Ministry and Faithfulness

 Next month it will be two years since we moved to St Margarets Rd and began our adventure of neighbourhood ministry. How has it gone? I would like to say that we’ve seen a number of people make commitments to follow Jesus but that isn’t the case. So have we failed?

Biblical Study Does Not Equal Discipleship

In the West we have a love affair with information. We believe that the more information we have the more power or wisdom we have to make good decisions, become better people and change things. The Western Church’s approach to discipleship reflects the belief in the power of information with it’s emphasis on preaching the word, Bible studies, discipleship and theological courses where the assimilation of information is central, and with our love affair with “How To” books, online videos, bloggs, sermons and articles and so forth. Never has a group of Christians had so much access to so much Biblical information. If Biblical teaching is the key to discipleship, why aren’t Western Christians leading the way in demonstrating what it looks like to follow Jesus? 

Recovering Discipleship: Growing by Living

The church in the West has been in decline for sometime now. There are a number of reasons for this but I think one of the major ones is that discipleship is misunderstood by most of the church. Unfortunately we the church have bought into a rationalistic approach to discipleship. The emphasis is on teaching the word in the belief that it will lead to transformation. For some time that was my own view.