As iron sharpens iron,
one person sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17)
A two-fold assumption is often evident when believers are evaluating the effectiveness of churches, ministries, movements, and denominations. The assumption is, first, that the Great Commission is the standard of measurement and, second, that the way to apply the standard is to count the number of people who are hearing the gospel or are being brought into worship services.
“While the form may be used to report concerns related to a church’s handling of sexual abuse, racism and various other pertinent issues, Bramlett cautions that suspicions of recent or current sexual or other forms of abuse should be reported to law enforcement officials.” - BPNews
“…if the Psalter is indeed a hymnal for God’s people, then shouldn’t we also make sure that our own singing covers both the full breadth of Christian doctrine and the full range of human emotion? Our singing should consist of more than pithy praise choruses. We need to sing songs that boldly proclaim all the truths contained in God’s Word.” - 9 Marks
“What is especially grievous to me, as a Jewish follower of Jesus since 1971, is that a few bad apples make the rest of us look bad. And in this case, the anti-Semitic rants of Rick Wiles and TruNews, an evangelical, online news network, might make more of an impression than the loving words and deeds of millions of other Christians.” - Christian Post
“When I think of ministries and organizations and their technology support needs, I often question if we are supporting things we should support or supporting things we shouldn’t even be attempting. My computer can support up to 12 monitors, does that mean I should, or I should add that support load to someone else so I can have 12 monitors?” - Church Leaders
To have an accurate theology of evangelism, believers must account for what God has revealed that pertains to the subject. Even after having done so, we must continually work toward a more accurate theology of evangelism by laboring to account for everything God has said in ways that many have overlooked.
“ ‘Early in 2020, around the anniversary of my last local church sermon, we will begin considering interim preaching opportunities,’ MacDonald said in a message on his ministry website, jamesmacdonaldministries.org, where he lists Vertical Church and Act Like Men as ministries that are ‘coming soon.’” - Christian Post
“Keith and I would likely have diverging ideas about how to fix this problem, but he’s absolutely right about this. Moving away from a sung liturgy, the Psalter, and robust hymnody has largely turned the service of Word and Table into a Christian parody of the rock concert.” - Ponder Anew
“We subconsciously oblige the sorrowing among us to swallow their grief, pipe up, and praise the Lord. Disconnected from the celebratory riffs and confident proclamations, the crushed in spirit become sorely neglected by the exclusion of their spiritual pain in corporate worship.” - Making Church a Safe Place for Sorrow
By Sam Horn. Read Part 1.
The gospel is also the record of God fulfilling His purposes and promises in four specific ways. By means of the gospel, God has fulfilled an ancient promise made to our first parents in the presence of their mortal enemy, Satan. Though this enemy bruised the heel of Jesus at the cross, the resurrection was the cosmic proclamation of Christ’s victory over our ancient foe.
Discussion