I’ll admit to being weary, to the point of irritation, whenever I hear ministers of the gospel reporting their statistics as external evidences of success. And I know I’m not the only one. (The first minute-and-a-half of this video...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
I’d imagine most of us on the conservative end of evangelicalism—whether you’re part of the YRR crowd or the OBR (Old, Boring, Reformed) crowd—we understand the wrongheadedness of church growth methodology. It’s easy...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
We learned in our last post that it is possible to be a faithful and effective missionary without excessive contextualization. In fact, there was a time when things like translating the Bible, eating native foods and wearing native clothing, and...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
Okay, so contextualization as pragmatism is out. John MacArthur put that to rest. But is there any form of contextualization that’s legitimate? Certainly missionaries have to contextualize to evangelize in a foreign context, don’t...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
Several weeks ago Grace to You launched a blog series examining the subject of contextualization, the pragmatic approach to evangelism that says the gospel can be made more powerful by adapting it to cultural contexts. John MacArthur opened that...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
It should be clear that modern church marketers cannot look to the apostle Paul for approval of their methodology or claim him as the father of their philosophy. Although he ministered to the vilest pagans throughout the Roman world, Paul never...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
Norm Sper went to heaven Wednesday night.You may never have heard of Norm before, but you probably owe him more than you realize. I certainly owe him more than I could ever repay.Norm lived an amazing life. Born in Hollywood, CA in 1925, he was...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
When Paul wrote, “To the Jews I became as a Jew … to those who are under the Law, as under the Law” (1 Corinthians 9:20), he was not talking about accommodating the message. He was simply saying he would not jeopardize his...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
“All things belong to us, and we are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” Paul made that tremendous, seemingly unqualified promise to the Corinthians (1 Cor. 3:21–23). Christians are free. Yet there is a paradox that...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
It is crucial that you understand the nature of Christian liberty. As a Christian, you are not under law, but under grace (Rom. 6:14). Freedom from the law certainly does not mean that the principles of righteousness revealed in the Old...[ abbreviated | read entire ]
