Food For Thought: Getting Back In The Swing Edition
Every week here at Pursuing Glory I try to bring together the best posts I’ve found that will equip the end-times church to operate in her God-ordained destiny. These are the best blogs, articles, books and other resources related to our purpose here at this site. Feel free to visit, comment, and make use of the resources found at each site.
This week marks the return of me to blogging after letting that part of my life slide for a few weeks. I’ve had a chance to hang out with some of the coolest people who aren’t part of our house church recently. However that time spent has taken me away from writing, so I’m going to try and get back in the swing of things. This post represents the best posts from the last few weeks. Enjoy!
I think that Jesus is most frequently the part of community that we leave out when we begin to discect a Christian community. Alan writes about Jesus’ centrality in a way that makes his whole discussions on the elements of a church more palatable than most similar discussions.
Two Vital Needs of Every Disciple
One of the things that gets left out of most discussions about discipleship is the necessity of being able to make other disciples. Here Ray writes about the paradox of following Jesus and leading others into following Him.
Change the Atmosphere, Change the Culture
One of the shifts that I’ve seen help people move from a static church mindset into a movement mindset is discovering the spirit of multiplication that the apostles walked in. Here J.D. talks about how that happens with a group people who currently have no vision for reproducing churches.
One of the common misconceptions in the body of Christ is that house churches in the third world are effective because persecution happening around them fuels evangelism and discipleship. Actually persecution causes the church to return to her organic roots and when she does that, she spreads quickly and naturally.
With the house church movement in the United States as new as it is, little has been written about what mature house church networks look like. This post has an incredible visual that says volumes about how a network of house churches can function interdependently.
Photo Credit: Design Probes – Food for Thought by centralasian.
The Wayback Machine: February
Some things just get better with age. “The Wayback Machine” posts occur at the end of every month and reference the best posts of that month in years past. My hope is to provide a good jumping on point for readers who have never been to Pursuing Glory.
2009
Back in 2009, my good friend Dick Speight rolled out the first of many books that the Lord has put in him. He offered me the great joy of writing a foreword for the book. So when the book hit the shelves in February, I gave a little background on Dick and shared my recommendation for the book. It’s still a great book that will help many draw away and experience Jesus’ love. I encourage you not just to read the post but to think about picking up a copy.
2007
The House Church We’ve All Been Waiting For
This post was more of a report about what was going on in our house church during its very early stages. You can tell we’ve definitely progressed beyond some of the issues listed here, but the point is that we were actually meeting God like we intended to. Check this post out for a glimpse into the good and the bad of what we were early on.
This post was a short attempt to sum up where I was feeling the Lord take us three weeks in to our house church. Four years later, much has changed but so much is still the same. It’s clear looking back, I wasn’t just trying to start a house church, I was hoping for true apostolic Christianity to emerge. We’re still contending for that to this day.
Food For Thought: More Media and Crowdsourcing Edition
Every week here at Pursuing Glory I try to bring together the best posts I’ve found that will equip the end-times church to operate in her God-ordained destiny. These are the best blogs, articles, books and other resources related to our purpose here at this site. Feel free to visit, comment, and make use of the resources found at each site.
Last week I talked about some of the other media out there that I’ve been thinking about including. I had some good response on some of the content that I added, so I will continue to add more as it becomes available. I also thought it would be a great idea to let you (the reader) suggest other material of similar content out there for us here at the blog to use. If you have suggestions, leave them in the comment section. And now to this week’s links:
Jackie Pullinger: The Sign of the Cross
How does the reality of Jesus’s death on the cross and His call to us to die to ourselves affect our idea of God’s mission on the planet? Kieth @ Subversive1 reposts this transcription of a fantastic message by Jackie.
Vision, Intention, and Means is the topic of this post on how human beings change. While spiritual growth is always a work of the Spirit, it’s amazing how many Christians ignore the human fundamentals of change that allow them to cultivate the working of the Spirit. Len takes snippets from a Dallas Willard article to look at the process.
Barney’s 10 Commandments for Reluctant Evangelists
Barney’s “commandments” are methods of human change applied to the subject of evangelism. If you really haven’t thought about what practical changes you need to make in becoming someone who reaches lost people, check out this post.
What is the Purpose of the Five-Fold Ministry
The five-fold ministry is designed by Jesus to reproduce an aspect of Jesus into His body. Felicity is right on in this article. Many of us cling to only one or two of these giftings which greatly hinders our transformation into a Kingdom people.
Encountering Heaven Part I by Shawn Bolz
This is an audio recording from 2005 where Shawn Bolz discusses the nature of heavenly encounters and their worth in transforming the body of Christ. If you’ve never had a lot of exposure to prophetic encounters, this will be a wild ride for you.
Photo Credit: Design Probes – Food for Thought by centralasian.
Cluster Map
Pursuing Glory 