On the Emerging Church and Blogs

From the Worldwide Faith News archives . . .
Here’s some good reading on the emerging church its use of blogs via TSK and Christian Pundits:
The Emergent Church is defined by Yearbook Editor, the Rev. Dr.
Eileen W. Lindner, as a "conversation" (some would say movement)
birthed in 20th century Protestantism and "characterized by a robust,
energetic and growing [...]

Clashing of Cultures

I am currently listening to a book on tape called, Sea of Glory, that details the US exploration of the South Pacific and Antarctica from 1838-1842. While the story is full of human conflict, fear, and peril, I have also noticed the clash of European Enlightenment ideals  with native cultures on the islands.
The explorers [...]

Borders Reading List

As of my last visit to Borders I noticed that Eugene Peterson has released the latest in his series on spiritual theology, Eat This Book. It follows up on Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places and is an important exploration of how we read the Bible in a way that we can live it. I [...]

Popular Postmodernism

I will not hide from the fact that some people are very vocal about the passing of philosophical postmodernism, some advocate a post-postmodernism, and some think it has yet to completely manifest itself.  Yet, wherever you fall on this issue, if you even care, there is still plenty of room for consensus on the effects [...]

Cooper Opts in To Heretics Guide

Jordon has posted on Spencer Burke’s new book: A Heretic’s Guide to Eternity. It’s kind of funny to see Spencer writing books. He’s incredibly bright and innovative, always looking ahead to what God has in store for the future. It would seem that books are too constraining for him, not enabling him to play [...]

Recommended Reading

Steve McKoy has a list of recommended books from Tim Keller’s (Redeemer’s) church planting organization, The Movement: Global City Church Planting. 
McKoy has compiled the books into a list that is very useful:Winter 2006: Missional ChurchFall 2005: Urban AnthropologySummer 2005: Global CitiesDecember 2004: EvangelismOctober 2004: Spiritual Life of a Church PlanterAugust 2004: Urban TheologyJune 2004: [...]

Article by Alan Roxburgh

Emerging/Missional church leader Alan Roxburgh has published an article dealing with the movement of society and hence the church away from structure. (via) Here’s a little snippet:

"The shift over the last 20 years has been from structure to anti-structure.
Put it in different terms, there has been a rapidly growing conviction
that the individual does not [...]

Remembering Stan Grenz

I’m probably a few days off, but about a year ago from today, theologian Stan Grenz quietly passed away and joined his Lord. Grenz was very influential on many young theologians (and older ones too!) who were trying to make sense of theology in a postmodern context. He put into words what many of us [...]

The latest by NT Wright

NT Wright keeps pumping out books at an unprecedented rate. His latest work did not receive a very thorough review while I was at Borders, but the dust jacket compares it to Mere Christianity. Wright appears to be carving out his own "generous orthodoxy" for today’s church. As always, it will be fun to read [...]

New Books You Need

This past weekend I hit the Christianity section pretty hard at the Borders in Saratoga Springs, NY. It’s a really nice Borders with a great selection. My focus was on the spirituality section and the church/theology section. I hope to post on some new books that I checked out (yes, I had quite a pile [...]

NT Wright on Systematic Theology

Scott just posted on his problems at WTS relating to systematic theology the other day. So I think it’s fitting to read what NT Wright has to say about systematics.
Wright is apparently not too impressed. In The Last Word, he notes that many systematic theologies have little to do with scripture itself and do not [...]

Renewing the Center Quotes

While revisting some of my research the Beginning Conversations project, I thought that it would be worth posting some of my favorite quotes. I’ll continue to post excerpts from the current draft of the book and from my current reading. Here is one of my favorite sections of Stanley Grenz’s Renewing the Center. You’ll notice [...]

The Last Word: Scripture and Politics

This continues my selection of quotes from NT Wright’s, The Last Word. After addressing the interplay of scripture and culture, Wright moves on the relationship between scripture and politics. He comments:
"The older models for discovering who we all were and what we all ought to be doing  . . . have disappeared, leaving it painfully [...]

First Words From The Last Word

A new goal of mine is to read a greater volume of theology. I have been dabbling in the books listed on the sidebar of this blog, but have yet to make it all of the way through them. As a result of my new resolution, I think that it will be most [...]

Emerging Churches: House Churches Only Please

Andrew Rowell, a youth min. prof at my alma mater (TU), has posted a carefully thought out critique of Gibbs and Bolger’s Emerging Churches book. No one has yet leveled a critique of the book. Most everyone, such as myself, has merely drooled over it and sung it’s accolades. And for good reason. The Emerging [...]