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my del.icio.us 7


It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these. I really need to get back in the swing of these…

1. For some reason I resonate with the guilty pleasure of this too.

2. The blogosphere has been abuzz by the announcement that CCM will no longer be a print mag. I thought the best reaction to this came from David Sessions of PatrolMag.com, but Charlie Peacock raised him by talking about the future of CCM. Wowsers. Makes me want to go back and read At the Crossroads again.

3. Alan Hirsch prophetically speaks life into what has become a church program in malaise: small groups.

4. Plant churches or make disciples? Challenging thoughts from Bob Roberts. Check Aaron Snow’s challenge in the comments section. Deep stuff.

5. Keller once again – albeit inadvertently – covers the balanced, middle ground via Christianity Today’s Colin Hansen in regards to Dever’s recent talk at T4G in the challenge of making the gospel ‘public’ rather than staying focused on its core message. Hansen rightly highlights that protecting the gospel can turn into neglecting the implications of the gospel… as though calling certain things “implications” makes those things optional. [HT: Kevin Larson]

6. Great thoughts on incarnational church planting from Hugh Halter of Adullam, one of the authors of a new book I’m hoping to get in the mail this week, The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community.

7. Sobering posts from uber-missiologist, Ed Stetzer on moral protection. See here and here.


the third incarnation

sevens.jpgIt’s been a long time since I’ve done The 7. A long time…

The scope of The 7 has been to particularly highlight posts from the blogosphere for those who are ministering to the ‘younger evangelicals.’ The feature ultimately echoes the theme of this blog: the rules of postmodern engagement.

It is one of the more enjoyable posts I get to do but honestly, it takes a lot of time. So this is the third incarnation of The 7: the del.icio.us 7.

Most of you are aware of the cool web 2.0 application, the social bookmark manager, del.icio.us. On del.icio.us, you can store web pages/blog entries by ‘tagging.’ By downloading the del.icio.us freeware, it puts a little icon in your toolbar and with a click, your favorites are saved to your del.icio.us site.

So to keep The 7 a recurring feature here on relevintage, I am shifting to the aformentioned ‘the del.icio.us 7.’ I’ll ‘tag’ 7 entries each week and post them on this site. So here we go, round 1:



The 7 are seven blog entries that stood out from the past few weeks [usually it's just from the last week but I'm behind] in the blogosphere.

The scope of this feature is to highlight posts for those who are ministering to the ‘younger evangelicals.’ This ultimately echoes the theme of this blog: the rules of postmodern engagement. Enjoy…

1. Do you fear not having it together might lead people to jump ship to places [other churches] that do? The ultra-honest Bob Hyatt lets us into his pastoral soul and describes the all-too familiar pressure of feeling like the ‘experience’ has to be right.

2. It’s not easy being green. Bob at Puritan’s Sword suggest we resist reactionary hostility and see environmentalism as a moral issue, not a conservative vs. liberal issue. And Andy Crouch, editorial director of The Christian Vision Project reviews A Greener Faith: Religious Environmentalism and Our Planet’s Future by Doug Gottlieb, professor of philosophy at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He says that books like Gottlieb’s “are likely to be remembered as the salvos that awakened a sleepy and complacent American evangelicalism to its responsibility for God’s good earth.”

3. How do we resist the temptation to turn justice into a church program? David Fitch, once again, challenges the status quo and gets us to consider how not to do justice from a distance, but rather let it become a “virtue of a people that gather there…not something we do, but rather something we are” and a “face-to-face embodied presence of Christ that isn’t afraid to touch.”

4. Asbury’s Ben Witherington III continues his review of Rob Bell’s ministry in reviewing the Grand Rapids pastor’s new book, Sex.God. Provocatively titled, Witherington does an exhaustive analysis of Bell’s book and reveals why it is called what it is. In Witherington’s words, he believes Bell is trying to state that “…the oneness experienced in sex points beyond itself to the oneness that exists in God.”

5. What does “being saved” mean? David P. Gushee, Graves Professor of Moral Philosophy and Senior Fellow, Carl F.H. Henry Center for Christian Leadership at Union University, says we tend to confuse the beginning of the faith journey with its entirety. He goes on to say, “If Jesus is to be believed, inheriting eternal life involves a comprehensive divine assessment at every step along our journey, not just at its inception.”

