Christ has come to build his Church and he will cleanse and renew us by his grace. He does this not only for our sake but for the sake of his saving Name being heard in the whole world. We exist for the sake of those who have not yet entered the Kingdom. So let us bid farewell to convenience-based religion, be more concerned about prophets than profits, and remember that the House of God isn’t confined to a beautiful building on Yamato, but is in fact every believer as we enter the world with Jesus’ message and mercy.

Why was healing so tethered to Jesus’ proclamation of the Kingdom? Why was healing such an important feature of his ministry anyway? In other words, apart from the simple fact of relieving human pain, why did Jesus heal people and why should we expect him to continue to do so now?

I want my friends in the GRN to hear me when I say that I understand why you’re responding to the issues which concern you. I share those concerns, even if we differ on how to deal with them. Such concern is a sane response to a church threatened with sinful pressures within and sinister snares without. That’s why we need to sing Psalm 133 without our fingers crossed as if we could celebrate unity only with those with whom we completely agree. 

In fasting, we are reminded that we are creatures blessed by the Creator with provision, that we are His servants empowered with his grace for our work, and his subjects ennobled by his truth. In fasting, we celebrate that we have God’s own word and will as our most needed food. The hunger we experience reminds us of how much we depend on God and not on ourselves, of how desperately we need him. Being satisfied with his word reminds us that our true treasure is Christ himself and that he alone can satisfy our souls.

The PCA has been my home for more than twenty years of ministry. All of the storminess has made me pause to give thanks for all I love about the PCA. I started making a list and decided to share it. Maybe others can make a list too.

The PCA is an Evangelical and Reformed denomination that has room for every GRN church I can imagine. The GRN’s version of the PCA, however, has no room for the vast majority of PCA churches that differ from them. And that’s the difference. The GRN desires a hyper-homogenous, super-southern, strict subscriptionist PCA — nothing short of a revolution — while others want an evangelical, good-faith subscription, a national church with a global vision that has a posture of serving inclusion rather than defensive exclusion.

Karl Barth wrote, “Prayer is a grace, an offer from God.” What do we mean when we say that prayer is a gift God gives us before it is an activity we engage in? Let’s consider this in three ways, communion with God, growth in grace, and help for others.

Church families need homes and these dedicated places remind us that all of creation is sacred, that every square inch is a stewardship entrusted to us by God. The stones and glass and beams and scents and acoustics and light and textures, both interior and exterior, serve the soul as well as the body. They also serve the city as well as the faithful.

It's time for a "swords into plowshares" day to dawn in the PCA. I  don't know that those who hold to strict subscription - or its defacto form of forbidding the teaching of allowable exceptions - can stay in community with good faith subscription brothers and build together. Perhaps not. But I hope so.  After all, both love the Lord Jesus Christ, his word, and his Church. Both are committed to the Great Commission. Both need one another. What neither may be animated by, however, is the condescending spirit of neo-fundamentalism. Fundamentalism has no place in our fellowship and will surely displace many because it has already begun.

I don't know how else to put this, but the Best News you'll ever hear, the truth that sets people free, might sound a lot like some pretty bad news to start with. The Church's job is to make the message clear, not acceptable - only God can do that. That's no excuse for arrogance or other forms of religious jackassery performed in the name of being radical. On the contrary. As I noted at the outset, the idea is making disciples that follow rather than audiences to be entertained. There's nothing wrong with entertainment. That's just not the mission.

I believe we have a crisis of formation in the Church and we must respond to it with an invitation to the Holy Spirit to awaken us to our deep need for Christ himself to not only dwell within us but reshape us, to form us within, to reshape our attitudes about everything from prestige and power to envy, fear, and greed. Dallas Willard wrote, “The greatest issue facing the world today, with all its heartbreaking needs, is whether those who are identified as ‘Christians’ will become disciples - students, apprentices, practitioners - of Jesus Christ, steadily learning from him how to live the life of the Kingdom of the Heavens into every corner of human existence.”

I’ve wondered about the citizens of Bethlehem passing the stable area where Mary had given birth to her son, gently laying him there in a straw-filled stone food trough. I wonder what they thought? They were strolling past the greatest story in human history - the greatest miracle imaginable - and probably never gave the scene a second glance or thought.  We can do the same. We can walk right through Christmas, right past the miracle in the manger, straight to the cranberry sauce singing “I’ll be home for Christmas” without a second glance or thought about the majesty that has unfolded.

The Bible speaks of the Messiah’s arrival as a moment when people that were entrenched in darkness suddenly saw a great light. The ancient world was dark. Very dark. And that was without changing any clocks.

It is so right that we pause this week to give thanks. That we set aside a day for thanksgiving, for pausing to ponder the overwhelming love and mercy that has been bestowed on us, is a great gift. The practice may even yet cultivate in us more than full stomachs, yielding instead glad and grateful hearts on the year's other more mundane days.

Gospel Reformation Network council member Jon Payne recently published a new article on the GRN website in which he notes that there are dismayed church leaders and members wondering if it’s time to give up on the PCA and leave. In “Should We Stay or Should We Go?” he asks that rhetorical question noting that “It’s a question that more than a few PCA elders and members are asking right now.” 

‘Vision’ may well be an overused word in our world but it's an important word, a deeply Biblical idea that describes the why of the what we give our lives for. Sometimes ‘vision’ may be limited in scope (get through another day), professional (get that promotion), or societal (pass that legislation). Those are vital perspectives, but let me suggest that there’s more to ‘vision’ than meets the eye.

“I don’t see the point in praying. God is going to do whatever he’s going to do whether I pray or not.”

I’ve heard that despairing comment - or something like it - from many people over the years. It seems to me that they’ve either forgotten the great meaning of prayer, communion with God, or the great privilege of prayer, to partner with God to accomplish his will. Or perhaps they’d forgotten both. Have we?

Is the gathered worship of the church more like a concert we attend or an offering we make together? Is it more of a performance for others by a few incredibly gifted individuals, groups, and choirs, or the shared labor of all offered to God? Does it really make any difference?

Pastors need confidentiality too. We also have our need for friends and colleagues with whom we can share our concerns, anguish, views, burdens, distress, and fears, and we cherish those relationships. Sometimes those relationships are spread across great distances and so the use of private correspondence - correspondence openly marked as confidential and which cannot be forwarded to others without the written permission of the parties involved - is one more way we get to talk about the important issues we face in ministry, whether in our congregations and denominations or our own personal lives.

The created order — angels, people, stars, & planets, oceans, mountains, and trees — was fashioned for communion with God, to behold and reflect his bounty and beauty. What does sin do? It undoes the perfect communion and happiness. What does redemption do? It restores it. The Gospel received results in communion restored.