BlogRodent: Pentecostal Rumination & Review

There’s an interesting interview just put out by my employer, Christianity Today International, that I think is worth reading. It’s an interview with Dallas Willard and Richard J. Foster conducted by Christianity Today associate editor Agnieszka Tennant: “The Making of the Christian: Richard J. Foster and Dallas Willard on the difference between discipleship and spiritual formation.”

I love this analyses by Dallas Willard regarding the current emptiness of the word “discipleship:”

“Discipleship as a term has lost its content, and this is one reason why it has been moved aside. … There are really three gospels that are heard in our society. One is forgiveness of sins. Another is being faithful to your church: If you take care of your church, it will take care of you. Sometimes it's called discipleship, but it's really churchmanship.

For all who were in last week’s open house, and for those who missed it, here are the little mini-presentations I gave regarding the future of this class.

For anybody else familiar with this site, this is my “boss blog” for the folks taking the Believer’s Life Institute classes at Calvary Chapel. Feel free to listen in and enjoy. But if this bores you, sorry.

Don’t have much to say on this first post except that we’re planning to talk a lot about Heaven and Hell over the next six or seven weeks. The next class will feature a video: The Search for Heaven. Here’re my open house talks.

[audio:http://tatumweb.com/blog/wp-content/mp3/bli-hh-01a-open-house.mp3]
[audio:http://tatumweb.com/blog/wp-content/mp3/bli-hh-01b-open-house.mp3]
[audio:http://tatumweb.com/blog/wp-content/mp3/bli-hh-01c-open-house.mp3]

You can also download them here, here, and here.

[tags]BlogRodent, podcast, heaven, hell, heaven-and-hell, mp3, doctrine, theology, afterlife, death[/tags]

There’s a flap heating up the newspapers and blogosphere about the winning design for the Flight 93 Memorial to be built near  Shanksville, Pa. The skinny is that architect Paul Murdoch submitted a design, the “Crescent of Embrace,” which bears an uncanny resemblance to the Islamic red crescent as seen on the flag of Tunisia.

The designer says the crescent shape was mere coincidence. He, apparently, wanted a soft symbol of openness to symbolize acceptance and embrace. I contend he was wildly successful. What better way to signify openness toward Islamic ideas and faith than by using a common Islamic symbol?

Pulitzer Prize-winning commentator Charles Krauthammer has written a great “big-picture” view of the blame-shifting realities of Katrina’s fallout: “Assigning Blame.” It’s not long and is worth reading. Here’s a graf Krauthammer put out there as a “throw-away” item, but it brilliantly sums up what I wish I had written:

This kind of stupidity merits no attention whatsoever, but I'll give it a paragraph. There is no relationship between global warming and the frequency and intensity of Atlantic hurricanes. Period. The problem with the evacuation of New Orleans is not that National Guardsmen in Iraq could not get to New Orleans, but that National Guardsmen in Louisiana did not get to New Orleans. As for the Bush tax cuts, administration budget requests for New Orleans flood control during the five Bush years exceed that of the five preceding

I received the following email late Friday evening:

-----Original Message----- From: Office of the General Secretary [mailto:churches@ag.org] Sent: Friday, September 09, 2005 3:45 PM Subject: A/G Hurricane Katrina Relief Efforts Update: 9/9/2005 VIDEO CLIP FROM THE SUPERINTENDENT

General Superintendent Trask has made a video clip regarding his trip to the devastated Gulf Coast yesterday. You can view this at http://ag.org. The brief clip is available for you to download to show to your congregation or Sunday school class this Sunday.

REPORT ON US MISSIONARIES IN AREA

Several USM missionaries and ministries were affected by Katrina. Go to USMissions.ag.org/ to get up-to-date information on these.

HOW TO HELP

Cash: Cash donations are the best way to get people help the fastest.

You may give online at ag.org/. Credit cards are accepted and 100% of all donations go directly to the Katrina relief projects. Medical Teams: HealthCare Ministries at headquarters is coordinating medical teams to go to these areas.

I took a few quizzes tonight, and I generously share the results with you, my Gentle Readers. I’m not sure what they really reveal about me. I worked as an opinion/market research interviewer for four years, and I know how very subtle changes in questions and their interpretation by the respondent can wildly skew results. But if you’re looking for a quick read on where I am theologically (or where you are, if you take the test) this may be helpful for you.

