Disqus - Latest Comments for Danny

Re: The dangers of the prosperity gospel

Danny — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 11:51:17 -0000

People always use the term "prosperity" gospel, and I am not sure what they mean. It has meant different things when used by different pastors throughout the ages. We need to be specific when we are criticizing something, and I think Piper is overall just too angry for my liking. I with he would explain rather than polemicize.

Re: A Pictoral Admonishment

Danny — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 15:25:56 -0000

I really like it, although it is a bit extreme.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 17:24:52 -0000

I searched for "kingdom of God" on google blogs and your site was the first one on the list. I was drawn to your site because of your name. Forgive me if you have covered some of my questions in your other posts (this is the only one I have read).

You suggested that one principle we should live by is "turning from the law" and be guided by Jesus, but didn't Jesus say he came to fulfill the law?

I am interested to hear your thoughts on hell. Is there another post where you deal with hell more fully? You can drop me a line on my e-mail if you want to discuss this more fully.

Mostly, I just wanted to say thanks for your thoughts. I really appreciated them. What do you do outside the blog world (i.e. your job, family, etc.)?

Re: Scripture, the Kingdom and the Historical “Church”

Danny — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 18:24:52 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 18:24:52 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 20:50:15 -0000

This is a great article!

Re: Apostle Paul Sues Publishers for Copyright Infringement

Danny — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 21:50:15 -0000

This is a great article!

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 18 Dec 2007 21:50:15 -0000

This is a great article!

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 21:09:07 -0000

Hi Mark,
I am starting a series on Jesus Manifesto on my blog, and I was wondering if you could check it out to make sure I am being fair and representing your views correctly. Thanks so much.

www.coldfire.wordpress.com

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 21:10:00 -0000

Whoa! How did your site know I was writing about you?

Re: Embracing the Gospel

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 22:09:07 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 22:09:07 -0000

Re: Embracing the Gospel

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 22:10:00 -0000

Whoa! How did your site know I was writing about you?

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 22 Dec 2007 22:10:00 -0000

Whoa! How did your site know I was writing about you?

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 19:46:40 -0000

I agree, but I think the problem is that people see the word "monastic" and instantly are taken back to the middle ages. If they don't take the time to understand you by asking serious questions, I don't think they will ever be convinced. Of all the people I've talked to online and in person, most of these people either don't care or just want us to be exactly like they are. But that is just my opinion.

Re: The Case for Communal Living

Danny — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:46:40 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:46:40 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 01:56:50 -0000

Thanks so much for writing this.

It is very inspiring.

Re: Eschaton

Danny — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 02:56:50 -0000

Thanks so much for writing this.

It is very inspiring.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 29 Dec 2007 02:56:50 -0000

Thanks so much for writing this.

It is very inspiring.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 13:48:23 -0000

Thanks for this post. I really enjoyed it. I think that this bias is very nuanced, and most people would not come out and say it, but it affects our lives everyday as Christians.

Re: Our Heavenly Mother

Danny — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 14:48:23 -0000

Thanks for this post. I really enjoyed it. I think that this bias is very nuanced, and most people would not come out and say it, but it affects our lives everyday as Christians.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 14:48:23 -0000

Thanks for this post. I really enjoyed it. I think that this bias is very nuanced, and most people would not come out and say it, but it affects our lives everyday as Christians.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 10:41:03 -0000

I think we all already know this, but the emergent church is not really a unified movement. I would argue that the main thing (perhaps the only thing?) almost all emergents share is their distaste for the evangelical right who care more about abortion than they do about Jesus. If emergence is an anger towards the way that most evangelical churches do ministry, then I think we do have a movement going on. I do not, however, think the emergent church should be breaking off from the protestant church. You can see more thoughts on this on my blog. I have been dealing with the ideas being thrown around at Scot McKnight's blog (www.jesuscreed.org) on how to explain emergents to those outside of the emergent movement. Basically, I really believe that those inside the emergent movement really need to try and seek change from within the church that is already established in cities and neighborhoods. I understand this is hard, but I think it is the way we need to do it. We need to be the change in the church that brings the church into a new era. We do not need another reformation that separates us even further from the Catholic Church.

