Please don’t give up on the established church…

I am convinced now more than ever that…

1. Healthy churches multiply by planting new churches as a strategy for spreading the gospel of Christ around the world.

AND

2. Healthy churches must labor to strengthen established churches through cooperation as a strategy for spreading the gospel of Christ around the world.

I could not agree more with Thom Rainer’s plea “Please don’t give up on the established church” in his recent blog post “Crisis at County Seat First Church” (posted 6/15/2009).

Here are some excerpts:

I hear more and more pastors and seminary students say that they don’t want to go to a church like County Seat First Church [Rainer's way of referring to "established churches"]. They have heard about the difficulties others have experienced at these churches. They have heard the condescending comments like: “It is easier to birth a baby than to resurrect the dead.”

Of course, the comment refers to the preference of church planting over leading an established church. And thank God for church planters. …But I am not ready to give up on established churches.

…

If church leaders across America decide in large numbers to give up on established churches, we simply will not replace them fast enough with new churches. The most optimistic church planting projections fall well short of replacing more than one-half of the churches in America.

…

We need leaders who will have a long-term perspective, who realize that, while change may be slow, it is possible. We need leaders who will love the existing congregants and lead them at a pace that will not divide the church. We need leaders who will love and live among the church members. We need leaders who will live and love in the community.

…May God raise up a new generation of church planters and a generation of those who can love County Seat First Church.

Amen. He who has ears to hear, let him hear.

Thank you, Dr. Rainer.

Read the full article.

Thom Rainer is the president and CEO of LifeWay Christian Resources. Prior to LifeWay, he served as dean at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary (SBTS) for twelve years. While he was at SBTS, I had the privilege of taking his course “Building an Evangelistic Church” in my M.Div program.

Crisis at County Seat First Church

Freedom for Obedience #3

From chapter 1, Law and Grace in Ethics:

In contradistinction to both legalism and relativism, I propose an ethics of divine commandment in which the law and gospel are united in the voice of the living Christ, who speaks to us in the here and now, even as he has spoken in the past. The divine commandment cannot be reduced to rules or principles, for it signifies the act of God speaking and people hearing in the divine-human encounter.

– Donald G. Bloesch. Freedom for Obedience: Evangelical Ethics in Contemporary Times. p.7. (Harper & Row, 1987)

Freedom for Obedience #2

Another quote from the introduction:

“An ethics of the divine commandment, by uniting law and grace, the imperative and the indicative, shows how we can live the authentic Christian life in obedience to the highest, which is not a law but a person, not an ideal but the reality of the New Being, the power of crucified love, as we see in Jesus Christ.”

– Donald G. Bloesch. Freedom for Obedience: Evangelical Ethics in Contemporary Times. p.5. (Harper & Row, 1987)

Freedom for Obedience #1

One thing I enjoy about being out of seminary for summer break is the privilege of reading books of my own choosing. Tonight I started reading Freedom for Obedience by Donald Bloesch. Here’s a quote from the introduction.

“The divine commandment does not overthrow law but transforms it. In the divine commandment law and promise are united so that God’s word is seen as an empowering to obey and not simply a command to obey. It is a word of grace and hope that rids the law of its tedious aridity and fills it with promise. In this perspective the gospel opposes the misunderstood law, the law of works and condemnation, but it affirms and ratifies the law of the spirit and life, the law that is now in the service of the gospel.”

– Donald G. Bloesch. Freedom for Obedience: Evangelical Ethics in Contemporary Times. p.3. (Harper & Row, 1987)

On the Absence of Christ in Preaching

Charles McIlvaine describing the disappointment of those who hunger for Christ to be present in preaching and yet find Him absent:

“They that come to be elevated in their affections to things above, and to be fed with the bread of heaven, are sorely disappointed. They came to see Jesus. They have seen only that man in the pulpit and his empty abstractions. They asked bread, and he gave them a stone.”

– Charles P. McIlvaine. Preaching Christ: The Heart of Gospel Ministry. p.19. (Banner of Truth, 2003. First published 1863.)