A longtime friend of mine, Bobo Burns, died last night after a long struggle with diabetes and strokes. Bobo was an amazing man who was more committed to youth ministry than anyone I’d ever met. Having struggled with addiction in junior high and high school, he went through treatment and spent the next 30 years completely available to any kids in Edina, Minnesota who needed a listening ear. He was a big part of what I consider to be the... Read more
Thanks for dropping by my new blog. My blogging journey began back in 2005, when I starting blogging under “Theoblogy,” using a free blogspot blog. (The word “blog” appears far too much in that sentence.) Then I migrated to WordPress and used the domain TonyJ.net. All the posts from those two blogs have been imported here. A year ago, I accepted an offer to blog at Beliefnet, and TonyJ.net was repurposed as a landing page for my professional life. While... Read more
By Steve Breen, San Diego Tribune, October 18, 2009 Read more
Following up on Christianity21, we at JoPa Productions are developing a series of boot camps for pastors who want to learn about and utilize social media tools like blogging, Twitter, and Facebook. These are one-day, hands-on learning experiences, currently offered in the Twin Cities and soon to be offered around the country. We’ll also be offering social media boot camps for authors soon. More info HERE. And find out more about Christianity21 HERE. Read more
I’ve taken some heat in the comment section for using yesterday’s post on “unbiblical” and a “higher view of scripture” as a thin foil for my own disregard of biblical standards. To the contrary, I was pointing to the use of the word unbiblical as a stand-in for a particularly thin hermeneutic. There are, of course, things that are unbiblical: child pornography and shampoo, for instance. Both are technically unbiblical since they are never mentioned; further, the first is morally... Read more
Last week at Christianity21, GENERATE Magazine debuted. With the tag line, “an artifact of the emergence conversation,” it fit perfectly at the gathering. When I actually got around to reading it last weekend, I was truly surprised at how good it is. There have been several efforts to begin a paper journal that capture the exploits of emergence, and none has quite succeeded. GENERATE does. First off, there’s a fine defense from the editors to the question of, “Why a... Read more
In our attempt to exterminate Christian euphemisms from our vocabulary, Nathan nominated thusly: “Unbiblical” when what the situation really is is “I really, really DON’T like that” OR “I disagree” OR “Your words challenge my deepest held idolatries posing as genuine Christian faith.” This euphemism seems to be more prevalent today than I remember it — or maybe I just ran into it less in the past. Of course, what it implies is that there is a consistent, reliable, and... Read more
I received loads of great comments about what Christian euphemisms we should drag, kicking and screaming, into the light of day in an attempt to euthanize them. I won’t be able to tackle them all, but I’ll highlight some of my favorites this week. Chris Enstad nominated this beauty: “The Lord laid it on my heart…” Which is a euphemism for: This is something I want to do. I grew up in a home in which, while faithful and Christian,... Read more
Thanks to Don Heatley Read more
As other bloggers have noted, putting the Christianity21 experience into words is nearly impossible. In short, it went even better than Doug and I imagined it. All of the pieces came together beautifully. In fact, when people repeatedly stopped me in the hallways on the first day to say how well they thought it was going, I found myself giving the same response over and over: “The energy in that room is amazing.” If you want to find out about... Read more
Theoblogy
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