First, I went to QuizFarm and took the “What’s your theological worldview?” test. Here are the results.

I just received this from the General Council of the A/G:

--
From: Office of the General Secretary [churches@ag.org]
Sent: Wednesday, September 07, 2005 1:45 PM
Subject: A/G Hurricane Katrina Relief Efforts Update

The General Council of the Assemblies of God, together with the Convoy of Hope, continues to respond to the Hurricane Katrina disaster with acts of compassion and practical helps.

Convoy of Hope

As of today COH has distributed 75 truckloads of ice, water, food and other relief supplies with another 16 truckloads scheduled to arrive in the next couple of days. To date over 3.5 million pounds of life-sustaining relief materials have been distributed in the following communities:

Louisiana: Gretna (West bank of New Orleans)

Mississippi: Bay St. Louis, Biloxi, Caesar, Gulfport, Henryville, McComb, and Picayune

Convoy of Hope has ongoing distribution

Hi.

Here’s my current list of active Pentecostal, Charismatic and Assembly of God bloggers. I hope you enjoy it. And feel free to add to it with your comments.

   PneumaBlogs: Select Pentecostal/Charismatic Bloggers

Rich.

[tags]assemblies-of-god, assembly-of-god, blogger, blogging, BlogRodent, charismatic, church-of-god, foursquare, god-blogger, god-blogging, godblog, godbloggers, godblogs, pentecostal, pneumablog, pneumabloggers, pneumablogging, pneumablogs, spirit-filled[/tags]

As I’ve watched the news feeds over the last several days, I noted that the A/G has been quick to respond, first with nearly a dozen Convoy of Hope trucks being sent down (over twenty more on the way), and an email plea from the General Superintendent, Thomas Trask, to contribute funds at the A/G disaster recovery site. Already $25,000 was sent to the Louisiana district to help some 400 people stranded at the LA district campgrounds.

Here is a good update on what is known and not known about the state of our churches and district offices in the Gulf region: Hurricane Katrina—much still unknown.

At this point, giving money is more effective than sending things. Let the organizations with the infrastructure in place to provide help turn your dollars into tangible aid. Currently, the hardest hit areas are still evacuating survivors and I’m reading that well-intentioned helping

UMC pastor, Donald Sensing, over at the One Hand Clapping blog, has posted his sermon manuscript on the failure of moral levees. It’s an excellent sermon in the wake of the Katrina disaster, regarding the fallen nature of man, and the need for the rule of God’s law in our hearts through love.

His best graphs, like finely polished jewels, come at the end:

One of the things that churches should do is train the moral sense of it members. The God who created us also demands a high level of morality in us. The Ten Commandments do not say that a little murder is okay, a little adultery is permissible, a little thievery is allowable. Instead they instruct: No murder. No adultery. No stealing. There’s no wriggle room.

Our continuing challenge as Christians is to follow the moral commandments of God’s law

An interesting interview by Hugh Hewitt is available in transcript form, over at Radio Blogger. It’s worth the read, featuring commentary from his three guests, Biola University, Professor John Mark Reynolds; Louisville, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Dr. Albert Mohler; and Dr. Mark D. Roberts, theologian, author, pastor. There are no ground-breaking insights in the show transcript, but it’s a useful, brief, discussion of the problem of evil in the world and the proper Christian response to it.

One interesting point that I want to highlight was raised by John Mark Reynolds regarding a lot of the blame-casting that’s been going on about how slow the gummint has been to respond:

I … think we have a problem that's unique to our culture. And that is that people are used to information, and even money, changing hands very quickly.

(Updated with accurate URLs for Frank N. Johnson's websites.)

I am not sure if this is just a meme without substance, or if the idea has actual merit. But the cliche rant among tech- and media-savvy Christians is that the Church world is always slow to adopt new technology. The claim is that we missed it with film and now Hollywood “owns” the field, to the exclusion of overt Christian influence. We missed it with radio, and now we’re relegated to the low-end of the FM dial where we must solicit donations, or the AM dial where nobody listens to talk radio. We missed it with music, and at any given time the state of the art in the Christian music scene is 10 years behind the secular industry. They say we missed it on the Web, which is boldly dominated by the secular dot.coms and the porn purveyors.

I’m not sure.

In “The Ultimate Issue” Brian logged an interesting and thought provoking post on “designing your own God.”

