Thought Exercise on Denominations

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Quarreling Yesterday & Today

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Keywords

In Paul’s day the church quarreled over the Jewish law and over genealogies, over meat sacrificed to idols and sabbath practices, and over favoritism shown to the rich patrons and negligence shown to ...

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The Many Houses Analogy and the Problem with the Attic

Author

Joshua Chatraw and Jack Carson

Keywords

Scripture

John 10:6, John 17:21, 1 Corinthians 3:11, 1 Corinthians 1:10-13, Revelation 7:10

Before he was a household name, C. S. Lewis was a hardened atheist. From his teens to his early thirties, he vocalized many of the objections to Christianity that animate doubt in our age. After his s...

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The Founding of the African Methodist Episcopal Church

Author

Esau McCaulley

Keywords

Scripture

Luke 1:1-4, Galatians 4:4-7

The African Methodist Episcopal Church began when Richard Allen and Absalom Jones demanded an equal place in the Methodist Episcopal Church and were refused. In their preaching and teaching, jus...

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The Front Doorstep of Christianity

Author

Brian Fikkert and Russel Mask

Keywords

As the center of Christianity shifts from the West (North America and Western Europe) to the Global South, grinding poverty is on the front doorstep — and in the front pews — of the church of Jesus Ch...

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Burnout in Clergy

Author

Andrew Purves

Keywords

What is happening to us, we who are the ministers of Jesus Christ? Many of us are professionally, spiritually and financially depressed. The figures produced by studies only serve to quantify what we ...

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When Doubt Hurts

Author

Uche Anizor

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As many theologians have helpfully described, there is a healthy place for doubting that is integral to faith. When approached thoughtfully and sincerely, these doubts can lead to a deepening understa...

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Pursuing the Common Good Throughout History

Author

Don Everts

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 22:39, Philippians 2:3-4, 1 Corinthians 10:24, Romans 15:1-2, Galatians 6:10, Romans 12:10, Acts 20:35, Matthew 25:35-40, Isaiah 58:6-7, Proverbs 19:17, Luke 10:30-37, James 2:15-16, 1 John 3:17, Proverbs 31:8-9, Matthew 25:40, Acts 11:29-30, 2 Corinthians 8:13-15, Acts 2:44-45, Acts 4:32-35, 1 Corinthians 12:25-26

Pursuing the common good has been a strong marker of the Christian church from the very beginning. The early church had many habits that they became known for, of course—including meeting frequently, ...

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The Two Poles of Speaking to God (And What’s Often Missing in the Western Church)

Author

Soong-Chan Rah

Keywords

Lament

Old Testament scholar Claus Westermann situates the Hebrew poetic material into two broad categories: praise and lament. Westermann asserts that “as the two poles, they determine the nature of all spe...

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What Exactly Is Racial Reconciliation?

Author

Brenda Salter McNeil

Keywords

What exactly is racial reconciliation? If you asked ten different people, it’s likely you’d get ten different answers! At a gathering I attended of national multiethnic leaders—pastors, professors, di...

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Defining Religion: Creed, Cult, Conduct

Author

Robert Farrar Capon

Keywords

Religion

In this fictionalized pastoral counseling session, the Episcopalian Priest Robert Farrar Capon shares some eternal truths related to the nature of religion—and in conclusion, how Christianity differs....

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The Heretic

Author

Emo Philips

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 7:3, James 2:13, 1 Corinthians 1:10, Galatians 3:28, Romans 14:1, John 13:35

I was walking in San Francisco along the Golden Gate Bridge when I saw a man about to jump off. I tried to dissuade him from committing suicide and told him simply that God loved him. A tear came to h...

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Compartmentalizing our Lives

Author

Frank Viola

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Ever since I became a Christian, I’ve met countless believers who treated their lives like the US government treats its various departments. In the US government, there is the Department of Education,...

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Categorized, Labeled, Cubbyholed

Author

Robert Mulholland Jr.

Keywords

Stereotypes

When I say “New Testament” or “a theological seminary,” in most cases I can see from their reaction that they immediately and radically reverse their evaluation. From a relatively high place in their ...

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The Solution to Divisions

Author

James Bryan Smith

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The solution to gender, race and social divisions is not to eradicate our differences but to see them in light of Jesus. The Pentecostal movement in the United States in the early twentieth century wa...

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The Puzzle of Polygamy

Author

Bradley Long

Keywords

Scripture

1 Timothy 3:2, 12, Titus 1:6

A classic mission dilemma: The chief of a village in a remote area, whose people practice a tribal religion, becomes a believer and declares the whole village is now Christian. Most of the leading m...

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Never an Only Child

Author

Eugene Peterson

Keywords

Whether we like it or not, the moment we confess Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior, that is, from the time we become a Christian, we are at the same time a member of the Christian church … Our membe...

