This is what we send out to our friends all around the country. It’s two PDFs, one pretty big. If you have any interest in praying for us or just keeping up with our family, we’d be honored if you read it.
Page 1 of the Spencer Holiday Newsletter
Page 2 of the Spencer Holiday Newsletter
One of the greatest untold stories among Southern Baptists is the life, mission and ministry of Clarence Jordan.(pronounced Jerden) Now, thanks to PBS, Jordan’s story has been made into a documentary that can communicate this overlooked history to a generation eager to see the true message of Jesus at work in the world.Continue reading “Briars in The Cotton Patch: A Story Finally Told”
I’m not feeling particularly spiritual these days. Of course, even that sentence is a symptom of how much revivalistic ways of thinking are still running around in my brain. The Gospel is good news for the unspiritual, am that is good news indeed as far as I am concerned.
Anyway, the BHT’s Bill Mackinnon penned this IM classic essay several years ago: I‘m Not Spiritual. As we say around here, this dawg will hunt. It’s a goodun.
I’m back. Upcoming Interview. TR watchblog news. A question about Muslim evangelism.
The Internet Monk Radio Podcast is available at iTunes. A glowing review will get your name entered in our contest to give away two tickets to a future iMonk Radio taping.
Dan Edelen is on one of the best bloggers I know of, and his post We Need A Gospel That Speaks To Failure is outa the park, center field.
Your church is looking for new elders. Which of these two 40-year old men has a better chance of becoming an elder, the self-made man who runs his own company OR the fellow who works the night shift as a convenience store clerk? In the split second (Blink!) you thought about that pair, did class distinction enter into your assessment? Has anything been said about the spiritual maturity of those men? Don’t we assume that one is more spiritually mature simply because he runs a successful business, while the other only makes $8/hr.?
Did Jesus ever think that way? He summons the less esteemed to the head of the table, while one who believes he belongs in the place of honor is sent down. The beggar Lazarus, whose sores were licked by dogs, winds up in heaven, while the rich man suffers in torment. Jesus said nothing about Lazarus’ spiritual maturity, did He? But Lazarus is the one in Abraham’s bosom. Obviously, failure and poverty have nothing to do with one’s eternal destiny and spiritual depth.Continue reading “Riffs 12:17:06: Dan Edelen and a Gospel That Speaks To Failure”
(The following post is a summary of a recent chapel message. I originally thought of the message after hearing C.J. Mahaney teach on the passage. My use in chapel and here is my own, but I acknowledge his excellent exposition and application as my starting point.)
I Corinthians 6:1 When one of you has a grievance against another, does he dare go to law before the unrighteous instead of the saints? 2 Or do you not know that the saints will judge the world? And if the world is to be judged by you, are you incompetent to try trivial cases? 3 Do you not know that we are to judge angels? How much more, then, matters pertaining to this life! 4 So if you have such cases, why do you lay them before those who have no standing in the church? 5 I say this to your shame. Can it be that there is no one among you wise enough to settle a dispute between the brothers, 6 but brother goes to law against brother, and that before unbelievers? 7 To have lawsuits at all with one another is already a defeat for you. Why not rather suffer wrong? Why not rather be defrauded? 8 But you yourselves wrong and defraud—even your own brothers!
Paul asks an insightful question: Why not choose to be wronged rather than mar the witness of Jesus Christ before unbelievers?Continue reading “A Pointed Question: Why Not Rather Suffer Wrong?”
UPDATE: Noel Heikkinen writes a wonderful endorsement of Challies’ post from his own experience.
UPDATE II: Challies does Part II.
Tim Challies starts a series on why he doesn’t homeschool. IM readers know the subject of options in education is near and dear to my heart and I want to urge you to read Tim’s blog (like he needs my blog for the traffic) and to participate in the discussion. The comments will be an education, I assure you. Watch for the “public schooling is child abuse” committee to make an early appearance.
I’m a public school grad- proudly- and a supporter of community schools. I work at a private school and believe strongly in that option. I appreciate and support capable, conscientious homeschoolers. I believe the church should support all three options, and especially teachers in all three.
The IM essay you’ll want to read on this subject is the famous/infamous “Is School Out For Baptists?” in which I defend public schools. As part of a private school that ministers to kids who don’t do well in other schools, I believe we must support parents making difficult choices in education. I oppose those who insist that homeschooling is the only Biblical way to go.
The BHT has a regular banner quote, and this one was so good I wanted to share it with my readers over here.
The nominal Christian, then, will see Jesus as a name, a representative, a symbol, a personification, a prototype, a figure, a model, an exemplar for something else. The nominal Christian pays homage to something about Jesus, rather than worshiping the man himself. For this reason, nominal Christians will extol the moral teachings of Jesus, the faith of Jesus, the personality of Jesus, the compassion of Jesus, the world view of Jesus, the self-understanding of Jesus, etc. None of these worships Jesus as the Christ, but only something about him, something peripheral to the actual flesh-and-blood man. This is why when the almighty God came into the world in Jesus, he came as the lowest of the low, as weakness itself, as a complete and utter nothing, in order that men would be forced into the crucial decision about him alone and would not be able to worship anything about him. -Robert L. Short, “The Parables of Peanutsâ€
Continue reading “Robert Short on The Partial Jesus of the Nominal Christian”
Courtesy of the thoroughly agitated Bill Kinnon, a post by Alan Hirsch on “The Apostolic Genius.” How did the early church do what they did? (Without cool ads!) Take it away, Mr. Hirsch.
About four years ago I attended a seminar on missional church where the speaker asked the question “How many Christians do you think there were in the year 100AD?” He then asked “how many Christians do you think there were just before Constantine came on the scene, say 310AD?” Here is the somewhat surprising answer…
100AD There are as little as 25 000 Christians
310AD There are as many as 20 000 000 ChristiansContinue reading “Riffs: 12:10:06 Alan Hirsch on The Apostolic Genius”
Having arrived at age 50, I am striving for a degree of self-knowledge that might be called true wisdom. Yes, there is much to be learned from books and teachers, but I believe that the Greeks were right: a man who does not know himself, no matter what else he knows, is woefully ignorant.
The self-knowledge that I desire is, in the main, the knowledge of my own humanness, particularly the contours of my character, the weaknesses of my morality and, most of all, the temptations of my own sinful depravity. Prominent in that self-knowledge are those things which, when presented to me, hold unusual power over me; those particular temptations of the flesh and the senses that draw me ever deeper into the darkness.
The inventory of those things that I have great difficulty resisting has grown over the years.Continue reading “True Confessions of an Egg Nog Addict”
The Internet Monk Archives