There’s been a great deal of talk about schism in the United Methodist Church (#UMC) over the last couple of days. It hasn’t disturbed me in the way it has disturbed many of my friends, but it has made me ask this question: Why? No, not why might we have schism. Why don’t I care…
The Adventist review has a taste of Barry Black’s testimony, which makes excellent reading (HT: Dave Black Online). As an ex-Seventh-day Adventist I find his story very interesting. In his career, he was fighting not just racial but also religious discrimination. Some people thought he shouldn’t be in his positions because he was black. Others…
The fact is, we want to be bigger, and we really can’t be bothered with the health and well-being of other denominations — after all, their gain is our loss, right? He tells about how he got in trouble with his trustees … and fellow pastors. And I love it! Read the whole thing.
What should a church that grows out of the New Testament witness look like? Dave Black posted a list of items on his blog today, and I, with his blanket permission, extracted the list to the Jesus Paradigm web site. (The site supports Dave’s book The Jesus Paradigm, which I publish.) I hope you will…
I tried not to steal the headline from the article by Rev. Robert Rynders in UM-Insight, The Church Isn’t Dying, It’s Already Dead, but this post is largely to tell you to go read that post. After reading his article and thinking about the good things I’ve seen happening in some United Methodist churches —…
Or you might say, denominations (or even just “organizations”) and innovation. We don’t have to work within the system if we don’t want to. We can work without it. We can go outside of it. We can leave it if it continues to stifle us. I might have preferred “if God calls us to,” but…
Dave Black responded to my previous post on the United Methodist Church by referring to some thoughts he has had on his own denomination. I want to quote them here, since Dave’s blog doesn’t make linking to a particular entry possible. 7:55 AM Noted Methodist blogger Henry Neufeld ponders the question, How to cure the…
No, not that type of curing. Fixing it. Making it healthy and productive. Practically every day I find in my inbox, or on one of the various feeds I follow, an article on how to fix the dying United Methodist Church. While there are many disagreements on details, generally everyone agrees that the church is,…
A great quote: We Americans aren’t very good at absolute authority, but we presently have the opposite of it in the UMC – we have an episcopacy shackled to lead, but convenient to blame. It’s a great system to play armchair quarterback in, but it doesn’t make disciples. Go read the rest. It’s thought provoking.
United Methodist Insight led me to Jeremy Smith’s article, Defeating the Dark Side of Church Metrics. I recommend the second link because of comments. Since one commenter talks about people who oppose accountability but who receive their paycheck from the church, let me note that I am a United Methodist layman, and I do not…
