Blog - Page 290 of 318 - John H Armstrong

Luke Timothy Johnson on The Creed: How Liberals and Conservatives Both Go Wrong

By John Armstrong|2006-09-26T10:25:16-05:00September 26th, 2006|Categories: The Church|

One of my very favorite recent books, written in 2003, is The Creed, written by Catholic biblical scholar Luke Timothy Johnson. Rarely have I read such a stimulating and faith building academic work on Christian theology and how the church should think about faith in the modern world.

A friend recently asked me for a list of the best books on the Apostle’s Creed. When I recommended this volume he began to read it with much interest. He later wrote to tell me how inspired he was by Johnson’s fresh and stimulating work. He even sent me a favorite quote. I noted the quote and then expanded it a bit. Read it and maybe you will also want to buy the book and read it for yourself.

Some groups within Christianity have remarkably clear boundaries. They know exactly who they are, how they are different from others, and what they demand of their members. They insist on the "literal" meaning of Scripture and on "classic Christian teaching." Even though they are often as individualistic in their piety as other forms […]

Jerry Falwell Speaks Again

By John Armstrong|2006-09-25T10:36:19-05:00September 25th, 2006|Categories: Politics|

The Associated Press reported today that Jerry Falwell believes that God will preserve a Republican majority in the Congress. I wonder who told him? I am sure of only one thing—it was not God. Where does he get this stuff? I wonder if the Republicans are grateful that he told the world these new revelations before the November mid-term elections. Nonsense is nonsense regardless of who utters it, including conservative preachers. Maybe it would be better to say, "especially Christian preachers." I am grateful for more and more Christians who are exercised to engage in public affairs but I am struck by the lack of wisdom that often reigns on the religious left and the religious right.

Keeping the Daily Hours

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:10-05:00September 25th, 2006|Categories: Spirituality|

I have found a number of resources helpful for daily spiritual disciplines over the course of many years. I am currently using one of the most helpful, The Divine Hours: A Manual for Prayer, by Phyllis Tickle (New York: Doubleday, 2000). I even noted the other day that Scot McKnight had a blog based on this resource. I have found it to be a superb way to follow the discipline of the Benedictine hours throughout the day. I do not keep all the hours on many days but I am still working to make that a part of my pattern.

Today’s reading reminded me that September 29th is the day on the church calendar when we celebrate the role and presence of angels in God’s plan. I don’t know if I have ever celebrated the ministry of angels in my daily disciplines. Perhaps I have reacted against all the pop fascination with angels over the past decade or so. I know that I do not think about angels often on most days. From The Divine Hours I learned that there are only […]

Getting the Gospel Right

By John Armstrong|2006-09-24T20:13:52-05:00September 24th, 2006|Categories: Reformed Christianity|

Very often we confuse the gospel itself, this wonderful and glorious good news about our salvation being totally and completely by grace alone, and in Christ alone, with various doctrines and arguments that properly surround the defense of the gospel itself. By this mistake we turn the knowing of certain doctrines into the gospel. Don’t misunderstand me. If doctrine is teaching, and biblically this is what the word doctrine means, then the gospel is a message that must be taught, and that message can be rightly or wrongly taught.

This is the very point Paul makes in Galatians. I was reminded of all of this Sunday evening while listening to several sermons from Galatians 1 given this month by my friend John Wood, pastor of Cedar Springs Presbyterian Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. (John is one of the finest preachers I know. You should check out his sermons at www.cspc.net.)

My point here is actually not complex. What is important to know about the gospel, if we would defend it from serious error and misunderstandings, is […]

Putting Mission in Perspective in the Emergent Discussion

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:10-05:00September 23rd, 2006|Categories: Missional Church|

There is a great deal of interest today in what is called, rightly or otherwise, "the emergent church." What is it, how should we respond to it, and what is its future? I am a student of revival and mission, having studied both for about forty years now. I am deeply interested in the emergent church phenomenon, whatever it is and whoever speaks for it. It shows promise of being a movement that might well be a precursor to real awakening. It also appears to be a misisonal model that could well be used to help the church in the West reach the emerging generation with the gospel.

