Blog - Page 156 of 318 - John H Armstrong

Global Mission Must Become Mutual Mission

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:01-05:00April 27th, 2010|Categories: Missional Church, Missional-Ecumenism, The Church|

My own denomination, the Reformed Church in America, produces a monthly piece on mission for member churches to use in their Sunday bulletins. The March issue of Mission Today: Reformed Church in America Global Mission, had a particularly helpful look at what drives our shared global mission as a historic American denomination.

In a world that is clearly multicultural, where we now experience unprecedented advance in communications and tremendous economic and political upheaval, all Christians and Christian institutions need to recognize the importance of both giving and receiving, of teaching and learning, of sharing and listening. Simply put, we need to be careful about being intentionally mutual in mission. Mission Today says it well: “The RCA believes in mutuality—that any relationship, if it is healthy, must benefit both parties. Each must give and each should receive.”

When a particular church focuses only on giving then it will tend towards paternalism and chauvinism. When […]

The Relational Unity of John 17:20-23

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:01-05:00April 26th, 2010|Categories: ACT 3, Missional-Ecumenism, Unity of the Church|

Biblical students and scholars have often interpreted John 17 in ways that deny the obvious meaning of Jesus’ prayer for our unity and oneness. Did Jesus intend for us to share in the eternal unity of the Father and Son, or what we call the ontological unity of the Godhead? Yes, in a sense, but primarily the answer is no. We do share in the life of God and we have taken on the divine nature in the sense that 2 Peter 1:3-4 teaches. The ancient church called this process deification. By this the church fathers did not mean that we become God (ontologically) but rather than we become fully human as those made in the Triune image of the relational God. We become more and more like God by the Spirit’s transforming power making us more and more like Jesus.

This is the very key to John 17. Jesus is not praying that we will all join one church or that we will all agree on every point of doctrine. (There is a pattern of true faith that […]

Could the Church Be Missing Its Spiritual Blindside?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:02-05:00April 25th, 2010|Categories: American Evangelicalism, The Church|

I have quoted New York Times columnist David Brooks more than a few times on this blog site. I find Brooks to be one of the most insightful and helpful syndicated writers today. On March 29 he wrote a column titled: “The Sandra Bullock Trade.” He wrote that in the month of March two things happened to Sandra. First, she won an Academy Award for best actress in 2009 for her role in The Blind Side. Shortly after winning her award she learned that her husband was “an adulterous jerk.” Brooks asks: “Would you exchange a tremendous professional triumph for a severe personal blow?”

On the side of the Academy Award triumph Brooks notes that major research shows that those who win the award live four years longer than those who are nominated and never win. But, as Brooks notes, marital happiness is far more valuable than any recognitions or awards. You don’t even need to think about this for three seconds.

[…]

The Boys of Summer Are Back

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:02-05:00April 24th, 2010|Categories: Baseball|

Spring is finally here and baseball is back. For me the two have been synonymous for as long as I can remember. Spring begins with "Play Ball" and winter begins when the World Series is over. I know many of you think that is crazy but it is me and I love this time of the year. For almost every fan "hope springs eternal" in April. Your team is still in it and no one is buried in the pennant race yet. In fact, many teams are surprisingly good right now and some that seem to be bad this early will turn it around in the next few months.

You may wonder what makes baseball so different since you see it as a dull and slow game. I answer, "It is a thinking person's game. It is paced just right for conversation and thought. It is slow enough to allow for breaks and pauses yet each pitch has a different purpose and result." If […]

What Great Work Does God Require of Us?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:02-05:00April 23rd, 2010|Categories: Spirituality|

The way of Christ is a truly radical way of living. Our lives are to rest on two virtues: humility and faith. “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus lived his life, in the moment of each single day, in a radical (radix: meaning at the root) poverty of spirit. He had no agenda except to do the will of his Father. “I do nothing apart from the Father.” “My words are not my own.” “I only do what I see the Father doing.” And, “Though being in very nature God, he did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself taking the form of a man.” This is man living to the fullest as God made him without sin. This is man in communion and fellowship with the Father, through the Son and by the Spirit. It is life in the Trinity.

