Series: Blogs

Silence and Socializing

By Jim Tune Susan Cain, in her best-selling book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can”t Stop Talking, says at least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who generally prefer listening to speaking, who innovate and create but dislike self-promoting, and who favor working on their own over working in teams. Cain argues that we undervalue introverts and shows how much we lose in doing so. There is a certain inner work we can do only by ourselves, alone, in silence. Meister Eckhart helps us understand that when he asserts, “Nothing

May 26, 2015

Culture & Public Square

“Fewer Christians in the U.S.” Good News?

By Mark A. Taylor News outlets across the country reported the Pew Research Center”s findings that fewer Americans than ever are calling themselves Christians. Most secular reports led with the summary statistic, that only 70.6 percent of adults in the United States identified themselves as Christians in 2014, compared with 78.4 percent in 2007. Meanwhile, the “nones,” those who claim no religious affiliation, increased by about 19 million. The Pew study projects that 56 million American adults, almost 23 percent of the total adult population, say they have no religion. Christian writers tried to find a positive spin in the

May 20, 2015

Church Leadership

The Myth of the Supreme Leader

By Jim Tune In 2007 a Southern California woman named Jacqueline Gagne claimed she made 16 holes in one””10 of them in less than a four-month period. A statistician determined the odds of that occurring to be 12 septillion to 1. As far-fetched as that sounds, Gagne holds nothing on Kim Jong-il, the former “Supreme Leader” of North Korea. During his reign as the unchallenged leader of the secretive nation, Kim, according to official North Korean state media reports, routinely shot three or four holes in one per round of golf. But Kim”s greatest feat occurred the very first day

May 19, 2015

Culture & Public Square

Considering Ourselves Amid the Decline of Mainline Churches

My Mark A. TaylorÂ If you think religion in America is claiming less loyalty than ever, the latest data released by the Pew Research Center will affirm your concern. At the same time, it offers a few morsels of encouragement for Evangelicals, who seem not to be losing as much ground as mainline Protestants and Catholics. America”s Changing Religious Landscape, based on more than 35,000 extensive phone interviews with adults in all 50 states, summarizes the situation this way: “The Christian share of the U.S. population is declining, while the number of U.S. adults who do not identify with any

May 13, 2015

Tables of Grace

By Jim Tune God has a thing for tables, and many of us can understand why. The Scriptures are full of stories of people meeting around tables and of relationships being formed and strengthened in that space. We resonate with these experiences. In my own life, the best moments with family have taken place around the kitchen table, visiting or enjoying a meal. The table is a place where we can be fully present with one another and develop deeper community. The psalmist connected God with the table in a familiar passage: “You prepare a table before me in the

May 12, 2015

Church & Ministry Church Growth

Weighing the Numbers

By Mark A. Taylor Don”t tell a numbers guy you”re not interested in numbers! You may risk seeing the seething side of a fellow you thought was a mild-mannered researcher! Maybe I”m exaggerating, but it was quite clear to me from correspondence with Kent Fillinger, compiler of our annual “numbers” report, that he wasn”t happy. At issue was the decision by more than one Christian church or church of Christ not to participate in this year”s survey. Their stated reasons sound lofty. “We don”t want to compare ourselves with others.” “Our ministry is about so much more than numbers.” But

May 6, 2015

Culture & Public Square Race

In All Things Love

By Jim Tune There”s a scene in Mark Twain”s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn I will never forget. Huck Finn has helped hide Miss Watson”s runaway slave, Jim. But Huck was sure he was committing a grave sin in helping the fugitive. Huck had learned in Sunday school, “People that acts as I”d been acting . . . goes to everlasting fire.” Eventually Huck writes a note to Miss Watson as an act of repentance. Desperate to save his soul, he tells her where to find her runaway slave. Huck prays the “sinner”s prayer” and “gets saved.” Even though he

May 5, 2015

Age-old

By Mark A. Taylor Let me tell you about my new best friend, Bob. Bob”s the guy from the other end of the office who paused last week beside my cubicle, festooned with “Happy Birthday” banners and a big, red “65” in the middle of the display. Bob said, “Hey, wait a minute!” I looked up from my desk and smiled. “This isn”t real, right? This is a joke, right?” He was completely sincere. This fine man couldn”t believe I was celebrating the welcome-to-Medicare birthday. I”m not sure his reaction is due principally to the fact that he doesn”t wear

April 29, 2015

Human

By Jim Tune In C.S. Lewis”s book The Magician”s Nephew, readers meet an unsavory character named Uncle Andrew, who consistently displays an arrogance that causes him to distance himself from others, view them with contempt, and attempt to use them for his own purposes. Near the end of the book, when Uncle Andrew encounters things he can”t fathom or explain (like talking animals) he descends into insanity. Aslan and the other animals are speaking to him in plain English, but he can”t understand a word. All he hears are roars and growls, and he is terrified. Finally, he loses his