6. At a recent Calvin Institute of Worship Symposium on Worship, Argentinean minister and composer, Pablo Sosa talked about why he thinks congregational singing is important. In his own words, “Songs put words in people’s mouths, knowledge in their bones, and conviction about whose voice counts. Songs shape how a community lives out its faith.” We should ask ourselves: can we even hear the congregation sing in our churches? Are the decibels of our worship overshadowing the importance of the congregants hearing themselves?

7. I couldn’t help but feel drawn to this entry. In a sense, it is what I have a special interest in as I look to future ministry. Eric Bryant, elder, speaker, and navigator at Mosaic in Los Angeles talks about an overlooked people group in ministry: the ‘Intuitives.‘ According to Bryant’s research, 75% of persons who have taken the Myers Briggs Temperament Indicator are ‘Sensing’. That’s potentially a large percentage of ‘Sensing’ pastors and congregants. As I look at evangelicalism, in my estimation, the 25% that’s left, is what is making up much of the emerging church scene…


The 7 are seven blog entries that stood out [imho] from the past week in the blogosphere.

The scope of this feature is to particularly highlight posts for those who are ministering to the ‘younger evangelicals.’ This ultimately echoes the theme of this blog: the rules of postmodern engagement. Enjoy…

The 7

1. Independent singer-songwriter and Caedmon Call’s band member, Andrew Osenga, explains why he struggles with the moniker “Christian music.” Pastors and worship leaders would do well to heed Andrew’s words as it relates to ministry to the ‘younger evangelicals.’ Read his two-part series here and here.

2. Are accountability groups lame? Covenant Seminary Prof Anthony Bradley thinks so. He says, “Men sharpening other men into the image of Jesus, who through blood, sweat, and tears, fought to make the world right again demands more than a weekly, quarterly, or annual confession booth, checklist, penance meeting.” I think he is right…

3. Asbury Prof Ben Witherington has been gently critiquing Rob Bell over the last couple of weeks. He comments on Rob’s Sex God book tour; his book, Velvet Elvis; and his Nooma video series here, here, and here. Make sure and read the comment sections. Ben graciously deals with others on his views on homosexuality and his belief about the true Jewish culture during Jesus’ ministry.

4. At the recent Passion ’07 student conference, John Piper introduced his talk by recounting a message he had heard in the 80′s by pastor George Verwer, founder of Operation Mobilization. blog.worship.com has tracked down a message given by Verwer in February ’07 @ Perimeter Church in Atlanta. Particularly, he talks about the “seven people lying at the side of the road” that need the attention of the contemporary church.

5. How well do we minister to those with disabilities? Brian Sims of Brentwood Baptist Church has created a church service exclusively designed for deaf people. It is called Brentwood Baptist Deaf Church. This sort of service is social justice at its finest! [HT: churchrelevance.com]

6. LifeWay Research conducted a survey among people age 18 to 34 discovered four major factors that are causing young adults to leave the church. [HT: catalystspace.com]

7. Are short-term missions becoming faddish? Seth Barnes, founder and Executive Director of Adventures in Missions, an organization that takes thousands of short-term missions trips each year, says yes. Seth points to seven standards of excellence to keep short-term missions from being done too casually and therefore, without any long-term impact.


the 7

The 7 are seven blog entries that stood out in my mind from the past week in the blogosphere.

As I mentioned last week, I’ve narrowed the scope of this feature to particularly highlight posts for those who are ministering to the ‘younger evangelicals.’ This ultimately echoes the theme of this blog: the rules of postmodern engagement. Enjoy…

The 7

1. What would it be like to become the person of God’s dreams? Brian Russell writes a beautiful essay on how mission is involved…

2. Making a sacred space sacred can be a challenge when the environment is wrought with sterility. Maybe there is a way to ‘humanize’ the space. Photographer/designer Matt Frise lists a few ways to address these obstacles to worship. [HT: Dan Wilt]

3. How many candles does an emerging worship service make? Well, if you listen to the contrarian theories on the emerging church on the web and off, you might think that is what it boils down to. A.O.G. Theological Seminary Professor and author of the new Leadership Network book, Off-Road Disciplines: Spiritual Disciplines of Missional Leaders, Earl Creps, has heard them all and my guesstimation is he isn’t convinced. Absolutely an ingenious post!

