Category Archives: General

Church, Future trends, General

The last man to wear pantaloons

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A while ago I spent an evening flipping in and out of a B-grade mini-series on life in the early 1920s. It was the time of transition between the Victorian era and the modern Industrial era. The shift from horses to cars, from provincialism to nationalism, from rural to urban living (for the rich), from hooped skirts to the sleek flappers (The term “flapper”, which became common slang in the 1920s, referred to a “new breed” of young women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered “decent” behavior. The typical flapper was unafraid to wear cosmetics or to be seen smoking or drinking alcoholic beverages in public – from Wikipedia), from top hats and cravats to suits and ties.

It was a fascinating look at the times of transition, following one man and his family from mid 1800s to the 1930s. One of the interesting things for me was the clothes people wore – epecially the men. A question sprung to mind: who was the last man to get up in the morning, go to his wardrobe and decide to put on pantaloons?

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Church, General, Missional, Sermons, Social Justice, Theology

God’s Kingdom Meets the Real World

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A few months ago, I spoke at a men’s conference in Johannesburg, at South Africa’s leading Methodist Church. They asked me to speak on being a Christian in a world gone mad. I used the opportunity to do a bit of a “preach” on what I think is an absolute essential for any Christian man (or woman) who wants to make sense of the world: we need to change our view on what we think we’re here for.

You can listen to the podcast recording of the session at the church’s conference website (if you battle to listen or download it, please let me know, as I have an MP3 copy). If you want to download a copy of the slides I used and was referring to, I have created a PDF file and you can get it here.

Church, General, Generations, Youth

Multigenerational ministries in local churches

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In 2000, I wrote my Masters thesis on the topic of multigenerational ministries in the context of a local church. It was an extension of the work I had been doing on different generations, and a forerunner to a best selling book I wrote a few years later that applied generational thinking to all aspects of life and work (that book is “Mind the Gap” – see here for more details and to purchase copies).

I have received numerous requests to post my thesis online, and so, here it is. The thesis itself was nearly 200 pages in length – the HTML file is 1.5Mb in size. You can read it online by clicking here – feel free to save it to your machine to read at your leisure.

There are some parts of the thesis that feel a bit out of date and simplistic. But I hope it sparks your thinking and influences your practice of multi-generational ministry in your church.

Gender, General, Global issues, Social Justice, Theology

The death penalty – pause for thought

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I have just posted a blog entry on my business focused blog site, ConnectionEconomy.com. It may interest you. I compare two women both found guilty of murdering their husbands and sentenced to death by their countries’ courts. But one is Iranian and so her sentence is labelled “barbaric”. The other is American and many American Christians therefore consider her verdict to be “justice”.

Why two very different responses? Read my blog entry here and see what you think. It’s a useful intersection of two very similar stories that might help us to examine our own cultural lens, and discover that what we think are eternal moral issues related to God’s unchanging standards and decrees might actually just be culturally conditioning.

General, Missional

Kairos course – getting people passionate about missional living

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I am hearing good things about a course called Kairos. Their website promises that it is an interactive course that looks at our world from God’s perspective, helping you to grasp God’s global purpose and understand how Christianity is growing around the world. It presents mission as God’s heartbeat – a thread that runs from Genesis to Revelation.

I’ve heard from a few people who have done the course, and they say it’s amazing.

From their website again:

Kairos is for anyone. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been a Christian. You don’t have to be already committed to world mission. You might even already be a missionary! And if you’re a pastor, this is something you and your church need to know about. Whoever you are and wherever you are at in your walk with God we believe Kairos has something to offer. We’d love to see you on one of our courses. All we ask is that you come prepared to hear whatever God may want to challenge you with.

To be honest, this blog entry is more a bookmark for me. I plan to check Kairos out at some time in the near future. But I thought I’d let you know about it too. Check it out, and let me know what you think. If you’ve done the course, what was your experience of it?

Church, Future trends, General, Missional, Social Justice

The Gospel of Wealth – are Faith and the American Dream compatible?

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An op-ed piece in a recent New York Times reviews a new book that suggests that the American Dream (health, wealth, happiness, freedom) are not compatible with the Gospel. The author says Americans should live as if they earned $ 50,000 a year and give the rest away. The NYT piece makes some great points. Read it at the NYT site here, or an extract below.

The Gospel of Wealth

By DAVID BROOKS, Op-ed columnist, The New York Times, September 6, 2010

Maybe the first decade of the 21st century will come to be known as the great age of headroom. During those years, new houses had great rooms with 20-foot ceilings and entire new art forms had to be invented to fill the acres of empty overhead wall space.

People bought bulbous vehicles like Hummers and Suburbans. The rule was, The Smaller the Woman, the Bigger the Car — so you would see a 90-pound lady in tennis whites driving a 4-ton truck with enough headroom to allow her to drive with her doubles partner perched atop her shoulders.

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Church, General, Theology

Competing Christianities

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Here’s something you should hear at church this Sunday: we are not the only Christians.

