Wednesday Link List

Once again, it’s time to hit the links: You can catch this week’s list at its home at Out of Ur, a blog of Leadership Today magazine.  Click anything below:

• Steve Taylor fans will want to catch the video for his album fundraiser on Kickstarter.
• If you like to keep idealistic memories intact, think twice before clicking to this article on the horrible personal life of C. S. Lewis.
• Why stop at bumper stickers if you can put the entire story of Jesus on your car? (Pictured below)
  
• In the UK, Christmas cards are becoming increasingly me-centered.
• So when all was said and done in the Mefferd-Driscoll controversy, Carl Trueman had predicted the outcome either way…
• …and then InterVarsity Press (IVP) became an official player in the saga with a short press release.
• …and a Reformed author offers seven thoughts on the writing of books.
• Saeed Abedeni wasn’t one of them, but Iran has released two other pastors detained in prison for 214 days.
• Do progressive Christians read books as do Evangelicals? Maybe not, as one Christian publishing imprint scales back.
• While reading a video game Kickstarter proposal, my wife discovered that one of the creators of the classic video game Myst, is now a pastor, at this church.
• When Jesus said to ‘take up your cross,’ is this literally what he had in mind?
• Sarah Palin is promoting a book which will resonate with conservative Christians, fighting the ‘war on Christmas.’
• …But are some conservatives fighting the wrong war?
• Essay of the Week: What do we mean — and is the definition changing — when we say pastoral.
• Most Clicked Article of the Week: As seen on various websites, Jon Foreman of Switchfoot on the use of ‘Christian’ as an adjective. (Here’s some classic music by Jon)
• A case will be heard in court in Armenia in January as Jehovah’s Witnesses appeal two building permit requests turned down because of complaints about the sect.
• A discovery by South African scientists again reopens discussion as to the age of the earth.
• Living Out, a new website in the UK offers encouragement to Christians experiencing same sex attraction…
• …and also from our brothers and sisters across the pond, a great Christmas Eve service video (that also proves not every spoken word piece that rhymes is rap).
• Former Charisma magazine editor Lee Grady thinks that with the passing of Paul Crouch, it’s time to reinvent Christian television.
• Link that takes you to more links: The best of the internet on the subject of hell.
• Going Deeper Department: Do we start with scripture or do we start with Jesus? Discuss.
• In Holland, the election of Pope Francis is at best slowing down a rapid exodus of Catholic parishioners…
• …Meanwhile, back at The Vatican, is the Pope sneaking out at night to give away money?
• A reality show in the U.S. may be intent on popularizing the idea of group marriage, aka polyamory.
• Recurring theme, different location: Pentecostals in Africa prescribing prayer instead of drugs for HIV patients.
• The Grammy nominations are out, scroll down the list to gospel and contemporary Christian categories 36 thru 40. This was the first time I’d heard of Tye Tribbett, nominated in three categories.
• Weird Video Moment of the Week: Rob Bell talks God and surfing — but not necessarily in that order — on the Pete Holmes show, a talk show affiliated with Conan O’Brien.
• It’s not in your mailbox. It’s not on your video screen. It’s the four-letter word you don’t hear.
• When the person playing Mary in this Australian Christmas re-enaction boards her donkey, she’ll be wearing a helmet of sorts.
• Finally, our gift item for the week: Mormon missionaries riding their bikes through some kind of environmental aberration.  Free shipping available.

 

Wednesday Link List

Welcome to Wednesday Link List Leap Day Edition, or as we prefer to call it, WLLLDE.

Here’s my social media observation for the day: Pinterest is to Facebook what Tumblr is to WordPress.  (Five years from now they’ll be quoting that in business textbooks.)

CT Stories

• There may be some changes afoot at Christianity Today as to who can access articles online, so we’ll do these while we can.  First, in one we missed in January, T. D. Jakes revealed he’s now regarded as heretic by both mainstream Evangelicals and one-ness Pentecostals.
• A brief rare interview Rob Bell did with CT earlier in the month. Doesn’t let the cat out of the bag as to what he’s currently working on, though. (But if you’re really into Bellmania, flash back to this piece Tony Jones did exactly one year ago, which remains in his all time top five.)
  
• “A century ago, a novel called In His Steps convinced generations of Christians that Jesus would, among other things, oppose the sport of prizefighting. That novel became the ninth best-selling book of all time, and the book’s thesis found new life in the ‘What Would Jesus Do?’ movement.” So begins a look at the ethics of cage fighting with three viewpoints.
• “Here’s what you can do in a New York City public school after hours: You may gather people together once a week (or more often). You can start off with praise choruses and Bible reading. Someone can stand up and teach that Jesus is Lord, that he rose from the dead to save us from sin, and that he is coming again. Then you can break bread and pray together.  Here’s what you can’t do in a New York City public school after hours: Hold a ‘religious worship service.'” Another look at the strange situation in NYC.