4. Speaking of the emerging church, Scot McKnight poses the question: is the ‘emergence’ just the 60′s all over again? The comments are intriguing…

5. Worship should propel us outside of the four walls of the church to share the justicethat has been shown to us to others. At this month’s National Pastors Convention, Mark Labberton, pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, California spoke on the intersection of worship and justice. Skye Jethani of Leadership Magazine’s online presence, Out of Ur, reflects on the response from attendees of Labberton’s message. She concludes, “Have we so fully bought into the notion that worship is primarily entertainment that when someone gives a biblical perspective we are surprised, rush to the bookstore, and get in line to discover more?” Check out the insightful entry here.

6. Lifechurch.tv’s Craig Groeschel pines on what is the definition of the real church. For Craig, ‘real church’ meant stopping instead of starting…

7. Your postmodern media moment: the Tall One puts the ‘dangerous words of Jesus’ to a Sigur Ros video. Innovation at its best…


the 7

I’ve decided to do yet another incarnation of the ‘best of the blogosphere’ series. I’m renaming the rearview mirror to: the 7.

The 7 will be seven blog entries that stood out in my mind from the past week in the blogosphere. I really believe in this feature for edification of those who are ministering to postmoderns.

It also has a slight spiritual flavor. Additionally, it will cut down my research time considerably. Enjoy…

The 7

1. Via the Bible Belt Blogger, 18-25 year olds are staying home on Sundays. It is a tragedy…

2. Alan Jacobs of Wheaton College writes a fascinating essay on Books & Culture’s blog on how a Christian should respond to secular mischaracterizations: infrequently and briefly. He states that sometimes we should be thankful for the short attention span of the American people.

3. Is mere Christianity a misnomer when you need to turn to your Christian heritage for answers? J. Todd Billings of Western Theological Seminary says doctrines that have been jettisoned because they can be divisive can leave a church scrambling for answers when that doctrine can ‘speak’ to a issue at hand.

4. Christianitytodaymovies.com’s Critics’ Choice Awards for the top 10 films of 2006 were released last week. It is so refreshing to see a Christian publication take art and spirituality so seriously. [Note: Three of these films in were technically 2005 films. But few people saw these films until early 2006]

5. Dan Wilt shares with us what emerging worship ideas should do…

6. iMonk reprints a list entitled, The Top Ten Signs You Are a Fundamental Christian, from atheist David Lynch. Mr. Spencer rightly suggests the list “is a window into some things we ought to look at occasionally. This is how we sound. This is the way we reason. We’ve got Christians running around making all kinds of outrageous claims- and most of the stuff we believe is pretty outrageous- and we condemn unbelievers for not swallowing it all like we do.”

7. At the recent 5th Annual Conference for Pastors and Laymen at Truett Theological Seminary, one of my favorite pastors/thinkers, futurist Leonard Sweet, says the old model of church is “killing the West.” Further, he said, “It’s all ‘come and see’ and not ‘go and be…” Ouch…


the rearview mirror iv

1. Alan Hirsch says it is futile trying to revitalize the church, or a denomination, without first changing the system. And that system should be organic…

2. The president of the university I graduated from-Missouri Baptist University-reflects on how the recent Missouri ice storm affected him and how cavalier the unaffected can be when the roles are reversed.

3. Say what? Jimmy Swaggart, yes that Jimmy Swaggart, says God won’t be displeased to see the Saints win the Super Bowl [via the Bible Belt Blogger]. Yesterday’s score: Chicago 39, New Orleans 19. Sorry Jimmy…

4. The Klouda debacle rages on the blogosphere here, here, here, here, and here.

5. Are we lying to God when our heart doesn’t line up with the lyrics we are singing? Bob Kauflin weighs in…

6. Was it just me or was this a weird post from Challies, our friend up north? I couldn’t figure out if he was just joking or sarcastically serious…

7. Underage drinking and communion. Sign of the times example #1.

8. If these walls could speak… Church advertising, literally. Sign of the times example #2.

9. Blinging Tim Hughes. Sign of the times example #3.

10. The new trend in the technological church…the internet church. Will it catch on?

11. At a comedy club near you, Jerry Seinfeld says: What’s up with real estate agents who won’t work on the Sabbath?

12. Ellen Laverty waxes philosophic on the ‘Midworst’ American Idol auditions and America’s addiction to schadenfreude. Great article!

