Darryl Dash's Blog, page 84

Preaching to a Post-Everything World

It’s overwhelming sometimes.

I pastor in one of the most secular cities in North America. I face questions I couldn’t have imagined when I started pastoring. My friends who pastor in other communities not far from here tell me that I may as well be on a different continent because things are so different.

Don’t get me wrong. I love it. I also suspect that some of my friends will find that our secularism is coming their way. It’s why we need a book like Zack Eswine’s Preaching to a Post-Everyt...

Saturday Links

Links for your weekend reading:

What Is the [Functional] Great Commission of Your Church?

At the end of the day, it’s about this: Real Church Growth = Organized Disciple-Making.

Are We Making Jesus Famous or Just Trying to Make Him Sexy?

Making Jesus famous is more than affirming Gospel facts or emphasizing excellence in church services.

Six Reasons You Should “Go” to Church

I’m still “all in” for church attendance, and I think you should be, too.

5 Reasons the Ordinary Means Are Extraordinar...

How to Grow Giveaway

Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers.

No regular post today, but I am giving away 3 copies of my book How to Grow this weekend. Enter below for a chance to win before midnight on Monday (EST). The contest is open to anyone in Canada or the United States. Enjoy!

The post How to Grow Giveaway appeared first on DashHouse.

Tincture

When Thomas Boston wrestled with a set of theological issues, it changed his ministry. “These things, in these days, while I was in the Merse, gave my sermons a certain tincture, which was discerned; though the Marrow, from whence it sprang, continued in utter obscurity.”

In The Whole Christ, Sinclair Ferguson comments:

I hope it will become clear throughout these pages what this tincture was. There is a perennial need for it in the ministry of the gospel. It is not linked to a particular per...

Saturday Links

Links for your weekend reading:

Choosing Church

There are lots of reasons to avoid church, but here are the reasons to look again.

Local Church, Healthy Partnerships and Sin

The best reasons I need healthy partnerships are to avoid sin and for the gospel.

Eleven Ways Christians Can Love One Another

Here are 11 pithy suggestions for loving one another in the church. I find them helpful. Maybe you will too.

Ecclesiology Matters. Especially for Elders.

Perhaps we think unity on ecclesiology is s...

Learning to Be Content

I’ll admit it: I sometimes struggle with discontentment. It’s why I include a prayer for contentment in my prayer list. I could be more gifted. My church could be more successful. I could have more money. We — especially those who are leaders — live in the land of more. There’s never enough.

But I recently heard Ed Stetzer say that he sometimes wished he was a simple church planter. Ed Stetzer, the Billy Graham Chair of Evangelism at Wheaton, a sought-after speaker, author, and pastor, someti...

It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Church

I forget where I read it, but I’ve found it to be true: pastors tend to be either too busy or too lazy. That’s why I pay attention to pastors who work hard, but then know how to take time off. I haven’t found too many of them.

I had coffee with a pastor last year. I showed up late, having crammed my schedule too full with meetings. He waited patiently. “I don’t work too hard,” he said. He spoke of sloth or acedia, one of the seven deadly sins, not just as laziness but as an inclination to get...

Saturday Links

Links for your weekend reading:

Where to Find Hope and Help amid the Sexual Revolution

I want to suggest at least four changes that account for how our culture has come to this moment, and then propose seven ways in which we can respond.

Preaching a Church Toward Mission

The motivation of grace better triggers a church’s impulse for gospel mission.

Why You Should Consider Reading the Bible Chronologically

One increasingly popular approach is chronological. This plan takes you through the Bibl...

A Letter From a Friendly Skeptic

This isn’t the kind of thing that I usually post. It may or may not be a real letter. Regardless, I think it makes a few good points.

Here it is without any further comment.

A church is in the news because of a church discipline case. They have the audacity to insist that their members hold to the beliefs and practices that the church — not only this one but the universal Church — has always held.

But that’s not all. I did some digging on their website, and discovered that this church discip...

Out of Step

I spent the weekend thinking about two men whose lives and ministries stayed out of step with our times.

Fred Rogers Fred Rogers

I finally got around to watching Won’t You Be My Neighbor? It’s a documentary about Fred Rogers, the quirky children’s television star who created and starred in Mister Roger’s Neighborhood from 1968 to 2001. Behind his quirkiness, Fred Rogers held to fierce theological convictions: the importance of love, the dignity of every human being, and the value of children....