The Evangelical Cycle

I've been going through my stuff lately and have found many Christian magazine articles from as long ago as 20-25 years. So about once or twice a week, I thought I would comment on some fo them to see what the evangelical comunity was thinking 20, 15, 10, 5 and even 2 or 3 years ago. And yes, I haven't forgotten about the podcasting. I am still reading up on it in my Podcasting For Dummies book.

Here are snippets from an article by Philip Yancey from the Sept. 2004 issue of Christianity Todday magazine.


Yancey tells about Gordon Cosby, founding pastor of the Church of the Savior in Washington, D.C., who found that "high-commitment communities begin with a strong sense of devotion, which expresses itself in a life of discipline. Groups organized around devotion and discipline tend to produce abundance, but ultimately that very success breaks down discipline and leads to decadence."

John Wesley (18th century) said,
"I do not see how it is possible , in the nature of things, for any revival of religion to continue long. For religion (here he means evangelical Christianity) must necessarily produce both industry and frugality, and these cannot but produce riches. But as riches increase, so will pride, anger and love of the world in all its branches."

Two summers ago I did a series on the history of revivals in America. Here are the revival series links to that series if you wish to read them. I found the same to be true. Here is what I saw as a pattern:

First Generation Revivals break out with devotion, theological purity and care for others
Second generation (their children) The revival now is handed down more and more as laws and processes.
Third generation (grandchildren) The revival has faded and this generation has trouble with the dead laws and rules. Some try to follow the religion as much as possible and others rebel. Still others water it down to fit the world's mold.
Fourth Generation Churches are empty except those who water down the gospel and preach to felt needs. A remnant begins to rise similar to the first generation.
Fifth Generation Hopefully another revival comes. If not, the society is in deep doo-doo. Rampant crime and chaos ensue and then the people want a dictator. For example, you can follow this same trend throughout 19th and early 20th century Germany int he Protestant churches and the society in general there.

Where do you think America is now? In the first, second, third, fourth or fifth generation?

Quote of the Week

Let us watch that we do not slide imperceptibly to a state where the women do the praying and the men run the churches. Men who do not pray have no right to direct church affairs. We believe in the leadership of men within the spiritual community of the saints, but that leadership should be won by spiritual worth.

___A. W. Tozer

Source: http://christianresearchnetwork.com/

Why Can't We Join?

John MacArthur has an interesting sermon here on churches that tolerate sin. The sermon is about the church at Thyatira which is dealt with in Revelation 2:18-29. This is the part I want you to consider. He writes that in Thyatira, they had labor guilds, similar to our labor unions or I would imagine, the guilds of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. In fact if one didn't belong to a guild, it was difficult to obtain a job. Now here's the kicker. Guilds weren't just a business arrangement; they were also social places. Those who belonged to guilds had to do what they did including feasts, sacrifices to the gods and orgies. These things were common in the Roman Empire as many of the events were seen as "religious" activities. MacArthur goes on to say that Christians kept away from the guilds for obvious reasons. He then conjectures that perhaps some Christians might have said,

"How are we going to win the world unless we join the guilds?"

Anyway, many Christians joined the guilds and the result was sin - idol worship and immorality - brought into the church


Does this sound familiar to today???

I think perhaps so....:)

Christian Carnival Crisis

The Christian Carnival moderator, Dory, is missing and we are worried about her.

Meanwhile, Jeremy Pierce (Parableman) and Nick Queen are trying to craft together another list. Jeremy already has hosts and hostesses for the month of May. Kudos to Jeremy.

If you wish to host or just read the submissions and be on the new Christian Carnival list, please go to this site put up by Nick. It's really simple to register. NO passwords needed - just put your email and click the SUBMIT button.
Many of us want the carnival to continue so hope you will sign up.

http://cc.nickqueen.com/mailinglist/?p=subscribe&id=1

To keep up with where the carnival will be hosted each week, be sure to visit Jeremy's blog, .

According to the Christian pollster, George Barna, less than 10% of the young adults, aged 21-29, in America meet the following criteria:

*Knowing, loving, and serving God was identified as their top priority in life.

*They described their faith in God as being of the highest importance.

*Each of these young adults possessed a "biblical worldview," based on their responses to a series of questions about their view of life. In essence, they contend that absolute moral truth exists; such truth is defined in the Bible; God is the all-knowing and all-powerful creator and ruler of the universe; faith in Jesus Christ is the only means to salvation; Satan is a real being; Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth; and all of the principles taught in the Bible are true and accurate.

