Month: June 2012

What good is the local Church?

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The Church is universal, the Church is local. The Church is the joyful assembly of the redeemed of all ages. The Church is the body of Christ extended through time and space. The holy church has two lives: one in time and the other in eternity. – Gregory the Great The Church is the bride of Christ, even though it sometimes acts like a wayward bride The local church is where believers are discipled, commissioned to be light of the world. The local church is where the broken is mended, the sick healed, and where friends become friends forever. The local church cares for the poor and fights for justice in our world. The local church is the body of Christ, the hands and feet of the master. The local church is where spiritual gifts are used for the common good, where believers learn to use their talents to serve others. The local church is where the gospel is preached, sinners are saved, prayers are offered, ministers ordained, the sacraments celebrated, and a cup of …

Spare the Rod Spoil the Child: What the Bible really says about Discipline

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Three days ago police in Fayetteville County, GA arrested the senior pastor of World Changers Internation Church on simple battery charges. Video In a Sunday morning speech to his congregation, Pastor Dollar said that the accusations about him choking punching and kicking his 15 year old daughter are completely false, and anything else is “exaggeration and sensationalization.” The pastor than went on to talk about the challenges of parenting. So today I would like for us to explore with Chip Ingrram what the bible says about this challenge. What the Bible Says About Discipline Parents can learn how to best discipline their children by taking note of how the Bible says God disciplines us. by Chip Ingram Next Article in Series: Previous Article Next Article Overview What the Bible Says About Discipline Five Characteristics of Biblical Discipline Discipline Is Worth the Effort Punishment Versus Discipline Discipline With Action and Words The Biblical Approach to Spanking Next Steps / Related Information The second case study I want us to look at doesn’t come from sociological research but from …

Oh how I hate small groups!

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A few years ago I preached a message at a thriving church where I served on staff. It was at the time small groups were gaining momentum. Every church around the world and especially here in the USA was all about getting people of the same interest, same profession connected in the same group. Unfortunately, I began to notice that all the cool people were joining groups with  other cool people – you know, like some did in high school. And the not so cool people we being left out. So I preached on a passage from Romans 12:16: Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. After my message I was sent into the office of the big man on campus (senior pastor) where I was grilled for a few minutes. Don’t get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with wanting to hang with like-minded folks, but if we really want to live in authentic community, we need to understand what community really …

Liberia: Getting Back to the Founding Faith | Christianity Today

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A controversial clergy-led campaign to officially return Liberia to its Christian heritage has sparked debate in the West African nation. Liberia was founded under the “blessings of the Christian religion” by freed American slaves in 1847, but became a secular state following a 1980 military coup and subsequent civil war. In April, an international tribunal convicted former president Charles Taylor, once supported by Pat Robertson, of crimes against humanity. Today a group of pastors called the Liberia Restoration to Christian Heritage Committee has stirred up popular momentum to add Christianity back to the constitution—similar to Zambia, a “Christian nation” since 1996. The Liberian Council of Churches has remained tight-lipped about its opinion, but vice president W. Nah Dixon, archbishop of Don Stewart Pentecostal Church, has appealed to pastors to stop collecting signatures. He worries that imposing a state religion could refuel civil conflict in a nation with a sizable Muslim minority (12 percent). Catholic, Baptist, and Lutheran leaders have echoed his concerns Liberia: Getting Back to the Founding Faith | Christianity Today.

Kerfuffle among brothers

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Webster-Merriam People’s Favorite Words and how the Bible might have something to say about it. Part 3 Kerfuffle – disturbance, fuss! To create a scene and attract lots of attention. A social brouhaha. alteration of carfuffle, from Scots car- (probably from Scottish Gaelic cearr wrong, awkward) + fuffleto become disheveled First Known Use: 1946 I entreat Euodia and I entreat Syntyche to agree in the Lord. Philippians 4:2 Euodia and . . . Syntyche: probably deaconesses in the church here in Philippi. These two women were the source of some sort of quarrel in the church. Instead of taking sides or trying to “solve” their problem, Paul simply tells them to be of the same mind in the Lord. Whatever the dispute was about, Euodia and Syntyche had forgotten what their common ground was in Jesus Christ. They forgot that everything else was less important than that common ground. They had a falling out or disagreement over some point of doctrine or practice, and the animosity between them had become a problem in the whole church. Paul simply tells them – hey ladies, …

