Check out Justin Taylor’s recent interview with Os Guinness on the 25th Anniversary of Francis Schaeffer’s death: http://theologica.blogspot.com/2009/05/interview-with-os-guinness-on-25th.html.
I also recommend Guinness’ book review of Frank Schaeffer’s memoir, Crazy for God: http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2008/marapr/1.32.html.
A new article on The Briefing, Making Singleness Better, is well worth the read.
The column begins: “There are those who say that singleness is better, but unfortunately that is not the experience of many who have been single long-term. Tim Adeney looks at why, and what we can do to love and serve the single people in our churches.”
You can also read some of my thoughts on singleness at: https://joshberrus.wordpress.com/2008/04/22/some-thoughts-on-singleness/
I have been challenged by Dennis Okholm’s book Monk Habits for Everyday People where he challenges pastors toward solitude, listening, poverty (sharing the goods), obedience, humility, hospitality, stability (staying put to get somewhere), and balance (God in everything). By cultivating these disciplines, ministry leaders have great potential to change the world for Christ.
I’ve been especially blessed by chapter 8 considering the Benedictine monks who took a vow of stability to stay with one church community for life. This kind of consistency is rare for GenX who tend to lack commitment. I urge you to prayerfully read Okholm’s book as a reality check. It may help you re-think your future ministry.
Kevin Roose has written an interesting book, The Unlikely Disciple, about his experience going “undercover” as a student for one semester at Liberty University.
Check out J. D. Greear’s excellent book review at: http://betweenthetimes.com/2009/04/27/the-unlikely-disciple/.
Greear says, “It is worth reading just to see how we as Christians look to those on the ‘outside’, and to see what intelligent, articulate, surprisingly MORAL ‘unbelievers’ think about us.”
Nicholas Carr, author of the book The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google and the article Is Google Making Us Stupid? recently wrote a sobering blog post: Twitter dot dash.
Here are some highlights:
“Twitter unbundles the blog, fragments the fragment. It broadcasts the text message, turns SMS into a mass medium. And what exactly are we broadcasting? The minutiae of our lives. The moment-by-moment answer to what is, in Twitterland, the most important question in the world: What are you doing? Or, to save four characters: What you doing? Twitter is the telegraph of Narcissus. Not only are you the star of the show, but everything that happens to you, no matter how trifling, is a headline, a media event, a stop-the-presses bulletin. Quicksilver turns to amber.”
He goes on:
“The great paradox of ‘social networking’ is that it uses narcissism as the glue for ‘community.’ Being online means being alone, and being in an online community means being alone together. The community is purely symbolic, a pixellated simulation conjured up by software to feed the modern self’s bottomless hunger. Hunger for what? For verification of its existence? No, not even that. For verification that it has a role to play. As I walk down the street with thin white cords hanging from my ears, as I look at the display of khakis in the window of the Gap, as I sit in a Starbucks sipping a chai served up by a barista, I can’t quite bring myself to believe that I’m real. But if I send out to a theoretical audience of my peers 140 characters of text saying that I’m walking down the street, looking in a shop window, drinking tea, suddenly I become real. I have a voice. I exist, if only as a symbol speaking of symbols to other symbols.”
No generation has arrived. Every generation has gains and losses. I pray our generation will be prayerful, teachable, Scripture-centered, seeking counsel from ministry leaders who have paved the way, learning from history, and making greater strides for Christ in the decades ahead.
I recommend the following article by Nathan Akin: A Call for Foot Soldiers in a Great Commission Resurgence: The Positives and the Pitfalls for Young Leaders. A brief outline is below.