*They believe that their main purpose in life is to love God with all their heart, mind and strength.

*They are currently active in a vibrant community of faith, as demonstrated by their consistent engagement in worship, prayer, Bible study and spiritual accountability.

"Another" Version of Acts

In this very ingenious post from More Books and Things, we might see how the emergent churches might someday translate some NT Scriptures. Here is a snippet, but do go to the post link above to read the whole thing.

Acts 4:31
And after they had done the Daily Office, the Ignatius Examen, and Lectio Divina, when they had practiced a listening exercise, the labyrinth where they had gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Divine Presence and began to chant Taize mantras with boldness.

Acts 9:40
But Peter sent them all out and lit a candle in his sacred space and breathed a breath prayer, and centering himself, he said, "Tabitha, breathe in, breathe out, visualize your inner healing." And she opened her eyes, and when she saw Peter, she sat up in the Lotus position.

Acts 14:23
When they had completed enneagrams they appointed elders that fit the right personality profiling for them in every church, having practiced the presence with spiritual disciplines, they did a guided imagery exercise to direct them to the divine center in whom they had believed.

Acts 28:8
And it happened that the father of Publius was lying in bed afflicted with recurrent fever and dysentery; and Paul went in to give spiritual direction to him and after he had found his true self in the silence, he laid his hands on him in his altered state of conciousness and realized his inner divinity.

Only Conversion Will Save the Day

This is from the January/February 2005 issue of UU World: The Magazine of the Unitarian Universalist Association, VOL XIX NO 1:


(note: Unitarianism gained many former evangelical adherents in the late 18th and all throughout the 19th century. James Luther Adams was a modern 20th century Unitarian. Unitarians do not believe in the Trinity nor the divinity io Jesus, although they consider him a great moral authority.)

"When James Luther Adams, a young Unitarian minister and newly appointed professor of theology at Meadville Lombard Theological School, went to Germany in 1935 to study with some of the greatest theologians of the time, he confronted a deeply unsettling fact: Germany's churches were not effectively resisting the rise of Nazism. A convert to Unitarianism from Baptist fundamentalism, Adams had high expectations for Germany's long tradition of liberal theology. After all, a century earlier, Unitarians had found the inspiration for Transcendentalism in the new German theology of their time. But German liberalism hadn't foreseen the Nazi threat--nor did it seem to offer adequate resources for resistance. Adams came to admire the German "confessing church" movement, whose members did actively oppose Hitler at great personal risk. He later described the impact of his experience:
Let me put it autobiographically and say that in Nazi Germany I soon came to the question, "What is it in my preaching and my political action that would stop this?"...It is a liberal attitude to say that we keep ourselves informed and read the best papers on these matters, and perhaps join a voluntary association now and then. But to be involved with other people so that it costs and so that one exposes the evils of society...requires something like conversion, something more than an attitude. It requires a sense that there's something wrong and I must be different from the way I have been".

The emphasis in the last phrase is mine.

"Something like conversion." It's interesting to note that so many Lutheran churches at that time in Germany were solidly in the liberal theological camp of "higher criticism." When Nazism came, they either folded, or as most did, adapted their "theology" to Nazi nationalism. This consisted of leaving out the miracles, the resurrection and any favorable references to Jews or Israel. It reminds me of the Jeffersonian Bible where Thomas J. did the same thing (except for the Jewish deletions) so that his children could have a good moral code without all the "nonsense."

If the evangelical church goes down the same path the liberals did 100 years ago, and I think they are, heaven help our country. Atually, Heaven will have to help it.

Cell Phone vs. Bible

I thought this was neat AND the message is obvious.


CELL PHONE vs. BIBLE

I wonder what would happen if we treated our Bible like we treat our cellphone?

What if we carried it around in our purses or pockets?
What if we flipped through it several time a day?
What if we turned back to go get it if we forgot it?
What if we used it to receive messages from the text?
What if we treated it like we couldn't live without it?
What if we gave it to Kids as gifts?
What if we used it when we traveled?
What if we used it in case of emergency?
This is something to make you go....hmm...where is my Bible?
Oh, and one more thing. Unlike our cell phone, we don't have to worry about our Bible being disconnected because Jesus already paid the bill.
Makes you stop and think "where are my priorities?"
And no dropped calls!

