Disqus - Latest Comments for prayeramedic

Re: Fight Cancer, Keep Pastors Alive

prayeramedic — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 22:22:56 -0000

Our former pastor passed away from colon cancer when he was only 30 years old. He only made it 8 months after his diagnosis. CRAZY! It really is a huge problem these days....

Re: jWinters.com

prayeramedic — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 09:55:52 -0000

Ha ha! Absolutely. I think of my area, where professionalism and big business in church is the norm. If you bring children to church, you turn them into "children's church" and they issue you a pager and put a bracelet on the kid matching the pager number. That way if something is wrong with the kid your pager vibrates during the service. They also typically have worship bands and professional sound equipment rivaling the local concert venues. The websites all podcast every sermon, or you can watch them via Flash video. Every church seems to have at least three pastors, usually about six - one to cover every area of congregational life. I can't say I've ever driven past the churches and seen an empty parking lot. Most of the members are wearing trendy new clothing, buying a cup of coffee in the church lobby's bookstore/coffee shop and maybe hanging out in the cafe before the service begins. Of course whenever the pastor mentions a good book in his sermon it will be available for sale at a special table set up in the lobby after the service, at a considerable discount since the church bought them in bulk. It's imperative to leave shortly after the service, since the North, West, South, and East parking lots need to be emptied to allow visitors for the other two services.

Apparently being part of the church today means attending Sunday worship, reading the Bible, becoming a member of the church, attending a Bible study, attending a small group, serving in a ministry, participating in events and programs that connect believers with others in a similar life stage. (i.e. men, women, married couples, moms, singles, college students, etc.), helping out with missions in some way, and inviting others to church.

Whatever happened to simply making disciples? How are you going to spend time reaching nonbelievers if 80% of your free time is spent at church, and the remaining 20% is when you need to take care of your own stuff (bills, cleaning the house, laundry, etc.)? Maybe we've got it all wrong. . . .

Re: jWinters.com

prayeramedic — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 17:00:36 -0000

Thanks for the link love!

Re: jWinters.com

prayeramedic — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 13:23:30 -0000

Good point Jay, interesting ad - for whiskey! Is there a link to subscribe to your comments? It's too tedious to try to remember everything I comment on and check each individual post again.

Re: Sexuality and the local church

prayeramedic — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:55:45 -0000

GREAT observation Jay. I've been trying to make sense of this after talking to a local ELCA pastor and reading Cyberbrethren's posts. I had considered the hermeneutical issue, but not the polity issue. That makes a lot of sense. It really is a cop-out from making a decision, a great postmodern political decision.

Re: Rawr....

prayeramedic — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 11:14:18 -0000

Yes, Jay - this is the attitude that makes me not want to be Lutheran. Lately I've even considered becoming Reformed, but I still have some issues with full-blown Calvinism. Tiffany and I are very frustrated, two years of marriage and still no church we are comfortable calling "home." We have found churches we like, but we could never invite friends to them. We have found churches we could invite friends to, but teach "fluff." Where's the happy medium? When half of your family is in and out of drug rehab, work as strippers, are practicing homosexuals, where can I find a church that teaches the Bible accurately, promotes infant baptism, and yet is still a comfortable enough atmosphere that a junkie would feel welcomed? The Lutheran churches are nowhere close to being that atmosphere in this area. . . . House church may be the way to go, that's how it worked for several hundred years and still works overseas.

Re: Which "us" are you talking about, demon?

prayeramedic — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 19:55:23 -0000

I haven't heard that before. Very interesting!

Re: Stay tuned: We're enhancing our mediocrity

prayeramedic — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 19:54:50 -0000

I saw it over at Cyberbrethren as well. I remember reading it thinking, "isn't this what the Church should have been doing all along?"

Re: What are we reading this year?

prayeramedic — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 13:22:55 -0000

I never did understand that. I should put together a cycle that covers all of the readings that aren't currently covered -- that way you get through the whole Bible ;)

Re: In the FED We Trust?

prayeramedic — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 00:21:55 -0000

Amen! http://tyrannywatch.com/200...

Re: Salvation and unity

prayeramedic — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 22:32:13 -0000

I expanded on these thoughts in a post entitled 'American Jesus: A Manifesto', which can be found at http://390days.com/2008/12/...

It's long, but I really explain the problem with American Decision Theology.

Re: Salvation and unity

prayeramedic — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 10:18:16 -0000

Great point here, Chris. Not to mention Ephesians 1:9-10, where God reveals the mystery of His will, which is to make "known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth." TO UNITE ALL THINGS IN HIM, THINGS IN HEAVEN AND THINGS ON EARTH. Amen.

You said,

"Why is this? It is because if I am in Christ I must have his Spirit in me. I cannot be in him unless he is also in me! This is salvation, to have his Spirit in me. . . . So the Kingdom of Heaven is not something to be attained, and it's not a place we will go when we die, the Kingdom is the place of unity with the Father, with the Son, with the Spirit, and with one another. The Kingdom of Heaven is here right now and it's attained solely by the will and purpose of the Father."

That is precisely correct. A proper understanding of the Kingdom is essential (but overlooked in today's churches). Jesus continually preached about the Kingdom, Matthew records multiple instances. Most of His parables were speaking about the Kingdom.

Great post! We cannot trade truth for false unity any longer, we must get back to the biblical understanding of unity, which only occurs in His Kingdom, and it is the mystery of His will.

Re: jWinters.com

prayeramedic — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 12:41:39 -0000

I wanted to leave a comment on this post after seeing it on your feed, but I decided to unsubscribe to the old feed and subscribe to this one. Unfortunately, there is no post at this location, just a title and no body. I also could not click the title from the main page, I had to click on the comments link on the bottom to get to it. I know glitches go, I've had several -- just wanted to make you aware of this one. . . .

Re: Clergy and laity

prayeramedic — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 18:48:51 -0000

Thanks for the reply. I really appreciate it! I'll be sure to add you to the blogroll over at prayeramedic.com. Possibly at 390days.com too, I've gotta read more first ;)