Disfrutar de una relaci贸n 铆ntima con el Dios del universo es el prop贸sito principal del ser humano. En Dios encontramos respuesta y sentido a nuestras vidas. El salmo 15 describe al tipo de persona que puede relacionarse personalmente con el Creador. El salmista se pregunta qui茅n puede ser un hu茅sped de Dios. En esa cultura, un hu茅sped gozaba de acceso directo con el anfitri贸n. Este salmo de sabidur铆a se entonaba al entrar al templo. Los adoradores iniciaban con la pregunta y el sacerdote respond铆a con los requisitos y finalizaba con una promesa para aquellos que los cumpl铆an.
Michael Wilkins recommended these axioms to me. It has taken me several years to figure out and understand what they mean. They have worked like seeds for me. I鈥檓 sure he would elaborate on them differently (and better) than I鈥檓 doing here. But this is what I see in them ...
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss the different ways to assess the health of a church.
I am regularly vexed by how shallow my prayers can become. When I pray for something鈥攁nd I know that all prayer is not for things鈥攚hat should I pray for? Only for my family? For someone I know who is ill? For God to help me in the day ahead? For God to resolve whatever problem is currently worrying me? I often sense that there is some content that I鈥檓 missing when I鈥檓 praying. Do you sense the same thing? ...
This post is the substance of a chapel message I gave to the students of Kyiv Theological Seminary on October 14 of last year (2014). At the time Ukraine was (and still is) in the midst of brutal conflict with Russian-backed separatists in the eastern regions of the country. All of the students present had been impacted by the conflict, some profoundly either by burying church members, relatives, and friends, or by answering conscription summons. No one in the country has been left untouched by the crisis. I offer these thoughts here because suffering and crisis and loss may come to those around us at anytime. We need the mind of our Lord to enter into such a house of sorrow or pain and be his instruments for healing ...
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss the challenges and opportunities of bi-vocational ministry.
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss how their Talbot education impacts their ministry today in valuable ways.
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss why a seminary education is so valuable for ministry today.
Las noticias a nuestro alrededor pueden ser bastante desalentadoras. Por alguna raz贸n las noticias que se publican y tienen promoci贸n tienden a ser las negativas y las que reflejan alg煤n conflicto social. Para los medios de comunicaci贸n y para la sociedad en general las buenas noticias parecieran no ser atractivas y solamente las negativas pueden salir de la sombra de lo cotidiano para llamar nuestra atenci贸n. Desgraciadamente, el estar rodeados de malas noticias origina un ambiente negativo en el que la vida pareciera una mara帽a de conflictos que crece cada vez m谩s y a la que no se le encuentra soluci贸n por ning煤n lado. Si a esta situaci贸n le agregamos los actos de terrorismo de grupos radicales que se escudan en la religi贸n para cometer atentados deleznables contra inocentes y las posturas tan radicales de pol铆ticos y grupos sociales que impiden una sana conversaci贸n para resolver sus diferencias, es f谩cil caer en la desesperanza y la impotencia.
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss how local churches can better engage and love their communities.
Talbot faculty member, James Petitfils, and a panel of Talbot graduates who are now pastors in Southern California discuss the unique challenges of ministry in this region.
A few months ago I wrote about Jos茅 Bowen鈥檚 seminar and his book, Teaching Naked: How Moving Technology Out of Your College Classroom Will Improve Student Learning (Jossey-Bass, 2012). I shared that his main thrust was for teachers to use technology to deliver content outside of class sessions, and shift the use of class time to processing that information, promoting critical thinking and the application of knowledge to real life situations. There are three ideas from Bowen鈥檚 work that I think have the potential of deepening the impact of our teaching in the church. Over the next few months I鈥檒l be writing a brief blog on each of the three ideas, beginning with ways of using technology to get students into the content of the Bible lesson/study before you meet, preparing them for a more active and deeper learning experience together.
Several years ago Charles Arn and I surveyed pastors and asked them to identify the most frustrating part of their job. Can you guess the most frequent response? 鈥淕etting laypeople to help with the work and ministry of the church鈥 ... One of the major reasons people are reluctant to serve in and through a church is the feeling that they鈥檒l be stuck in the position for ever, or at least a very long time ...
In this audio recording, David Horner, Professor of Biblical and Theological Studies, shares about Epiphany and its significance in the life of the Christian.
