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Author's note: This article is cross-posted on Founders.org and ABWE.org. Every head bowed, every eye closed. Good. Now, do you feel a stirring deep in your soul when I talk about missions? If so, stand up. If you’ve spent any time in evangelicalism, you know all too well this familiar scene, when the trajectory of one’s life boils down to a single, mystical moment … Continue reading Learn How to ‘Adult’ Before You ‘Missionary’
Author’s note: this article is cross-posted on Founders.org. “When I went to war, I marked my enemies like a sniper. And when I got to them, I chopped their heads off with a knife.” These are the translated words of Wangloi Wangshu, one of the few surviving members of the Naga headhunting tribe in northern India, documented … Continue reading Are Some Cultures ‘Better’ Than Others?
“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with … Continue reading The Government of What?
In recent weeks, over 100 members of Early Rain Covenant Church in Chengdu, China, have been imprisoned. Among them is Pastor Wang Yi, one of China’s foremost Protestant pastors and Christian leaders. Foreseeing this possibility, Pastor Yi drafted a letter, “My Declaration of Faithful Disobedience,” leaving it in the keeping of his church to be … Continue reading The Fruit of Faithful Presence: Reflecting on Pastor Wang Yi
Author’s note: this article is cross-posted on Founders.org. What is a Christian? In spite of the New Testament’s clarity, if you were to ask a dozen self-identified evangelicals about their Christian identity, you’d get a dozen, mystifying, disparate answers. Some would reject the label “Christian” in favor of a deconstructed term like “Jesus-follower” with presumably … Continue reading 3 Identities of the Christian Man
In the wake of the death of John Chau on the Indian island of North Sentinel, lots of questions have been raised about colonialism, conversionary missions, and a theology of sacrifice and martyrdom. Scott Dunford and I addressed these critical topics today in a special episode of The Missions Podcast. We humbly submit this interview … Continue reading John Chau: Missions, Methodology, and Marytrdom
Conventional wisdom says that everybody loves their mother. It’s a man’s one thing—apart from one’s beard—that his fellow man isn’t to insult. Even Mussolini, nature dictates, had a soft spot for his mammina. But somehow, even though everyone has a mother, a segment of society has managed to declare war on motherhood. This war has … Continue reading The Time Mothering Saved the World
Author’s note: this article is cross-posted on Founders.org. Everybody wants the rights to the term “kingdom.” The word, as an adjective in Christian parlance, roughly translates, “Any vaguely spiritual activity or notion.” Clocking a few hours at a soup kitchen isn’t just volunteerism, it’s “kingdom work.” My menial life can be transcended and replaced with … Continue reading The Cost of ‘Kingdom’ Talk
“Evangelical” is a dirty word these days. Not just because of the politicization of the term; that’s a given. Rather, it’s becoming taboo even within theologically conservative, Bible-believing Christian circles (heretofore known as evangelicalism). W. Robert Godfrey, in lecture 72 of his church history series, notes that “evangelical” is not strictly synonymous with conservative Protestantism … Continue reading The Right Kind of Reductionism
Life in ministry is teeming with transitions. Whether it’s moving your family to answer a pastoral calling, sending off a missionary from your church, bringing onboard a new pastor, or passing through parted waters of seminary on dry ground—a life lived in service of the kingdom is always in flux, never fixed in one easy, … Continue reading Transition, Trust, and Tablescapes
