Season's Greetings

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Sharing God's Love/Hate Relationship With People

jake magee

Christians harbor a fear of speaking about God's wrath towards sinful humanity. We shy away from the stark declarations of Scripture like Psalm 7:11-13,

"11 God is a righteous judge, And a God who has indignation every day. 12 If a man does not repent, He will sharpen His sword; He has bent His bow and made it ready. 13 He has also prepared for Himself deadly weapons; He makes His arrows fiery shafts. 14 Behold, he travails with wickedness"

The thought of God preparing weapons to afflict the impenitent is a bit unsettling to us, how much more the non-believer. Some fear that to thunder these kinds of verses will invariably eclipse the love of God and scare off our neighbors. God's wrath repels, God's love attracts.

Little do they know that God's love is amplified given God's righteous anger. Consider these words from Mark Dever:

"The Preacher who talks only of the love of God talk about it less and less with each sermon they preach, because there is less and less in their own mind that God loves us in spite of. There's less and less of a problem that has been dealt with; less and less weight that Christ has carrieed; less and less extent to which he has gone in his love for us."

Bad Day at Work

Chock Full Of Shopping Carts @ Yahoo! Video

"Let Him Alone"

"Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone" (Hosea 4:17)

Thomas Brooks draws out the horrible state of someone forsaken by God.

"Woe, Woe to that soul that God will not spend a rod upon. This is the saddest stroke of all, when God refuses to strike at all"

A Tribute to Billy Graham at 90.

by John Piper

HERE

What if Starbucks Marketed like the Church?

Corvettes, Geos, and Church Models

BY JAKE MAGEE

www.oasisnorthvalley.org
www.jakemagee.blogspot.com


There has been tension within evangelical ranks as to the model of church that is most faithful to Scripture: Attractional or Incarnational. A new breed of churchmen appear to have a fatal allergy to anything “attractional” or “corporate,” by which they mean most large gatherings on Sunday mornings that are somewhat programmed; gatherings which include skilled musicians leading people in singing, as well as a skilled man teaching people from the Bible. In other words, these churchmen have an allergy to what we have assumed to be church. This allergy is due in large part to a conviction that such a model has perpetuated passivity and spectatorship. This is either because the model is intrinsically flawed or unnecessary for capturing the New Testament church ethos.

I suspect that many of these churchmen are responding to an abuse of the “attractional” model. Certainly, many pastors have reduced “church” to the two hours on a Sunday morning. This is a shame. Whatever the rationale may be, I think it’s in unwarranted rejection. The solution of abandoning traditional church is an exaggerated prescription, like amputating your arms because of arthritis in your hands. Unknowingly, they’ve limited their missional velocity.

The mistake they’ve made is kind of like a person driving a Chevy Corvette taking mountain corners no faster than 30 mph, because every time he’s seen Chevy Geo Metros taking corners faster than 30 they flip and the driver dies. He concludes that all Chevy’s flip at 35mph and faster. He’s responded to the limitations of a bad Chevy (Geos) by concluding that all Chevys are bad (including Corvettes); he’s limited the potential of his good Chevy because of the limitations of a bad Chevy.

Like wise, many have responded to the limitations of bad corporate gatherings by concluding that all “corporate” gatherings are bad –thereby limiting the potential of good gatherings for their movement.

Great Resource for Apologetics

Check out Apologetics 315

Another Failed End-Times Prediction

"Members of the Lord Our Righteousness Church near Des Moines believed they would escape their earthly bondage and ascend to heaven Friday night. Their once-active Web site came down, and a church representative sent the Journal an e-mail saying he didn't anticipate having anymore contact with the media.

But as a small crowd of people and a TV news crew looked on from the gate to the wind-swept compound, midnight came. And then midnight went." MORE