I was raised in a church world in which 鈥渃ulture war鈥 was a favorite metaphor of how the church relates to the nonchurch. We were God鈥檚 courageous moral infantry doing battle against those cunning cultists, those hateful homosexuals, those lying liberals, and those devilish Darwinists. If we listen with tuned ears to Christian radio, Christian literature, Christian blogs, and Christian conversations, it becomes clear: We Christians love the language of war. Over the last 30 years it has become our dominant metaphor for relating to culture; it saturates our vocabulary, shapes our politics, and soaks our worldview. But is culture war helpful? Is it biblical? Should we be jarheads for Jesus?
A few evenings ago, we hosted a delightful group of ten Biola students at our house for dinner. During dessert, we launched into a lively discussion about how we should celebrate Christmas as Christians. We discussed various sub-topics under this broader question, but we spent the largest portion of our time talking about how Christians should鈥攁nd should not鈥攖alk to their children about Santa Claus.
Readers of this blog may be interested in the short article I have written over at Reformation 21. The gist of my claim is that the person of Jesus Christ shapes our primary ethical response to torture and our attitude to its perpetration by our authorities. Person, that is, over procedure, particularly over fear based consequentialist reasoning that might allow in extremis the ends of security to justify the means of torture. I very minimally offer that the health of our moral imaginations as Christian citizens is attested to in our habits of corporate prayer.
Students often ask, What does a Christian leader need in order to experience an effective life of ministry in the local church? A key part of the answer has to do with the kinds of people we gather around ourselves. As I look back over some thirty-five years of local church ministry, four kinds of relationships (besides God and my natural family) have proven indispensable to the health and vitality of my own pilgrimage as a pastor ...
Stability is a good thing 鈥 knowing that your favorite chair won鈥檛 collapse when you plop down in it after a hard day 鈥 being able to count on the love of someone no matter what. But as followers of Jesus Christ, we need to be willing to adjust with the changes that come with such a commitment. The first disciples were so inclined, and because of it, we have the gospel, are born-again, and look forward to an eternity in the presence of our loving Father.
At the end of September I had the honor of speaking at the installation of my good friend, Mickey Klink, as head pastor of Hope Evangelical Free Church in Rosco, Illinois. The following is the text of my talk and I thought I would share it in this venue as it might possibly serve as encouragement for others who are about to embark on the journey of pastoral ministry. (I鈥檝e shared this with Mickey鈥檚 permission) ...
Hace unos d铆as tuve el privilegio de participar en el IV Congreso sobre la Reforma Protestante Espa帽ola que tuvo lugar en la Facultad de Filosof铆a de la Universidad Complutense en Madrid, Espa帽a. Este importante congreso internacional tuvo como tema principal la Reforma en Hispano Am茅rica. Entre los participantes se encontraban profesores, historiadores y eruditos para dialogar acerca de la influencia del protestantismo en Am茅rica Latina y su relaci贸n con la reforma espa帽ola. Aunque el n煤mero de participantes no eran tan numeroso, el significado de esta reuni贸n y los temas tratados son de suma importancia y son relevantes para nuestros d铆as. Me gustar铆a compartir en este espacio algunas reflexiones sobre el pasado y el presente basadas principalmente en los temas tratados en este congreso.
As indicated in a previous post, Talbot School of Theology will be well represented this year at the Evangelical Theological Society's national meeting [need link here]. For those unable to attend (most of you, I assume!), here is a video clip that touches upon some key ideas that I will be sharing in my plenary address. The interviewer is Dr. Jason Cusick, a pastor at Journey of Faith Church in Manhattan Beach, CA. The clip was shown in a church service as part of a series on the church and the family.
It was twenty-five years before church growth researcher Win Arn, building on the initial discoveries of Donald McGavran, conducted one of the largest studies of how people come to faith in Christ and to the church in the United States and Canada. Arn鈥檚 Institute for American Church Growth surveyed over 17,000 persons in 1980 asking, 鈥淲hat or who was responsible for your coming to Christ and to your church?鈥 Arn published his findings in The Master鈥檚 Plan for Making Disciples, and church leaders were astounded ...
I often think about home in a specific way. For a long time, home has been a safe place to come back to at the end of the day. It has been a place to establish a comfortable niche in the world as a respite, a literal financial investment in emotional well being. Home has been about rest and nurture, as it can be a place of ministry to family and friends. It also has been a place to launch out into kingdom ministry more broadly.
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