Review: By the Waters of Babylon

mlward

aniolScott Aniol’s new book, By the Waters of Babylon: Worship in a Post-Christian Culture, argues at length against the architects of missional evangelism—not because Aniol thinks the attractional model (of Hybels, Warren, et al.) is better, but because he doesn’t see cultural forms as neutral, suitable for any message including the gospel.

Here’s what I take to be his thesis paragraph for the book:

Although the missional church seems to correctly recognize the nature of the Christendom paradigm in western civilization and in many cases rightly discerns the integral relationship between Christianity and culture during that period, it appears to view this development in the history of the church as entirely negative, with very few positive fruits. At the very least, most missional advocates see what happened as merely neutral contextualization of the church’s worship to culture, yet their very quick dismissal of worship forms coming out of that period as simply antiquated “relics” reveals what may be a simplistic understanding of the impact of the church upon culture during that period. This perspective limits their ability to recognize the strengths of the cultural forms from that period in expressing Christian values and the vast differences that exist today with regard to culture and contextualization in worship.

Discussion

Answering Objections about the Problem of Evil & Suffering (Part 3)

Mark Farnham

Read the series so far.

Non-Christian Answers to the Problem of Evil & Suffering

Several other attempts have been made to address evil and suffering in our world.

1. Non-Reality of Evil View

Some Eastern religions, such as Hinduism and Buddhism, deny that evil and suffering are any more than an illusion. By denying that evil and suffering are real, they attempt to avoid any dilemma between the deities in charge of the world and the way the world is. The problem for this view, however, is that the experience of suffering is universal and undeniable. Additionally, these same Eastern religions seek to end oppression and alleviate the very suffering that they deny exists. This is clearly self-refuting.

Discussion

Averaging everything out, do you think your church uses the right balance between video and live teaching?

Ed Vasicek

Whether DVD or live steaming, do you think our conservative churches are leaning too much on video presentations? We are assuming that the videos themselves are good quality both doctrinally and in format. Or do quality videos abound and you think it good that the church uses them frequently?

Perhaps yours is a satellite church with a projected speaker from another location. Why does this seem fine to you?

It goes without saying that it depends upon the specific church and perhaps the specific crowd.

Discussion

China detains 30 Christians in latest religious crackdown

SI Filings

“According to China Aid … personnel of the religious affairs bureau and the police raided the Olive Tree Church’s Sunday worship service on the morning of July 10. The officials took pictures of the congregation, confiscated church property, banned their church meetings, sealed the church doors and then took away 30 of its members to the police station.” ChristianTimes

Discussion