Re: My Emerging Father-in-law

Danny — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 11:41:03 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 11:41:03 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 10:53:23 -0000

When I first saw this on my google reader I thought it was serious.

But then I laughed a lot!

Re: Tony Jones to Leave Emergent Village

Danny — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 11:53:23 -0000

When I first saw this on my google reader I thought it was serious.

But then I laughed a lot!

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 11:53:23 -0000

When I first saw this on my google reader I thought it was serious.

But then I laughed a lot!

Re: Younger Evangelicals Drug of Choice

Danny — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:57:49 -0000

Thanks for this. One problem that I have in the youth group I work is the kids really are aware of all the problems of the world. Many of them want to move to Africa when they are older, practice social justice, and many other things. But they are also the least likely to do anything about it. With all the awareness in the world, very few of them could think of tangible ways to implement their ideas in the world. Sometimes we are bombarded with issues that we don't take the time to think about any of them.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:57:49 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 21:57:49 -0000

Re: As November approaches…

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:32:25 -0000

I mean to put this link in with the Burmese immigrants. It is a really sad story.

http://weblog.xanga.com/papua2001mk/646912398/d...

Mark, if you could link that to number 6 in my list so people can read the story. Thanks.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:32:25 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:32:25 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:32:25 -0000

Re: Morning Missive: MARK VAN STEENWYK – HYPOCRITE

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:53:58 -0000

hahaha.
Great article.

Especially the Jesus action figures.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:53:58 -0000

hahaha.
Great article.

Especially the Jesus action figures.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:53:58 -0000

hahaha.
Great article.

Especially the Jesus action figures.

Re: As November approaches…

Danny — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:54:29 -0000

That is a great idea Joe.

Thanks for sharing the idea.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:54:29 -0000

That is a great idea Joe.

Thanks for sharing the idea.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:54:29 -0000

That is a great idea Joe.

Thanks for sharing the idea.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 16:54:29 -0000

That is a great idea Joe.

Thanks for sharing the idea.

Re: Another Song About Me?

Danny — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:00:22 -0000

Thanks for the wonderful article. I have a feeling that the rootedness of there being more than just a "personal relationship" between God and us is happening primarily at the academic level. It is being taught by frustrated professors who want their students to understand what the bible actually says. In the American church, where average men and woman gather everyday, most do not have the exegetical tools available to them to understand scripture in the deep way that you have described above. They do have exegetical lenses, they are simply different than the ones that we "learned" students have because we have had the privilege of years and years of theological training in our fields. I have this feeling that there are enough people writing about change (myself included), but the average man or woman who goes to these churches is not surfing the net for good blogs on the subject of reading Jesus Manifesto.

The average man or woman is working, taking care of a family, attempting to do their best to keep a hold on their own spirituality (much less the spirituality of others). When they come together for these "small groups" the Bible study that happens is within their context. They don't have language to describe the word in the beauty and depth that Jason has described above, so what are we supposed to do? If we tried to take these messages into the church, they would probably be shot down by a skeptical elder board or pastor who doesn't want to change from the way things have always been. If we try and introduce all of these new terms that we have learned at seminary or Christian college, we will be accused of invading the sacred world of the church will too much secularized university non-sense that makes the Bible too "heady."

What can we do, then, practically to change the life-blood of the church. Do we change it from the inside? If we cannot change it from the inside, do we leave the established church? If we leave the established church, are we given up on all those people (most over 30) who simply have a different mindset about the bible? Is their mindset wrong? These are all questions that I have no answers to, but I want to start a meaningful dialogue about them.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:00:22 -0000

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 16:00:22 -0000

Re: Choosing Barabbas

Danny — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 13:44:35 -0000

great post. This is really good political commentary at a good time for us to hear it.

Re: Revolution is in the Details

Danny — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 16:09:44 -0000

I would agree wholeheartedly with your post, Michael. Having done two years of choral music at the high school level, I remember how nit-picky my teacher would before choir festivals. Any group can sing through a song using the right notes. It takes a director to form it, mold it, and bring it to beauty. It reminds of Balthasar and his thoughts on biblical exegesis. He argued, unlike many modern biblical critics, that unity of the scripture was found in treating it like a score---with different parts having different functions to bring beauty to the whole piece. Thanks for your great thoughts.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 13:48:07 -0000

Great post, Mark. While many do argue that socioeconomic rifts based on class/race are not their fault, if we take on a Biblical worldview, we will note that when Jews celebrate the passover meals they imagined themselves actually back in Egypt---remembering oppression. I think your remembrance here is a stark prophetic reminder to many huge churches that pride comes before the fall.

