If you follow the news at all, you can’t possibly have missed the Barack Obama/Jeremiah Wright controversy that cropped up again a few weeks ago. To sum it up very quickly, Wright is the pastor and spiritual mentor to Obama who caused a stir by publicly stating a lot of, uh, controversial things. Obama has [...]

Is it appropriate for a church leader to publicly question Christianity and the Bible? That’s apparently what happened when Kent Dobson, a respected Bible teacher here in my corner of Michigan, appeared on a Discovery Channel program that raised questions about the historicity of the Bible. Dobson resigned under pressure from the school board and [...]

Have you been following news about Pope Benedict’s visit to the US? There are a lot of issues he’ll undoubtedly address before the visit concludes, but the one that’s attracting the most attention is the ugly history of sexual abuse scandals in the Catholic church. He’s already made some comments on the issue, although given [...]

Have you ever heard this most famous of sermons preached? Today I came across a recording of Mark Dever preaching “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” at the Capitol Hill Baptist Church a few years ago. You can listen to the sermon online or read the transcript. I strongly recommend listening to it; [...]

In 2006, Professor Klouda’s contract was not renewed (which is a polite way of firing someone in academia) with the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. She was a Hebrew teacher, and the official position for her dismissal was because she’s a woman.
No other official position has been stated to my knowledge. Although [...]

How redundant is your church? Is your church a cult of personality?
So asks Dan Edelen in a post about pastors and “redundancy” in church leadership. Dan’s not asking if your pastor is a cackling, scheming cult leader who wields total control over his brainwashed congregation (although if that describes your church, you may have a [...]

Have you ever had a pastor or ministry worker quit without warning? Have you ever quit from a ministry position without warning? Michael Spencer writes about the tempation to quit, and the importance of quitting only for the right reasons and in an ethical manner. In particular, he warns against quitting in revenge—using your abrupt [...]

This post from Christianity Today is months old, but the topic is still quite relevant.
The post begins with a paraphrase of a conversation between a pastor and a member of their congregation, which is quite worth reading. Apparently, the pastor had quoted Erwin McManus. This concerned the member, because McManus was fingered as [...]

There’s a great article by Elliot Anderson at Leadership Journal about ministry to people suffering from mental health problems. Going by the statistics, plenty of people in your church congregation are struggling with depression, addiction, and other mental health issues. Elliot lays out some great practical advice for doing ministry in this environment, including how [...]

One of my denomination’s leaders likes to quip, “A Christian bozo is still a bozo.” His point is that simply claiming the name of Christ doesn’t make one competent to be a brain surgeon, nuclear power operator, plumber, or any of a thousand other skilled professions. And it certainly is not the sole qualification for [...]