When the Edit Goes to Heart: A Review of Donald Miller's A Million Miles in a Thousand Years
Miller asks: why do we pursue material goods, or status, or whatever, and think that’s going to be any more compelling – or ultimately sustaining – than a bad movie about a guy longing for a Volvo?

Contemplations from a Confined Space: PART 1
Liminal space refers to times when we experience change and transition in our lives; where the old way of functioning seems to no longer “fit”, but we haven’t yet discovered or figured out the new way.

Exploring the Third Way: A Review of Jim Belcher's Deep Church
Deep Church seeks to offer clarity and perhaps even mend relationships between those aiming to break new ground, and those content with the status quo within the traditional versus emerging church debate.

David Bazan Find it Hard to Be... Or Not to Be
Bazan fingers inflexible biblical inerrancy as a prime cause of his disenchantment with the religion of his childhood, but Curse Your Branches reveals that there was so much more involved.

Strong Partnerships Can Spread Contagious Hope
Like good ballroom dancers, we need to begin to discipline ourselves to stop looking down at our own feet and start looking up and ahead to see where God is leading us together.

Assessing the Spiritual State of the World
I believe it is the Holy Spirit who is, slowly but surely, informing our collective and individual consciences so that fewer people (25% in 2008, as opposed to 40% in 1977) live in extreme poverty today.

The Wondrous Cross: Sorrow and Love Flow Mingled Down
It seems to me that as we seek a deeper understanding of the cross we have to acknowledge both sorrow and love are expressed simultaneously and merge together in a single act that defies our human understanding.

Vintage Green: Imagination and Stewardship
Despite an environmentally friendly marketing campaign, contemporary society has digressed in the conservation department. Our idea of going green has morphed into recyclables bins and paper plates on Sundays.

Justifying Our Justification Doctrine: A Review of N.T. Wright's Justification
When it comes to debating justification doctrine, unlike John Piper, N.T. Wright's process actually follows in the spirit of biblical inquiry that the original Protestants called for, that they revolted over.

Even the Grand Miracle Needed a Hand
When God wants to accomplish something in the world, he usually uses ordinary people like Mary and Joseph… and like you and me... our flaws and frailties not withstanding.

The Poetics of Leadership: Part 2
The NT narrative tells us that the most religious people of Jesus day did not recognize him when he appeared. We need to be humbled by this, and to let God be larger than our categories.

Can You Please Speak My Language?!
I fear that if we don’t continue to let our Christian language evolve so we can more effectively speak to the outside world, we run the risk of suffering the same fate as Latin and other dead languages of the past.

Phyllis Tickle's the Great Emergence: A Review by Darren King
Phyllis Tickle’s The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why is a book that introduces an idea that Tickle has been pushing for some time now; that Christianity is in the process of undergoing a major tectonic shift.

The Poetics of Leadership
This past year I have been reflecting on leadership as listening. Along the way I’ve been wondering, “what makes the difference?” Why are some more inclined to listen, and to what are they tuned? Why the difference?

Reverse Mentoring
Having spent years under the tutelage of dozens of young people, I believe that reverse mentoring may be one of the most important and under-used forms of learning available to leaders today.

The Work of the Cross: McLaren, McKnight, and the Emerging Vision
This really is not just about following the way of Jesus, but actually relying on the empowering of Jesus. And, let us be clear, here I speak of spiritually-regenerative empowering, not mere inspiration for Jesus-like actions.

Leaving the Church to Find the Church
"Hospitality is not part of the gospel - it IS the gospel." We're learning the deep truth of these words. Jesus invited us into His family. "Church" is something dynamic and mysterious that occurs within us and between us.

A Wright Understanding of the Bible
So what's the solution then? Onward with the endless deconstruction, or forward with the unwavering eye of assumptive faith? Well... neither. Which is to say... both/and. The truth is that there's value in blending the two.

