Brandon O’Brien in his new book Strategically Small Church, The: Intimate, Nimble, Authentic, and Effective writes, “Despite the fact that the Bible compares the spread of the gospel to the mustard seed, which appears insignificant and unproductive, the dominant expectation of most pastors is that success is measured in terms of numerical growth. Fifty years …
Continue reading ‘A Move Towards Intentionally Smaller Churches?’ »
“But there is a danger in our desire to do big things for God, for our pursuit of success dovetails with a powerful American temptation: the appeal of celebrity. These days, obscurity is the worst kind of failure. When we do something significant, we expect to be rewarded with popularity.” (Brandon O’Brien, The Strategically Small …
Relevance is a big topic in the church these days. Of course we ought to be relevant, but the issue is how such relevance is defined. Doug Wilson in his A Primer on Worship and Reformation provides a good distinction between proper and improper irrelevance. “There are at least two kinds of irrelevance. One is …
This analysis by Tozer in his day is no less true in ours. The acceptance of trite entertainment and showmanship in church is surely the result of a shallowness that has resulted from frenetic activity. The idea of cultivation and exercise, so dear to the saints of old, has now no place in our total …
Continue reading ‘Tozer on Slowing Down for Cultivation of the Soul’ »
I have commented here from time to time on the value of proper imagination in interpreting and proclaiming Scripture. I was pleased today to come across a quote along this line from A. T. Robertson. Robertson was certainly not one to minimize close attention to the text. In fact this quote comes from his famous …
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“…where criticism takes place on the basis of anti-supernaturalist presuppositions and the teaching of scripture is assessed in terms of what modern, unbelieving western man is prepared to accept, again the evangelical will have no truck with it. The kind of ecumenism which tries to assure us that really we all believe the same things …
Continue reading ‘Howard Marshall on Evangelical Certainty’ »
Augustine’s sermon “On the Anniversary of His Ordination” (listed as Sermon 340) provides a beautiful portrait of pastoral ministry. I have included here several excerpts. The importance of the oversight of souls is clear in these comments. Here is a good blend of authority and humility. The people need their pastors and the pastors need …
Continue reading ‘For you I am a bishop, with you, I am a Christian’ »
This is a good exhortation from Doug Wilson as we prepare to preach the Word tomorrow. Speaking of Heb 4:12-13, Wilson writes: “…preachers need to learn to preach as though this is what is happening. First, we must handle the Word like a sword. And secondly, we must learn to handle the Word as though …
Continue reading ‘Preach the Word as Though It Were Alive’ »