Book Review: and the Shofar Blew

Although I rarely read Christian fiction, a friend recommended a book by Francine Rivers, and the Shofar Blew.

Anne Graham Lotz (daughter of Billy Graham) says about this book,
This book is A POWERFUL and almost PROPHETIC STATEMENT of the church in America...."And the Shofar Blew" is a must-read.

I agree and would say it is a must read for every pastor and those going to be pastors.

Here is a synopsis of the story, except for the ending which I will leave for you to read.

A young man (son of a famous successful TV pastor) and a young woman (her father is a part time pastor in a small eastern town) meet at a Christian college in the Midwest and get married. He serves as an assistant pastor and then is called to a small dying church of mostly elderly folks in northern California. Sadly, instead of ministering the gospel to the church members, he wants to "grow" the church. Most of the book is about his attempts to grow it and he succeeds in bringing in 5000 people. In the meantime, he neglects and bullies his son and wife because everything is for the church. Well, that is, his conception of "church." His sermons become shorter and more entertaining because that is what brings in the folks.

Meanwhile, those who want the Bible and Bible-oriented music leave. But because so many more are coming in, the pastor doesn't care and feels those who have left are a good riddance. Many of those who left are praying for this pastor to see the error of his ways. His son becomes so messed up that he is expelled from school and goes to live with his grandmother in Southern California in the wealthy hills of North Hollywood. I have to interject here that I live 15 minutes from North Hollywood and there are no wealthy hills. In fact, there are no hills. Now there are the Hollywood hills where people like Ellen Degeneres and Paris Hilton live or lived. But, this is fiction, so, moving on.....the boy grows up and is ready for college and the wife is cowed and pyschologically abused by her husband. It's at this point that things start to fall apart for the pastor. I won't give away the ending as I want you to be in suspense so you'll read it. I got my copy at my local library. Maybe you can too

And what is the theme of this book?
Church growth isn't all it's cracked up to be. Not if you lose your soul, family and those friends who count in the process.

Answer to Riddle

Answer to yesterday's riddle is:

Albert Einstein

Riddle

Who said this?

The fanatical atheists are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures who—in their grudge against traditional religion as the 'opium of the masses'—cannot hear the music of the spheres.

The answer will appear here tomorrow.

Chat Room Reunion Weekend

As I have said here before, between Jan. 1999 and December, 2004, I took care of my bedridden mother (because of a stroke) by myself 24/7. Since I couldn't get out much, my social life became online friends I met on Christian forums, on email discussion lists and in Christian chat rooms. Now that I am out and about, I have the best of both worlds - online friends and real-world friends.

I met many wonderful people online. One of the best Christian chat rooms I've been in is for Christians over 50. Every year they meet in Dallas and of course I wasn't able to go until my mother died. So, tomorrow (Thursday, April 12) I am flying out of Burbank to Dallas. I will meet not only chat room friends, but also two couples who will come up from the Tyler, Tx area. I met one on a forum and the other one in another Christian chat room.

I've never met any of these people in person. I probably will be the odd person out. It's a California thing...I am from the "left" coast, act like it and look like it..I guess....LOL.

So, I leave you with three items today. From today's Christianity Today weblog,

"In our lifetimes, the centuries-long North Atlantic captivity of the church is drawing to an end," says Philip Jenkins, historian at Pennsylvania State University.

My comment: captivity? Wow!


Here is the second item,

More than one answer has been given, but few have improved upon an answer given by my father, Dr. Samuel A. Moffett, more than half a century ago. Korea was already then one of the miracles of the modern missionary movement, and a commission of inquiry was sent to study the methods that had produced such great results. Since the first dramatic leap in church growth had occurred in my father's area of work in north Korea, they came to ask him the secret. I think his answer disappointed them. It was too simplistic. Too pietistic. But I think he was right.
"For years," he said, "we have simply held up before these people the Word of God, and the Holy Spirit has done the rest.
Source: Christianity Today magazine-Nov. 23, 1973 issue)

My comment: AMEN!


And I end with this tidbit from Donald Grey Barnhouse,

Satan's purpose is not to make good people bad or bad people worse. Satan's purpose is ultimately to make people good without Jesus Christ. If the devil owned any one town in the United States, it would immediately become the loveliest town in America -- crime free, prosperous, and everyone would go to church, where Jesus Christ is not preached.

Yep. You got it right Dr. Barnhouse.

See you next week when I get back from Dallas.

I'm #10!