Can Anything Good Come out of Law School: Part 2
The circumstance were explained to me in the hopes that, as an attorney, I might be able to broker, or force, a solution. Should we sue? Should we threaten a lawsuit? Who was responsible?

Autumnal Glory and Seasons of Being
While I am no longer subject to a timeline when learning has to begin in September, I still look at the the fall as a time to embark on new adventures of discovery. It is a cycle of renewal tied to the natural order.

Faith of Our Fathers... Teaching Still? Common Ground for the Common Good
In a sense, competing interpretations of Scripture have led to differing views of what the “message of Jesus” really is.  Dallas Willard has summarized two opposing views as the Gospel on the Right and the Left.

Can Anything Good Come Out of Law School?
When I am representing a client, I am not, at that same time, representing my Lord. No one can serve two masters. At the end of the day, my loyalties must run with my client, or else, by definition, I am not acting as an attorney.

A Challenge to Change: Embracing Shifting Cultural Dynamics
The problem is that somewhere along the way we took the Gospel and mixed it up with our nostalgia for the “good old days” of the brush arbor meetings, the fire and brimstone preachers, and the “come to church” mentality.

Missional, Emergent, Emerging: A Traveler's Guide
I distinguish the “missional” conversation from the emerging conversation. The emerging conversation, while incorporating some missional movement insights, is also built on perspectives rising from the new science.

Witness to Decline, Witness to Change: Postmodernism and Faith
Continuing our series on the Fall of the Evangelical Nation, I discuss the ways in which the two seemingly opposite choices of Christian fundamentalism and liberalism, are actually children born of the same mother.

The Faith of our Fathers... Teaching Still? Emerging Christianity and the Ancient Present
I think the exploits of the church fathers, pioneers of their own time, are worth learning about, because the world they lived in bears a remarkable similarity to the post-Christian world we live in today.

 

Witness to Decline: A Series Interacting with Christine Wicker's the Fall of the Evangelical Nation
Christine Wicker tells the true (and perhaps surprising) story of the American Evangelical movement. Not only are existing numbers greatly inflated, but growth rates suggest the movement is actually shriking fast.

 

An Interview with Andrew Perriman: On New Testament Eschatology and the Emerging Church
Andrew Perriman's book the Coming of the Son of Man: New Testament Eschatology for the Emerging Church offers penetrating insight into the apocalyptic tradition and the implications for the 21st century Church.

 

Diving Deep into Mystery: Examining the Stages of Faith
People in the final stage feel they have learned a deeper appreciation for the “otherness” of God. It’s easy to see how people in this particular place can be so much more open to the insights of postmodernity.

Of Falling Stars and Multi-Headed Monsters: Understanding the Apocalyptic Tradition
If we are to take the notion of "being biblical" seriously, we must begin with an understanding of genre. And perhaps no tradition is more essential in this endeavor than that of Jewish Apocalyptic.

An Interview with Brian McLaren: On Pain, Gain, and the Human Response to Crisis
In this interview, Brian McLaren discusses some of the ideas expressed in his book Everything Must Change, as well as some of the helpful and hopeful conversations that have arisen since then in the follow-up tour.

A Wall Between Envrionment and State
Your worldview answers four questions, the last of which is, "Why?" Your understanding of humanity -- and therefore of politics, religion, and science -- is shaped by where you locate the source of value.

Preparing for Mission: Addressing Spiritual Authority
Abbots and spiritual directors are nothing new, just something old that we misplaced. During the industrial age this role was increasingly awarded to competent managers, as churches were increasingly run as corporations.

In Conversation with Brian McLaren: Finding Our Way Again via the Ancient Practices
In part 1 of my interview with Brian, we discuss the role that the spiritual disciplines have played in his life, and why many 21st century Christians - as well as many other spiritual seekers - are opting for this ancient-future dimension of faith.

