The 2kers I know are not afraid of engaging the culture. We do so daily in the variety of callings God has granted. The fears that lurk around 2k are those of its critics who seem to be afraid that the kingdom will not come without the culture wars or the redemption of “all things.”... Continue Reading

People who disclose sin, especially when they probably would not be caught, are inspiring because the Spirit is obvious in them. They are motivated by the Lord more than the praise and opinions of people, and that is a sight to behold. But we have to do more than admire the work of Christ in them—they will need help.

“But with the third wave the error of infant baptism was exposed. Now the Particular Baptists, self-consciously as part of this progress, were pressing those Reformation principles more fully into further areas of faith and life. Not least the doctrine of the church, especially with regard to its very nature its role and purpose on earth”

There was not a single Baptist, northern or Southern. Certainly, no African American or Pentecostal picture and write-up could suggest to the scholar centuries from now that nationally the members in this last group were huge presences not unrepresented in greater New York but nowhere that week in the Times.

If we’re honest with ourselves, we really don’t want God’s grace. Maybe a more accurate way of putting it is that we don’t want to have to need it…In a sense, we buy into the lie that says we never needed God’s grace until we blew it! Kind of like my saying that until I got Vitiligo my skin was perfect. Like I never had a zit!

Religious ritual cannot take away sin. The Jewish people made a tragic mistake. They took the symbols of sacrifice and started to treat them like they were the real thing, like adherence to religious ritual could actually take away sin. People do that today when they think that certain religious rituals (like taking communion, regular church attendance, tithing, or saying a ‘Hail Mary’) can take away their sin

[W]e are not to try to guess the result of our behavior. We are supposed to do what God commands. We are not responsible for the results of what we do. We are responsible to obey whatsoever God commands. We are called not to success, but to obedience.

Notice that in the current debate about spiritual gifts many in the charismatic movement (but probably not most Pentecostals) agree that apostles - in the sense of those who are "first" among the gifts given to the Church, like the 12 and Paul - are not present in the Church today. In that respect, at least, whether or not they care to think of themselves as such, the large majority of today's charismatics are in fact "cessationists."

Ethnic specific churches historically have served as a place of cultural cultivation and identity affirmation. It is in the black church that I first learned God made me black on purpose and that I can be proud of how God made me. Who I am as a person was forged within the confines of an ethnic specific congregation

Chuck Colson often said that Christians cannot impose their views on anyone. Instead, we propose. That applies to human sexuality. Our job is to hold out to a hurting world a better way to live, a way that points to love and human flourishing, to human wholeness.