- just got a new web design job… one that pays! #
- tired #
- more tired #
- even more tired #
- not looking forward to knocking door-to-door on this cloudy day… I really hate sales! #
- I had a very productive day on many fronts! #
- excited to begin our series on prayer tonight at Growth Group #
- my screen is dead… praying it gets fixed fast and free! #
- sitting in the Mac store, hoping to make it to the Zoo before too long… happy birthday William #
- what a day!!! #
Weekly Tweets for 2009-07-12
July 12th, 2009 2 comments »
Americas Most Innovative Churches
July 10th, 2009 No comments »My recent post shared a Mark Driscoll video clip and spurred a good discussion about church. One comment from Matt Huggins brought out some excellent points and he included a quote from EM Bounds “
What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use — men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men — men of prayer.” — E.M. Bounds
What hits home to me is that the Church needs less man-centered innovation and more Holy Spirit inspiration. This got me reading through some of my previous posts on the church. Today I wanted to revive one of my previous posts and read it in the context of this quote by Bounds. I want to revive this previous post and examine the concept of innovation–what place does it have in the church? Is innovation the enemy of the Spirit, or a cooperative element of the Spirit’s work in us.
——————— repost from Feb 2007 ———————-
Back in January [2007] I wrote a response to the current issue of Outreach Magazine, and their first ever list of “America’s Most Innovative Churches.” Based on the content of the list, I titled my post, “America’s Most Inbred Churches.” Having taken some time to visit the websites of these churches, I have been struck by something that is quite convicting; entertainment has become the core conviction of many groups masquerading as the church.
I spent some time browsing the website of a popular and large church. They had a link for, “first time visitors” and so naturally I went there first. As I viewed the content of these pages, I asked myself the following, “if I were new to Christianity, what would I learn about these people who claim to follow Jesus?”
The first thing I noticed is that they gave a history of their church—that looked interesting. It was well organized by giving key dates that served as milestones in their history. But with each milestone came the recognition that everything was about numbers and a building. Every milestone was about how many people showed up on a Sunday, how much property they were able to buy, and how much money they had raised to build a building. The website even gave a nicely crafted bar chart so visitors could track just how big and prosperous the church had grown. What was the most important message to their first time visitors, “we have grown really big and now we have a really expensive building on some prime property. We can entertain you!”
The next article for the “first time visitor” was a video showcasing their 2006 year in review. I watched this video as this church displayed everything they thought was important for the first time visitor to see. What did I see? I saw a lot of fun events; people eating food, people dressed up like chickens running across the “stage” during services, and generally people having fun. Nothing wrong with that, I guess, but what bothered me is what I did not see. I did not see one person in prayer, I did not see one person serving the needs of others, I did not see anything that looked liked a missions project, I did not see one single baptism, I saw no one taking communion, I saw nothing that emphasized the teaching of God’s Word or the making of disciples… in short, I did not see anything about Jesus. What was the most important message to their first time visitors, “we are a really fun group that will make you feel good about yourself. We can entertain you!”
The reason I don’t care to reveal the name of this particular church is because, quite frankly, I am more concerned that it does not become the name of my church. Seeing this group’s website convicted me that our own Reunion Church website [and our actions] needs to reflect the unique message of the Gospel. Sure we want people to know that Christians have fun and can throw a good party, but this message must not come out at the expense of the letting people know we are doing the work of our Father and proclaiming the message of our Brother.
Who are America’s most entertaining churches? I don’t 
know, but I pray my church does not earn a spot on the list. And before anyone volunteers to compile a list, take a good long look in the mirror and make sure your church is not already on it!
Quick Guide to Protecting Family Computers
July 9th, 2009 1 comment »There is no such thing as “safe sex” and there is no such thing as a “safe internet.” With that in mind, my friend, and brother in Christ, Nathan Rambeck wrote a very useful guide for protecting your kids from on-line pornography. With his kind permission, I am sharing this well researched info with you today.
A parent’s guide to protecting the eyes of your family members from pornography on computers and other online devices.
Nathan Rambeck of Rambeck Group
It is an almost incomprehensible fact that 42% of children have been exposed to pornography online. The world wants to seduce you and your children into their perversion, and, as parents, we need to do everything in our power to protect our homes from these perverts and their filth. To make matters worse, our culture is gradually mainstreaming pornography, so that certain forms of pornography are considered acceptable for family entertainment and advertising. Below is a concise summary of things you can do to protect your family.