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The Death of Christendom

Author

Tod E. Bolsinger

Keywords

In one generation, the place of Christianity within culture dramatically shifted as we experienced what theologians and sociologists of religion call the “death of Christendom.” Christendom isn’t Chri...

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Are All Religions Basically the Same?

Author

Timothy Keller

Keywords

Most people who assert the equality of religions have in mind the major world faiths, not splinter sects. This was the form of the objection I got from the student the night I was on the panel. He con...

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The Church of San Diego

Author

Jon Huckins and Jer Swigart

Keywords

Scripture

1 Corinthians 1:12-13, John 17:21, 1 Corinthians 3:4, Romans 3:28, Acts 4:32

We were recently with a collection of pastors in San Diego and were asked to share about our common call to peacemaking. Fully aware of the posturing and isolation of many of these churches, we found ...

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Baal In America

Author

John M. Perkins

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I know most Americans today do not worship Baal, but when I look at the church in America, I fear that we have our own Baals that demand our worship. I see so many people bowing down before prosperity...

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A Strange Relationship

Author

Matthew Y. Emerson

Keywords

Confession of Faith

Evangelicals, in my experience, have a strange relationship with both the three ecumenical creeds—Nicene, Apostles’, and Athanasian—and with a particular affirmation of the latter two: that Jesus “des...

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Christians Ought to be Different

Author

James Bryan Smith

Keywords

Christians

Scripture

Micah 6:8, Galatians 6:9-10, Matthew 25:35-36, Romans 2:21-24, Matthew 5:14-16, 1 Timothy 3:2-3, James 3:1

If a CEO or an accountant is caught in an adulterous affair, it is not likely to make the news at all. But when a pastor is caught in an affair or embezzling money, it is a big deal. Which leads us to...

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The United States is Like Samaria

Author

Phillip Yancey

Keywords

Scripture

Jeremiah 29:4-7 , 2 Kings 17:24-33, Isaiah 1:18-20, John 4:4-26, Acts 8:4-8, 14-17, Psalm 46:1-2

The United States retains a basic respect for religion though it may be following European trends: surveys show a steady rise in the “nones” (now one-third of those under the age of thirty), that is, ...

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The Separation of Church and State in America: What Did Their Separation Entail?

Author

Jon Meacham

Keywords

The wall Jefferson referred to is designed to divide church from state, not religion from politics. Church and state are specific things: the former signifies institutions for believers to congregate ...

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The Global Church Stewarding Resources Together

Author

Brian Fikkert & Russell Mask

Keywords

Scripture

Acts 11:29 – 30, Romans 15:23 – 33; 1 , 1 Corinthians 16:1 – 4; 2 , 2 Corinthians 8:9, Romans 15:30 – 31, 2 Corinthians 8:13 – 15

The Bible envisions the global church as one body with no national or geographic boundaries. This one body is called to steward all of its resources — spiritual, human, technological, theological, org...

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A Relationship Among Fellows

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Colossians 3:14-15, 1 John 1:7, Ephesians 4:3-6, Galatians 3:28, Philippians 2:1-2

Did you know that the history of the word “fellowship,” is, rather simply, a relationship among fellows? The idea of a fellowship being that two or more people have been bonded together in some signif...

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Sinner and Saints

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

1 John 1:9, Luke 19:1-10, 1 John 1:8-9, Luke 18:9-14, Psalm 51:3-4, James 4:6-10, Psalm 32:5, Proverbs 28:13, 2 Chronicles 7:14, 1 John 1:9

Dwight Lyman, better known as D.L. Moody was a renowned evangelist, publisher, and preacher during the late 19th century. On one occasion, he was invited to guest preach at a local church. Soon after ...

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“Christians:” Worshiping God in Equality

Author

John M. Perkins

Keywords

Scripture

Acts 13:1, 2 Corinthians 5:17, Galatians 3:28

Christ followers were first called Christians at Antioch—about fifteen years after the birth of the church at Pentecost. There must have been something remarkable about this particular group of believ...

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When the Church Isn’t so Welcoming

Author

The Pastor's Workshop

Keywords

Scripture

Genesis 12:1–3 , Isaiah 56:3–7, Ruth 1:16–17 , Luke 10:25–37, Acts 8:26–39, Psalm 146:7–9

Lamin Sanneh, the African theologian who would be pivotal in the development of missional theology, was raised in an orthodox Muslim household in Gambia. He found himself drawn to Christianity after e...

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Excluding Sinners is Excluding God

Author

Brennan Manning

Keywords

Scripture

Luke 19:7, Matthew 21:31, John 1:11, Luke 7:34, Mark 2:17

There is a story of a public sinner who was excommunicated and forbidden from entering the church, He took his woes to God. "They won't let me in, Lord, because I am a sinner." "W...

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