Congregationalism & Churches
Biblical Hebrew uses similar names for “vanity” and the slain brother. That’s no accident. “Meaningless! Meaningless!” So says Qohelet, the author of Ecclesiastes, as he begins his reflections. “Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.” For many, these words resound with a skeptical and, some may say, nihilistic tone. But must they? Russell L. Meek, a gifted… Read More
Denhollander and Russell Moore respond to the third-party investigation of sexual abuse in the SBC. Rachael Denhollander is horrified by the information inside the monumental third-party investigative report into sexual abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC). But she’s not surprised. “The most sobering part,” Denhollander tells CT public thologian Russell Moore, “is that we… Read More
Vol. 15 No. 8 Dear Friend, One of most beautiful things written about speech may be found in the Book of Proverbs: A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver [Pr 25:11 NIV]. Wow! To be able to say the right word, the helpful word, the encouraging, correcting, guiding, blessing… Read More
While Presbyterian Church in Taiwan has historic ties to the push for independence, most Chinese congregations in the US avoid highlighting the ongoing political polarization. As soon as they heard that a gunman attacked a Taiwanese church in California on Sunday, some Taiwanese correctly assumed political motives. The clash between the desire for Taiwan’s independence… Read More
Vol. 15 No. 9 Dear Friend, Sometimes we love changes in life… a newborn baby, a new season, a new friend. At other times we dislike change… something becomes different about a friend or our home or work or church that we preferred the way it was before. We embrace the changes we choose for… Read More
Baptism tallies, though, are beginning to recover from 2020’s pandemic plunge. The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) has lost over a million members in the past three years, with back-to-back years of the COVID-19 pandemic following a decade-plus of decline. Reported SBC membership fell to 13.7 million in 2021, its lowest tally in more than 40… Read More
Vol. 15 No. 10 Dear Friend, In this season of football playoffs, you can tune in and watch exceedingly strong men tossing each other around like so many toothpicks. Their strength is remarkable. Consider the various kinds of strength people have in addition to the strength of their physical bodies: strength of character,… Read More