Likewise, the hundreds of differing beliefs that people have about God, and the fact that people dearly want them to be true, do not make them true. God is who he is. God is the authority on God. We cannot design God. We have to deal with God as he is. We have to face reality, like it or not.

I like it. That’s good stuff.

Yet, I think there is a tension between having the right beliefs about God and having a personal knowledge of God—which will always be unique to at least a degree.

To make a comparison: Knowing God is like studying the stars. There are facts that can be known: among other things, stars are hot; are primarily composed of

What do cereal, gospel music, Mickey Mouse, and the Assemblies of God have in common?

Beats me.

But if you were at the Ebenezer Missionary Baptist Church here in Chicago, Illinois, on July 16, you would have heard 8 youth choirs belting out their best for Jesus in a Kellogg-sponsored “Gospel Sing-Off Youth Choir Competition,” where the just-announced winner, Evangel World Outreach (Assembly of God), harmonized their way to a $10,000 check and a “magical vacation” to the Walt Disney World Resort. (Evangel’s choir beat out 38 other regional finalists to win the top prize.) Once there, they’ll get to rhapsodize once more among the likes of:

• Kierra "KiKi" Sheard,
• Audio Adrenaline
• tobyMac
• Casting Crowns
• Nicole C. Mullen
• MercyMe
• Steven Curtis Chapman
• Kutless
• CeCe Winans
• Newsboys
• Donnie McClurkin
• Mark

In the Paris News story about the Assembly of God church shooting in Sash, Texas, Debbie Wolfe is quoted, remembering the scene when Sash A/G pastor James Armstrong was killed by the gunman:

“Brother Armstrong’s wife crouched down beside their travel trailer, and I know the man walked back and forth several times shooting. The Lord protected her.”

Can I tell you I am bothered when folks say this?

Does Mrs. Wolfe really mean to imply that God was not protecting Rev. Armstrong? That God was not protecting the other three who were murdered this Sunday?

Not really, I really don’t think that’s what she means.

But the words say it, and people who aren’t native speakers of “church talk” hear a different message than she’s intending to send. (For my part, I think she and others like her simply mean, “The outcome should’ve been different, but God must have had a different purpose

I just learned about an Assembly of God church shooting in Sash, Texas, not far from where I went to Bible college:

The suspected gunman, A.P. Crenshaw, walked into a North Texas church and opened fire, police said. Two people were killed, including church member Ernest Wesley Brown, 61, and pastor James Armstrong, 42. A third person inside the church was also shot.

Crenshaw, who is believed to be in his 50s, then allegedly shot and killed Holly Love Brown, 50, and her unnamed passenger before taking the woman's car, officials said.

Please pray for the family, loved ones, and church members of this little community. As of now, there are no answers about why this happened, and the gunman killed himself after a standoff with SWAT.

Update: More details here. It started with words exchanged in the parking lot. Crenshaw returned, killed the man he was arguing

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that the Association of Christian Schools International (800+ religious schools in California) and the Calvary Chapel Christian School (Murrieta, California) filed a civil rights lawsuit this past Thursday against the University of California, claiming religious discrimination. I believe the suit specifically alleges that UC discriminates against students who are taught creationism. According to the LA Times, UC won't recognize high school science courses using textbooks based on creationism, or that challenge Darwinistic theories.

Aparrently, UC believes it is impossible to teach real science when matters of faith are at stake. Has anyone in the admissions office there looked up the definition of "theory" lately? Among the high school courses rejected by UC are:

• Christianity's Influence in American History
• Christianity and Morality in American Literature
• Special Providence: American Government

Those sound like reasonable course titles, to me.

I found this especially compelling in light of some of

An excerpt from from a Lincoln Journal Star article, “ Conservative churches grow while mainline churches struggle,” b y Bob Reeves, regarding recent explosive A/G growth:

Successful evangelism is also a major reason for the phenomenal growth of the Assemblies of God, especially outside the United States, said Bob Friesen, director of research for that denomination's headquarters in Springfield, Mo. Missionaries work with indigenous leaders in countries worldwide to build local churches that will grow and multiply, he said. The biggest growth is in Africa. "Revival is happening there and people are turning toward the Lord" in record numbers, he said.

As of 2004 there were approximately 30 million adherents of Assemblies of God worldwide, nearly double the number in 1990.