Re: Welcome to the Church of Consumer Jesus

Danny — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 13:49:14 -0000

Excellent poem. I especially like the ending.

Re: Deal or no Deal?

Danny — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 21:54:13 -0000

Thanks Bill.
I stand corrected.

See what I mean about the education thing?

It really would help us if I even knew what language they spoke in Pakistan.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 18:18:59 -0000

Thanks so much for this post, having worked in the inner-cities I resonate very strongly with this story. About five or six years ago I would have been defensive about this story, but I think that this is sooooo important. Thank you.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 12:50:23 -0000

Yes, but we still know who are the Nestorians ARE and we know about Matteo Ricci, and we know their legacies. All of these groups are important to Christianity, and much of the time, when Christianity is supported by empire, Christianity becomes stagnant (as it did in SOME places during SOME periods of the Middle Ages, I'm a historian, so I don't like to make generalizations about history). The facts also from Acts and other places that Christianity grows expotentially when it is in opposition to empire, as it was for the first three centuries to Nicea and Constantine.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 21:40:48 -0000

Yes. Christianity grew under the Roman Empire, but it often grew apart from political power.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 21:42:28 -0000

Are you condoning such uses of force (what specifically are you referring to within history)?

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 11:24:31 -0000

If I could tack on the end of Dan's comments, I would suggest reading "Christians as the Romans Saw them." The book talks about how Rome's view of Christianity actually helped shape Christianity. It was in these responses to Roman criticism that Christianity found its wings. It was in opposition to the Roman way of thinking that Christianity emerged.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 23:39:38 -0000

Good question. I don't know if this directly Augustinian (someone told me it was, but i have never checked 'the sources' out in the primary sense), but evil is the absence is good. Thus, scarcity, in my mind, is only evil because no good is done to correct it. There are children starving in Africa, and as Jordon Cooper says, no one really cares "that much." (http://www.jordoncooper.com/2008/10/21/no-one-r...). The goodness of heaven comes when we do (the famous phrase of Bonhoeffer) "Life Together." The worldly way of thinking is like isolated.

I don't think of evil as an entity in and of itself.

The idea of knowing good by evil is more an eastern idea of the ying and the yang (although, if i understand it correctly, this is more about a balance than about an epistemological knowing of good and evil). This is somewhat scattered, but it is the first thing that came to my head.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 00:21:07 -0000

Thanks Nathanael. You might have just said this better than I ever could.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 10:35:35 -0000

I agree about the "broken record," but that often happens at any place where there is a central theme around which the users center. I hope also to see more diverse articles in the future, but I also like what I am already reading. It provides an alternative to nicely offset the rest of what I read in Christian literature. We just have to remember not to be "radical for radicals sake" (like Maria said recently).

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 00:29:25 -0000

I think this is what Sarah might be talking about in the article. You used the word "naturally" in reference to the way you speak. A stronger truth might be that sociologically, religiously, and culturally you have been taught to talk a lot. This is not just your maleness, but your family values and cultural values all playing into it. This is also why I think many teachers think that African-American students "act out" more than white kids in high school. They might say something like "African-Americans just naturally talk more," but it is a sociological and cuttural value system rooted in the fact that black students often see schools as the enforcer of racism and segregation (it is more complicated than this...but it is just an example).

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 00:35:28 -0000

The sexual view is dangerous because our reproductive organs were used by Aristotle to "prove" scientifically that men were superior to women and was used in the ancient near east to "prove" that women were to be submissive in a relationship (because their vagina goes inward, which Aristotle interpreted to be a deformed penis...you can't make this stuff up if you wanted to. haha). I just get nervous anytime someone tries to use sex to show something about gender roles. Your metaphor also might be subverted to say, "While the penis is giving the vagina, the vagina envelopes the penis."

----someone with authority can delete this if it is too explicit----------

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 12:33:48 -0000

thanks for sharing the poem Jason.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 22:41:22 -0000

thanks for this timely post.