13. When does conversation cease to become conversation? Thoughs from Dr. McKnight.

14. Dan Kimball takes us a deeper level and turns our thoughts on church models on its head when he looks at the Chinese Christian culture.

15. The laugh-out-loud video of the week: Conan’s iPhone commercial.


Here is this week’s edition of “The Rearview Mirror,” where we peruse the past week’s best of the best in the blogosphere. Enjoy!

1. Online video becomes a real business. What does this mean for the church?

2. Missional churches, Epiphany, and squatters.

3. The history of religion in 90 seconds. Intriguing…

4. UNC-Wilmington criminology professor, Mike Adams, gives one of his students a lesson in integrity.

5. The ESV blog helps us visualize one-year Bible reading plans. Who knew there were this many ways to read the Scriptures?

6. Pamela Durso, associate executive director of the Baptist History and Heritage Society, writes on what we can learn from the long history of Baptist worship wars.

7. The recent Knicks/Nuggets brawl at Madison Square Garden was no doubt a black eye for the NBA. But ESPN Page 2′s Jemele Hill says don’t blame “thugs.” Blame false bravado, machismo and stupidity.

8. Get Religion’s Terry Mattingly voices his thoughts on the little semi-story The Greenville (S.C.) News missed last week and if experience matters when it comes to writing for the religion beat of a major newspaper.

9. The German Opera’s controversial production of Mozart’s Idomeneo went on in Berlin last week without incident, although it was two months late and with more than 100 German cops on hand. Paul O’Donnell of Beliefnet.com’s Idol Chatter discusses that though there is a controversial scene that is a protest against “any form of organized religion or its founders,” opera and organized religion face many of the same challenges…

10. It’s hard to believe that Mary was just a teenager [anywhere from 12 to 17 on who you talk to] when Jesus was conceived by the Holy Spirit in her womb. Scot McKnight “pushes back” Marko on the adolescent implications that Mary might have faced [or not faced].

11. The untold story of Southern Baptist Clarence Jordan via iMonk and the Bible Belt Blogger.

12. London, the new Jerusalem via Jonny Baker.

13. Moby tries to tells us the real meaning of Christmas. Nice try Mr. Hall, but there’s more to the Story: redemption of sin.

14. Shaun Groves lets us in on what happens when CPAs and artists breed together…hilarious!


the rearview mirror i

Last Sunday, I started a feature called “The Week in Review,” where I highlighted my favorite blog entries of the week.

But here is the big question about the feature: Isn’t that title boring? I though so too. It’s like a bad, recurring article in a stodgy news journal. Stodgy I am not.

So I thought long and hard about a really smart, creative title and I came up with [drum roll please...] “The Rearview Mirror.” Okay, it’s nothing revolutionary, just an attempt to be a little more clever than the next guy.

With that aside, be sure to check in each Sunday as we peruse [IMHO] the past week’s best of the best in the blogosphere on the “The Rearview Mirror.” Here is this week’s edition:

1. So why did The Nativity Story fail at the box office? It didn’t follow the ‘Passion’ Playbook a.k.a. the 10+ commandments of the new Hollywood.

2. Maybe numbers in church aren’t bad after all. Fuller’s Ryan Bolger ruminates…

3. Refuting the myth of guilt only for particular sins.

4. Crunchy Con balks at a couple of things that have been on my mind lately: the pursuit for homogeneity in public schools and yes, Bratz.

5. Cage match: Wal-Mart vs. Kentucky Baptists.

6. The Bible Belt Blogger tells us how a TV evangelist sent him money.

7. Jesus Christ, Cover Star.

8. Is advocating gay rights replacing advocating abortion rights as the new standard by which Republicans are measured by? Terry Mattingly weighs in…

9. The solution to permanently solving the issue of substance in new worship songs: Evangelical Mad Libs.

10. What are your boundaries in movies and TV? Over 200 people voted on this issue over at philcooke.com. You may the results surprising…

11. DJ Chuang notes a new study from the Pew Internet & American Life Project that says blogging is gaining in its popularity, especially for those under 30. Blogging is a fad no more..

12. Are ‘seekers’ poor judges of their needs? Oldtruth.com quotes the late Ichabod Spencer…

13. The venerable Jeff Tweedy is not ready to take a break from the road. Via Pitchfork, Mr. T announces a solo tour…

14. Common grace in the form of the best music video of the year. Well said Steve!


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