Basics #1: a guide to labels and why they matter – fundamentalist, evangelical and pentecostal

(Here’s a post written for nvc.org.au that you might want to read. I realise I don’t ever write about any of the basics; this might be the first in a series. If you’ve studied theology, all of this will be superfluous and potentially erroneous!)
Last night I was watching a secular documentary called Jesus Camp. It’s [...]

‘We need more money’

A reluctant visitor to a megachurch last night, the ‘financial giving’ talk made me feel queasy and miserable. I wanted to run out of there. I believe they have that every week, a talk to encourage everyone to give more money, to ’sacrifice’ for the kingdom.
I guess you have to do that when you employ [...]

‘Two lists’ theology

I’ve been re-reading some of Tom Finger’s Contemporary Anabaptist Theology ahead of a talk I’m giving on Anabaptism, and I was struck by his discussion of the ‘two-lists’ approach to Anabaptist theology.
In the two lists approach, Anabaptists share the standard distinctives of evangelicalism you might find for any evangelical organisation (like the Australian Fellowship of [...]

Why the church must be attractional: an Anabaptist critique of the emerging missional church via Milbank

A few weeks ago, Hamo wrote an interesting post called ‘Why the missional incarnational church is screwed’. He quoted at length from the postliberal theologian John Milbank:
The church cannot be found amongst the merely like-minded, who associate in order to share a particular taste, hobby or perversion. It can only be found where many [...]

Know your story, people!

Reading this history of the Vineyard movement made me remember how important history is. Evangelicals and Charismatics are mostly ignorant of their own history, and are poorer for it. Or I know I am. So many things we take for granted have historical reasons and interesting stories behind them. This book connected the dots of [...]

Book review – Evaluating the church growth movement : 5 views

This is an important book for me to have read. Throughout the book, several references are made to common misunderstandings of the church growth movement. The problem is that people like me associate it with megachurches and seeker-sensitive services and don’t know the historical roots.
This book starts with a good historical sketch to correct such [...]

Book review: David Watson – Fear No Evil

I have an unhealthy fear of death. Particularly, I have an unhealthy fear of dying young. That’s why I was so affected by Heath Ledger’s death. I think it’s related to what Alain De Botton calls status anxiety – for me, fear of dying without achieving. It’s an unchristian attitude and it needs changing. I [...]

Bob Dylan and Christianity, with a passing dismissal of power evangelism

Having just seen the Bob Dylan film I’m Not There and reading John Wimber’s Power Evangelism, Bob Dylan and John Wimber have been on my mind a lot this week. So it was interesting to find a very interesting comment on Wimber in an article about Bob Dylan.
I was looking up Bob Dylan’s faith journey [...]