Free Audio Book – Crazy Love – Francis Chan

If you haven’t bought this book already, I highly recommend it!  Crazy Love, by Francis Chan looks at WHY God loves us.  It is full of solid Biblical teaching and insightful theological perspective.  Francis Chan is the pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley California and also speaks around the country at different events.

For the month of July, you can download the audio book for free HERE!
This audio book even has Francis himself narrating!
You need to use discount code JUL2009 to get the book for free.

Caption Please -

Sad Times

Emerge-ed?

For those of you interested in the Emerging, Emergent, Missional conversation, I came across this article by Brother Maynard cleverly titled – Emerge-ed?

BTW – If you have never seen So I Married an Axe Murderer, one of Mike Myers early works, go get it now!  It is truly one of those classic comedies (at least of the 90s)

“Harriet, sweet Harriet, so knowing, so trusting, so love-ed.”

but I digress…

In this emerging/ent/ed conversation there have been several attempts at defining the different terms, but unfortunately there is not much consensus about which terms mean what.  That leads to several key figures deciding to abandon some of the terms and trying to come up with different, better ones.

Personally I have experienced some tension about these terms and which term means what and who is associated with which term, etc.

At any rate, if this is at all interesting to you, click through to Brother Maynard or Grace and see what they have to say about the terms in general.

And let me what you think too…

Bill George at the Willow Leadership Summit

Bill George is the professor of Management Practice at Harvard and author of True North.

My paraphrase of Bill’s thesis:
The question is not what can the leaders of the country do for us, what can we do for our country (our church, our community)?

Key Ideas:

—”Leadership is about empowering others to step up and lead”

—“We are born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. All of us!”

21st century Leadership ideals:
o Align
o Empower
o Serve
o Collaborate

Six things you need to develop your leadership
1. Know what you want to do
2. Gain self awareness
3. Be true to your values
4. Follow your motivating capabilities
5. Building a support team around you
6. Lead an integrated life

—-
Great Session about Servant leadership and I will be processing this and the other sessions for a long time.

Interesting Reading – Why I’m Not Emergent?

http://www.notemergent.com/

Check out this website to learn why these two guys are not emergent. Pretty interesting stuff. Here’s a quote from the book:

“You can be young, passionate about Jesus Christ, surrounded by diversity, engaged in a postmodern world, reared in evangelicalism and not be an emergent Christian. In fact, I want to argue that it would be better if you weren’t.”

So are you emergent or not?

Charles Wesley, little brother, poet, preacher

Charles was born two months premature on December 18th 1707 at Epworth England.  His father prophecied over him, saying, “Be steady, the Christian faith will surely revive in the Kingdom; you shall see it though I shall not.”  

In April of 1716 he entered Westminster School and then in June of 1726 he entered Christ Church, Oxford.  While at Oxford he formed the Holy Club which would be the foundation of Methodism. 

He says about his time at Oxford. “Diligence led me into serious thinking.  I went to the weekly sacrament, and persuaded two or three young students to accompany me, and to observe the method of study prescribed by the statutes of the University.  This gained me the harmless name of Methodist.”  

It is well to note that “no new theology was involved, no break with the Church, no revolt against tradition.  Methodism meant discipline, self-discipline, a resolute sense of duty and responsibility, a life of regular devotion and active witness.”   The latter is a point that must not be undervalued.  The ‘Methodists’ as Charles’ group came to be called “were neither sour puritans nor pious sentimentalists.  Their enthusiasm found a healthy outlet in social and philanthropic as well as evangelical activities.”  

I thought this may be encouraging to some like me who are struggling with the same issues 300 years later.  Theology is no good if it is not practiced.  And one need not revise theology to cause a revolution.  The Gospel as it is written is enough for that! 

I really dig that Charles also had a great intentionality of missional living (though they did not call it missional then)  Loving this world is the whole point of Christ’s church on earth.  So let’s get out there and love the world!

References
  John Telford,  The Life of the Rev. Charles Wesley, MA.  Wesleyan Methodist Book Room.  EC. 
  John R. Tyson, Charles Wesley; A Reader.  Oxford University Press.  Oxford.  1989. 
  Frederick C. Gill, Charles Wesley; The First Methodist.  Lutterworth Press.  Great Britain, 1964. 

Book Review – Stand Against the Wind – McManus

Read a great book today.  It was a quick read, but so full of great stuff that I will be ReReading it many times over the next few years.  I really enjoy McManus.  His style and theology is thought provoking and encouraging.  He illuminates the scriptures of the Bible and forces the reader to wrestle with what it really means to live as a follower of Christ.

Here are some quotes:

“Courage is the strength of heart born out of integrity.” p30

“You overcome selfishness with servanthood and greed with generosity.” p38

“Faith is not always a way out of crisis [it] gives us the strength and confidence to see every challenge and crisis through to the end.”  p54

“Wholeness is not found through receiving, but through giving.”  p70

“Only the testing of our faith develops the perseverance we need.” p 83

McManus ends with this provocative statement, “The ultimate end of character transformation is not freedom from sin, but freedom to once again be all that God designed for us to be.” p118

This is a good read and very short, but packed with thought provoking ideas.  Go pick it up!

Book Review

The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World

Lofty title, but looks to be a great book. I am anxious to get my hands on it. Contributors include, John Piper, David Wells, DA Carson, Tim Keller, Voddie Baucham and Mark Driscoll. You can get it at http://www.wstbooks.com.

I read a review today which said this:

Tim Keller’s Chapter points to a (re)thinking about ministry and the way it is done. He has six areas where the church should change.

1. Gospel Theologizing – All of theology must be an exposition of the Gospel
2. Gospel Realizing – We can know the Gospel, but not really know the Gospel
3. Gospel Urbanizing – many Christians must move to the city, urbanize the Gospel and create strong versions of Gospel communities (All about community!!!)
4. Gospel Communication – through evangelism that is intelligible, credible, plausible, thorough, progressive, and process-oriented
5. Gospel Humiliation – Christ’s power is evident through your weakness
6. Gospel Incarnation – within a pagan city, God’s people are to be neither withdrawn nor assimilated, but rather distinct and engaged

My comments -

Bottom line from Keller – are we aiming too low with our evangelism ambitions and expectation and not allowing God to actually work in our faith?

I especially love the Incarnation and Theologizing statements. We need to be distinct yet engaged with the community, how else can we share the Love of God?

And, we need to base all our theology around the actual, practical application of how the Gospel is lived and presented.

LOVE IT!