Sunday, December 30, 2012

Foisting GTD on People Around Me

I dunno why I haven't subscribed to this podcast before now. It's (mostly) brief snippets of info from David Allen, or one of his crew, on GTD implementation.

My point of entry was his, "Getting Others Doing GTD" episode. I like the human-ness of his response--very personal, not so task-y.

Monday, December 24, 2012

Service and Joie de Vivre

Just the other morning I was reading Colossians and came across this phrase:
"Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, as something done for the Lord and not for men, …" (Col 3:23, HCSB).
'Enthusiastically'. Really?! Don't get me wrong, I think it's a pretty cool vision for life in the world--that picture of being truly engaged, present, delighted in what you're doing, rather than detached and disinterested. But is that what the verse is really saying?

(Note: how to apply this verse, given that Paul's instructing slaves here, is a whole other discussion. I'll assume for now that it has broad application to most of us in most areas of life. Ok?).

For comparison, the NIV translates it as follows:
"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart…"
I totally get that "with all your heart" is pretty similar to "enthusiastically", but the latter seems to carry more a sense of zest; the former more a sense of sincerity, commitment (though both are present in each).

Here's what I did:
  • Step 1: Look at the footnote. The footnote tells me it's literally, "do it from the soul". I decided to dig around a little more.
  • Step 2: Look at the context. We could say heaps here, but the surrounding verses hint at things like integrity, propriety, service, living life confident that you enjoy God's favour in the gospel. Also, in the previous verse slaves are instructed to work "with sincere heart", which sounds like a kinda parallel: no hidden agendas, 'what you see is what you get', my Biblical Greek dictionary says. Transparency.
  • Step 3: Look at the words. The word for 'soul' is pretty broad, but here it probably refers to a centre of human emotions/feelings--which would kinda fit with either "enthusiastically" or "with all your heart"… but perhaps tips me toward the former.
  • Step 4: Look at how the same words are used by the same author elsewhere. Ephesians 6:6 is a really close parallel. Same topics, similar instruction--and both sincerity (v5) and a positive attitude (v7) are on view.
Conclusion: both translations are certainly defensible, and I'm probably splitting hairs anyway. But I'm tipped toward the HCSB:
"Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, as something done for the Lord and not for men, …"

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Which Bible in 2013?

I'm a read-the-Bible-first-thing-in-the-morning kinda guy, and have been for a while. The routine still works, still has a freshness to it, doesn't get *too* interrupted at this stage in life.

That said, in the new year I think I'll make a change: it's time to read a different English translation. The trouble we have in English isn't in finding one good translation, it's the challenge of choosing between a bunch of good ones. So which one next? For the last couple (?) of years I've been reading the Holman (HCSB)--so not that one.

Some options:
  • KJV - King James Version
  • NIV (2011) - New International Version
  • TNIV - Today's New International Version
  • NLT - New Living Translation
  • ESV - English Standard Version
I'm leaning toward the King James, actually.

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

What is the Mission of the Church?

Apparently, christianaudio's free download of the month is Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert's recent book, What is the Mission of the Church?

I kinda like audio books. They exist in my world of 'things to do while mowing the lawn', alongside listening to This American Life podcasts and catching up on Manager Tools.

This particular book I've heard generally positive reviews of, though I'm expecting at least some points of difference with my rather Sydney-flavoured theology of church. We'll see!

I guess I'll just have to wait for the grass to grow again :)

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Feminism v. Gay-Marriage??

Sensitive topic, I know. But I have a question that I'd genuinely like an answer to:

Would a feminist be able to support the current push for gay marriage (here in Tassie) while remaining consistent to his/her own feminism?

I think the answer is a categorical, 'No'.

Now, that sounds rather naughty. After all, we're talking about two world views that are generally considered 'progressive' (feminism and the mainline of GLBT in public discourse). So let me outline my thinking, and I'd appreciate it if you could (politely!) point out to me if/where I'm mistaken.

