Advancing

Drisoll's New Book For Free

   

Read this great review by Steve McCoy over at Reformissionary

(UPDATE:  2:30 pm)  This offer has expired.  75 bloggers already applied.

Steve McCoy On Mark Driscoll's "Confessions"

Steve McCoy received an email from Mark Driscoll a couple of months ago asking if he wanted to read and blog review his new book Confessions of a Reformission Rev: Hard Lessons from an Emerging Missional Church.

Steve approaches the review in three phases:

I. The Boring Details: how long, when published, etc. 
II. Themes, Quotes & Content: themes and highlights.
III. My Take & Recommendation: why you MUST read.

"This has been one of the most important books on church and ministry I have read, and I think (it) will hold a unique place among books about ministry.  My advice?  Get this book.  Read it.  Reread it.  Give it away.   It's most helpful for pastors and planters since it deals a lot with dealing with preaching, logistics, pastor's family issues, church growth, etc.  But I highly recommended for all church leaders and thoughtful Christians."  Thanks for the review, Steve.

All I Want for Xmas is a Revolution

Over the past couple decades the polling industry has faced one primary challenge:  keeping up with the George's.  George Gallop and George Barna have earned the trust of secular and Christian clients respectively.  One of the George's seems to have had an epiphany as of late.  Barna's latest book, Revolution, heralds an impromptu departure from a hugely successful career informing clergy with current statistics and trends within America.  In fact, he's downsized the once mighty Barna Research Group (100 employees) and renamed it simply The Barna Group (8 employees).  "Barna Light" will undoubtedly focus it's attention on what he calls a spiritual "revolution" occuring OUTSIDE of the four walls of traditional, organized religion.  This book is all I wanted for Christmas.  Well...that and world peace.  David Yeubanks, a friend from the Tri-cities, wrote this great review on Amazon.  A podcast blog entitled The God Journey recently dedicated a show to Revolution.  And on November 17th Barna made a guest appearance on TBN.

UPDATE (12-28-05) Kevin Cawley just posted some reviews here and here.

Mark Driscoll At WSU

Excerpt from the Introduction of Radical Reformission:

"As I continued to read (the gospels), Jesus seemed okay, but the guys I really liked - because of their self-control and strength - were the denominational leaders of that day:  the Pharisees.  They were about the only guys in the cast of characters with any guts.  I identified with them and was convinced they were the good guys in the story...until they killed Jesus.  I wasn't much of a theologian at the time, but murdering Jesus did seem like a bad move."

The oldest of five kids from a hardworking, blue-collar Catholic family, Mark Driscoll was raised to believe that morally outperforming those below him on the ethical food chain would mean The Jefferson's "movin' on up" theme song would play at the end of his life.  Then everything changed.

Radical Reformission by Mark Driscoll

One of my best friends, Frank Martinez , drove up from Portland for a visit a week ago. He happened to have a book, The Radical Reformission in his car (A '96 Toyota Corolla with over 700,000 miles which he bought from me in '97). He picked the book up at a conference hosted by the author, Pastor Mark Driscoll.  I've since become a glutton for Driscoll's online sermons and articles.  Frank knew I loved Mark's stuff so he let me "borrow" RR.  Yeah, right.  Like he'll ever see this book again.  This will be my way to get him back for inviting me to see Brokeback Mountain with him.  (I said NO!...I'm not that kind of cowboy!)

I'm not an intellectual so I won't attempt a critique.  My plan is to post quotes from Reformission, using them as launching pads to journal my own thoughts.  I'll begin with a quote from the introduction in tomorrow's post. 

READ:  A true blog is a great place for conversation!  I'm very interested in your opinion.  Fire away!  Iron sharpens iron and I need all the sharpening I can get.  I'll try to reply to all comments quickly and thoughtfully.  Thanks.

How Did Blue Impact You?

Donald Miller's Blue Like Jazz has become a great discussion piece.  What's your take?  I appreciated Don's vulnerability regarding his doubts, fears and sins.  He pens a confessional, of sorts, and while criticized by many as being self-absorbed Miller must be given the same permission to be himself that he freely offers others.  A refreshing component of reformed theology is it's appreciation of saving and common grace.  Miller's Jazz celebrates like a prisoner freshly pardoned.   If we all embraced culture with the same childlike faith and love our churches would be more effective at fulfilling the great commission.  It takes boldness and courage to face yourself as Miller has.  A beautiful read.

National Study of Youth and Religion Conclusions

I was recently impacted by a LifeWay article entitled Why Parents May Be Losing Their Teenagers, written by True Love Waits co-founder and seminary professor, Dr. Richard Ross.  I emailed Dr. Ross to express appreciation and ask if there were additional parenting resources he might recommend.  In his reply I learned that he and best selling author, Dr. Ken Hemphill just released an awesome parenting resource, Parenting with Kingdom Purpose. 

Most of Ross and Hemphill's conclusions are drawn from the National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR), a recent survey based on telephone interviews with over 3,300 youth/parent pairs.  Soul Searching:  The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers by Christian Smith and Melinda Lunquist Denton was the first important book based on this study. 

Chapter 5 of Parenting with Kingdom Purpose is titled Introducing Children and Teenagers to God.  In it a progressive chain of facts are laid out that, soberly considered, should send a chill down the spine of any loving parent.

1.  No parental duty matters more than introducing one's children to Jesus.

2.  Even though teenagers and children tend to be religious, the great majority have not grasped the basics of salvation.

3.  Parents who do not teach what the Scriptures say about salvation almost guarantee their children will simply make up their own ideas.

4.  Children who make up and trust their own ideas about salvation likely never will be saved.

5.  Children from Christian homes who never are saved spend eternity in hell.