Flibbertigibbet

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Webster-Merriam People’s Top Ten Favorite Words and how the Bible might have something to say about it. Part 2 It is often said that rich people’s children are born with a silver spoon in their mouths. But it also seems to me that people with too many words are born with a silver foot in their mouths. They always seem to say the wrong thing at the wrong time. And their chatter goes on and on and on. Flibbertigibbet: a silly flighty person Flibbertigibbet may have been coined to imitate the sound of idle chatter. The word first appeared in Middle English as flepergebet, and it has enjoyed a number of senses: gossip; chatterer;demon; imp. Shakespeare gave flibbertigibbet its current spelling, but the modern meaning only dates to the end of the 19th century. When words are many, transgression is not lacking, but whoever restrains his lips is prudent.? Proverbs 10:19 Researchers have found that women speak about 16,000 words a day and men fall shy of that number just by a very narrow margin. On the other hand we have some with the ability to …

Defenestration

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Webster-Merriam People’s Top Ten Favorite Words and how the Bible might have something to say about it. Part 1 Defenestration:  a throwing of a person or a thing out of a window; or a usually swift expulsion or dismissal. Defenestration comes from Latin (de- means “from; down, away;” and fenestra means “window”). The word first appeared in English in 1620. Have you ever been kicked out of a church? Have you ever been kicked out of your job? Maybe you know how it feels  to be kicked out of school or dumped by a girlfriend or a boyfriend. How do you model genuine faith in those times. There is a young woman in my church going through the feeling of being dumped. She now sits on the other side from where she used to in church and the guy is claiming that she should not come to church because this is his home church. But she says he is the one who needs  to find another church because this is her home church as well. They are mean and …

Missionaries to America

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You have heard of missionaries who went to Africa to tell the people about Jesus. But did you know that in the late 1800s an African man came to our country and showed Americans the love of Jesus?  I was reminded over the weekend of one of these mighty men of God Africa. His name was Samuel Morris, or Kaboo, as he was known to his tribe. His story is as amazing today as it was to those who met the young Samuel Morris more than 100 years ago. Here is his story based on his own account. Pay or Sammy Suffers! The year: 1872 The place: My native country of Liberia, in Africa “You must pay if you want peace,” threatened the enemy chief. “We will pay,” thundered my father, “We will pay.” As the oldest son, I was taken as a hostage until my father, also a tribal chief, could pay off the war debts. Each month, my father brought gifts to the enemy chief, but they were never enough. The chief beat …

Guyland

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The world in which young men live. It is both a stage of life, a liminal undefined time span between adolescence and adulthood that canoften stretch for a decade or more. It’s a bunch of places where guys gather to be guys with each other, unhassled by the demands of parents, girlfriends, jobs, kids, and the other nuisances of adult life. In this tipsy turvy, Peter-Pan mindset, young men shirk the responsibilities of adulthood and remain fixated on the trappings of boyhood, while the boys they still are struggle heroically to provethwart they are real men despite all the evidence to the contrary. Michael Kimmel, Guyland: The perilous world where boys become men (New York: HarperCollins, 2008), 4 This is a wake up call for guys. You don’t want to wake up one day in your forties or fifties and realize – oh my word – I am still stuck in the mindset of an adolescence. Unfortunately, too many guys are waking up to that brutal reality. Guys, it’s time to begin seriously thinking about …

You have come to the mountain of Grace

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Contrasts between Mount Sinai and Mount Zion. Mount Sinai was marked by fear and terror. Mount Zion is a place of love and forgiveness. Mount Sinai is in the desert. Mount Zion is the city of the Living God. Mount Sinai spoke of earthly things. Mount Zion speaks of heavenly things. At Mount Sinai, only Moses was allowed to draw near to God. At Mount Zion, an innumerable company, a general assembly is invited to draw near. Mount Sinai was characterized by guilty men in fear. Mount Zion features just men made perfect. At Mount Sinai, Moses was the mediator. At Mount Zion, Jesus is the mediator. Mount Sinai brings an Old Covenant, which was ratified by the blood of animals. Mount Zion brings a New Covenant, which is ratified by the blood of God’s precious Son. Mount Sinai was all about exclusion, keeping people away from the mountain. Mount Zion is all about invitation. Mount Sinai is all about Law. Mount Zion is all about grace. But you have come to Mount Zion: The …