Let's start with a cornerstone in the narrative of feminism (by 'narrative' I just mean a description of how the world does/could/should fit together):
(a) Feminism holds that a woman brings something truly special/wonderful/significant to the world by virtue of her being a woman, which is not equivalent to what a man brings to the world.
And we could, of course, replace 'world' with 'marriage', since marriage is just one sphere within a woman's life that she enriches (partly) by virtue of her femininity. Let's be generous and do blokes the same courtesy in the interests of equal-treatment (but it isn't essential to my argument):
(b) A man brings something truly special/wonderful/significant to the world by virtue of his being a man, which is not equivalent to what a woman brings to the world.
So, they're different, the feminist narrative holds, and those differences should be highlighted and celebrated. To minimise or down-play the distinctives of women as women is to take a backward step, indeed.

True, it may be very difficult to neatly define what a woman (or indeed mother) brings to a marriage (or family), likewise a man (or a father). Nevertheless, the feminist narrative holds dear that je ne sais quoi.

Let us turn our attention to one significant part of the GLBT narrative (as I encounter it, anyway):
(c) The GLBT narrative holds that Gay/Lesbian unions should be described by the term 'marriage' because your lover's gender has no bearing on the union you share with them, there are no significant distinctives dividing men and women in this arena.
If, (a) and (b) and (c) are correct, then I think it's fair to say…
(d) a feminist could not support a redefinition of marriage to encompass gay unions while remaining consistent with his/her own feminism, for it would necessarily involve marginalising the uniqueness of women.
Finally, let me spin this back the other way. If same-sex unions do become known as 'marriages', then would not a consistent feminist want to find some other way to positively signal the specialness of heterosexual unions? But that sure looks like a path of infinite regress to me.

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

Jeremiah

Preach all of Jeremiah in two sermons. That was my mission. The second-longest book in the Old Testament (behind Psalms, and, yes, ahead of Isaiah and Genesis), in two sermons. Whew!

Just in case you're ever tackling that task, let me give you a hot tip: J G McConville's Judgment and Promise: An Interpretation of the book of Jeremiah is the *bomb*.

Succinct, meaty, well-written, good engagement with modern scholarship, and he makes a compelling case for the coherence of Jeremiah's prophecy as a whole. It's not just a book for preachers, either.

(Thanks, Dan, for lending it to me!)

Friday, August 31, 2012

My Fav Free DISC Assessment Tool

This week the pastoral staff at Crossroads revisited the ol' DISC profile assessment. We did an online freebie test, the results of which were certainly 'about right' in my case at least.

But then I did another... and the results were wildly different (including wholesale shifting me from D to I). I didn't buy it. So the search for something a little more thorough ensued.

Then I came across the 'Personal Strength Profile' test (which includes DISC) from the Anthony Robbins---life coach extraordinaire, whose film cameos date back to Reality Bites. Yep, him.

The results were gold.

They weren't just 'about right'. They 'rang true' even to much of the detail. And detail there was--the report runs to some 20 pages. The considerable 'C' in me was suitably indulged.

I heartily recommend you check it out.

Btw, for the Manager Tools fans, make sure you check out the way those guys use DISC to give effective feedback. That has been one of their most enlightening podcasts for me yet. (It's in one of the Feedback episodes in the Basics series).

For the record I'm:
  • D - 81%
  • I - 53%
  • S - 39%
  • C - 67%
PS. The 'Values' test (which comes in the same package) didn't impress me at all. Perhaps I'm missing something.

Wednesday, August 29, 2012

Accordance for PC - next year

According to an email I received just today, Accordance (the uber-powerful Bible software I use) will be available for PC (native) from sometime next year.

A few details are on their website.

I'm wondering how they'll manage licensing for those who happen to have both a PC and a Mac--will they treat them as entirely separate beasts, or as a multiple licenses for one product... I guess we'll see!

I'm also wondering if it will lure anyone at all away from BibleWorks.

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

The Problem(s) with Boycotts

In general, I'm not much the fan of company boycotts.

Here's a great little HBR article that gets at some of the problems an attempted boycott faces (or, it's a good 'how-to', if you're wanting to stage a boycott, I guess!)

PS. I'm not saying 'never'; I'm just saying, 'rarely' and 'done right'.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Not all Short emails are Inane

"Thanks"
"You're welcome. And thank you"
"No, no. It was nothing"

Inane emails. None of those should have been written, let alone sent. (Ok, so the initial, 'Thanks', maybe).

