Blog Tidbits

From time to time, I'll share some interesting blog posts to read from the blogosophere.  Enjoy! (Click on the titles below to read the entire blog post.) 

  "Do you Actually Want to Be Our Pastor?"

"But it didn’t take me long to figure out that lots of churches don’t actually want a pastor. They want a leadership coach or a fundraising executive or a consultant to mastermind a strategic takeover (often performed under the moniker of evangelism or missional engagement). In this scheme, there’s little room for praying and gospel storytelling, for conversations requiring the slow space needed if we’re to listen to love.”

 "A Response to Christians who Are Done with Church"  (Carey Nieuwhof)

“People criticize the church today as being consumeristic. And to some extent, churches cater to consumerism—often to our detriment. I agree that consumerism is a problem for Christianity.

But ironically, much of the dialogue about why people are done with church pushes people deeper into Christian consumerism than it pushes them into deeper discipleship: Here I am, all alone, worshipping God on my schedule when it’s convenient for me.

Listening to a podcast of your favourite preacher while you’re at the gym or on the back deck and pushing three of your favourite worship songs through your ear buds does not make you a more passionate Christ follower.

It usually makes you a less effective one.”

 Is Your Church an Institution? (Ray Ortlund)

“Institutions are not a problem. But institutionalization is. An institution can enrich life, but institutionalization takes that good thing and turns it into death. How? The structure, the mechanism, the means, becomes the end. The institution itself takes on its own inherent purpose.”