Positives of Young Leaders:
1. Energy and Creativity
2. Theological Renewal
3. A Missionaries’ Mindset
4. Expectancy
Pitfalls of Young Leaders:
1. Pride and Ageism
2. Follow through
3. Capitulation to Culture
4. Isolationist Attitude
5. Neglect of the Spiritual Disciplines
Here are some thoughts from John Stott on Self-Forgetfulness:
“If you look at yourself in the mirror, and listen to yourself on tape, or do both simultaneously on videotape, I fear you may find that you continue to look at yourself and listen to yourself when you are in the pulpit. In that case you will condemn yourself to the cramping bondage of preoccupation with yourself just at the time when, in the pulpit, it is essential to cultivate self-forgetfulness through a growing awareness of the God for whom and the people to whom you are speaking . . . I know actors make use of glass and tape, but preachers are not actors, nor is the pulpit at a stage. So beware! It may be more valuable to ask a friend to be candid with you about your voice and mannerisms, especially if they need correction. An Indian proverb says ‘He who has a good friend needs no mirror.’ Then you can be yourself and forget yourself.”
During Ligon Duncan’s sermon at The Gospel Coalition conference he quoted Spurgeon’s sermon on 2 Timothy 4:13 where Paul asks Timothy to bring him his books/parchments.
Here is a section from Spurgeon’s sermon:
“We do not know what the books were about, and we can only form some guess as to what the parchments were. Paul had a few books which were left, perhaps wrapped up in the cloak, and Timothy was to be careful to bring them. Even an apostle must read. . . . A man who comes up into the pulpit, professes to take his text on the spot, and talks any quantity of nonsense, is the idol of many. If he will speak without premeditation, or pretend to do so, and never produce what they call a dish of dead men’s brains—oh! that is the preacher. How rebuked are they by the apostle!
He is inspired, and yet he wants books!
He has been preaching at least for thirty years, and yet he wants books!
He had seen the Lord, and yet he wants books!
He had had a wider experience than most men, and yet he wants books!
He had been caught up into the third heaven, and had heard things which it was unlawful for a men to utter, yet he wants books!
He had written the major part of the New Testament, and yet he wants books!
The apostle says to Timothy and so he says to every preacher, ‘Give thyself unto reading.’ The man who never reads will never be read; he who never quotes will never be quoted. He who will not use the thoughts of other men’s brains, proves that he has no brains of his own.
Brethren, what is true of ministers is true of all our people. You need to read. Renounce as much as you will all light literature, but study as much as possible sound theological works, especially the Puritanic writers, and expositions of the Bible. We are quite persuaded that the very best way for you to be spending your leisure, is to be either reading or praying. You may get much instruction from books which afterwards you may use as a true weapon in your Lord and Master’s service. Paul cries, ‘Bring the books’—join in the cry.”
I thought I was the only Josh Berrus in the world, but found out today that there are over 40 guys on facebook with my name (with a slight spelling difference such as Burrus and Burris). One of them is a minor league baseball player. Pretty cool.
Joshua Von Burrus (born August 20, 1983 in Marietta, Georgia) is currently an outfielder for the Mississippi Braves in the Atlanta Braves farm system.
See more at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josh_Burrus
I hear reports on a regular basis of ministry friends, pastors, leaders, and spiritual heroes falling into sin and wandering from the faith. We are to mourn, be broken over sin, and prioritize prayer. But even while grieving, we must not overreact to circumstances like most do, but rather live with priorities and keep our eyes on Jesus. Furthermore, we must not grow cold-hearted and numb. We are not to write people off and give up on them. Ministry requires getting our hands dirty. Charles H. Spurgeon said, “A church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.” May we be humble, repentant, broken over our personal sins and the sins of others, speak truth in love, encourage and build others up, and pray for restoration.
I heard Al Mohler speak at the SBC convention this summer concerning the scope of evangelical Christianity in today’s culture. Mohler claims that we live in a time where it doesn’t take long to see who is all about Jesus and who is not. Those who truly stand for Christ are swimming against the tide. Jesus said that the road to heaven is narrow and few find it.
Let’s be faithful, pray for one another, and fix our eyes on Christ!
Josh's Blog 