It is true that we have to work for change, and prayer really does help. It is not as easy as throwing money at a situation or wishing it all away. We have to be in this for the long haul.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 23:32:13 -0000

great poem! Thanks for sharing it.

I especially liked that you are "unreasonably" in love with sinners.

Too often the church tries to be reasonable.

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 13:52:48 -0000

I had a little smile too when I first saw the story as if I thought, "Well, you got what's coming to you."

But as I watch Bush in outgoing interviews, I do feel great pain for him. He knows how unpopular he is, he knows that he made major mistakes, and I can guarantee (almost 100%) that we will hear about all of those mistakes in forthcoming memoirs after he comes out of office. He is not a perfect man, and he made a number of mistakes because he surrounded himself with people who made the situation seem a way that it actually might not have been. This is what happens when you surround yourself with a unilateral voice that casts out of the diversity (like when they casted out Powell).

Re: the Jesus Manifesto » Maintenance Mode

Danny — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 23:58:37 -0000

I have never considered an interpretation like this before. Thanks for sharing it. I think that some conservative people would still consider it "liberal" though because it seems to make room for saving 'pagans' outside of the redemptive power of Christ (i.e. that pagans can be saved through works).

Re: Autumn is here to stay, I say

Danny — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 02:35:57 -0000

hahahaha.
That comic made me laugh out loud.

Re: Billy Graham and Rob Bell

Danny — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 00:43:50 -0000

Yes I agree with everyone's sentiments here.

Bell and Graham have very different styles, and Bell is reaching a different audience. I still think that conservatives are wary of Bell because his message is not the "orthodox" message of the last 50 years.

Re: Some of the hardest people to witness to… are Christians.

Danny — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 00:26:58 -0000

This is a very good question! Do you know the main problem with Christians? They think they already understand Jesus, they have one model for how to share him, they have one model for doing church, and it often feels like they say the same thing over and over again. I have found Christians much harder to talk to sometimes about spiritual things than people who just want to talk. It always appears that Christians want to be right. This bothers me a lot.

Re: TNC - Chapter 3

Danny — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 14:52:18 -0000

This is an interesting debate. I have discussed the introduction of Tony Jones' book on my blog in my series on emergent. As I read this, I have many of the same reservations as Don. How are we supposed to come together to a table of brotherhood when we don't believe the same things? The emergents are saying that we should do things like come together, but their rhetoric has been divisive towards the fundamentalist movement. It is the classic move that, because they are fundamentalist and because fundamentalists are unwavering, they cannot be part of the debate. Thus, because of Jones' rhetoric, the fundamentalists are put outside the circle because they are not willing to compromise what they believe their interpretation of scripture.

I am not a fundamentalist, but I cannot see how we could ever get them to the table. If we cannot get them to a table to discuss, what are we going to do except create two churches? This seems to be the road that emergents are going: old vs. new church. Those in the past are going to be left behind, and there will be a whiplash of literature (MacArthur's "Truth War" is only the beginning) that will divide these two groups for years to come.

So I think it is time to decide whether emergents will either stay with the church as they see it or if they are just going to break off and start something new.

Re: Chapter 3(b)

Danny — Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:36:15 -0000

I have been dealing with these problems of individualism for a long time now as well on my blog and in my own life. I sold my iPod because I thought it was too consumeristic and my TV (I would have sold the other TV that I have as well if my roommates wouldn't kill me). I have found it more helpful to read the news than watch in on Television, and it has given more time to read blogs and interact with others.

I want to see a church that is based in community not in part, but in whole. I am not really an emergent, but I have emergent tendecies, and I think that Jones has hit it right on the money. As Christians, we really don't have any rights. If someone wants something we are supposed to give it away. If our brothers are suffering, we are required (not really required, because Christians believe it is a privilege) to suffer with them.

Good thoughts.

I look forward to future reviews of the book as I am too poor to buy it myself.

Re: vote!

Danny — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 13:12:35 -0000

That picture reminds me of how big a deal this election is to some people. I wonder if we will actually see more people than usual turn out for this election.

Re: free starbucks coffee if you vote!

Danny — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 12:31:11 -0000

I voted, but it wasn't for Obama or McCain