IKEA Discovers the Key to Evangelism by Kim Reisman
Kim Reisman
December 6, 2017
From the beginning, God has desired a relationship of love and wholeness with something other than God.
From the beginning, God has desired a relationship of love and wholeness with something other than God.
One of my great hesitancies when I first entered the ministry concerned leadership. I was afraid to lead. I had too many doubts. What if I choose wrong? What if I lead my people poorly? What if I make a mistake and it all falls apart? As I was going through ordination in the United Methodist Church, my mentor suggested I read In the Name of
As unpopular as it may seem the reality of Advent is that it doesn’t need to occur in the best of circumstances.
Thank God for his presence. Express your feelings about following God despite your fear.
As Christ followers, in all times and seasons, but especially during Advent and Christmas, we declare to the world that we’ve seen that great light.
Sometimes there are questions that simply do not have clear solutions. As my husband and I neared the end of our first ministry assignment, a woman said to me, “I think if you hadn’t have been in your position of leadership, we could have been good friends.” Even in my late twenties, I didn’t completely comprehend what she was saying. It stung,
That is the surprise of the Beatitudes—what appears to be a source of unhappiness, turns out to be a source of joy and blessedness.
I believe these Holy Spirit-infused moments, when the thin veil of reality billows ever so slightly and we gain a glimpse of something larger and deeper than ourselves, are the moments that form and strengthen and sustain us in faith and in life.
The people of God were called to exude that more gracious and merciful identity and action all the time.
Humans are expert excuse-makers. “Well, GOD, the woman you gave me tempted me, so…that’s why I didn’t listen to you when you told me not to eat anything from that tree.” “I know I’m not supposed to cut my hair, but…I mean, have you seen Delilah? I’m only human.” “I’d love to follow you, Jesus, but I have family obligations and an urgent to-do list first.
A couple of generations ago in North America, camp meetings and revivals were not uncommon in many Wesleyan Methodist traditions, flourishing in part from their popularity in the 19th century across frontiers. Outdoor meetings or camp meetings or week-long revival series held in local churches perhaps helped to pave the way for Billy Graham’s famous evangelistic crusades that inhabited tents
Compassion, in the Jesus way, is active – it steers toward the pain, joins folks in the valley of the shadow of death and finds some way to point to the hope of the resurrection.
When you look closely at the first few verses of Philippians, something quite unique stands out fairly quickly:
Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus,
To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi, with the bishops and deacons.
You’ll notice that Paul does not refer to himself as an apostle.
We have a hungry prophet (Elijah) on assignment to stretch the faith of a widow woman on welfare and to add insult to injury she has just lost her son.
I stop by to tell somebody when you are dealing with a dead situation you have to expect the unexpected, process your pain, and trust the process.
What would you give your life for? Your kids? Your spouse? Your family? Would you give your life for people you don’t know? People forced into prostitution in Bangalore, or unborn babies? Would you give your life for the Church? Paul tells us Jesus gave his life for just this thing. Jesus gave his life for the Church. More precisely, Jesus
Here’s a news flash – the word “evangelism” is emotionally, historically, and theologically charged.
Cognitive dissonance is especially challenging in evangelism. We’re tempted to find ways to reduce the divergences between the Gospel and our culture, to change our message so it’s more palatable to the society in which we live, to accommodate it to the “wisdom of the world.”
The more I read those words and reflected on Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 25 the more it struck me that the Seven Works of Corporal Mercy are not an anachronistic relic of the Medieval church but constitute a very effective evaluation tool for the contemporary church.
The history of heresy in the first few centuries of Christian faith is fascinating as the church slowly and methodically made choices about the core tenets of Christianity.
And that’s the key. It was a process of choice – hairesis.
I really do love the book of Proverbs. There’s just some really good stuff within this great book: wisdom that can help us live our lives in ways that are just so powerful and so good. Ways that are just so true. Listen to what we are told today in Proverbs 21: 1-2: 1 A good name is to be chosen
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