Against the overwhelming weight and seriousness of the Bible, much of the church is choosing, at this very moment, to become more light and shallow and entertainment-oriented, and therefore successful in its irrelevance to massive suffering and evil. The popular God of fun-church is simply too small and too affable to hold a hurricane in [...]
Archive for the ‘contextualization’ Category
The Popular God of Fun-Church
Posted in Christ and Culture, John Piper, contextualization, irrelevance, suffering on August 1, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
A Peaceful Union
Posted in East and West, God of All Nations, Sir William Ramsay, contextualization on June 15, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Christianity is the religion which associates East and West in a higher range of thought than either can reach alone, and tends to substitute a peaceful union for the war into which the essential difference of Asiatic and European character too often leads the two continents.
–Sir William Ramsay
The Letters to the Seven Churches (1904, p. [...]
The Word Became Flesh
Posted in Incarnation, John Stott, contextualization, inspiration of Scripture on March 17, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Essentially the same principle is illustrated in both the inspiration of the Scripture and the incarnation of the Son. The Word became flesh. The divine was communicated through the human. He identified with us, though without surrendering His own identity. And this principle of “identification without loss of identity” is the model for all evangelism, [...]
God’s Condescension
Posted in Incarnation, John Stott, contextualization on March 17, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
What strikes us immediately is the greatness of God’s condescension. He had sublime truth to reveal about Himself and His Christ, His mercy and His justice, and His full salvation. And He chose to make this disclosure through the vocabulary and grammar of human language, through human beings, human images, and human cultures.
–John Stott
The Bible [...]
Guard and Interpret
Posted in John Stott, contextualization on March 17, 2008 | 1 Comment »
Since [the gospel] comes from God we must guard it; since it is intended for modern men and women we must interpret it.
–John Stott
The Bible in World Evangelization
(Perspectives Reader p. 23)
