The Cart and The Horse
What is the relationship of evangelism to church planting?
In a recent post titled, “Dr. Wagner’s Cart Has Been Pulling the Horse for Too Long”, Neil Cole (author, Organic Church) writes about this relationship. Continue reading »
In my last post (Frameworks for Mission: Direction or Dogma) we looked at the experience of Cornelius as described by Luke in Acts chapter 10. I asked the question, Are we saved by cognitive acceptance of certain doctrines or by the direction of our lives?  
Continue reading »
How are women and men “saved”? Are we saved by cognitive acceptance of certain dogmas? Are we saved by the direction of our lives? Or both or neither.
 I received a question from a friend in the Philippines. I’ve paraphrased his question below.
Alex,
Last week, I had a conversation with someone. While we were talking, he asked me if my insight was biblical.
I asked him, why does my insight have to be biblical? Isn’t that being fundamentalist? Continue reading »
Monday, March 10, 2008
Orlando, Fl
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“If you learn this you will know something about Jesus that many Christians do not know,” I told them. Continue reading »
This week:
The four turnings are these:
- A turning to Jesus Christ as Lord
- A turning to some form of Christ following community
- A turning to the Scriptures – Part 1
- A turning back to the world on mission
We been talking about the 4 Turnings of the human heart that lead to the kinds of people Jesus needs in the 21st century. The third of the turnings is the essential turn to the scriptures. (Remember, these turnings can happen in any order).
Contexts and Trajectories for Faith
In my last post in this series, I wrote that the scriptures give us both context and trajectories for faith. I touched on how the scriptures provide historical context for faith. Today I want to touch on how the scriptures give us trajectories for our faith.
The canon, as I mentioned in the last post, is not revelation. Neither the canon nor the Bible are authoritative in and of themselves. But the collection of documents that have been passed on to us as the Bible do provide trajectories for a more human future.
When I speak of trajectories for the future I don’t mean a “Left Behind” kind of map to what will happen in the future. I mean a description of the human world we are called to create. Continue reading »
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There is a spectrum of approaches for creating community with and among unreached people. Let’s draw from the world of technology for an anology.
Technologies exist on an opacity/ transparency spectrum. [Hat Tip to polymath and wordmaven Dean Sharp for the find].
An OPAQUE technology is one in which the technology being used is cumbersome or is
“in the way.” Posting a photo to your website using HTML is opaque. The HTML stands
between you and the task you’re seeking to accomplish. In a sense, you can’t “see” through
the technology to the photos you want to post. Opaque technologies require skills and capacities that do not come naturally to the user. For a more TRANSPARENT technology, think of using “Point to and click” technology to drag the photo of your choice into the page you’re creating. Using your finger to point is more natural to the user than typing HTML.
A transparent technology is one in which the technology is invisible. Continue reading »
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In PART ONE of this Two Part post titled, The Mega Church and Home Church Networks: Twin Trajectories and Why We Need Them Both, I wrote the following:
The first [Mega Church] trajectory needs excellence and resources to launch and heart and hospitality to succeed. The second [House Church Network] needs heart and hospitality to launch and resources to succeed. [More on this in my next post].
One of the reason corporate leaders and corporate churches don’t get mission to the emerging culture is Continue reading »
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There seem to be two leadership trajectories in the west. The first seems to be characterized by the recent phenomena of mega churches in the world. The majority of church conferences today are focused on this reality. The essence of these conference experiences seems to be a kind of corporate leadership guide for aspiring Executives of Corporate churches. Each conference introduces a new inductee to the role of mega church pastor-hood.
The excitement this type of environment creates for some makes others yawn.
Continue reading »
Welcome back.
I wrote a chapter in a book published by Relevant Books (The Relevant Church) where I suggested five realities awaiting us in our immediate future. One of those five realities is that “the future is spiritual.” How do I know this? Simple. The future is here.
A recent report from the Gallup Organization titled, Three in Four Americans Believe in Paranormal, suggests that “just about three in four Americans hold some paranormal belief — in at least one of the following: extra sensory perception (ESP), haunted houses, ghosts, mental telepathy, clairvoyance, astrology, communicating with the dead, witches, reincarnation, and channeling. There are no significant differences in belief by age, gender, education, or region of the country.”
Welcome to the future.
What do you think?
into the mystic…
Alex McManus
