Missional Code Breaking: Eleven

The third part of the summary of Stetzer and Putman’s Breaking the Missional Code deals with the question, "What does Jesus mean by ‘all nations’?"
The authors define this idea within a contemporary situation by looking at three divisions:

people groups
population segments
cultural environments

Stetzer and Puman maintain that churches must "contextualize the disciple-making process to each specific group." [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Ten

Continuing on with a summary of Stetzer and Putman’s Breaking the Missional Code:
Yesterday, we went through the first question that they pose in their chapter on spiritual formation. Today, we’ll take a cursory look at their second question, “What does it mean to ‘make disciples’?”
The authors see people as moving through various stages of development [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Eight

Stetzer and Putman, in Breaking the Missional Code, mention that interest in church planting in North America is increasing. Only two books were published on this subject between 1996 and 2002. Between 2002 and 2005, at least eight books were published, with more slated for publication in the near future. They point out that the [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Seven

Chapter 7 of Stetzer and Putman’s Breaking the Missional Code is about translating the gospel by using  communication methods that are understood by the people you are attempting to reach. It is also making sure that the ideas conveyed are moved from the head to the heart, from just knowledge to knowledge and action (or [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Five

Stetzer and Putman start chapter 5 of Breaking the Missional Code this way:
Change always happens, and most change is out of our control. What we can control is our response to a changing culture. The response by the missional congregation to change has prodcued emerging transitional patterns. As churches seek to break the code, they [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Four

Stetzer and Putman believe that the church growth movement, when it first began, was a good thing. Very little was written about the idea of “reaching” people before then. The church growth movement, however, became bogged down in “technique” (sometimes contradictory techniques) and pastors became frustrated.
Pastoral frustration led pastors away from books written by academicians [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Three

Do you and the people in your church set your minds and hearts on fulfilling the Great Commission?
If your answer is yes, then how much of the Great Commission do you try to fulfill? All of it? 25%? 50%? 75%?
Do you think these questions are a tad ridiculous? You might ask, “How can we know [...]

Missional Code Breaking: Two

Where culture is a strong influence on a person who first comes to know Christ, it is difficult for that person to become assimilated into a local church because there are times when that church’s culture is so foreign to what the new believer knows as normal. Sometimes cultural questions are simply matters of preference, [...]

Missional Code Breaking: One

Ed Stetzer and David Putman have written a fine book called Breaking The Missional Code. For the next however many weeks, I will be posting summaries and thoughts about the book’s main theme—that the culture has changed and churches will also need to change to maintain an effective ministry in their respective communities.
Stetzer and Putman [...]

The Larger Text

I know that Paul is not, at all, talking about the interpretation of texts in the third chapter of Philippians. He begins this section of his letter with a warning about putting faith in the flesh. He uses his past–a great and glorious past in the history of Judaism–as an example and states that it [...]

Protected: Postmodernism: Difference/Differance

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.

The Question Rant

The past couple of months, I've been making my way through a reading track devoted to a review of Postmodernism, especially philosophy. (No wonder I'm so depressed!) In the process of action and reaction, John (aka CP) has posted about the difference between philosophy and analysis. Vic has made comments that indicates he worries about [...]

Postmodernism: Thinking the Being

I wrote this post in draft form before my recent exchanges between Vic and CP.
This is a continuation of my posts about Carl Raschke's book The Next Reformation: Why Evangelicals Must Embrace Postmodernity.
Raschke says that the philosopher, Martin Heidegger, tried to overcome metaphysics through "thinking of the Being" while attemtping to avoid nihilism. Raschke summarizes [...]

Youthful audience finds new play is kids’ stuff - Yahoo! News

If philosophy goes too far one way (see my previous post), this story takes things in the opposite direction.
A play written for babies 6 to 12 months old?
It's no wonder guys like me find solace by watching sports.

The Smudged Line

The end of the week has exploded in busyness. I wrote the draft to my second post on postmodernism which I will keep in draft form, for now. I'll post this entry when (if) I have more time over the weekend.
Last night, at our Home Group meeting, we talked about the big line of legalism. [...]

The Flashing Red Line

Kevin Miller, editor at large at Leadership magazine, has posted an article about postmodernism.
I agree with much of what he says, especially this:
"I'm fully prepared to admit that when we boomers were young, we faddishly embraced church-growth ratios and sociological analysis; we praised these modern tools as the salvation of the church. So it's poetic [...]

Rampaging Through the Concourse

I am saddened to have to agree with the assessment that people are now accustomed to receiving their information in snippets from short form sources. This is the cruel truth. This attitude-although prevalent at every level of this so-called post-modern society-is something that will drive me to fashion a whip of cords and rampage through [...]