Wednesday Link List

“For what we are about to receive…”  The human and the dog seem sincere but cats are always overly dramatic. (And why does the cat have a marking that looks like another cat’s tail? Photoshop? No way!)

Time for another link list. Try to have your suggestions in by 6:00 PM Eastern on Mondays. More during the week at Twitter.

• Hey! We finally made the Church Relevance list of the Top 200 Ministry Blogs, at number 143. Now what will I complain about? A giant shout-out to Kent Shaffer at Church Relevance.
• From the weekend: Best Mother’s Day graphic.
• Michael Patton notes that while Calvinists uphold ‘perseverance of the saints,’ he often encounters some among that group that lack assurance of salvation.
  
• At Red Letter Christians: The Six Worst Things About American Christianity. Wait, there’s only six?
  
• I once heard that Billy Graham once said his calling to ministry was simply that he was trying to do what Charles Templeton started but never finished. That, and the fact my father once served in ministry with Templeton draws me to articles like this one whenever they appear.
• Do-Not-Do-This Department: BibleDude offers six ways to ruin a mission trip.
• Does Greg Boyd think that, despite their different beliefs about Jesus, Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses are saved? Check out this five minute video.
  
• Diane Lindstrom offers a six-part series on The Sneaky Sins. (The link is to the intro, then click the banner and scroll through malice, deceit, hyprocisy, envy and slander.)
  
• Recurring theme: This time in Northern Ireland, another printer is threatened with court action over refusing to print material that goes against his beliefs.
• This week at Rachel Held Evans, we were introduced to a young Assemblies of God pastor Jonathan Martin (that’s two links to RHE.) And here’s a short preaching sample.
  
• Dannah Gresh does a TED Talk at Penn State University on the subject of virginity.
  
• A blogger calls into question the youth ministry concept, in light of areas where he feels it has failed us.
  
• A former pastor and church planter now finds himself roaming among various churches and offers ten observations now that he’s not an insider.
• “I know who made the environment,” Mark Driscoll reportedly said. “He’s coming back, and he’s going to burn it all up. So yes, I drive an SUV.”  More in a Religion New Service piece comparing Driscoll to Pat Robertson.
  
• Music video link # 1: Two years ago we did a story here on a Nepalese worship band, Aradhna. I was going to run a link to something more recent, but opted instead for one of their earlier videos which includes English translation.
• Music video link #2: If this hadn’t existed I would have added it to my own YouTube channel. Classic Maranatha! Music worship as Erick Nelson sings Fairest Lord Jesus.  This was posted a few months ago and has only seen a handful of views. Let’s change that.
• Music video link #3: Classic British TV footage of Cliff Richard covering Randy Stonehill’s First Prayer. Whether or not you believe in “praying the prayer;” this is a type of song that models Christian behavior; a type of song we just don’t hear anymore.
• Music video link #4: From our own channel, the 1988 kids album with no kids, Prism Red rocks out Amazing Grace. Heck, let’s add it below.
• From @philvischer ‘s Twitter: “Got a Groupon ad for a 3-pack of ‘Jezebel Panties.’ Yes, the most evil woman in the Bible now has her own line of underwear.”
  
• New blogs added to my 700+ bookmarks this week: The Nuance with Zach J. Hoag and a multi-author blog, Christian Blessings.
• Looking for more links? Ed Cyzewski offers five posts from Christian blogs you’ve never seen.
  

Songs with substance: Classic worship

If you check the right hand margin over at Christianity 201, you’ll see that all of the various music resources that have appeared there are listed and linked alphabetically. Take a moment to discover — or re-discover — some worship songs and modern hymns from different genres.