But not all short emails are inane. Here's one that I wish I received more often:

"Yep. I can make it. Locked into my calendar."

If I'm trying to coordinate a meeting with multiple parties by email, those are the emails I want back. Even if one person has said, "Nah, I can't make that time. Sorry! How about... x, y, z (time, place)". Even then, I still want to know if *you* can make my originally proposed time. Two reasons:
  • I may not consider that first person essential to the meeting--I obviously care about their coming, or I wouldn't have invited them, but that doesn't make them essential.
  • There may be no time in the near future when everyone can gather at once, so I may split the meeting. i.e. meet with persons a, b, c. Then, an hour later, meet with persons d, e, f. (Obviously, for this to be even vaguely sensible depends on the purpose of the meeting).
Make sense? I'd be keen to hear how others manage to efficiently coordinate meetings with vast networks of volunteers.

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Jesus, History, and paving the way for Investigation

Occasionally, I read Dave McDonald's excellent blog. Among other things, he reviews lots of books; and just recently, this one caught my eye: his review of John Dickson's latest, Investigating Jesus: An Historian's Quest.

In general, I'm a big fan of John Dickson's books. But that's not what grabbed my attention.

Here's the thing: around the traps I get the sense that we Christians are generally seen as kinda thoughtless about the reality of the things we believe.
  • Are they real
  • Is there adequate warrant for your beliefs? 
  • Can you demonstrate it? 
  • Have you investigated it? 
  • Are you even willing to engage with criticism?
  • Are you equipped to face it?

Perhaps I'm reading it incorrectly, but this expectation/presumption seems to lurk beneath the surface of two areas of discussion:
  1. creation/cosmology, and 
  2. the historical events of Jesus' life.

Now, that presumption of thoughtlessness encompasses much: blasé disinterest, woolly thinking, vested interest in clinging to out-dated conclusions, fundamentalist/obstructionist opposition to contrary positions,... you get the picture.

With that enormous preamble, here's all I wanted to say: I'm pretty keen to check out Dickson's book, because I reckon I (and 'we') need to become really well-practiced in articulating the historical credibility of our convictions regarding Jesus. Obviously, this isn't evangelism (proper), but it's pretty jolly handy as a preliminary :)

Thursday, July 12, 2012

Two Right Answers

I just read this secular article entitled, The Power of Being Single. Worth a read. Take this for example:
"the language of singleness is really the language of couples who are pitying single people"

Their diagnosis of marriage's misuse is pretty accurate, in my opinion. But it lacks a cogent vision for what singleness is good for. Instead, the supposed benefits of singleness seem to be largely borrowed from those (mistakenly) held out for marriage: self-legitimisation, maximising my own happiness, etc.

For what it's worth, Tim Keller's The Meaning of Marriage and Andrew Cameron's Joined Up Life each make a far more satisfying account of both Singleness and Marriage, and why "there’s such a thing as two right answers", as Cameron charmingly puts it (Joined Up Life, 236).

My own stuff on Singleness you'll find here.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

The Poison of Costly Narcissism

This article puts its finger on a real poison, to which gospel ministers are not immune.
Those selected for development have one universal trait in common: They are by definition high achievers. But there is a difference between those superstar achievers that can make the leap to CEO and those that will implode: To what degree do they feel invigorated by the success and talent of others, and to what degree does the success of others cause an involuntary pinch of insecurity about their own personal inadequacies?
On a related note: I'm not such a fan of their suggested appeal to self-interest as cure. I think there's a better way.

Friday, June 29, 2012

Together, on Singleness

Last night a dozen or so of us gathered at the church office for a ministrylab on the topic of Singleness. It's one of those tricky topics, I reckon--singleness is viewed with such suspicion by many these days, but the topic has our 'hearts', big time.

One of the stories that came out quite clearly was the significance that single people have in the lives of married people, and that married people have in the lives of single people. That's why singleness is a topic for our whole church: because we love one another in community. As long as we reduce 'singleness' to merely 'coping with singleness', or 'the problem of singleness', then of course we'll leave it to single people to figure out amongst themselves. Rather, we'd do well to honour singleness as a legitimate, intelligible, and even good way of being in the world--and that's a call to married people as much as to anyone.