The problem with the emergent church discussion is evident to all who seek to enter it. Those who promote it are zealous and usually ideologically nuanced in ways they do not always admit. Those who oppose it are much the same, thus there is a lot of heat and not enough light. Far too often the basis for praise or criticism is rooted in anecdote and fad. When this happens one person becomes the […]

The Death of a Vision

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:10-05:00September 22nd, 2006|Categories: Personal|

In 1991 I had an idea. There should be a quarterly journal that had the style and respect of a seminary journal but a readership that would primarily be church leadership, both lay and pastoral. That idea became the Reformation & Revival Journal, renamed last year as the ACT 3 Review. That journal was the beginning of this mission ministry we call ACT 3, leading me to resign my pastorate in 1992 in order to advance this wider work of publishing, writing and teaching. That quarterly journal, a 224-page bound periodical that was widely respected and used by many colleges and seminaries across North America, will now cease print publication with the current issue, 15:2. This final issue should be mailed next week. Rarely have I had to make a decision that was this difficult to make. It felt like the painful death of a long friend and a treasured vision. I knew the day would come but I had always thought someone else would make it for me after my demise.

Based upon the wonderful input of about fifty trusted men […]

An Acute Western Problem: "Hardness of Hearing"

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:10-05:00September 14th, 2006|Categories: Spirituality|

Earlier this week Pope Benedict XVI told his fellow Germans, and other modern Western societies, that they are shutting their ears to the Christian message when they insist that science and technology alone can combat AIDS and other social ills. His description of the problem is one that will stand out for me for the foreseeable future. He refers to this acute spiritual malady as a “hardness of hearing.”

What a great description of modern life that expression provides. We are so enamored with our human insights and scientific discoveries that we have developed a spiritual condition that can be only called: “Hardness of hearing.” Benedict elaborated on this comment by saying “we are no longer able to hear God—there are too many different frequencies filling our ears.” And he added, “What is said about God strikes us as pre-scientific, no longer suited to our age.” He then told the crowd of over 250,000 pilgrims, gathered in Munich, that “People in Asia and Africa admire our scientific and technical progress, but at the same time they are frightened by a form of […]

Global Warming is Real

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:10-05:00September 13th, 2006|Categories: Uncategorized|

Gregg Easterbrook, writing about global warming in the current issue of The Atlantic Monthly, seems to get the issue about right. He suggests that the Chicken Littles on the left, including Al Gore, are wrong about how to proceed, just as the conservatives on the right who take an ostrich-like position are also wrong. The left routinely calls for a “wrenching lifestyle sacrifice,” says Easterbrook. The right denies that global warming is real at all and some even preach a kind of fatalism, arguing that our economy would be destroyed by restricting emissions. Easterbrook concludes, and on balance I think he has it about right, that “Greenhouse gases are an air pollution problem—and all previous air pollution problems have been reduced faster and more cheaply than predicted.” Easterbrook urges politicians to recast global warming issues in “practical, optimistic tones.” He concludes: “The only reason that global warming seems unstoppable is that we have not yet tried to stop it.”

This reminds me of several recent thoughts I had about this issue. First, I saw Al Gore’s documentary movie about a month or so […]

The Legacy of Reformed Missions in South India

By John Armstrong|2006-09-12T09:58:43-05:00September 12th, 2006|Categories: Missional Church|

Earlier this year a group of Reformed Church in America (RCA) pastors, and their spouses, joined the Global Mission staff of my denomination to make a journey to India to visit congregations in the Church of South India. This visit caught my interest for several reasons. First, I have made two trips to south India myself, both back in the 1980s. My life was transformed by these two trips. Second, I am a student of this particular missions movement in India because of the legacy of the late Lesslie Newbigin who led this fellowship during the late twentieth century. (For those who have not read Newbigin, rush out right now, and do not be deterred by anything but sickness or death, and buy anything Newbigin you can find, particularly Foolish to the Greeks, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, or The Open Secret, and begin a journey that I promise you will change your life as a Christian if you still have a teachable spirit!)

The Church of South India grew out of a mission work of the RCA and several other denominations. […]

Remembering 9/11

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:24:11-05:00September 11th, 2006|Categories: Current Affairs|

I was unprepared today for how deeply the tributes to the victims of 9/11 would move me. I did not personally know any of the victims of that day. I have friends, including my daughter, who knew at least one of the victims personally. And I shared Christian fellowship a few years ago with the parents of one of the victims (their son) who died in the World Trade Center.

What struck me today was the media’s steadfast attempt to not overtly politicize this particular remembrance. That felt good, at least for a day. But the contempt for President Bush, and that for his Democratic opponents from those on the talking right, is sure to come back with new venom by sunrise tomorrow. I do not pretend to know precisely how this war effort should be fought.(How many troops are needed on the ground? What exist strategy should we have in place? How do we stop what appears to be a civil war of some sort?) But I am quite sure of this much—most of the pundits are just as clueless about […]