I’ve been sharing a few thoughts about aspects of church life over the past few days to help those who are seeking to plant or replant churches think through the practicalities of church life. In this previous article, I wrote about elders and what they should do, today I want to talk about what elders… Continue reading Elders should be above reproach
Category: Church life
Church decision making – methods and majorities
This is a follow up to my article on how we go about making decisions as churches. In my previous article, I talked about when decisions should be made by church leaders and when they should be made by the whole congregation all together. Today, I’d like to talk about the nuts and bolts of… Continue reading Church decision making – methods and majorities
How does your church make decisions?
This is something that new church plants are going to have to consider. There are two main ways of approaching this. The first is to place decision making primarily in the hands of leaders, either the specific leaders of a congregation or leaders over a group of churches in a denomination, diocese or presbytery. In… Continue reading How does your church make decisions?
Elders are to guard and protect the church
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
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
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