The Virtue of Worldliness
When I was young, “worldliness” was a vice. Let me explain. As a teen, my church never tried to prove worldly things were wrong with a specific Bible verse which disallowed my participation—they would just say “it’s worldly” as in “we abstain from worldly amusements.” Worldly amusements meant the kind of entertainment that “the world”
How to Cheat on Your Minister’s Taxes
Tips for pastors willing to take a chance.. The following are the five most common ways ministers cheat on their taxes: 1. Hide your honorariums. Pastors get honorariums for weddings and funerals. The relatives never report this income to the IRS so ministers can easily tuck the cash in their pocket (or turn the check into
Seven Advantages of Starting in a Small Church
I’m getting to the part of my senior course where I urge ministerial students to start out their ministry in small churches. It is a hard sell. At IWU we have more than 400 students in our religion division. The median church they come from is about 700. Really! Half of my students come from churches larger than 700 and the other half from
7 Advantages of a Denomination
A few years ago one of my students was facing a big decision. He was trying to decide between a future in an independent church (like the one he was raised in) or joining up with a denominational church. Justin took his decision seriously enough to undertake a research project. He interviewed pastors in both kinds
The Big Blog Bust
Since Christianity Today announced the death of the blog in their October 2007 issue I’ve been thinking about blogging. Of the 300 million people who took up blogging, a full 200 million have given it up and let their pages go inactive. There are today only about 100 million active blogs. Actually I guess I don’t “blog”
Bono Church
I see a major shift in how my students see church and it isn’t in musical styles or starting little anti-church gatherings in homes. Those kind of “revolutions” might be the talk of aging and burned out boomers like George Barna but not my students. The revolution they seek has more to do with Bono than
Five Views of Sin in a Believer’s Life
Many Christians today don’t like to talk about sin. We’d rather talk about positive things like love, kindness, social action, acceptance and so forth. But the Bible does speak of sin, and most of us have a doctrine of sin–even of sin in the believer’s life. I sometimes doubt if we have fully thought through
Saving Wretches Like You
It is hard to sing some songs the way they were written. They just go against our grain. Few folk today want to sing John Newton’s Amazing Grace the way he wrote it: “that saved a wretch like me.” Or how about Isaac Watts’ hymn that includes the line, “for such a worm as I”?
Augustine’s Process for Receiving New Members
The ancient church had no “membership” like modern denominations have, but it did have a process of taking candidates into the church, and members in the church and catechumens knew who was who. It may be helpful to outline the process for a person to become a fully functioning “member” of the church at Augustine’s
My Students: The Coming Wave in the Church
I get to spend my day-to-day life with the next generation coming along in the church. I see everyday hints at what the church might become in the future. I have my ideas about what they’ll do in and to the church, but I’m not sharing that here. Instead I’ll just list 25 prominent characteristics
The Tyranny of the Telephone
I don’t do phones. I hate them. I don’t have one in my home (my wife has a cell though), and when I get a “pink slip” message at the office I go to the Internet and look up the person and write them an email instead of returning their phone call. In fact, when
Congratulations to You!
If you are reading this congratulations! You have been named Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year.” That’s right—they named you, the ordinary person who uses the Internet to read and write and watch as the person who most influenced the year’s events. And, if you’ve commented on past articles you should appear even closer to