Les autres links

• With just weeks to go before release, Donald Miller and Steve Taylor sit down to discuss how Blue Like Jazz, the collection of short stories, ended up as Blue Like Jazz: The Movie, with a more cohesive storyline. 
• Signs of the Times: There is now actually a blog with the name Church and Synagogue Security News. Tagline: Covering security and safety at places of worship and religious institutions worldwide.
  
• Sarah Bolme reviews Peace Child by Don Richardson; an absolute classic missions story that many of you have never heard of. “In the book, there is a quote from a missionary talking to Don before Don embarks on the mission field. This gentleman says, “You must be prepared in the strength of the Lord, to do battle with the prince of darkness, who, having held these hundreds of tribes captive these many thousand years, is not about to give them up without a fight.” Sarah says Christian authors today face similar obstacles.
  
• Zac Hicks looks deeply into the sometimes thorny issue of church membership. He offers five compelling arguments for moving from adherent to member. Which type of weekend service attender are you?
  
• Who to date.
  Where to go to college.
  Who to marry.
  Where to move.
  What job to take.  — Steven Furtick thinks that knowing God’s will for your life isn’t the main point.
  
• Mark Buchanan is blogging sample chapters of his forthcoming book, Your Church is Too Safe. Check out chapter five and chapter thirteen, a most interesting consideration of the types of spirits that showed up when Jesus ministered, some of which show up in our churches today.
  
• In other Zondervan book news, one of my favorites from last year is being released in a teen/youth edition; look for the bright red cover for Not a Fan Teen Edition by Kyle Idleman (no link).
  
• How do you get KJV-only teens revved up for the next youth conference? How about a Marine Corps themed promo video with the bold proclamation “In 1611 God forged a sword.”  Apparently before 1611 God was a little deficient in terms of a means to save the world.
  
• Donation request: Tony Jones (aka Tall Skinny Kiwi) needs about $5,000 US to ship his truck from Turkey to New Zealand, where it will serve as an operations base. Funds are needed rather soon.
  
• If you’re like me, you’ve probably tried at least once to learn Biblical Greek. Tyler Blanski thinks the key is learning to love parts of speech that aren’t so important in English.
  
• People Department: I always look forward to Brad Lomenick’s monthly Young Influencers List; here’s the one for February.
  
• I’m always interested when slightly more insider church references make it into the comics pages.  Wikipedia notes that Pluggers “…runs in 60 newspapers, mostly in the Southern, Mid-West, Plains, and Rocky Mountain states… In the context of this strip, ‘pluggers’ are defined as blue-collar workers who live a typical working-class American lifestyle, accompanied by a mentality characteristic of the veteran and Baby Boomer generations. In the comic, pluggers are portrayed in the form of anthropomorphic animals, most often a plump bear, dog, chicken, or rhinoceros…”

Blue Like Jazz: The Movie: The Teaser

And you thought the book was wild and crazy…

Chopping Down The Sunday Tree

Ya gotta love these Emergent guys, they know how to liven up the party.   But before I sound a bit flippant, you really need to read this, which is why I’m running the whole quote instead of linking.  Steve Taylor blogs at Sustainable If Able and also goes by the name Emergent Kiwi.   Read this, smile, and then read it again:

Say your church is dying. You have good buildings and some community ministry, but Sunday service is dwindling. It consumes a lot of your energy, both from your pastoral leader and your volunteers – to run sound and play music.

Change proposal: chopping down the Sunday tree.

Keep meeting at 10:30 am Sunday. Keep the doors open. Keep the coffee fresh. Keep the muffins warm. But stop the sermons and stop the singing. Take all that energy and reclaim the time for mission. Read a creed. Dwell in Luke 10:1-12. Initiate some listening experiments. Share stories. Foray into the community for simple acts of service. Return to share stories. Re-read a creed. Re-dwell in Luke 10:1-12. Initiate some more listening experiments. Share stories. Foray into the community for further acts of service.

You get the idea.

If it fails, you were dying anyway.

If visitors do come, they are not meeting a shut door, nor are they finding a stressed group of people. Instead they are finding a warm community who like coffee and muffins. Who knows, they might just be attracted by a group of people taking mission and church and leadership seriously. In the meantime, you are reclaiming an existing resource – your time and your pastoral time – and you’re investing that in mission. And you are redefining your stretched life around mission and community.

Do this for 3 months and see what shoots begin to emerge. Who knows. Some shoots will need another prune. But some might be worth persevering with. Some might even need a new name.

The mission tree.

Every time I read something like this, my mind immediately wants to ennumerate the reasons it would never work; but then I’m reminded that the early Church probably looked a lot more like this model than anything we do.

Photo:  I’m not sure what Steve Taylor had in mind, but this one was on a Flickr page titled as “Sunday Morning Tree.”    I couldn’t resist.   It’s part of a “trees” set of over a hundred, which is something I would do if I had a good camera and lots of time.

Trivia:  For my Canadian readers, Steve will be speaking at the Cultivate Learning Party in Hamilton, Ontario this May.    For my CCM readers, no he’s not the guy who made Christian albums and now makes movies.