Category: Missional Church

Total Church Conference – II

Posted on September 7, 2009

Last year I had the privilege of attending the first North American Total Church, hosted by Kaleo Church with key speakers Tim Chester and Steve Timmis. It was an excellent conference filled with stimulating talks and breakouts adressing the concepts in Chester & Timmis’ book Total Church.

Total Church Conference is back with the theme I Will Build My Church! Mark your calendars for November 17-19 for the TC II, to be held in San Diego again. Here are the speakers…more info to follow

  • Steve Timmis is the co-author of Total Church, cofounder of the Crowded House, a church-planting initiative in Sheffield, UK, and a director of the Porterbrook Network, which trains and mentors church planters. Timmis previously directed Radstock Ministries, a mission agency facilitating the involvement of the local church in world mission.
  • Michael W. Goheen, Geneva Professor of Worldview and Religious Studies at Trinity Western University , co-author of The Drama Of Scripture: Finding Our Place In The Biblical Story, Living at the Crossroads and author of “As the Father Has Sent Me, I Am Sending You”: J.E. Lesslie Newbigin’s Missionary Ecclesiology.
  • David Fairchild is the co-founder and preaching elder of Kaleo Church in San Diego. He is also the southwest movement leader for Acts 29 network.

HT: Goodmanson

Calvin on Repentance

Posted on September 4, 2009

In his Institutes, John Calvin makes a wonderful distinction between what he calls “Legal repentance” and “Evangelical repentance.” After a close reading of this text, it is abundantly clear that Calvin would be quite happy with our contemporary nomenclature of “legalistic” and “gospel-centered” to communicate the difference between legal and evangelical repentance.  Consider his descriptions:

Legal (legalistic) Repentance

“Legal repentance; or that by which the sinner, stung with a sense of his sin, and overwhelmed with fear of the divine anger, remains in that state of perturbation, unable to escape from it.”

This kind of repentance rises and falls with the effort of man. It leaves us upset with ourselves and fails to carry us to joy in Christ. It is a man-made trap of moral performance, an act that keeps us in the jaws of guilt never to experience the liberation of grace. Legalistic repentance is the antithesis of gospel-centered repentance. It exchanges grace for law, Christ for man, peace for anger and produces no real change at all.

Evangelical (Gospel-centered) Repentance

“The other they term Evangelical repentance; or that by which the sinner, though grievously downcast in himself, yet looks up and sees in Christ the cure of his wound, the solace of his terror; the haven of rest from his misery.”

This kind of repentance rises and falls upon the grace of God. It brings about a bittersweet conviction that is less bitter than sweet. Instead of beating us down, it lifts us up. Gospel-centered repentance makes much of the death and resurrection of Jesus on behalf of sinners. It carries us to Christ, where we find perfect forgiveness, acceptance, and rest. Gospel-centered repentance is the antithesis of legalistic repentance. Gospel repentance exchanges law for grace, man for Christ, anger for peace, and produces lasting change in the life of man.