Back to the future

Leonard Sweet (who looks suspiciously like Trevor Eve) is interviewed in the latest YFC Magazine, and makes a remark about church that I think merits some reflection:

"In the East and the South, Christianity is growing. One is a very highly liturgical almost Eastern Orthodox - smells, bells, chants -form of Christianity and the other a kind of back to basics Pentecostalism. Both are uing interfaces that work with their culture, so in some ways, traditional churches are not traditional enough."

ps. Which one's Sweet and which one's Eve (probably better known as Boyd from Waking the Dead)? Can you imagine Boyd leading a church?

Wynne Lewis

We received the sad news towards the end of last week that Wynne Lewis had gone home to be with the Lord.

It feels like the end of an era. Wynne was a very influential leader within the Pentecostal movement in general and within Elim in particular. He saw God's blessing wherever he went. His years at Kensington Temple will be remembered as a time of explosive growth as he took KT into realms of expansion that had seldom if ever been seen in any church of any denomination in the UK in the twentieth century.

In recent years, Wynne became a good friend and spoke at leaders' events in Crawley and at our Sunday gathering. I have benefited enormously from Wynne's leadership, encouragement and wisdom.

At times like this one can begin to understand David's reaction to the death of Abner:

"Then the king said to his men, "Do you not realize that a prince and a great man has fallen in Israel this day? And today, though I am the anointed king, I am weak." (2 Samuel 3.38-39)

Monday Fun

This has been around for a few months now. I think it's an amazing way to advertise.

Progressive Pentecostals

John Glass, Elim's General Superintendent always writes a quality editorial in Direction Magazine. In the April edition he draws attention to the term "Progressive Pentecostals". The term is used by Donald Miller and Tetsunao Yamamori, in their book, Global Pentecostalism: The New Face of Christian Social Engagement, to describe the rise of a pentecostalism that combines social action and evangelism.

John commented that this kind of two pronged outreach approach was becoming more common in Elim. Later in the magazine the Elim Church in Kingstanding is featured and it certainly exemplifies progressive pentecostalism.

You can catch up with John on his blog

Find out more about Direction Magazine here

Getting desperate with God in Starbucks

I was having a discussion recently about the future of the church, and, inevitably cafe church came into the conversation.

As I reflected on the discussion, I thought about some of the people who I've met "in church" with really desperate needs. I asked myself this question, "When life gets really desperate, and you need to get desperate with God, how do you get desperate in cafe church?"

What does "desperation" look like in that context?

Tribes

A couple of weeks ago I posted a video clip of Seth Godin. Steve Addison has posted directions for a free download of Godin's Tribes. This link will take you there.

If you want to know why you need a tribe, watch the video at cookiesdays

Come to us or go to them?

I always enjoy reading Steve Addison's blog . A recent post on missional church caught my eye.

The post covers an article by Dan Kimball. For a while now some very influential voices have been advocating missional church as opposed to attractional church as the way forward. The missional church, if I understand it correctly, is one which has as its focus equipping people and sending them out into the community to do the works of the kingdom. Attractional church on the other hand seeks to attract people to its building / campus. That is probably oversimplifying the concepts, but in essence that is the supposed difference in the two approaches to church. Advocates of the missional way of doing things often argue that their way is the most faithful to the New Testament.

But it would appear that perhaps all is not well in missional world. Listen to these comments from Kimball:

"Conversely, some from our staff recently visited a self-described missional church. It was 35 people. That alone is not a problem. But the church had been missional for ten years, and it hadn't grown, multiplied, or planted any other churches in a city of several million people. That was a problem.

Another outspoken advocate of the house church model sees it as more missional and congruent with the early church. But his church has the same problem. After fifteen years it hasn't multiplied. It's a wonderful community that serves the homeless, but there's no evidence of non-Christians beginning to follow Jesus. In the same city several megachurches are seeing conversions and disciples matured."

You'll find Steve Addison's post here and Dan Kimball's thoughts here

The history of Ireland and the future of the world

My good friend Christy Smith sent me the following quote from an article about St. Patrick in a back edition of Christianity Today:

"Patrick did not require the native Irish to surrender their belief in supernatural beings. They were only to regard these beings in a new light as demons. The fear of the old deities was transformed into hatred of demons. If Christianity had come to Ireland with only theological doctrines, the hope of immortal life, and ethical ideas—without miracles, mysteries, and rites—it could have never wooed the Celtic heart."