April 28, 2015

Church & Ministry Leadership Development

Listening to Lead

By Mark A. Taylor Maybe you”ve seen this happen at your company. The business has been sold. The new bosses arrive, and they”re very confident they know how to run the show. If they didn”t think they could do it better than the last guys they wouldn”t have forked over all that money to buy the operation. So they wade in with firm goals and bold plans to take the business forward. In the process, these new managers announce “new ideas” with the explanation, “This has never been tried here before.” But even though the long-timers watching from the shadows

April 22, 2015

Culture & Public Square Justice

World on Trial

By Jim Tune Henri Nouwen tells about a doctor in Paraguay who spoke out against the oppressive tyranny of the government. The local police took revenge against him by arresting his teenage son and torturing the boy to death. It was a brutal and senseless murder. The boy”s courageous father responded with the most powerful protest imaginable. At the funeral, the father did not have his son”s body cleaned up and embalmed. Instead, he displayed it as he found it in the jail: naked, scarred, twisted, with open wounds from the beatings and burns from cigarette butts. All the villagers

April 21, 2015

Church & Ministry Leadership Development

Heartfelt Leadership

By Mark A. Taylor When you go to a conference for church leaders, you expect to come home with a folder full of methods, strategies, and tactics for growing your church. This is especially true when a megachurch minister is the keynote speaker. What secrets does he know about growing a church? What”s working in today”s culture? What approaches are guaranteed to bring success? What techniques have been most effective where he serves? But when Aaron Brockett kicked off the Intentional Church Conference at First Christian Church, Decatur, Illinois, last week, he didn”t talk about methods at all. Or numbers.

April 15, 2015

Worship Worship & Prayer

Attracted to the Mystery, Amazed by the Beauty

By Jim Tune It was just another busy lunch hour in the food court. Then a young woman with a cell phone pressed to her ear stood up and began to sing “hallelujah.” While shoppers were trying to figure out what was going on, the first singer was joined by a man who, moments earlier, had been eating his Arby”s sandwich. Then a mall custodian joined the chorus. Suddenly all 80 voices of the Chorus Niagara were performing a magnificent rendition of George Frederic Handel”s masterpiece, the “Hallelujah Chorus.” The shoppers in the food court at Seaway Mall November 13,

April 14, 2015

Miscellaneous

Finding Our Place, Claiming Our Heritage

By Mark A. Taylor Talk to Mike Baker and you”ll discover a guy who”s serious about his work while not taking himself too seriously at all. In fact, in our latest episode of Beyond the Standard, Baker used the word unfortunate to describe the “celebrity culture” in today”s church climate. “There are a lot of great preachers and leaders in churches of 150 and 200 who in their part of the world are really doing great things for God and for his kingdom,” he said. “But they”re just not ever going to get the accolades” that often come to leaders

April 8, 2015

Church & Ministry Church Growth

Measure Up?

By Jim Tune In church circles, we talk about the three B”s: budgets, butts, and buildings. I get it. These are standard ways of determining success in most ministries because they are tangible and easy to measure. I”d like to suggest some additional metrics we might apply to our effectiveness. Let me pose them as a series of questions: “¢ Are people”s gifts and talents being drawn out of them and used to extend grace and encouragement to others? “¢ Are we pursuing justice and standing on the side of the oppressed? “¢ Are we increasingly willing to give a

April 7, 2015

Ethics & Moral Issues Sexuality

A Middle Ground in the Religious Freedom Debate

By Mark A. Taylor Does any Christian, in the name of religious freedom, really want the right to refuse service to a gay or lesbian? I doubt it. Christian restaurant owners, gas station operators, and Wal-Mart managers have been doing business with gays and lesbians for years, without a problem. The issue isn”t service“”whether I”ll fix a grilled cheese sandwich for a hungry gay guy or sell a dress to a lesbian she”ll wear at her wedding. The issue is endorsement. No one does a morality check before someone enters his business. Every day Christians do business with adulterers, fornicators,

April 1, 2015

Church & Ministry Church Leadership Preaching

Preaching from the Bible and the Heart

By Jim Tune Many debate the level of vulnerability preachers should exercise from the pulpit. If you share too much, you risk sounding self-absorbed. If you never share any personal stories, you may appear inauthentic or aloof. My experience is that most audiences embrace people who are willing to share their story, particularly those parts that reveal the preacher as an imperfect person, with whom others can identify. To be clear, I”m not suggesting this as an “approach” to preaching. Nor should it be considered a public speaking “method.” If vulnerability in the pulpit is contrived, a perceptive congregation will

March 31, 2015

Care & Counseling Grief & Suffering

Resurrection Promise, Hope in Our Pain

By Mark A. Taylor Some preachers choose Mary as the subject for a Christmas sermon, but I”m guessing we”ve never heard an Easter sermon about the mother of Jesus. There”s good reason for this, I suppose, because Scripture barely mentions her in one crucifixion account, and omits her by name altogether in the resurrection stories. But the certain fact that she was there when Jesus died (John 19:25-27) is enough for painters and storytellers and moviemakers to include her, watching and weeping, in their crucifixion portrayals. The Scripture doesn”t describe her anguish or her tears, but we have no trouble

March 25, 2015