How to win the “best book on the nature of church ministry”

Mike Leake 32 Comments

That is how Mark Dever described The Trellis and the Vine. 

According to this book, Christians are to be disciple-making disciples and pastors are to be trainers. Superb! This book sets out a crucial shift that is needed in the mindset of many pastors. The authors have carefully listened to the Bible. And they’ve worked on this book. The result is a book that is well-written and well- illustrated, but even more, a book that is full of biblical wisdom and practical advice. This is the best book I’ve read on the nature of church ministry.”

And this book can be yours for absolutely FREE.  You have three chances to win.  If you do the third one your name will be entered three times in the drawing. 

  1. Leave a comment with your name
  2. Leave a comment with your name and how you subscribe to this blog
  3. Leave a comment with your name, how you subscribe to this blog, and a link to this article on your blog.

That’s it.  You have until 11:59 PM Saturday, June 5th.  Winner will be announced on Monday. 

Note: Jeremy has yet to claim his prize from the previous drawing.

Fig Leaf Underpants

Mike Leake 1 Comment

There is a world of difference between the “covering of sin” in Psalm 32:1 and the “covering of sin” in Psalm 32:5 that David refused to engage in. 

Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.  32:1

…I did not cover my iniquity…  32:5

Let’s face it, we are messed up.  We are broken people living in a broken world.  So, what are we going to do about it?  The way I see it there are two options.  Either we engage in Adam-like hiding or we hide ourselves in Jesus. 

When Adam disobeyed God in the Garden he experienced for the first time what you and I experience everyday—brokenness caused by rebellion.  His response was to knit together a few fig leaves and try to cover his shame.  He tried to fix his brokenness.  And because deep down he knew it was not enough he decided to hide in a bush just for good measure. 

The problem with Adam’s solution (and ours) is that it simply does not work.  Sin is not conquered in the darkness of hiding—it grows.  And because sin aims at destroying creation and dethroning the Creator it inevitably leads to brokenness.  You can’t fix the effects of rebellion by rebelling further.  Nothing we craft can fix our sin problem.  There is only one fix…

Hide ourselves in Jesus.  This is what David does in Psalm 32.  He realizes that he is broken because of rebellion.  He feels the weight of his sin and is resolved to not hide it.  He knows that his only refuge is to find mercy in the one whom he has sinned against.  Only God can heal the brokenness caused by our rebellion.  Only God has the power to conquer not only the guilt of sin but also its damning effects. 

So, when you sin today don’t sew fig leaf underpants—run naked to Jesus.  (Hmmm, is that okay to say?)

Where did church buildings come from?

Mike Leake 2 Comments

I speak often.  I have the opportunity to speak in a public setting at least 4 times per week.  Even so, I occasionally say something that I know I have never said before.  (E.g. That’s it!  Jesus is the astronaut!)  Likewise there is one thing that I am certain the apostle Peter and the early disciples never said, “Grab the kids, honey, we are going to church”. 

They never said this because to the early disciples you did not “go to church”.  The early Christians met in synagogues until they were booted out.  During this time they also met in homes and eventually these and the catacombs would be their only meeting place.  For the first couple of centuries to “go to church” would have been unheard of.  “Church” was not a noun.  Maybe a verb.  Maybe an adjective.  Maybe an adverb.  I am not so good at English usage.  But what I do know is that church (ekklesia) was the word used to describe the gathering of believers. 

I am typing this article from inside my church office which is housed inside the church building.  Obviously, things have changed.  But when?  When and where did church buildings come from? 

One school of thought is that represented by Felicity Dale:

The first time history indicates that believers met in buildings is in AD 321, when Emperor Constantine adopted Christianity but followed pagan tradition by building special temples for the Christians.  A paid, professional clergy class arose.  (Quoted from an Army of Ordinary People, p33). 

There are many, especially those who advocate a simple/small/house church movement love to vilify the birth of church buildings.  But is it that simple?  Actually it is most likely that buildings used exclusively for Christian worship began to crop up before Constantine.  The oldest known church building is the Dura-Europos, as Gonzalez explains:

“…as congregations grew, some houses were exclusively devoted to divine worship.  Thus, the oldest Christian church, found in the excavations of Dura-Europos and built before AD 256, seems to have been a private dwelling that was converted into a church.

It is possible that there were a few exclusive Christian buildings that predate the Dura-Europos, but that is not essential to our discussion here.  It is enough to say that during the third century (not fourth) Christians began creating/transforming buildings to be used exclusively for Christian worship. 

There is, however, some credence to what Felicity Dale is saying.  Church buildings were totally different from what they were in the century prior.  As Gonzalez points out, “The churches built in the time of Constantine and his successors contrasted with the simplicity of churches such as that of Dura-Europos” (Gonzalez, 126). 

So, to answer the original question: Elaborate and decorated church buildings came from the time of Constantine.  Functional church buildings came from a time prior—perhaps a century before. 

Now what are the implications of this…

Come back on Friday!

I Just Follow The Golden Rule

Mike Leake 2 Comments

Luke 6:31 – “Do to others as you wold have them do to you.” This verse is commonly called the Golden Rule. I cannot say how often I’ve heard people say that they don’t believe in organized religion or need the church. That all they try to do is live a good life by following the best teachings of the Bible like the Golden Rule. When I hear this kind of statement, I often wonder just how much of the Bible the speaker knows and rightly understands. After all, the Scripture is not given to us as a random collection of pithy sayings for us to pick and choose the path we want to travel. Taking verses out of context is a dangerous path to travel. Sometimes it can lead people to follow a road that is diametrically opposed to what the Scripture teaches. For instance how many people claim the Golden Rule without truly understanding what Jesus was teaching when he spoke?

The Golden Rule appears in two places in the Gospels. One is Matthew 7:12 as Jesus brings the Sermon on the Mount to its conclusion. The other place is in Luke 6 as mentioned above. It is the Luke 6 teaching that intrigues me today. Here Jesus applies the Golden Rule in the midst of a teaching on ethics (the proper treatment of our fellow human beings). In the verses leading up to the Golden Rule, Jesus instructs his followers to: 1 – Love your enemies; 2 – Do good to those who hate you; 3- Bless those who curse you; and 4 – Pray for those who mistreat you. He then launches into some illustrations of how we do those things (IE: Turn the other cheek, give to those who take from you, do not expect repayment).

He then states the Golden Rule and continues this instruction by demanding that his followers have a higher, nobler ethic than that of the world around us. Loving those who love us, giving to those who will repay, being kind to those we know will be kind to us is easy to do. In many ways, its merely a convenient, self-satisfying barter-based ethical system. But to base one’s ethic on Christ is to do so on the basis of mercy and grace with the full knowledge that kindness will not always bring a kind return.

How many who say they live by the Golden Rule understand the context in which the golden rule was given? It is not in the context of family, friends, and decent civil behavior. This clear teaching from Jesus on the Golden Rule comes to us in the context of hatred, anger, and belligerence.

Next time someone says to you that they live according to the Golden Rule in an attempt to justify their lifestyle, consider the not only the words of their lips, but the testimony of their lives. But before you do, check yourself out first.