It really is as simple as that. Though materialists of all stripes want to deny it, there is a dimension of the human person that goes beyond the merely physical, a dynamism that connects him or her with God. Classically, this link to the eternal is called the soul…. What the soul requires for nourishment is the divine life or what the spiritual masters call “grace.” It... Read more

Grant to us, Lord, we pray, the spirit to think and do always those things that are right, that we, who cannot exist without you, may by you be enabled to live according to your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. Read more