Ground Rules: Blogroll Psychology 101

referee.jpgGround Rules are a series of posts reflecting on what I’ve learned in some of my controversies and conflicts with other bloggers.

Who’s on your blogroll? Your RSS reader?

What are you saying by including or excluding them?

Somewhere in my future volume called “Blog Psychology: The Behavior of Bloggers Explained” I will have a chapter on blogrolls. Maybe I’ll even do that long lost doctoral thesis on “Blogrolls Explained: The Significance of Inclusion and Exclusion on Christian Blogrolls.”

Let me make clear at the outset that I put myself forward as an example of such behavior. I have included and excluded a number of people from my blogroll, and it will be on that basis that I’ll make any observations on what someone is thinking.Continue reading “Ground Rules: Blogroll Psychology 101”

Fifty Things You Didn’t Know….and one outright lie

shh.gifUPDATE: Blast you Kyle Potter!

You’ve read this blog for 7 years. You’ve read my confessional essays. You’ve got the bio memorized. Your iPod has the podcast all the way back to episode 1. You’re confident you could pass any quiz on the life and times of the iMonk.

You’re wrong.

Welcome to fifty things you (probably) didn’t know about me. And only one of them is an outright lie. (Can you find it?)Continue reading “Fifty Things You Didn’t Know….and one outright lie”

Five Questions for Noel Heikkinen on the Mark Driscoll “Confessional.”

noelj.jpegOne of the most talked about posts in the blogosphere this week is Mark Driscoll’s report on his exhaustion, health problems and current explosive growth church situation. Reformed Catholicism and others wrote excellent responses. When I read Driscoll’s post, I decided I wanted to get the reaction of one of the pastors of one of the healthiest growing evangelical churches I know about, Riverview Church in East Lansing, Michigan.

Noel serves as one of five pastors at Riverview, a growing church with a uniquely Biblical and common-sense approach to leadership and preaching. Check them out.

Here’s my questions and Noel’s answers.Continue reading “Five Questions for Noel Heikkinen on the Mark Driscoll “Confessional.””

The Strange Case of the Missing Scripture Lessons

6phyllispierson.jpgJosh at eucatastrophe and Pirate (at the BHT) have been writing about the public reading of scripture, something that is strangely absent in the worship and preaching of the vast majority of evangelicals.

If you wanted examples of preaching that completely left out the Bible and any reasonable use of it, I could keep you here all day with some stories that even I have trouble believing are true. But to be conservative, it’s become rather typical for the average evangelical worship experience to…Continue reading “The Strange Case of the Missing Scripture Lessons”

Riffs 3:19:07: Responding to Dan Edelen’s “The Holy Who?”

201.jpg“I’m not a supporter of the Emerging Church, but I’m sympathetic to some of the reforms they’re calling for in the Church as a whole. Yet I’m utterly mystified that a reform movement could be so lacking in any concept of the Holy Spirit. Pneumatology in the Emerging Church? I’ve not heard one peep about it. As far as I’m concerned, any reform movement that perpetually leaves out the mention of the Holy Spirit is nothing but flesh-centered hogwash.” -Dan Edelen, “The Holy Who?”

Yikes.

Always one of the more provocative writers on the web, Dan Edelen has stirred up a grande discussion with the charge that not only is contemporary evangelicalism without a proper emphasis on the Holy Spirit, but the emerging church in particular fails in its attempt to be a reform movement by leaving out the entire “concept” of the Holy Spirit (“not one peep”) and in amounting to “flesh-centered hogwash.” (I’ll wager that term’s never been used before.)

I’m generally a big fan of Dan’s writing, though his perspective as a charismatic and a revivalist differs widely from mine as a post-evangelical reformation Christian humanist who largely rejects the evangelical notion of revival. I’ll commend Dan’s article to you, and after you’ve read and digested it, I have a few responses. (Dan, I respect and love you as a brother, so don’t think I’m trying to be all up on it.) Continue reading “Riffs 3:19:07: Responding to Dan Edelen’s “The Holy Who?””

iMonk 101: Jesus, Tongue Piercing and The Culture War

tongue.jpgAbout a year ago I wrote this piece on one-culture warrior’s evaluation of the phenomenon of tongue piercing. You will find a link to another IM piece on a similar subject as well.

Posts about tattoos, piercings, fashion in general and other stereotypical attempts to portray the missional church as a collection of immature punk kids who have nothing more to offer than bad clothes, the latest trends and no soap are as common as ever. They keep the usual suspects in applause mode, and that’s always a good thing. Certainly better than discussing something divisive like dispensationalism.

You can make up your mind on these controversial subjects. That’s how it works. Here’s some of my thoughts. (BTW, this essay made one of my co-workers so mad, he stopped speaking to me, so it must be a good one.)

READ: Jesus, Tongue-Piercing and the Culture War.

Thoughts and Review: The Unseen by Craig Wright

wright.jpgThe Unseen by Craig Wright, March 16, 2007, Actor’s Theater of Louisville, Humana Festival of New American Plays.

It will probably be a long time before you have the opportunity to see Craig Wright’s stunning short play, “The Unseen.” If you get the chance, it will probably be at a university theater performance where some student director wants to try something that leaves you thinking deeply about philosophical issues- and life- in a way few “entertaining” plays ever will.Continue reading “Thoughts and Review: The Unseen by Craig Wright”

Southern Baptists and the Emerging Church: Friends or Foes?

devine-200.jpgMark DeVine, theology professor from Midwestern Seminary (and a man who knows his Barth), has looked seriously and deeply at the emerging church and suggests some directions for SBC interaction, avoidance and further study. A measured and competent essay, worth your time. [Or you can watch the video below. It’s more of a summary of big ideas, like the dangers of “beat” music. (jn).]

The entire article is here, or you can read/print the pdf from Dr. DeVine’s site. (24 pages) The whole paper gets the coveted “Internet Monk Five Stars.”

Mark DeVine is proving to be a thoughtful, careful and trustworthy voice in this, and other, discussions. Bookmark his blog and stay current with his excellent posts on many subjects. And get his book on Bonhoeffer.

Maybe Dr. DeVine has a book on the SBC and the emerging/missional church movement in the works. How about letting the IM audience in on that possibility, Dr. DeVine?

Anyway, read it. Decide for yourself what you think. That’s how it works around here.

Missional Leaders: Right There All Along?

guy.jpgHmmmm. He doesn’t look like he’s trying to be cool.

Is this the face of the controversial and misunderstood missional church leader we keep talking about? Could it be that “missional” leaders have been right there all along, but our hang-ups on the subjects of culturally compromised churches led by twenty-somethings have fogged our vision?

Years ago, I was at an associational meeting listening to “Don,” the pastor of a local mission, talk about his ministry. Don was in his 50’s, and had a long career pastoring bi-vocational, rural churches. He was again working in a rural community, and his “church” was little more than a storefront that involved a small group of mostly elderly community members. He was sponsored by a larger church, who paid his salary to do ministry at the mission.Continue reading “Missional Leaders: Right There All Along?”