Communism fell in Eastern Europe 20 years ago and the church in America is largely unaware of the role that Christians played in its demise. I wrote about the role of Christianity in the fall of the Berlin Wall on Tuesday and today I ran across another article on this subject. Adrian Pabst in his… Continue Reading
Category Archives: Spiritual News
Marty Duren, Todd & Paul Littleton, Art Rogers, David Phillips and . . .
Me. What do all of us have in common? Apart from being friends, we have blogged on ministry and missional living over the past few years as pastors and leaders. We also found common ground in some of our views on the SBC and found ourselves blogging together on the now defunct SBCOutpost. Perhaps you… Continue Reading
NYC Schools to Celebrate Muslim Holidays
Claiming that Christian and Jewish holidays are celebrated, the New York City Council voted last week to add two Muslim holidays to the city's public school calendar, citing the annual observance of Christian and Jewish holidays. Mayor Bloomberg objects, saying that you can't take off school for everything. Apart from the fact that I would have… Continue Reading
Phil Busbee, Pastor of First Baptist, San Francisco, Passed Away June 27th
This is very sad news. Pastor Phil Busbee of First Baptist Church, San Francisco, passed away June 27th. Visitation will be on July 6 and the funeral service will be July 7. All of the funeral arrangements are listed at First Baptist's website. When I was a seminary student at Golden Gate in the late 90's, Erika… Continue Reading
Gateway’s 3-on-3 Basketball Tournament Is a Huge Success!
About 9 months ago, we had a big breakthrough in our church when we began to reach teenagers in our community for the first time. Our youth group went on a mission trip to Houston and came back wanting to reach out to their neighbors. We started a Kid's Club on Sunday afternoons thinking that we… Continue Reading
Bulldozers Are Tearing Up Our Church’s Property
Today was the day. I drove up to the church and they were working. The bulldozers or backhoes or whatever they are called (sorry, I'm an idiot) were uprooting trees and knocking them down. Our church is building a new multi-purpose building and today is the day that I finally saw construction equipment on site. … Continue Reading
Has the SBC Reached a Tipping Point? Toward a Southern Missiology, Part 3
Parts one and two are HERE and HERE. Has the SBC now reached a tipping point for change and reform from which there is no return? Alvin Reid, professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary seems to think so. He thinks that we have reached a point of no return when it comes to being aware of the… Continue Reading
Random Thinking
Last night, I couldn't get to sleep. My mind was racing. Finally, I drifted off, but not before I ran through a dozen different subjects. I've been told by friends that I have adult ADD. Maybe so. It would explain a lot. Normally, I write essays for this blog because it is really rewarding for… Continue Reading
Where Did All The Christians Go? America Loses 10% of Its Christian Population Since 1990
America is de-Christianizing at a rapid rate. According to the American Religious Identification Survey released today, the percentage of those identifying with Christianity in America dropped from 86% in 1990 to 76% today. 15% say they have no religion, up from 8.2% in 1990. Keep in mind that these are people who, if you asked… Continue Reading
Missional Holidays, Part 2
Eugene Peterson says that it is the role of the pastor to keep the community attentive to God. In speaking of community here, I think that he means the church. He is right and I take that role very seriously, however imperfectly I carry it out. But, I also think that it is the role of… Continue Reading