Kudos to the married people who came along :)

You'll find the notes to the ministrylab here.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Segue in Story Telling

Last night I listened to this address from Ken Robinson at the School of Life, last March.

From a public-speaking point of view, the thing that stood out to me was the strength of each segue between stories. It seems to me that the mainline--so to speak--of his lecture was very short. He spent most of his time exploring one digression after another. And he waffled, rambled, occasionally stumbled around looking for the right way to say something.

But here's the thing: his segue from digression-to-mainline was seamless every time. He did not miss a beat *there*. His pace, his wording, were bang-on at those points.

And so I never felt that the address had lost its way, which is pretty remarkable for what was almost an hour telling stories.

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Very Early Manuscripts. Like.

The Evangelical Textual Criticism blog has just linked to a quick interview with Dan Wallace regarding recently discovered manuscripts of the Gospels and Paul. It's less than 4 minutes long and worth a listen.

Still have to wait until 2013 before they're published, though.

I should probably say: I'm not expecting anything dramatic in those manuscripts. More likely, we're talking about adding to the already vast wealth of evidence we have for the reliability of our Scriptures. But they *are* early (or so Wallace says), which is nice.

Tuesday, May 15, 2012

Bargains Galore.

Ok, not actually 'Galore'. One bargain, to be more precise.

I grabbed a book from the 'markdown' section at Koorong today. $3. When I got to the counter I was informed that all markdowns are a further 50% off.

$1.50 for a copy of Mother Julian of Norwich's 'Revelations of Divine Love'.

Crazy mystics at crazy prices.

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

How Cool is their Swag Bag?!

I've had my eye on the 99% for a while now. They've just had another of their conferences this week. And their swag bag caught my eye, as well as my imagination.

I reckon it would be cool if...
  • My church produced a grab-quote video for occasional post-church display, featuring the most incisive Christian thinkers of our day.
  • FOCUS produced an infographic poster blending info on Christianity/Church/Tasmania.
  • Uni Fellowship produced an infographic of the Christian life at uni, with a slightly activist bent.
  • Uni Fellowship produced a grab-quote video engaging with typical defeater beliefs in Hobart.
  • My church produced a grab-quote video of testimonial Christian-growth mini-stories.
  • My church produced business-card sized info cards on ministries we partner with (all on one card)--just the barest of details, and with our own brand graphics.
  • We updated the graphics on our lanyards (we're still back in 2006 there--they've dodged all our updates!).

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Brushing-up on Email Use

Email is a key communication tool for the ministry teams at Crossroads. So that's one place I'm investing a bit of effort right now: helping our teams with best practices.

Best practices with email go way beyond basic etiquette, of course. And it's stuff that deserves a regular brush-up, too.

Here are two helpful articles (via Communicate Jesus) to cast your eyes over, if you're due for a tune up:
Both are a little dated, but remain current in their essence.

If you've got a go-to email etiquette article, I'd love to hear about it :)

Monday, April 16, 2012

Vision 100 IT takes us back to School

Thanks heaps to the Vision 100 IT team. This evening I spent a good while (along with leaders from a bunch of churches) thrashing through how to best use our various IT systems to manage our data and communicate with our church, and beyond.

