Dan at Eucatastrophe recently posted this question. I too have a $30 gift card, which is like $100 to a churchplanter! Tell me what books should I buy? Pick from these categories:
Fiction, Theology, Cultural Criticism, Philosophy, Biblical Studies/Theology, History
An estimated 27 million people in the world today are in slavery. They are sold into sexual slavery or forced labor from sub-Saharan Africa to suburban America, from big-city brothels to small-town sweatshops. Every day, men, women, and children looking for work and a better life are tricked, coerced, or forced into slavery.
If this is news to you, don’t be surprised. This is a silent horror. No one is paying any attention.
William Wilberforce once said, “If to be feelingly alive to the sufferings of my fellow creatures is to be a fanatic, I am one of the most incurable fanatics ever permitted to be at large.” Only this kind of good “fanaticism” can bring today’s version of the slave trade to an end. (Taken from Chuck Colson’s breakpoint)
Act by visiting and contributing to these sites/ministries:
In a recent article in the Austin American-Statesman, Eileen Flynn explored the trend of online church donations and in-house ATM kiosks in lieu of the offering plate. No cash or checks necessary, just a swipe of the card.
What do you think of this practice, particularly the ATM transactions in the church lobby? Is this just another opportunity for the church to contextualize its forms or are there greater issues at stake in this form of the offering? As Flynn points out, writing checks in church would have been radical at one point in time. Thoughts?
“I am not speaking to you of God because I am a pastor, I am a pastor because I must speak to you of God.”
These days it seems that many pastors have reversed Barth’s logic. The office precedes the unction, management and direction usurp awe and submission. Speaking is part of the ministry, and the ministry is just that “the ministry.” It exists by itself and deserves an article. The God whom we speak of is often diminished by the looming presence of our personalities and ministries. Sermon preparation turns rote, teaching is reduced to a task, and counseling becomes heartless duty. Noble as some of our efforts are to stand before God and speak, all too often we enter the pulpit only to shout “Man!”
Karl Barth had a painting by Grunewald that hung over his desk, The Crucifixion. One of the unique aspects of the painting is the pointing hand and the inscription behind it: “He must increase and I must decrease.” Like John the Baptist, Barth’s aim was for his words and theology to always move upwards, as the trees, pointing to the increase of glory in the transcendent God.
How did he sustain such an upward, Godward view? He didn’t; God did. Barth was convinced that in order to truly know God, we must stand before him, and standing before God meant regularly recognizing that being before God is not a result of our resolving to do so, but by God’s introducing himself to us.
For a good intro to Barth see Gerhard Busch’s, The Great Passion: An Introduction to Karl Barth’s Theology. According to Kevin Cawley, a more concise intro is Colin Brown’s little book, Karl Barth & The Christian Message.
