In Acts 20:17, Paul sends for the elders (note plural) of the church in Ephesus to come and meet him at Miletus as he travels back to Jerusalem. There he gives them instructions about how to continue serving the church when people like Paul are no longer around to visit and write letters. He tells… Continue reading Elders are to guard and protect the church
Category: Church life
Twitter Church?
The big debate over the past 12 months has been about whether our online activities during lockdown counted as church worship services and whether it was possible to do things like share communion online. My position throughout has been that given the specific context we found ourselves in, that yes the online provision did count… Continue reading Twitter Church?
Let women learn
Alistair Chalmers has started a series of articles from a complementation perspective on allowing women’s voices to be heard in church. He gives the extreme example (extreme in logic sadly not necessarily in terms of commonality) of women attending women’s conferences and being taught by men on what it means to be a godly mother… Continue reading Let women learn
What does the Bible tell us about corporate worship?
Talking about the connection between church context abuse and a shallow view of worship the other day, I mentioned a debate about whether corporate worship was primarily a corporate activity, addressed to God or a horizontal activity addressed to one another. I would like to investigate that question a little further with a quick look… Continue reading What does the Bible tell us about corporate worship?
The connection between faulty views of worship and abusive cultures
What has our view of corporate worship got to do with the problem of abuse in the church? Well, it struck me during a conversation on social media that it might have quite a bit. The discussion was about whether or not corporate worship is primarily horizontal or vertical. I intend to engage in a… Continue reading The connection between faulty views of worship and abusive cultures
Abuse and the fault in our theology
I remember being asked once whether I’d prefer to pastor a church that was weak/confused in its doctrine but seemed on fire with passion for the Lord and loving or a church that seemed to be ticking all the right boxes doctrinally but wasn’t clicking in terms of love, welcome, enthusiasm. After thinking about the… Continue reading Abuse and the fault in our theology
Relax, refresh, restart
I’ve been writing a few articles about churches and life after lockdown. In them, I’ve included some potentially provocative comments about traditional midweek church ministries. Please don’t get me wrong on this. I’m not saying that you must never run these activities. I simply have a twofold point. The first is that a lot of… Continue reading Relax, refresh, restart
What would it help to know?
Yesterday I commented on the need of the pastor to be informed on a whole range of issues outside of their specific expertise in Biblical studies. We cannot and should not seek to become experts in every field but there are things we can do to help pastors be prepared for this aspect of ministry.… Continue reading What would it help to know?
So why run clubs and toddlers’ groups?
I’ve written a couple of articles recently about our outreach post COVID. I’ve suggested that we might want to revisit some of our weekday programmes. That’s partly because I suspect there will be a nervousness about attending such events for a while, and indeed, the suggestion that social distancing measures will be needed until well… Continue reading So why run clubs and toddlers’ groups?
I didn’t expect to need to know that
It’s been wryly noted that we suddenly have become experts in virology and epidemiology. Two years ago many of us didn’t even know that epidemiology existed. Today, we use terms like “R rate” freely and talk confidently about the impact of this or that variant and the efficacy of different NPIs. Similarly, I remember at… Continue reading I didn’t expect to need to know that
Faithroots 