Jesus Isn't Crazy: How to Bless Those Who Curse
In his Summa Theologiae (I-II.51.3), Thomas Aquinas says some habits involve seeing truth, and can be acquired instantaneously. In other words, you see some truths all at once and are convinced forever.

"A" Response to "An" Evangelical Manifesto
Before I opened up this manifesto, I took some time to take note of my mental and emotional state. I asked myself what my expectations were. Was I hopeful? Or was I cynical? And how would this change the experience?

Islands, Not Worlds: A Call for Contextual Honesty and Hermeneutical Humility
The main point is to not to compare and contrast "Grace" versus "Law", but to demonstrate that how one even perceives these two concepts is completely determined by a whole set of preconceived notions.

An Interview with Tony Jones, Author of the New Christians [Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3 ]
Recently I spoke with Tony Jones about his book, the future of Emergent, and the mean-spirited criticism and misinfomation that tends to pervade the medium through which Emergent was born: the Internet.

The Trouble with Normal: Deconstructing Certitude
Ultimately, the Lord is unlikely to ask, “Were you right?’, but rather, “Were you faithful to the truth you knew?” This latter question has to do with faithful following, the life of a disciple.

Abandoning a Graven Mirage: Letting Lose Sacred Symbols
Not only do we homo sapiens hold closely to our treasured symbols, but sometimes, we hold these sacred symbols even more dearly than we do the very invisible realities they supposedly point us towards.

Hope, Memory and Waiting in a Place of Exile
If I had something to speak into the emerging and missional conversation, it might be this wisdom of St. Francis of Assisi: Let us begin again, for as yet we have done nothing.

Postcards from the Edge: A Review of Tony Jones' the New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier
Tony Jones, national coordinator for Emergent Village, offers an insider's perspective on a theo-cultural phenomenon with his book, the New Christians: Dispatches from the Emergent Frontier.

If Not Seeker-Sensitive, What Then?
I think we don't trust in the transformative power of Love. So we try to construct good arguments, design cool worship experiences, put on spectacular and aesthetically sensitive productions. Because we fundamentally believe that Love just isn't enough.

Hope that Doesn't Disappoint: A Review of N.T. Wright's Surprised by Hope
In Surprised by Hope, N.T. Wright offers a refreshing, yet ancient understanding of ultimate Christian hope as depicted in the New Testament. And in so doing, Wright helps to retool our vision and mission as followers of Jesus.

Toward A Missional Spirituality
When the Gospel first went from Jerusalem to Antioch, the Temple began to lose place as the center of Messianic faith. The diaspora we are seeing in our own day, with increasing numbers of believers not claiming any traditional church institution as their home, is divinely orchestrated by God to move us from a Temple religion toward incarnational and missional communities.

Resurrecting the Garden of Eden
Many people throughout history have all tried to figure out where we go from here. How do we regain that intimacy with God like they had in the Garden? Is it something that we can do ourselves or does it have to be a miraculous event initiated by God?  When will this happen? Now? Sometime in the future? After we die? The questions go on forever as does our effort to avoid death.

Are You Analyzing Me? Being Ogled by Science
To think about humans, you have to be able to think about the parts of a whole without reducing the whole to the parts. It’s kind of fun once you get used to it. Like Sudoku. A little mental challenge can be invigorating.

Following the Root, Wherever It May Lead: A Review of Viola and Barna's Pagan Christianity
In Pagan Christianity, Frank Viola and George Barna make a compelling (and for many, startling) case for questioning the roots of our contemporary church practices. But do they go far enough?

Formatio Future: Learning, Collaborating, Mentoring in Web 2.0
Any instructor not learning to exegete the culture is already time-expired. Any instructor who doesn't surf the web, has never visited WIKIPEDIA, and has never used a social networking tool is on the verge of obsolescence.

Worship in the Whisper
I remembered when God told Elijah He was going to appear to him. There was a windstorm, an earthquake, and a fire- but no God.  And then finally, God appears. In a gentle whisper.


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