Install a Software Filter on Each Computer
A software filter should have at least 3 features. 1) Block objectionable sites using a continually maintained blacklist of bad sites. 2) Provide regular usage reports that can be delivered to parents showing sites visited and any attempts to view bad ones. 3) Password Protected so that only parents can uninstall or disable the filter.
Since adult addiction to pornography is epidemic, the usage reports and password protection features can provide a great opportunity of accountability for spouses or other adults in the home.
Recommendations:
BeSecure [PC]
SafeEyes [PC/Mac]
Add A Hardware filter to your home network
A hardware filter will have many of the same features as a software filter, but instead of protecting just one computer, it protects any computer connected to the internet through that network. This means that if a friend or relative comes to your house with an unprotected computer, it can be protected even if it does not have a software filter installed. However, keep in mind that a hardware filter only protects computers on your home network; if you have a laptop computer without a software filter, it may be protected at home, but will not be protected when connected to the internet at a friend’s house, the coffee shop, or a hotel. Laptops can even easily connect to a neighbor’s wireless network while you inside your own home. DO NOT rely on a hardware filter alone.
Recommendations:
- iBoss
- OpenDNS [FREE]
Cell Phones and other web-enabled devices
The internet is becoming ubiquitous in our culture. Cell phones, TVs, gaming consoles, PDAs and other electronic devices are, many times, now able to connect to the internet. Unfortunately, for most of these devices, there are no filtering options yet. When purchasing a cell phone for children, find one without web capabilities or talk to your wireless provider about turning the feature off. When purchasing other electronic devices always ask about their ability to connect to the internet.
Block Advertisements
Because “sex sells” so many products in our culture, even browsing a news site or social network may bring up an offensive advertisement. Because of this, I recommend using an ad blocker on your browser. An ad blocker will allow you to browser web pages without having to view any of the ads. While these sites should be able to earn revenue from the content they publish through advertising, the risk from many of these ads is too great to let them through. I recommend using the Firefox web browser with the Adblock Plus plugin.
Recommendations:
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1865
http://www.ie7pro.com/ad-blocker.html
Children should never be left alone on the internet
It is not wise to allow children free access to an internet-connected computer when they are alone or by themselves in a room. Internet filters can work very well, but they are not perfect. Also, industrious young people, can find ways around the filters. Keep family computers in living areas with lots of traffic and only allow laptops to be used in public areas.
Talk to your children about the dangers of pornography
When your kids reach an age at which sexuality becomes an attraction, talk to them about the dangers of pornography; how it will harm them, their future spouse, and even those women exploited in the pictures.
Is Mark Driscoll Still Confused About Church?
July 7th, 2009 15 comments »So I was poking around the web and came across the videos for a conference called Advance09. I was just a minute into the first video from Mark Driscoll when I heard the following excerpt.
I admit, I don’t keep up with all Driscoll teaches, so I am asking for your input to help me get this straight.
Mark Driscoll was at a conference for pastors who have super large congregations. He is there with Rick Warren (25,000 members + 200,000 pastors trained in the PDL) and Jonathan Falwell (20,000 + members plus “millions” through their TV ministy). These men are considered hugely innovative and successive pastors because they have built really big congrgations. Driscoll (8,000 attending + plans to have 100 worldwide campuses and 50,000 people) turns to this group of men who are the spiritual guides to hundreds of thousands of people and asks, “what is the church?” All of these successful pastors look at one another with confused looks and say, “I don’t know! What is the church?” According to Driscoll, not a single pastor had a clear ‘functional’ ‘biblical’ definition of church!!!
Really? What do you think when you hear this story? How did these men grow such big congregations without knowing how to define church?
Second observation and question.
Mark Driscoll says we are living in an age when “Ecclesology is being redefined” by technology and redefined by the innovative ideas of this group of pastors (online church, video-venues, etc…). So again I am confused. Driscoll says, good things were happening for Jesus in his church, but he did not know how to define church. So now we have a group of pastors who don’t know how to define the church and they are now taking on the responsibility for redefining the church based on their use of technology and dreams of multi-site venues.
Is Driscoll suggesting that the Ecclesioology as defined in the New Testament is insufficient for today’s high octane mega-church leadership? Is God’s revealed Ecclesiology no longer viable and so it is left to this group of leaders to redfine Ecclesiology for the next generation? Is that really what Driscoll is saying? Is he right? Does Ecclesiology really need to be redefined for each new generation? Are these mega-church leaders the ones God has appointed to lead us all into the redefinition of church?
So what do you say?
——
NOTE: I am not intending this post to be a rant against Driscoll or big churches. From what I read, he preaches the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is a brother of the cross. I just want some discussion on the topic and video.
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