10.27.2009

Moralism Sends People to Hell

I was recently working in a children's church that had a lot of kids from the projects.  They were "bad kids."  There was one girl who sat quietly the whole time.  She was a "good kid."  The teacher brought a list of rules in to try to get the bad kids to act like good kids.

That's deadly.

If we teach kids that they need to do good things without teaching them the gospel, all we will get is good kids who don't know anything about a personal relationship with Jesus.  Acting good on the outside will help the children's worker's sanity, but not anyone's heart. 

10.08.2009

An Amillennial Point of View

Ok, I know that I just posted a link to Kevin DeYoung's blog, but I really need to do it again.  All my life I've grown up only being taught pre-millennialism. I just never was explained an amillenial point of view, even critically.  So, today I found this post by Kevin DeYoung on his blog.  While I almost totally disagree with it, I love how he explains why he believes what he believes.  Read it and learn something.

10.07.2009

What Is The Kingdom of God?

Kevin DeYoung:

Last week I preached on Mark 1:14-15 where Jesus delivers his first sermon: "The kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel." In this one sentence we find four of the most important words in the New Testament: kingdom, gospel, repent, and believe. Although we are familiar with these four terms, many Christians would struggle to articulate an accurate definition of each.

This is especially true of "kingdom." Clearly the kingdom is central to the story of the gospels (basileia occurs 162 times in the New Testament). But what does the word mean? Let me suggest three complementary ways to look at the kingdom. I realize this is not an exegetical study. But perhaps the theological overview will be helpful.

Click through to read the rest of "Thinking About The Kingdom."  It's something Christians seldom talk about, but it's one of the central themes of the Bible.

10.06.2009

Re-planting Churches

Here is a pretty good blog post by Philipe Assis on replanting churches.  I'm really not sold on the idea, but it was still a good article.

Really not a good morning. I woke up sick, am tired even though I got 8 hours, and am probably going back to my room to sleep.

Posted via SMS from Andrew's posterous

10.04.2009

To Buy

I need to buy...

Jars of Clay - Church Music
Above The Golden State - Above The Golden State

Posted via email from Andrew's posterous

üthe old me dead and gone awayü

Posted via SMS from Andrew's posterous

Fwd: Live Free by Lecrae





Check out "Live Free" by Lecrae.  Lecrae is they guy who proves that modern Christian music actually has lyrical and musical quality.  He describes sin so well.

"Sin so bad it's a liar,
It says we on the throne, tells God to retire.
It says He ain't enough, and it says we want more.
It says He ain't just, and it says He ain't Lord.
Sin is the laugh at his power, rape of His mercy,
Mock of His patience; it says he ain't worthy.

10.01.2009

Jesus Saves From The American Dream

Monday night at Bible Study, a man spoke about his recent missions trip to Mongolia. Mongolia is a really interesting country. It's huge, about the size of Alaska, but only 3 million people live there, and a third of them live in the capital. The rest of the people are scattered hundreds of miles across wasteland. Dirt roads connect villages made up of just a few tents.

The people aren't rich at all by our standards. Most of what they have can be fit into their one room tent. This man went over to teach courses for college credit to members of a church in the Mongolian boondocks. They crammed into a building for nine hours a day for weeks, simply learning about the Bible.

The church is young. Most are first generation believers under the age of 25. They really don't have much, but from the pictures we were shown, they live a whole lot like the end of Acts 2. They do life together. They don't care about stuff; they care about each other. They are a true chuch, growing closer to God together.

It's such a contrast to the American church.

We treat church like a social club. Yeah, the gospel may be preached, but church can still be just a social club. We show up on Sundays caring more about how our external looks than our internal. We talk about things that get us status: our jobs, our sports teams, our girlfriends. We tell other believers about how we prayed and God provided us with a raise, a BMW, or a huge house.

What happened to Acts 2? What happened to sacrificially providing for other believers? What happened to encouraging others, building them up in their walk with Christ? Where is that in the church today?

It's easy to give God credit for giving you wealth. It's not easy to give God glory by giving it away. It's easy to show up on Sunday to keep up appearances. It's not easy to repent of all the crap you did the week before. It's easy to talk about football. It's not easy to ask for help with your addiction to it.

Where'd the church go?