Wednesday Link List

Click the image above for sourcing; meanwhile, here are the rest of this week’s suggested readings:

• The Economist catches up to the wind of Evangelical and Charismatic Christianity blowing through the church in the UK.  Yeah, really, The Economist. 
• I was recently scanning the four youth books that deal with cutting, addiction, abuse and food disorders by Nancy Alcorn, and noticed the books are somewhat of a commercial for something called Mercy Ministries. Then I read this report.
• Last week while we were linklisting here, Pete Wilson posted an article about all the damage being done by Facebook. Except that Facebook isn’t really the culprit. 
• At Internet Monk, Denise Spencer, wife of the late Michael Spencer who founded iMonk, shares some insights she discovered after being lost in a forest.
  
• Why do so many Christian blogs have Christian book reviews, and so few have Christian music reviews? Amy Sondova at Backseat Writer is the exception with this in-depth CD review of The Same Love by Paul Baloche.
  
• Here’s an intriguing idea: What if we read the directives in Paul’s epistles in the first person? This example from Galatians 3 models what could be an instant small group exercise. B. J. Stockman guest posts at Zach’s. (Chapters one and two are also blogged there.)
  
• Here’s an opportunity to wear your Spandex to the Red Sea: Stryper frontman Michael Sweet is leading a Holy Land tour.
  
• Why Writers Need Editors: A guy we associate with alternative Christian media doesn’t have much use for mainstream Christian media. Maybe too much so.  He apologizes, sort of.
• Here’s a short story that will rock your world when it comes to how we tend to view who pays for what when it comes to missions. Not everyone gets a 4-star hotel with M&Ms (red ones removed) either.
• Texas pastor and blogger Trey Morgan was involved in a house giveaway last week that didn’t involve either Habitat for Humanity or Extreme Makeover Home Edition. It’s the second house they’ve given away. (Here’s more about the first one.)
  
• If some are chosen, elect or predestined, why evangelize? Here’s a Calvinist with seven Biblical reasons.
  
• Wanna go deep? Here’s an article about the concept that worship is a physical act; there isn’t a higher or purer worship to be experienced; not in this life.
  
• Author Linda Mintle talks to CBN News about the “Am I Pretty?” YouTube video disturbing teen trend.
  
• And here’s another parenting must-read: Brad Whitt’s 20 Ways To Tell Your Child You Love Them
  
• Know someone responsible for worship and/or creative arts ministry in your local church? Tell them about Sunday online magazine.
  
• Dave Carrol has a great quotation from Randy Bohlender’s new book, Jesus Killed My Church.
• Speaking of books, Rick Apperson reviews the new Mike Howerton book Glorious Mess which he found literally too funny.
  
• Here’s a blog link just for the sisters; but the guys can read it, too. Sometimes parents exasperate their kids because we think that they have to learn to do a task the way we do it.
  
• Hometown (sort of) rapper Chris Greenwood aka Manafest, has a new album, Fighter releasing in April. One of the producers worked with Justin Bieber while another produced for The Newsboys.
  
• Don’t forget to have your link suggestions in by Monday night.
  
• For our closing picture below, we ask the musical question: Why throw out your old car parts when they can be part of the church stage design on Sunday morning? Click the image for the story link.

Serve God When You are Young…and Ready

I’ve written before, including just four months ago, how increasingly, so much of what goes on in the modern church is a young man’s game.  We often tell teens and twenty-somethings that they need to “maximize their impact for God” while they are young.  And certainly, when it comes to serving in tropical rainforests, helping out in the high arctic, or ministering in communities located at high elevation, you want to have youth or fitness on your side.

But I’m also reminded of the number of times those opportunities were afforded to me — especially those where a church turned their worship time or pulpit time over to me — where I honestly didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t have anything close to resembling the wisdom of age, and I’m still not sure I do.  But I do know that I wish I had known then what I know now.

So here we have a dichotomy between offering ministry experience to the young and inexperienced, and then denying the older and wiser those same opportunities because all the time-slots are full. 

However, I also have to ask myself if I would be that older, wiser person if those early opportunities to fall flat on my face had not been offered to me.  So…

To the young:

1. Take the opportunities as they present themselves.  Paul told Timothy not to allow anyone to look down on him because of his youth; but
2. Get all the training and preparation you can get for each individual assignment.
3. Know what ministry roles not to accept because of lack of spiritual fitness in that particular area, or lack of Biblical understanding.
4. Get connected with an older — the older the better — person in your faith community who can mentor you in specialized ministry positions, as well as a general mentor for your overall spiritual journey.

