Having served on the pastoral staff (relatively briefly) of a couple of churches, ran a Christian counseling center (for much longer), and served on the faculty of multiple seminaries, I have seen the recurring struggle over what is more important, people or institutions. When counseling one or two members of a marriage--- should one focus …
Continue reading In Ministry, People are More Important than Institutions
I am teaching an online class, "Introduction to Pastoral Care and Counseling" for seminary students in Sierra Leone. The students had a great question: Why call it "Pastoral Care and Counseling"? Why not simply call it "Care and Counseling"? This is a more fleshed-out version of my response to the class. "Pastoral" comes from the …
Continue reading What Makes Pastoral Care and Counseling “Pastoral”?
<I took a break from posting to clean up my old posts. I have gone through all of my posts from the beginning in 2009 to the end of 2012. I deleted around 100, and touched up the rest.> Leviticus 19:33-34 seems to have become a popular verse recently, at least in the United States. …
Continue reading Foreign Missionary Thoughts on Leviticus 19:33-34
I have been a bit surprised at a pattern I have seen recently, especially among American Evangelicals. I see a trend of these Christians (and I generally can be described as an American Evangelical) have with the message(s) of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew chapters 5-7). First, though, I should note an older view …
Continue reading HALF in Agreement That the Sermon on the Mount is Not for Today.
I think most Christians would kind of like the Bible to be written more like a Charles Dickens novel. I mean that in terms of characters. Dickens wrote social commentary with numerous characters. In this sense, his novels share something with much of the Bible. A big difference is that Dickens uses pretty simple characters. …
I don't normally point people to someone else's article, but I will today. William Wade Burleson, wrote a great article, sharing it on FB, strangely, addressing the issue of female clergy. He links the hermeneutics of this issue with that of slavery. He was not relabeling or equivocating. Rather, he was noting the similarity in …
Where does theology come from? Many would say that it comes from the Bible. However, the Bible is not a theological work--- it is a work of revelation. Theology is first interpreted (Hermeneutics), and this should be done based on what it says in the context of it being originally said (Grammatical-Historical Exegesis). But theology …
Can we speed up the return of Christ? Up until quite recently, I would have given a resounding NO!! However, more recently, I have drifted into the "PROBABLY NOT, BUT MAYBE" response. My reason for the resounding NO in the past was that there were two common arguments that I heard. Argument #1. Matthew 24:14 …
Continue reading Can We Speed Up the Return of Christ (If We Are of a Mind To)?
If one looks it up online, the expression "plain sense of Scripture" refers to the literal sense of Bible interpretation. But this doesn't help at all. Why? Because both "plain sense" and "literal" are somewhat technical terms that sound as if they are anything but technical. Both "Plain Sense" and "Literal" focus on the grammatical-historical …
Continue reading What is the “Plain Sense of Scripture” Anyway?
I do admit that I rarely criticize a group that I am not part of. As a missionary associated with the Southern Baptists, an Evangelical Protestant Christian Denomination, I feel pretty comfortable critiquing or complaining about missionaries, Southern Baptists, Baptists, Evangelicals, Protestants, and Christians. At least I am more comfortable with critiquing these groups than …