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Big Tent Christianity in Big Time Denominations

Last Updated August 12, 2010 by Matt 4 Comments

“[It is] urgent … to reclaim a Big Tent Christianity, a centrist return to ‘just Christian’ in word and action. The two poles are driving each other ever further apart, spawning ever deeper hostilities. The solution — in American society as in the church — certainly is not to let the other’s anger fuel my […]

Filed Under: Christianity Tagged With: Big Tent Christianity, philip clayton, synchroblog

A Maundy Thursday Meditation: Praying with Jesus in the Garden

Last Updated April 11, 2009 by Matt Leave a Comment

One of the last pieces of our youth Maundy Thursday worship service. Prayer seems like an appropriate thing to do on this Holy Saturday. After washing the disciples feet, after eating the Last Supper, Jesus finds himself in the Garden of Gethsemane, doing what he often does: praying. He prays for us, his disciples, knowing […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Youth Ministry Tagged With: death, gethsemane, maundy thursday, prayer

A Maundy Thursday Meditation: The Last Supper

Last Updated April 10, 2009 by Matt 2 Comments

This is another part of our worship service from last night regarding the Last Supper. It seems fitting on this Good Friday. On this night we remember the meal that Jesus gave us, the meal that we celebrate every week. A piece of bread, a sip of wine. This is the body and blood of […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Youth Ministry Tagged With: death, last supper, maundy thursday

A Maundy Thursday Meditation: Washing One Another’s Feet

Last Updated April 9, 2009 by Matt Leave a Comment

I wrote the following for a portion of our youth’s Maundy Thursday worship service. We based the service off of Bonhoeffers famous quote, “When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die.” We tried as best we could to make the worship service feel like a funeral and tried to tie in the […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Youth Ministry Tagged With: bonhoeffer, death, foot washing, maundy thursday

Is the Financial Crisis the Church’s Fault?

Last Updated October 13, 2008 by Matt Leave a Comment

Tony Jones makes the comment that without a wide swath of our culture subscribing to Calvinism and the “protestant work ethic” free market economies are a thing of the past. Are free markets incompatible with secularism?  Is the only hope for the free markets a Third Great Awakening?  Or maybe the first Global Great Awakening? […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Ecclesiology, News Tagged With: economy

Theologically Vacuous Christian Advertising

Last Updated May 8, 2008 by Matt 2 Comments

Got a packet of advertisements in the mail at church yesterday. Two stood out: On the outside of the packet there was a teaser from a sign company: “The first step in growth? A quality church sign.” Then, on the real advertisement inside, it said: “This is the sign that reached the family and brought […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Random

Locution, Illocution, Perlocution, and Developmental Psychology: Age-Appropriate Cultural Texts

Last Updated May 6, 2008 by Matt Leave a Comment

More thoughts have been spurred by reading the opening essay by Kevin Vanhoozer in the book he recently edited: Everyday Theology: How to Read Cultural Texts and Interpret Trends. If you are familiar with Vanhoozer, you will know that the orienting metaphor he uses in his thought comes from speech-act theory which declares that when […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Theology, Youth Ministry

Jesus Made Me Puke

Last Updated April 30, 2008 by Matt Leave a Comment

Such is the title of a new article on Rolling Stone’s website; the full title is “Jesus Made Me Puke: Matt Taibbi Undercover with the Christian Right.” In the article, Taibbi goes undercover and attends a three-day retreat with Cornerstone Church in San Diego Antonio, the church of John Hagee. I always find it interesting […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Ecclesiology, News

The Narcissism of Christian Education

Last Updated February 27, 2008 by Matt 8 Comments

A fairly quick and random thought that I had during a worship service a few weeks ago: Christian education is narcissistic. Well, I guess I should qualify that. The current status and priority that we give to Christian education is narcissistic. When a Christian desires to “go deeper” in their faith or to become “closer […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Ecclesiology, Youth Ministry

Neo-Youth Ministry Interlude

Last Updated November 16, 2007 by Matt 2 Comments

Sorry to interrupt the regularly-scheduled Neo-Youth Ministry Series programming, but I wanted to address something about the series. You may notice I don’t talk about the Bible much in these posts. There is a reason for that. Quite simply, I’m trying to keep my posts fairly short. I want these to be able to be […]

Filed Under: Christianity, Neo-Youth Ministry, Theology, Youth Ministry

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Best Youth Ministry Books

These are the books that will completely change the way you think about youth ministry, for the better. Links are to my reviews of each book.

Teen 2.0 by Robert Epstein

A psychologist makes you question every assumption you have about adolescence.

Revisiting Relational Youth Ministry by Andrew Root

Why build relationships? Root’s answer will surprise you.

Best Youth Ministry Books: Youth Ministry 3.0 by Mark Ostreicher

Yesterday I finally read Youth Ministry 3.0 by Mark Ostreicher, and since I’m one of the latecomers to the conversation I won’t summarize the book too much. Marko has linked to tons of reviews on his blog if you are interested in more in-depth summaries. If you are fairly in-tune with a lot of the […]

Best Youth Ministry Books: Postmodern Youth Ministry

Postmodern Youth Ministry by Tony Jones is the book I would recommend to youth ministers if they could just read one youth ministry book. I first read the book in my Foundations and Practices of Youth Ministry class at John Brown University. After the preface to the book there is a page titled, “The Day […]

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