To the old(er):

1. Yes, you have more experience and can do a better job.  Now get over it.  The chain of grace isn’t constructed that way.  In some institutions, maybe, but not a fully functioning organic church.
2. Find young people who are teachable and are willing to be mentored.  Meet them halfway by learning about and connecting with their culture, their technology, their family situations.
3. Mold and shape them through encouragement, not criticism.  Avoid the “in my day this is how we did it” type of stories, and instead, use non-directive responses, i.e. questions.
4. Become a translator.  Not a Bible translator, but someone who takes solid spiritual concepts from past devotional writers and Bible commentators, and asks, “How would the next generation communicate that same idea?”

Those are my suggestions for today, and you should listen to them, because I am older and wiser, and if you don’t, I’m calling the pastor and telling him that everybody’s doing it wrong and instead, they should all listen to me.

Seriously, I do think there’s something here worth considering. Does your faith family give equal weight to encouraging the next generation and appreciate the wisdom and experience of older participants?

The graphic above is from a book on inter-generational ministry, the other side of the coin, how churches can reach a wide variety of ages. Read more on this topic from Zondervan author Dr. Jeff Baxter

Hot Off The Presses

Our Book is Out!

Check out the picture at right.   Impressive, huh?  Notice my name as coauthor?  Wait ’til my family sees this.   They used a larger typeface for my name than I thought they would! How would you like to be the coauthor of Donald Miller’s new book?  Well you can.   Sort of.   Fresh off their blog and Facebook promotion for Andy Andrews’ The Noticer, Michael Hyatt, CEO of Thomas Nelson is at it again, and it’s not even April Fools Day.   You not only get to pretend to be Miller’s coauthor, but you get a webpage with your name on the introduction and your comments on what it was like to work with Donald.   You then blog it or e-mail it to your friends.   You can read my page here.   Join the prank at Hyatt’s blog, here.

Play that Worship Music, white boy

Chris Vacher, who blogs at Chris from Canada questions whether a high profile worship event purporting to represent “worldwide” worship and involving “all peoples” is living up to its goals when, without exception, every advertised participant is very white.    Read his thoughts here.

9 Simple Rules for Not Dating My Teenage Daughter

Tony Miano blogs at The Lawman Chronicles.  On the occasion of both of his daughters’ community college graduation, he talks about the qualities necessary for someone to ask for the girls’ hands in marriage.   Tony doesn’t believe in dating.   To paraphrase the title of the Josh Harris book, he’s kissed the concept goodbye.   But this may be new for some of you.  In one of the comments, he elaborates:

I don’t expect my daughters to identify a potential man to marry. I expect that young man to identify himself, since he will be pursuing my daughter and not the other way around. I also expect (and trust) the Lord to give us the collective wisdom and discernment as a family to recognize that man as the one He has chosen for my daughter.
Once that man is identified (using not only my list of requirements; but also my daughter’s list of requirements), and we (my wife, daughter, and I) agree that a courtship should take place, with the goal being marriage, then I would give consent for the man to court my daughter.

You can read the post here.   Just be careful if you leave any comments.   Tony is a policeman.   He knows where you live!

We interrupt this sermon…

Has your pastor ever stood up in the pulpit and said that he had a sermon all prepared, but God is leading him to share something entirely different?  While it does happen, it doesn’t stop Jon Acuff, at the blog Stuff Christians Like, from having some fun with what’s become a staple of evangelical life.   You can read his post here.   And if you missed this one from May 29th, Jon has guest blogger Tyler Stanton share “The Essential Cast of a Great Missions Trip,” just in time for summer.

And finally, a public service announcement

This is actually from 2007, but I thought I’d leave a reward for those of you still clicking.   Via YouTube, here it is.