An announcement from Mars Hill about the collaborative where I will be speaking… Mars Hill Students Collaborative with Scot McKnight– February 9, 2013 How Do We Talk With Our Students about the Gospel? Over 2 years ago, Mars Hill’s Student Ministry developed a new youth ministry training opportunity that pairs engaging speakers and content with sound teaching and a learning context that encourages thought-provoking discussion and collaboration. Driven by 3 values, the MHS Collaborative: Explores topics that are crucial to... Read more

From NBC: Detroit’s total of 411 homicides in 2012, up from 377 the previous year, includes 386 criminal homicides and 25 “justifiable homicides” that included three shootings by police, according to numbers released by the city. The number of criminal homicides increased 12 percent from 344 in 2011. The total in 2010 was 308. Homicides have declined nationwide for years, most notably in New York, where in 2012 there were 414 homicides and a rate of one per 19,915 people. New Orleans... Read more

From Steve Hendrix: George Holden envisions a world without spanking. No more paddling in the principal’s office. No more swats on little rear ends, not even — and here is where Holden knows he is staring up at a towering cliff of parental rights resistance — not even in the privacy of the home. When it comes to disciplining a child, Holden’s view is absolute: No hitting. “We don’t like to call it spanking,” said Holden, a professor of psychology... Read more

Harm in Holy Things Imagining that merely possessing and studying the Scriptures, some of the Pharisees believed they had life; life with God in God’s kingdom (John 5:39-40). They were Book-obsessed; book worms; jot and tittle types who boasted in owning “the oracles of God.”  When “the Word made flesh” actually stood before, opposed, and warned them, these Book-centered religious folks dismissed Jesus as horribly misguided. To them Jesus was a life-destroyer, not the life-bringer. This Book-centered flaw is still... Read more

When it comes spiritual warfare, Greg Boyd offers a distinct viewpoint, one from which many of us can learn. In his study, “The Ground-Level Deliverance Model” [I would call his view the Cosmic Battle Model], in Understanding Spiritual Warfare, Boyd presents his theory that the Bible contains gobs of evidence for God at war with the cosmic forces — and he begins by raising a red flag of foul on Augustine for thinking that everything that happens is God’s will. Instead,... Read more

Wow, see this? Read more

What is the wisdom out there? A letter from a reader: I was recently asked by one of my students, who has just taken a ministry position, whether she should petition for exemption. The form one has to sign for the IRS says: “I certify that I am conscientiously opposed to, or because of my religious principles I am opposed to, the acceptance (for services I perform as a minister, member of religious order not under a vow of poverty, or... Read more