Wow! Thanks to Rich Tatum of Pneumablogs for putting me in the top 20 of Pentecostal bloggers. In fact I am #10.

Pneumablogs can be found here.

Another Form of Persection?

I know many Christians who are looking for a good Bible believing, Scriptural teaching church, but cannot find one anywhere near them. Some of these also want the Spirit to be in strong evidence a la the Charismatic/Pentecostal stream, but they also cannot find a church that preaches the Word and cross.

Previously, I posted thoughts about how I believe persection in America started in earnest last year with the publication of the books by atheists Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins, written mostly against evangelicals. But I never thought of not being able to find a good church as a form of suffering for Christ. In other words, many are willing to leave churches where they've been for years, leaving their close friends behind, to search for the real deal instead of staying in a "clown house."
Here is the post that got me to think along these lines.



And from the Christian Post, comes this snippet:

....two of the top reasons [people] left their previous church: lack of help to develop spiritually and the pastor was not a good preacher.

Here is Tozer and J and S

I've been looking for someone who makes conversion very clear since as I have posted in the past weeks, many of the Young Calvinists, IMO, are not clear about this, especially between justification and sanctification. Here is a very good teaching from Tozer (1897-1963) on what "accepting Christ" means. This is the type of thing I want to hear more of. And, hopefully if I can get the podcast up later this month, I will present my...hopefully clear....version too....LOL.

Here is Tozer's sermon. It's only 23 minutes.

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=11603193641

I want to bring to your attention what Phil Johnson wrote here at the blog, Pyro Maniacs.

He makes five excelent points but since his blog is copyrighted, you will need to read it for yourself which I hope you will. I do want to point out his fourth point (#4), the one about Sanctification. He says essentially what I have posted many times over the past two weeks. He puts it this way--"it is missing." I would say it is confused with justification. But at any rate, the true meaning of the Sanctification concept isn't getting through to a lot of people. And not just to many emergents, but to many others in evangelical churches.

He says we need to:

4. Reinstate holiness on our list of priorities. Sanctification is an idea that seems almost completely missing from the Emerging conversation. An almost pathological fear of "legalism" keeps emerging types from ever questioning whether any element of postmodern culture is compatible with Christlikeness or not.

Do read the entire post at the link above (where it says here).

Tuesday Testimony

Someone in the blogosphere has suggested that today (Tuesday, April 3,2007) be devoted to Christian testimonies.

So here's mine, although I've presented bits and pieces here and there in other previous posts. I will make mine short and sweet so you can continue your Internet surfing....:)

*I grew up in a Protestant (PCUSA) church where I never heard the gospel.
*My parents were nice, ethical, honest people so I modeled after them and was a nice, ethical, honest person too. Some Christian leaders today probably would think I was a Christian. I didn't dress like Brittany Spears. If you are as old as I am you will know what Lanz was. That's how I dressed--think al ittle more conservative New York Jones.

*I became an atheist in college--why not. My liberal Protestant church had nothing to offer me.
*I sat next to a Christian (Baptist) in my sophomore year of college. She told me the gospel. I said to myself, "How bizarre. I've studied lots of other religions and I've never heard anything like this one. It must be a Baptist thing."
My friend said that, "No, it wasn't a Baptist thing." It's what the Bible said in the NT. Oh. OK.
*I decided after wrestling with it for two weeks to receive Christ, now that I knew now.
*Two days later "it took." I saw truth and was really happy inside.
*In my junior year I transferred to USC (So. Cal, not So. Carolina) and met up with Campus Crusade for Christ. They discipled me and I htink they did a superb job.
*I graduated and became a music teacher. I went to church. I grew in Sanctification as a Christian by means of a few churches I've attended (most notable among others The Church on the Way--think Jack Hayford), my own reading and dating Fuller Seminary guys....:)

The End

Evangelism for Children

At Sign of Jonah there is a post about being careful to "indoctrinate" children with what I would call Third Wave Charismaticism. This includes revelations, "seeing" Jesus, spiritual warfare, prophesying and so forth. Of course the film, Jesus Camp has now brought this to the forefront.

I completely agree with Keith (Sign of Jonah) and would like to add this from Brannon Howse's book for children which teaches them the Christian faith,

Compelling a child to “pray a sinner’s prayer” will not save them. It will only make false converts if the heart is not prepared for God’s presence.

You can read about Howse's book here. It even has a forward from Candace Cameron Bure who played the sister to the Olsen twins on Full House.