The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why By Phyllis Tickle (reviewed by Peter DeHaan)The subtitle to The Great Emergence provides a concise summary of this book’s content: “How Christianity is Changing and Why.” To respond to this statement, Tickle first explains what emergence is, then how we arrived at this point, and concludes […]
Say a Pre-Church Prayer One of the practices my wife and I followed when we visited 52 churches was to pray before we headed out the door. This seems simple enough and something we should have always done, but praying prior to church was a practice we seldom did, more likely skipping it than remembering. […]
Today, I will not go to church, at least not in the traditional way. This Sunday morning I am sitting in an airport, waiting for a flight to take me home. Even so, the church will happen. It might be through a seemingly random interaction with someone at the airport. It could be through silent […]
In the developed world, especially the United States, size is celebrated. If something is big, we judge it as good. If it’s bigger, we applaud it as better. And if it’s the biggest, we acclaim it as the best. People equate size with success. Churches fall into this same trap. If a church is big, […]
Should Churches Pursue Excellence in All Things? A phrase I hear from time to time at churches is pursuing excellence in all things. Other churches don’t speak this directly, but they do understand it. One reason for this may be pure, to give God our best. Or the motive may be practical, to provide a […]
It’s fun to be in the company of likeminded individuals. It’s comfortable to hang out with people similar to us. But are fun and comfortable, necessarily good things? Do they promote personal growth and advance understanding? Being with people like us?—uniform or at least similar in perspective—is a homogeneous experience. The opposite of homogeneous is […]
Last Sunday I only made it halfway through the church service. I completely missed the sermon—and it was the best church experience I’ve had in a long, long time. That’s not to imply I didn’t like the speaker (I do) or that his words lacked substance (my bride gave me a recap, so I know […]
The Bible says that Jesus is God’s one and only son. However, God also calls the church his children. How can we be God’s children if he has only one son? Although the Bible is full of paradoxes—which are hard for modern people to accept but not so difficult for post-modern people and certainly not […]
Multiply: Disciples Making Disciples By Francis Chan and Mark Beuving (reviewed by Peter DeHaan)Many Christians—and the churches they attend—skip the part about making disciples. Though Jesus commanded us to make disciples and modeled how to do it, too often we neglect disciple-making altogether. Even when we try to make disciples, we often reduce it to […]
When people in our materialistic society say they want more, they usually mean more money and possessions. But that’s not the kind of more I’m talking about. A year ago, after Easter, my wife and I slipped away from our church to take a yearlong sabbatical to visit a different Christian church each Sunday. On […]