Here are their six things on 'How to do IT well':
  1. The pastor has to own IT. It's about consistency of vision and communication.
  2. Have regular content, up to date content.
  3. Get your 'Key Person' - you need that person. To update content.
  4. Key Systems - get a sense of what you need and how to write that. Regularly oversee it with your key person.
  5. Coordinate/Integrate all of your communication.
  6. Make it Look Good - if it looks crumby people will think its dodgy. Quality of photos matter. It all matters.
Some Advice on using Social Media
  • If your ministry or church isn't on Facebook, it's not on the Internet.
  • All of your staff have gotta be on there.
  • For members and visitors to see your involvement in ministry, in your particular ministries, then they see how you work and where there are opportunities to serve.
  • Don't think of Facebook as a commercial front door, think of it as a window on your gathering, a window into your church. Incidentally, that way it actually becomes a commercial front door.
  • Embrace the change: make Facebook for your church. Make your website for your visitors.
Some Warnings from the Graveyard of Social Media.
  • Don't blindly link between social media--Facebook to Twitter linked, but then only commenting on one of those. Death.
  • Facebook events are potentially where your ministry dies. If you don't invite people, post the image, include times, places, etc. then there's no point having it.
Some Best Practices in Social Media (esp. Facebook)
  • Events: Fill out the detail first, when you begin.
  • Don't put stuff into your page which is likely to change and get outdated unless you're confident it will get updated (so write a procedure). Provide links to your website, which will be updated.
  • If it's announced up the front, then it should feature in your social media.
  • Feed (some of) your new website content to your Facebook page.  
  • Write a procedure to creating events on Facebook (or doing other things). Procedures for social media are a good and helpful thing (especially for delegating, quite apart from helping you out).
  • Interaction. Do it.
  • Give your posts personality.
  • Twitter. Time is the filter on Twitter. Whereas popular posts stick around on Facebook.
  • So e.g. rosters posted to twitter won't really get caught by many people.
  • Organisations on Twitter must post regularly.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Why you should Focus on the Wrong Things

Welcoming guests, getting in touch with them afterwards, and then helping people 'break-in' to our church community, are things we've been working at recently at Crossroads. And that's meant a whole host of small changes (and many more to come).

But what I'm discovering is this: it's only when I focus hard on making one thing happen, that some-other-thing that gets me really excited comes into view. And if I'd never put in the effort on plan A, plan B would never have come to light.

Example: I've been trying to devise a 'response card' (or 'contact card', or...) that I'm actually happy with. Finally I go the wording, the layout, the everything, just right. But then Good Friday came along, and I realised that I didn't even want a response card. What I wanted was a Guest Book--something I'd never even thought of before. But here's the thing: the guest book took me about ten seconds to produce, because I'd done all the thinking on the response card.

I focused on the wrong thing, and the right thing came into view. I'm very happy with the result.

Check it out here.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Remembering Repentance

In preparation for this Sunday's Easter service at Crossroads--hey, you should come if you can!--I've been writing a sermon on one of Luke's resurrection stories. It's a ripper. Luke 24:36-49. But something that's really hit me is a reminder of the place of 'repentance' when the New Testament talks about people becoming Christians. Particularly, I'm wondering if that biblical emphasis is reflected in my (and, our) preaching.

Here's how Bock puts it (long quote, worth it):
“For Luke, repentance is the summary term for the response to the apostolic message […] Change in thinking (i.e., a reorientation) is basic to human response to God's message. People must change their minds about God and the way to him, especially their thinking about sin, their inability to overcome sin on their own, Christ's essential role in forgiveness, and the importance of depending on him for spiritual direction. Those responding to the apostolic message of the gospel must come to God on his terms in order to experience the forgiveness that comes in the name of Jesus. But repentance means more than changing one's mind about God. People must also change their minds about who they are and how they can approach God. Repentance involves turning to and embracing God in faith. Forgiveness of sin comes to those who stretch out a needy hand to Jesus, clinging to him alone and recognizing that without him there is no hope.” Bock, Luke (BECNT), 1940.
These two things gripped me: "Repentance"; and, "without him there is no hope"

Sunday, March 25, 2012

On Evil's Elimination

Later this year, the University Fellowship of Christians have their God vs. Evil events. I'm really looking forward to them, and I figure now is a good time to prepare for it by getting my head back in the game, so to speak.

Obviously, you could scarcely manage to be a Christian for as long as I have without giving evil/suffering/pain considerable thought. For instance, I particularly appreciated Henri Blocher's, Evil and the Cross.

More recently, I liked Alvin Plantinga's video interview on CPX a couple of years ago (the last part of the interview, especially).

But just today, I read the transcript of this address by Greg Clarke, also from CPX. It's entitled, The Elimination of Evil.