Patrick and the Celtic Christians have been cited on more than a few occasions in recent years as exemplifying the kind of approach to mission that is needed in a 21st century postmodern context.

I am sure there is something to this, even if some of the contrasts between Roman Christianity and Celtic Christianity and sometimes presented as being a bit too sharp.

Would love to hear your thoughts on this.

You can read the whole article here.

Ireland v Wales 2009 six nations - Higlights-Grand Slam Win

A day to celebrate the memorable Irish victory.

Monday Fun - not quite

Very sorry that there is no Monday Fun video today. For some reason I can't upload videos. Hope that this will be sorted soon.

If you want to have a look at something a bit hairy, take a look at this .

Now for something a bit more off beat. I caught a news article on Radio 4 this morning about the show to see in France this spring. It's called The Satin Slipper (Le Soulier de Satin). I think the reporter said it lasted eleven hours - that's right eleven hours.

The play was written by a conservative French Catholic writer, Paul Claudel. A New York Times review described the film version as a "profoundly religious movie that exalts self-sacrifice redemption and eternal life."

I know I might well be grasping at straws, but I think we are entitled to ask why this kind of production is so popular in probably the most secular nation in Europe, if not the world? Is it a sign of spiritual hunger in that most anti-religious of European nations?

If you want to go to Paris to take a look, you can find details here

Keller Talks at Urban Plant Life

The talks Tim Keller gave at Urban Plant Life are now available here. There are four of them. Well worth listening to. These are from the conference I wrote about in a 25th February post.

Between Two Worlds can direct you to some other talks he gave while he was in Britain.

Labour of love

Intriguing post over at Culture Making. According to the work of a psychologist, Anders Ericsson, practice is a more important factor in good performance than talent. But it's not just hard work that brings good results, it is when you work hard at something you love.

So find out what you love and work hard at it! Read the whole thing here .

Calvin makes an inevitable comeback

Some audios caught my eye this post at Between Two Worlds. If you scroll down you will find four talks to download by Colin Hansen. I have listened to the first three. They were very informative not to say fascinating. I hadn't realised that there was such a revival of Reformed theology amongst young Christians in America.

I think of my theology as pretty much Reformed but set in a Pentecostal context. I think that Reformed people would consider my theology "Reformed lite" at best!

Piper, Driscoll and a college principal called Al Mohler are considered the kind of unofficial leaders of what is happening.

What ecclesiastical and cultural currents are driving it is another question. A desire to return to a more classical expression of Christianity? Disillusionment with the megachurch culture? Burnout out from just trying to love Jesus and do good? Who knows. Whatever the drivers are it is certainly making an impact and on the whole an impact for good.

Not sure that such a "revival" is happening in the U.K. or mainland Europe. Perhaps it is partly to do with people rediscovering the theological sources that were so influential in the founding of the American nation.

Hansen's talks are worth listening to at any rate.

The Gathering, 13-15th March, Telford International Centre

The final promo video for The Gathering. Find out more here

ChristianAudio.com Free Download

The March free download from Christian Audio is Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life by Donald S. Whitney. It's a book on spiritual disciplines which enjoys a good reputation. You can find it here .

Monday Fun

Off to the Ukraine this week for some international Monday fun. Remember this video next time you lift a lid on a saucepan.

Cherie Blair and the marginalisation of Christianity

Most Christians I know feel that the Christian faith in general has come under a lot more pressure in recent years than one would expect in a country that still claims to value freedom of speech.

A couple of Guardian posts that you can find here and here argue that this is not so.

Enter Cherie Blair. An article in the The Telegraph reports Cherie's comments in a Channel 4 documentary, Christianity: A History, in which she refers to the marginalisation of Christianity in Britain. You can read the coverage here. Catch up on the C4 documentary with their Catch-Up service. Not available when I wrote this post, but it should be there soon.

All a waste of time?

Since we've been on the subject of social networking sites, here's some thoughts from Seth Godin. In fairness, the question is being put to him in the context of business, but his comments are interesting.

Godin's considered a (big) bit of a marketing guru. You can find his blog here.

Look forward to your comments.