My wife and I have been visiting with some various churches in our area. My main concern is not the preaching style on Sunday morning or what services they can offer me, my concern is finding a group of people who are actually interested in building relationships. Although, since Sunday mornings are very important to most, it would be nice to not be bored during the sermon. So, yesterday, while I was sitting, wondering where Preacher Joe was going with his sermon about why GM and Ford are failing, I came up with a great idea. Sitting there, with my “fill-in-the-blank” style outline, waiting in anticipation for the next word, I thought to myself… MAD LIBS! Think about how interested the church would be in the sermon, if we could fill in our own blanks!
Here is an example of what the outline COULD look like:
Sermon Outline Mad Lib
Here is what it would look like filled out (Thanks Alan for unknowingly fill in this mad-lib):
Sermon Outlin Mad Lib (filled)
I think this speaks for itself. You should expect to see Sermon Outlines in a Mad Lib format in a Church building near you!
I have a hypothetical situation/question for my readers:
Let’s talk about you. You are a “good” Christian. You read your Bible every morning and every evening before bed. Your pray before each meal asking God to bless the food. You talk about Jesus to the lost several times a week and try through Jesus to live a holy and pure life. You attend a regular church meeting a few times a week and even find time to minister and disciple people outside of the walls of the building. Your marriage is in great shape, your spouse loves and supports you. Your children are well discipline, get good grades and are all followers of Christ. You pray with your family daily and have weekly bible studies with them and your neighbors.
One night, you go to bed. Before bed you are burdened to pray. You pray extra long this night, making sure to pray for God’s will in your life. You pray for the health of your family, friends, neighbors, and enemies. You talk to God as if he were in front of you and were responding. As you are praying you fall asleep and have the most amazing and vivid dream. In this dream a man, who you recognize as Jesus (but looks nothing like the pictures) is standing before you. He is talking to you but his lips aren’t moving. You wake up the next morning to your alarm and feel completely rested. You are also overjoyed about your dream. Y try to remember everything that Jesus relayed to you but can only remember one thing – he told you that the book of Revelation is not Scripture.
Today a friend of mine sent me a link to Voddie Baucham’s blog post called “Call to Dunkirk“. The Call to Dunkirk is a call for all Christians to remove their children from public school and start homeschooling (or maybe private Christian schooling).
The video starts by comparing the U.S. Education system to Nazi Germany (hence the Call to Dunkirk a battle in World War II). The absurdity does not end there, these are my two favorite quotes from this video:
If you ask me, we need to march some more, and the first place we need march is right out the front door of those Christ-dishonoring, academically inferior, soul-killing government indoctrination centers… – Voddie Bauchman
First, referring to public schools as “academically inferior” is opinion at best… many brilliant people have come out of the public school system. Second, referring to public schools as “soul-killing government indoctrination centers” is hardly Chirst-honoring. I went to public school, my soul has not be “killed”. In fact, I was saved while I was in college.
the scripture unambiguously teach that theeducation of children belongs to the family with the assistance from the church, not government, particularly at the K-12 level… – E. Ray Moore
Moore is completely off on this. The Scriptures do not “unambiguously teach” this doctrine. In fact, the Scriptures never even mention K-12!
If I were to judge, strictly by this video, I would say that these people have a bigger problem with trust in God and Scriptural inerrancy than they do with public school. To me, this video does not portray the Love of Christ. It instills fear into the watcher – which is not from Christ. It is also judgmental and absurd in its logic.
Please share with me your thoughts on this video, whether you agree or disagree. I am not against home-schooling at all. I am against this extremist position that purports lies and fear, instead of love and fairness.
The way I see it there are three types of Christian counselors:
The first counselor blames all of your problems on you. You reap what you sow kind of counseling. Basically, if you have cancer, it is because you do not have enough faith, God is punishing you for something bad you’ve done, or some other weird scenario.
The second counselor tries to convince you that your problems are a test from God. They believe wholeheartedly that what is happening to you will teach you a moral lesson and that you should be happy that God has blessed you with your present misery.
The third counselor will tell you that your problems are not because of a previous sin, or because God is teaching you. Because you are living you deserve to suffer. Ultimately we were all born wicked, and therefore all deserve to suffer for it.
These three types of counselors are very commonplace. I have heard numerous stories about this. I am unsure of where it stems from, but I have a feeling it comes from education and not from love. What I mean is, you can easily learn in a Theology class that everything that happens to us is because we are sinful people… but you cannot learn in a Theology class how to love your brothers and sisters.
I would make a bad counselor because I admit that of these three, I cannot tell someone why they are having problems. What can I say? I can tell them that God loves them, I know that. I can tell them that God desires to strengthen his relationship with them, I know that. I can tell them that God is just and faithful, I know that. But I cannot tell them what I do not know. I do not know why they are in their present situation. I do not know if the situation was a result of their behavior, or is a test, or is a result of the human condition.
I would make a bad counselor because I do not have the answers, I only have faith.
We’ve forgotten that Job’s consolers did not have the answers either.
Alan Knox of The Assembling of the Church recently interviewed Frank Viola. Frank Viola is the author of the books, Pagan Christianity and Reimagining Church. I haven’t read Reimagining Church yet, but thought Pagan Christianity was a great book.