In a recent column for the ABP (Associated Baptist Press), David Gushee wrote an excellent article on the issue of Christianity vs Christianities. I think he makes an extraordinarily good point. Given the ways in which some Christians abuse the message of Christ (just think of the recent attempts to burn qu’rans as one example), it’s important for those of us who are trying to find a way to be Christ-followers in the 21st century to state clearly that there are different versions of Christianity out there.

Gushee writes:

I remember the first time it became crystal clear to me that there is no such thing as Christianity, but only competing Christianities. It was when I was working on my doctoral dissertation on Christians who rescued Jews during the Holocaust. During that time I attended a most remarkable conference in New York on hidden children of the Holocaust. This gathering brought together the now-grown adults who had hidden from the Nazis to survive. Some of these children were saved by Christian families.

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Future trends, General, Global issues, Missional, Youth

Expanding Youth Professionals Opportunities

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This paper, originally published in the peer reviewed Journal of Youth and Theology, edition 3, volume 1, 2004 (see http://www.iasym.org), aims to expose youth professionals to a number of opportunities within the corporate business world. This will enable youth professionals to self-fund their ministries/work, as well as gain credibility and experience in their area of expertise. The paper outlines the need that the corporate world has with regards to an understanding of today’s youth culture, as well as provides specific guidelines for ministry professionals who wish to pursue part-time (or full-time) consulting work in the corporate world. The paper specifically ignores theological and ethical issues such work may provoke. Since it was written in 2003, it also doesn’t take into account the many social media and digital opportunities to prove your expertise that are now available. These should obviously be utilised as part of developing one’s profile.

Expanding Youth Professionals Opportunities

The contribution that not-for-profit youth professionals can make in the corporate world
by Dr Graeme Codrington (2003)

The Professional Youth Ministry Problem

One of the abiding complaints of professional youth ministers and workers1 around the world is that they are not taken seriously. They are often seen as glorified baby-sitters or cheerleaders. Yet, in an increasing number of countries, there is a growing number of professionally trained, well qualified, called and committed life-long career youth workers and ministers (“youth professionals”).2 These people are as qualified in their specialised field as any other professionals are in theirs. Their expert knowledge and critical skills in fields such as childcare, adolescent development, youth culture and group dynamics, together with deep understanding of related disciplines, such as theology, psychology, sociology and education, set these youth professionals apart in today’s world. Yet, they are often not accorded the recognition they deserve, or the responsibilities they are equipped to handle.

In addition to these systemic challenges, youth professionals also facea financial challenge at the start of the 21st century. Churches, denominations, missions and youth agencies are no longer receiving the funding they were some years ago.3 Budgets are tight, and full-time youth professionals are seen as a luxury in many places. Many are ridiculously underpaid, and cannot sustain a career, and therefore are either forced to go part-time, or to abandon youth work/ministry all together.

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General, Global issues, Missional, Social Justice

Would Jesus burn the qu’ran?

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A church in Gainsville, Florida, USA, has started an international campaign to make 9/11 (11 September) an “international burn the qu’ran day”. They even have a Facebook fan page dedicated to it (I am NOT going to supply a link to it). The small church is called ‘Dove World Outreach Center’ and pastor Terry Jones is unmoved by growing international outrage at the planned burning of 150 copies of Islam’s holy book.

The Quran, according to Jones, is “evil” because it espouses something other than biblical truth and incites radical, violent behavior among Muslims. You can do a Google search for news of this event, and how even the US military is running a bit scared as they fear reprisal attacks by militant Muslims all over the world (inspired not by the qu’ran, but by hatred for the West and for those opposed to Islam).

I am not going to comment on the ramifications of such madness, although my head is spinning at how much damage one small church could potentially do around the world.

My only simple question is a spiritual and theological one: Would Jesus burn the qu’ran?

There may be debates about whether Jesus would be inclusive towards Muslims or not. I think he would have been, but I can see how some Christians would read their Bibles in such a way that indicates that Jesus would have excluded them from his friendship circle. There may be discussion about whether Jesus would have tried to engage with Muslims. I think it’s clear he did engage with people from other religions, and always did so with respect, tolerance and love. But again, I can (only just) see how some people read their Bibles and gain a different, more strident picture of Jesus. There is certainly debate about what Jesus taught us to do in relation to other religions. I see Jesus instructing us to engage, to be loving and respectful. I can see how others would interpret the Bible to say we should proselytise and point out error in other religions, and protect ourselves from contamination.

But all of these debates aside, I still have just that simple question: Would Jesus have burnt a qu’ran?

I cannot fathom any interpretation of the Bible or understanding of the nature of Jesus that would allow one to answer ‘Yes’ to that question. Pastor Jones might be right in his interpretation of Biblical truth (I think he’s not), but I cannot believe that burning a qu’ran is a Christ-like response.

I want my Muslim friends to know that anything that happens at ‘Dove World Outreach Centre’ this 9/11 weekend is not done in my name. I am a Christ-follower and I am abhorred that something like this could be done in the name of Jesus. What would Jesus do? I think He is weeping right now…

Salaam. Shalom. Peace be among us all.