church

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Rocking the (Gender) Boat

Let Her LeadOne of the most controversial subjects in the church today is the role of women. Should they be senior pastors? Are they allowed to teach adult Sunday School? What about teaching boys? Are women only allowed to work in the kitchen, change diapers, and knit baby blankets? Was Paul a misogynist? What does the Bible really say?

I’ve avoided this issue until now, but not because I don’t have an opinion. I do. I have a very strong opinion! But being of a personality type that abhors conflict, I just didn’t want to open a can of worms, female or otherwise. I’ve felt a lot like Moses at the burning bush—sure, I’ll have an opinion about this topic, but please get someone else to do the writing!

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Five Lies

This may come as a shock to you, but did you know that Christians lie? Yup, we do. In fact, our pastor recently listed five lies we commonly tell, things we say in the church that really are downright falsehoods. While we all laughed as he expounded on each item, at the same time I bet a lot of people were convicted—I know I was! I thought our pastor’s insights were worth sharing, so here we go:

greeters

Five Christian Lies and Exaggerations, by Brady Boyd

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Volunteer!

I can cut up a melon in minutes, core and slice a pear like a pro, roll and wrap a burrito before you can say, “egg and cheese and potato.” I can even run the industrial dish washer! How did I get so skilled? I volunteered to work in our church’s café.

Yes, this is the same eatery I complained about in my blog, “Carb Café.” The menu still mostly includes foods I cannot eat on my low-carb, sugar-free diet. At least they offer salads, paninis, and fruit cups now. I’m proud to say, Pete and I cut up all the fruit, at least on the Sundays we work.

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Resurrection Sunday

Easter is my favorite day of the year—Resurrection Sunday, the reason for my faith in Jesus and my hope of heaven. While Christmas is buried under tons of tradition, Easter has escaped relatively unscathed. Perhaps that’s why I like it best.

Sure, Easter gets mingled with the renewal of springtime. When I was small, my secular parents observed this holiest of days with jelly beans and marshmallow peeps, a chocolate bunny and perhaps an Easter egg hunt. But there are still ways to focus on the significance of the resurrection. When I became a Christian at age 18, I started attending the sunrise service held on our college campus. I can still imagine every detail of the warm spring sunshine (it was California), green leaves, singing birds. We sat on the dew-covered grass and listened to a pastor from a local church praise God for the resurrection. And we sang:

Hear the bells ringing. They’re singing that you can be born again. Hear the bells ringing. They’re singing Christ is risen from the dead.

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Are We Losing the Youth?

The news is everywhere—young adults are leaving the church! Survey after survey is finding that only a small percentage of kids raised in a Christian home continue on with church attendance as they grow up. It doesn’t matter if they’re on their own, or still living with their parents. Christian leaders are doing some serious soul searching, beating their breasts over what went wrong.

  • The Barna Group has found that “nearly three out of every five young Christians (59%) disconnect either permanently or for an extended period of time from church life after age 15.”
  • A survey by LifeWay Research found that “seven in ten Protestants ages 18 to 30 who went to church regularly in high school quit attending by age 23. A third of those had not returned by age 30. That means about one-fourth of young Protestants have left the church.”

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Signed Up

Short-term missions. I’m for them. I’m against them. I’ve waffled back and forth for several years, seeing good points and bad points. You may have read my daughter’s post about her short-term experiences, or some of my own thoughts on the topic (see “World” listed in the Categories to the right) . We’ve supported friends and relatives going overseas, I’ve read numerous books and articles, and I’ve even accompanied Pete as he’s attended meetings and spoken at conferences on several continents. Sure, there’s always some role for me to play on those trips, some way I can be helpful, but I’ve always been there as Pete’s wife, not me.

Well, this year all that will change.

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Words and Works 2

This is Part 2 of my thoughts on science and Scripture (see Part 1).

Last time I mentioned that the Bible has been used to “prove” scientific “facts” that we now know to be false. For example, Psalm 104:5 states, “He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved.” Yet, of course we now know that the earth rotates on its axis, revolves around the sun, and the entire solar system revolves around the center of the galaxy which is itself hurtling through space.

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Keep On Growing

Last month, I whined about discussed the dearth of churches that disciple believers to maturity and then keep them well fed on spiritual meat.  It’s good to point out problems, but more helpful to put forward suggestions on how to fix those problems. So, what do we do when we’re hungry for more of God, and church is only offering Happy Meals?

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Happy All Saint’s Day

Ghosts are dangling from neighborhood porches. Scarecrows and pumpkins litter lawns, assorted witches fly their brooms into sturdy tree trunks, and costume stores have sprung up all over town. Love it or hate it, it’s almost Halloween.

When it comes to celebrating Halloween, Christians are incredibly polarized. Some (such as the Church of England) consider Halloween to be a “religious festival just like Christmas Eve.” Others condemn the holiday as pagan and satanic.

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Expecting More

Some friends of ours recently moved to northern Colorado and are in the process of looking for a church home. They want a church that focuses on God. That prays. That listens to His voice. That wants to go deep. They expect to serve. They expect to live out their faith in community. They expect miracles.

They want meat, and all they can find is milk.

Their disappointment makes me wonder: is the American church so focused on being seeker friendly that we ignore mature believers? And is that a problem? Should these seeker-friendly churches hang on to their members indefinitely? Or should they tell their members to move on to other, more “advanced” churches after a few years (as one church in South Korea does). Are there churches that offer spiritual meat?

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