Kent Dobson, who succeeded Rob Bell as pastor of influential Mars Hill Bible Church, has recently announced his decision to step down.
He had begun, he says, with a desire to follow Paul by offering the traditional gospel in culturally-relevant dress. But he had come to question not only the packaging as traditionally offered by the church, but also the message.
…“I have always been and I’m still drawn to the very edges of religion and faith and God.
At Christmas, fact and fiction, truth and legend, are mixed so thoroughly that even preachers include what they should have left out, and leave out what they should have included.
The late Dick France wrote:-
…‘Most people’s awareness of the Christmas story is derived mainly from school nativity plays, in which Luke’s tea-toweled shepherds rub shoulders with Matthew’s magi (promoted to royal status), and a surly innkeeper and his wife are surrounded by infant angels with tinsel halos.
Urban Legends of the New Testament: 40 Common Misconceptions. By David A Croteau. Published by B&H Publishing Group (1 Aug. 2015).
This book discussed 40 misinterpretations of New Testament passages. Strictly speaking, only some of them could be regarded as ‘urban legends’ (i.e. they are misreadings that have passed uncritically into public consciousness). Others are passages which are liable to interpretations that simply add something to the text that isn’t really there, or subtract something that really is there.…
‘Doctrine is but the drawing of the bow. Application is the hitting of the mark.’
Thomas Manton (1620-1677)…
In the run-up to Christmas, the Church of England hoped to place a 60-second advert – a presentation of the Lord’s Prayer – in cinemas around the UK.
But Digital Cinema Media – the advertising agency responsible for advertising in 80% of the cinemas across the country – has decided that it won’t be showing the advert after all. It has a policy, it says, of ‘not accepting political or religious advertising’. It added that ‘some adverts could cause offence to those of different faiths or of no faith.’…
To the seasonally tongue-tied among us, Donald Whitney suggests that the following could get a meaningful conversation going in almost any Christmas situation. It will be noticed that the later questions in the list would help in moving the conversation to a deeper level:-
[Note: I’m using the word ‘heresy’ in the old-fashioned sense of ‘divisiveness’ as in Titus 3:10 (Authorised Version): ‘A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject.’]
When Mike Licona published his book on the resurrection, he ventured to suggest that some elements in the Gospel story might be symbolic in character, rather than strictly historical. The passage which has received most attention is the one in Matthew 27:52f, about the raising to life of many dead saints. …
And there were in the same country children keeping watch over their stockings by the fireplace.
And Lo! Father Christmas came upon them; and they were sore afraid.
And Father Christmas said unto them: “Fear not, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people who can afford them. For unto you will be given great feasts of turkey, pudding and cake; and many presents, wrapped in bright paper, lying beneath a tree adorned with tinsel, coloured balls and lights.…
When I was just a little girl,
I asked my mother, ‘What will I be?’
‘Will I be pretty, will I be rich?’
Here’s what she said to me:
Compare:-
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul.…
God had made a promise to Abraham, and part of that promise was the Abraham would have a son who would carry on the family line. He and Sarah waited a long time, but the promised son didn’t arrive, and they were getting old. So Sarah said to Abraham: “Why don’t we take my maid-servant Hagar, and try for a baby with her?” So Abraham did, and along came Ishmael. So it seemed that Ishmael would be the promised son. …