At one point, Clarke compares a popular estimation of God's judgement with a biblical picture:
This gracious act of Jesus, as God incarnate, is an entirely different kind of act to what people expect of a perfect God who is judging evil. It is almost the opposite of what Zizek [...] calls ‘divine violence’ [...] a gleeful divine punishment, pleasurably handing out what the evil creatures deserve. But the message of Christianity is vastly different.
Well worth a read. And it comes with a bonus: Clarke also includes a lengthy quote from Bono, which is bang on target.

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Beyond Hellish Self-Centredness

Recently, I finished reading David Powlison's, Seeing with New Eyes. My ol' mate Kristan recommended it to me years ago, and I'm very thankful that he did.

Powlison's writing about Counseling as a professional in the field. But he's an evangelical trying to put the horse back in front of the cart in a discipline where the cart has led the way for a good while. (Note: this book pre-dates Tim Chester's, You Can Change, by some 5 years, I think).

I particularly appreciated his thoughtful critique of Gary Chapman's, The Five Love Languages. Chapman's book, says Powlison,
"...not only leaves fundamental self-interest unchallenged, it plays to self-interest." (230)
He pithily captures the dynamic here:
"[Five Love Languages] does slightly alter the 'You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours' calculus. It is a 'glorified version', taking a small step in the right direction by reversing the order. 'I scratch your back (and then it's likely you'll scratch mine).' " (232)
Now, let's be clear, there's lots of handy stuff in Chapman's book as Powlison is quick to point out. But oh-so-many Christian-ish psychology books pull the same move (e.g. Kevin Leman's books spring to mind).

Powlison pin-points the problem when he makes the gospel his point of comparison:
"The love of Christ speaks a 'love language'--mercy to hellishly self-centred people..." (236)
That's the language in which Christians must become fluent.

Wednesday, March 7, 2012

Cultivating Intelligent Engagement with Common Objections

Recently I was looking over the Effective Ministry stuff again. These common objections caught my eye (numbers are percentages for people in their twenties):


  • Irrelevant        13
  • It’s for non-copers        17
  • Set of rules        5
  • Science disproves it        6
  • No proof        10
  • For the well off        2
  • The only way?        9
  • Problem of suffering        31
  • Truth of the Bible        27
  • Good, but not for me        21
  • Too many hypocrites        5
  • I’m not good enough        5
  • Other        3
It got me thinking, "Where are we equipping our people to intelligently engage with these common objections?". It's not hard to relate any of them back to the gospel, either, as (for example) Tim Keller has shown in The Reason for God.

But then a second reflection came to mind: perhaps there's an implicit assumption that undergirds all of these objections. Let me put it positively in the language of a hypothetical objector:

"I want to be thoughtful about how I live in this world, and why I live that way. And I just don't think churches are in the habit of intelligently engaging with real issues with satisfying depth."

As an axiom, it's kinda the flip-side of the naming of the Brights Movement, for example.

So what? Well, if I'm right, then...
  • we've gotta assume that our public communication (e.g. advertising for church) has to punch through that assumption to register anything more than glib dismissal.
  • where we fail to engage with current issues, it will more likely be taken as deriving from our inability to do so, rather than our burden for evangelism-ahead-of-apologetics.
  • the task of training our people in winsome apologetics paves the way for evangelism methodologically, as well as topically.
  • the way we engage is important--and I don't mean rhetoric. But as we carefully articulate our engagement with any of the above topics (or indeed, something else altogether), we undermine the knock-down strength of all of them by illustrating the depth and integrity of Christian thought.

Friday, March 2, 2012

RTR now (finally) has a website

At long last, the brilliant Australian journal, Reformed Theological Review, has a website.

In the past, if you wanted to, say, change the mailing address for your subscription, you had to use one of those red post-box things in your street, together with stamps, an envelope, etc.--I could never figure it out.

No longer!

Subscribe now. Here. I dare you.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Food for smallgroups Thought

Crossroads Classic smallgroups are just about to kick-off for the year.

I'm spending some time with our leaders tomorrow, and we're going to take a look at the models advocated in these two articles:
This year, our smallgroups will follow a varied curriculum across the year: a couple of months reading big slabs of Scripture; a couple of months at a slower pace, in the details; some time functioning as a book club; and more.

So I need to figure out how to coach our smallgroups leaders to run fantastic book clubs... hmmm. More thought required :P