In the United States, the growth has leveled off in recent years, said Dave Argue, pastor of Lincoln's Christ Place Church, an Assembly of God congregation. The worldwide growth is "part

Kathryn Lang, of Guntersville, Alabama, grew up Episcopalian, started attending a Southern Baptist church a few years ago, and lately began attending a local Assembly of God church because of the programs for her kids. They’ve taken membership classes at the A/G church, and her oldest son was baptized there.

Her comments in The Huntsville Times’ community column are interesting, in light of what I’ve recently blogged on. She remarks that the main differences aren’t as much theological as practical: Do you think you have a structured service, or an unstructured service? (Perhaps she glosses over the problems rampant in the ECUSA, or maybe her recent church activities have taken her “out of the loop.”) But then she analyzes the apparently unstructured services of the Baptist and Assemblies crowd and, guess what? We’re pretty structured after all.

Some of the services merely have an outline. … The

Bethany clued me in to an article I’ve seen around the office but hadn’t yet read, and I’m nearly ashamed, because I just blogged about the subject! Anyhow, Grant Wacker, a noted Pentecostal historian currently Professor of Church History at Duke University, recently wrote an amazing article for Christianity Today: “Hand-Clapping in a Gothic Nave: What Pentecostals and mainliners can learn from each other.” Here's an excerpt:

Recently media have paid much attention to two distinct religion stories. One is the surge of global Pentecostalism. The other is the visibility of mainline Protestantism in U.S. culture wars. Yet the two stories rarely connect, and for good reason.

Pentecostals and mainliners generally glide around each other like icebergs passing in the night. Over the years, Pentecostals have viewed mainliners with deep skepticism, judging them theologically lax and culturally

I recently received a copy of The Art and Craft of Biblical Preaching: A Comprehensive Resource for Today's Communicators, and have been browsing through it from time to time. Whether you’re a full- or part-time preacher or even if you spend any time at all speaking in front of others as a Christian attempting to bring others to a better understanding of the Bible, or to bring them to a point of decision, you need this book on your shelf. It is the finest compendium of useful preaching/exhortation articles I have ever seen.

[Full disclaimer: This book was written and produced by my employer, Christianity Today, and edited by my good friend and coworker, Craig Brian Larson. But I’m not writing as a shill here. I get absolutely nothing out

It's dated, but I just stumbled across this.

Stanford U. Chi Alpha pastor Glen Davis guffawed at the news and then blogged about a book put out last year by the Assemblies of God's Gospel Publishing House (GPH): Pentecostal Gifts and Ministries in a Postmodern Era, compiled and edited by the General Treasurer of the General Council of the A/G James K. Bridges, with some contributions from past CBC president Maurice Lednicky, and former CBC prof. Opal Reddin.

What's laughable about this, you ask?

Just the irony of a septuagenarian and a few other retirees writing about postmodern ministry.

But, wait, is that really the case? Look at the GPH sell-copy:

For the Pentecostal movement to continue to be an effective instrument in this last day harvest, there must be a renewed emphasis

Last night (Friday), my boss, Kevin A. Miller, VP of Resources at Christianity Today, was ordained to the Diaconate (the first step in the process to priesthood) by the Anglican Mission in America. Consisting of less than a hundred churches in America (according to the website’s church locator), and growing at a rate of about one new church every six weeks, this diocese has an interesting history.

I recently posted about how the Evangelical Global South is growing incredibly fast, and that we will soon be receiving missionaries here from Africa and the other usual “mission fields.” Here’s an unusual example. The AMiA came about as a result of Episcopal dissatisfaction with the direction of the Episcopal Church in America (ECUSA)--which has lost over a third of its membership in the last three decades, and is

If you haven’t seen this site, yet, you should. If you ever refer to the Greek or Hebrew texts in your Bible studies or sermon prep, then you really owe it to yourself to check out this website:

zhubert.com
For Fellow Students of the Bible in the Original Languages

When you get there, just check out your favorite passage in whichever language you prefer. Once you see the passage in all its glorious original language splendor, you can click on a word and get the lexical root, it’s basic meaning, and a bit more. You can suggest additions (or “fix”) definitions, the related words, etc., and your entry will be considered. You can also see the word frequency count of both the inflected form of the word you’re studying, and all its appearances in the root form, and by clicking on the graphs, you can go directly