My only disappointment with this article, featuring some of the greats of the contemporary church (and no, I’m not talking Bill Hybels, Rick Warren, or Franklin Graham–not that there’s anything wrong with that), is that the word “discernment”, though talked about indirectly, was never used, unless I read too rapidly. Still, these guys are on track, though they differ some with each other:
The Most Crying Need of the American Church
This phrase comes from the 1978 "Jonestown massacre" in which most members of the Peoples Temple cult, blindly following their leader Jim Jones, committed suicide by drinking cyanide-laced Kool-Aid.
Radically Tolerant - of all people, irrespective of race, faith, circumstance. As a person, you will be treated with the respect and dignity you deserve as an individual created in the image of God.
Radically Intolerant - of slipshod reasoning, emotion without intellectual substance, bad ideas, lazy thinking, cowardly ad hominem attacks, the preposterous notion that 9/11 is some government conspiracy (proceed directly to the Loony Bin; do not pass "Go"; do not collect $200), the designated hitter, and the Dallas Cowboys.
Osborne: A Contrarian's Guide to Knowing God
Schlossberg: Idols For Destruction
Ogden: Unfinished Business
Marshall: Reclaiming God's Original Intent for the Church
Yancey: Rumors of Another World
Frazee: The Connecting Church
Pearcey: Total Truth
Postman: Amusing Ourselves to Death
Bork: Slouching Towards Gomorrah
2 Responses to “The Crying Need(s) of the American Evangelical Church”
Two words: Grow up.
Don ~ May 14, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Succinctly, if a tad cynically, stated.
Byron ~ May 15, 2008 at 1:28 am