God requires that we abandon our own puny plans and genuinely […]

Becoming Fully Present in the Moment

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:02-05:00April 22nd, 2010|Categories: Spirituality|

A remarkable thing happens to us, and in us, when we learn to live in the present moment. We learn to live for him who died for us and was raised again for us and thus we live for the moment he has given to us and not for something else or for some other time we dream about.

When we live this way each day, each moment, becomes a kind of sacrament. Every moment contains something in it that we need to fulfill our deepest need. That need is to love God with all our heart and our neighbor as ourselves. When we live in the moment we become present to our presence in that moment and then to others. Our posture toward everything changes. We wake up wondering, “What will God show me and do in me today?” Or, “How will I really see him in the ordinariness of my day?”

Catherine of Siena described what I speak of this way: “To the true servant of God every place is the right place and […]

Our Essence is Our Emptiness

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:02-05:00April 21st, 2010|Categories: Spirituality|

A friend recently wrote that “our essence is our emptiness.” Our true selves are refined into gold by the purifying fire of life and the ministry of the Holy Spirit. We are made to be divine chalices, human receptacles made in the image of the Triune God for the living God. God made us for himself and he made us to hold within ourselves his glory. Through the purifying power of God he makes room for himself. “It is not I who lives but Christ in me.”

The Western Church tended to reduce salvation to the forgiveness of sin. The East understood that God made us for himself and the fall removed us from God. Salvation restores us to union with God in Christ (Calvin saw this too) and brings about a refining process that brings us into the divine.

We must be emptied of ourselves (not our humanity or uniqueness but our false, independent selves) so […]

The Market As God

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:03-05:00April 20th, 2010|Categories: Economy/Economics|

The free market is the best way we know to distribute goods and services fairly. When the freedom of the market is taken away efficiency and production are both adversely impacted. I believe in free market capitalism, not because it is overtly biblical but because it is just and because it has lifted the most people out of poverty. Both communism and socialism have failed because they control people in adverse ways that destroy human initiative and responsibility. I have believed this way for a long, long time. In fact, I have believed this way for as long as I have thought about economics and the way societies function best in promoting freedom and the incentive to work and serve.

What I do not believe in is the concept of the market that many in America now defend in our every day debates about the Great Recession. I believe the market has become, for many Americans and for a […]

Is the Fullness of Faith to be Found in a Particular Visible Church?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:03-05:00April 19th, 2010|Categories: Missional-Ecumenism, Personal|

My dear friend, Father Wilbur Ellsworth, a former evangelical Baptist and now an Orthodox priest, is one of those brothers I want near to me the rest of my life. He always has something to say or do that brings grace and fullness to my life. Now that Father Ellsworth is fully engaged in ministry as a priest he is beginning to tell his story in various places. A few months ago he told it in Oklahoma for an Orthodox parish ministry. He gave me the DVD and I later wrote him a note expressing my appreciation for what he said and how he said it.

There was so much in Father Ellsworth’s story that I identified with, especially since I lived these days of change with him in the love of real friendship. I can still remember being at Notre Dame and me telling him I was going into the Reformed Church in America and I expected him […]

My Vision for Your Church Is Too Small, Part Four

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:19:03-05:00April 18th, 2010|Categories: ACT 3, Missional-Ecumenism|

In the midst of all these recent developments Roman Catholics, who already had a major encouragement to engage with the rest of us in the pursuit of Christian unity because of Vatican II, began to seriously join these missional conversations. They are also taking part in city-wide efforts to reach the un-churched. Pope John Paul II’s call for the “re-evangelization” of the West has been heard by many younger Catholics. These young Catholics are meeting with many of these young Protestants. They are beginning to see how much they can do together. This began in the pro-life movement but it is clearly moving beyond those concerns. This is not about a political alliance for conservative values but rather about a common sense of identity in the ancient creeds joined with a common call to share the love of Christ in every way possible. The Orthodox Church is a different story altogether. Many Orthodox Christians have remained comfortably ensconced in their ethnic churches and thus have […]