New Questions for the Church

New Questions for a New Day:

It's time to start asking new questions. Better answers to the same old questions about the church will not get us through the tumultuous times in which we live. This is a time for out-of-the box thinking. Old questions keep us in the box. New questions invite us to move outside.

One question that has been asked consistently through the years, and even more so in these days of declining church membership is, "How do we bring them in?" It would be better for us to ask, "How do we send them out?"

In these days of changing roles and responsibilities many wonder, "What should the pastor do?" But a more important question for congregations today is "What is our shared ministry?"

When congregations focus on strategic planning they ask, "What's our vision and how do we implement it?" What would happen if they instead asked, "What's God up to and how do we get on board?"

When congregations have financial struggles, they ask, "How do we survive?" Instead they might ask, "How do we serve?"

When congregations think about their mission, they often ask, "How do we save people?" or perhaps, "How do we help people?" A better question might be "How do we make the reign of God more present in this time and place?"

There are no "right" answers to these new questions that can be applied to all congregations. Every congregation needs to live with the questions, because it is only in living with them that new ways being and doing church emerge. The familiar line from Rainer Maria Rilke in Letters to a Young Poet can guide us: "Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, one distant day live right into the answer." 

If you ask these questions there is no assurance that you'll find the way to renew, revitalize or redevelop your church. It may happen. But you may just as likely discover that asking these questions takes you down a road to some other alternative that you hadn't even thought of before. What I feel pretty confident about, however, is that asking these new questions will bring us closer to discovering what God is seeking from us in this time. I also believe asking these new questions will help ensure that whatever the future holds for us and our congregations we will be more faithful in the work we are about right now. And that is a pretty wondrous thing!

By Pastor Jeffery D Jones - Alban Weekly

Great Quote

Richard Hays from A Moral Vision of the New Testament: “…for the foreseeable future we must find ways to live within the church in a situation of serious moral disagreement while still respecting one another as brother and sisters in Christ. If the church is going to start practicing the discipline of exclusion from the community, there are other issues far more important than homosexuality where we should begin to draw a line in the dirt: violence and materialism, for example”

5 Differences Between Kingdom of God & Kingdom of the World

http://reknew.org/2015/01/5-differences-between-the-kingdom-of-god-and-the-kingdom-of-the-world/?utm_source=Website+Signup&utm_campaign=6bebc3724e-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_0de6226b5c-6bebc3724e-28050201

From Greg Boyd

A Little Humor

The Preacher's Lament

If I express myself on a subject, I'm trying to run things.

If I'm silent, I'm dumb or have lost interest.

If I'm often at my office (preparing sermons or studying), why don't I get out and learn what's going on.

If I'm out when they call, why am I not tending to business, or studying for a sermon.

If I'm not at home at night, I'm out having a good time.

If I'm home, I'm neglecting important outside contacts and activities.

If I don't agree with people, I'm bullheaded.

If I do agree, I don't have any ideas of my own.

If I don't do what I'm asked, I'm a poor pastor.

If I do agree, well, that's what I'm paid for.

If I give someone a short answer, I'm "too big for my britches."

If I attempt to explain the pros and cons of an issue, I'm a know it all.

If I'm well dressed, I'm a big shot.

If I'm not, I'm a poor representative of my office.

If I'm on the job a short time, I'm inexperienced.

If I've been there a long time, It's time for a change.

Shane Claiborne: The power of a name | Christian News on Christian Today

Shane Claiborne: The power of a name | Christian News on Christian Today

It's Not Always about the Money

When it comes to choosing a career and picking a college major that will help you achieve your goals, money isn't everything. Job meaning counts for a lot too. That's why PayScale asks everybody who takes our survey if they feel like their job makes the world a better place. This list ranks 207 college majors by the percentage of graduates in each major who answer that question with a resounding "yes."

The major that leads to the most meaningful work is pastoral ministry - 93 percent of respondents told us their work definitely makes the world a better place. Graduates who chose this path definitely sacrifice income potential for good karma, since the median mid-career salary for pastoral ministry majors is only $46,000.

That doesn't mean that all meaningful majors lead to salaries. The second most meaningful major on our list is nursing (85 percent), which results in a median salary of $73,600 - not too shabby. And people with the highest-pay major on our list, petroleum engineering, don't seem to feel like they've sold their souls for a high income - 70 percent of them report high job meaning.

In general, high job meaning correlates with majors whose grads work with people and/or really get to do the work they want to be doing, not with high pay. Clinical laboratory science majors and child development majors score high. We also see majors related with sports and fitness rank as very meaningful - athletic training and sports medicine majors are near the top of the list.

Which majors rank as the least meaningful? Advertising (30 percent), graphic communication (29 percent),fashion merchandising communication (20 percent), fashion design (27 percent) and film production (23 percent) round out the bottom of the list.

http://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/most-meaningful-majors#explanatory

Pornography: The Secret Assassin By Ronnie Floyd

Sin is most powerful in the darkness. Sin’s power to operate in secret has destroyed many followers of Jesus. Open sin can be confronted, rebuked, challenged and repented. Secret sin eats away like acid on skin. Jesus warned us the most dangerous things to us come from inside ourselves (Matthew 15:16-20).

Sin is most powerful when secret
Sin is most powerful when unknown, and few sins among Christians are more destructive in secret than pornography. In Bible Studies for Life, Chip Ingram writes, “13 percent of all web searches are related to erotic content [and] almost 9 out of 10 young men (85 percent) and almost half of young women (48 percent) report viewing pornography.”
More troubling than the overall data is that related to followers of Jesus: 50 percent of men and 20 percent of Christian women regularly view pornography. Too many from the body of Christ are being eaten up from the inside by this secret sin. Marriages are suffering. Husbands do not love their wives as they should. Wives are looking for pleasure apart from their husbands. Single adults are allowing pornography to substitute for actual relationships rather than remaining mentally pure. Seven of 10 teens have accidentally been exposed to pornography online.² This exposure could permanently affect their ability to have deep relationships. It could torpedo marriages before the “I do’s” are even spoken.

Pornography wounds not just you, but others
As bad as those things are, pornography does not only affect the person consuming it. Pornography is “like shrapnel [which] will damage and wound those around us.”
The Old Testament hero of the faith, Job, recognized the need for purity saying, “I have made a covenant with my eyes. How then could I look at a young woman?”⁴ The Apostle Paul instructed us, “For this is God’s will, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality, so that each of you knows how to control his own body in sanctification and honor, not with lustful desires, like the Gentiles who don’t know God.”⁵ Mental and physical sexual purity are required by God. Physical impurity is always preceded by mental sin.

Pornography can be overcome
Victory over pornographic use or pornographic addiction should begin with the spiritual root. All sin is a result of wanting selfish desires rather than God’s desires. Sin is a not merely an unwise choice or unhealthy decision. Sin is the replacement of God’s authority with our own. This is why all sin, including the viewing of pornography, must be repented. Followers of Jesus must use the word of God to combat the temptation to indulge in viewing pornography. The power of God’s Word is the power to overcome sin, any sin. Reading it, meditating on it, memorizing it, and internalizing it lead to victory over sin. The work of the Spirit in the power of the Word is the power Jesus’ followers need to overcome temptation. He has not left his people defenseless against sin and temptation. The allure of pornography and the damage that comes from it can be overcome in the power of God’s Word. Saturate your life in every way with God’s Word. Be filled with the Spirit at all times. The Word and the Spirit together will lead you to overcome pornography.

http://pastors.com/pornography-secret-assassin/