A story is: “an account of characters and events in a plot moving over time and space through conflict toward resolution.” The Bible obviously has characters and events, which takes place over time and space. It moves through conflict to resolution. To me, the bigger question is whether there is a plot. A plot to …
I don't preach missions sermons very often. Why? Well... as bad as many (most?) churches are in terms of missions, I rarely feel that that is the topic that is needed on Sunday. However, I am in the US right now, and preached this Sermon at one church, and will preach this same sermon three …
Continue reading How Should the Church Respond to Persecution?
Long ago I wrote up paper on Christian Community Development based on my personal experiences, and interviews with acquaintances of mine who were involved in CCD in the Philippines. I wrote it because I was hoping to expand into a full dissertation for my Doctor of Theology. In the end, I went in a different …
Continue reading CHALLENGES IN CHURCH-INITIATED COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT IN THE PHILIPPINES
We are in the US right now, staying in an extended stay inn. It has been a fairly good place for us--- decidedly unfancy, but we are decidedly unfancy people. Last night at 3am we had a visitor. We had a knock on the door... followed by more knocks. I ended up getting up and …
In Part One, I talked about how much of the history of the early church was structured around the Acts 1 version of the Great Commission, with the missionary journeys of Paul providing much of the narrative. In Part One, I suggested that we may have enough information on the Mission Journeys of Peter to …
In Sunday School, and college, and seminary we studied the four missionary journeys of Paul. Of course the fourth journey was hardly a missionary journey, but I can see why it is called that because it completes the structure of the book of Acts (of the Apostles). Most of the latter half of Acts is …
On occasion I have thought about what topics should be covered in Missions Training. I looked at some stuff I put together in 2010. Looking it over, I liked a lot of it. The main lacking I think was not recognizing the importance of theology in missions. So I would like to divide missions training …