#evangelism training

[vince700]

Do we know ourselves like God does

1. Jesus shows the rich young ruler that he does not know himself. Jesus reveals that he is comparing himself with others but not comparing himself with God. The ten commandments only reveal that we all fall short of God’s righteousness. 2. The young rich man did not understand who Jesus the Eternal King of Kings was, so he was not willing to sell all he had and followed Jesus. No one has…

[mothofmany]

tw ramcoa

To Train Up a Child is TBMC

To Train Up a Child is TBMC

To Train Up a Child is TBMC

To Train Up a Child is TBMC

[menlove]

have to do a paper focusing on modern religion instead of religious/cultural history i have suffered more than jesus

[obrother1976]

about to read "to train up a child". this blog is gonna be insane soon.

[pastored123]

The Decency of Christ: An Assessment from the Mount

Here’s the last chapter excerpt before my new book, The Decency of Christ, is completed. I can’t wait to share it with you this Summer. Chapter 5 An Assessment from the Mount Let’s be honest; not everyone who identifies as a faithful husband or wife is one. Everyone who claims to be counted on in a crisis can be genuinely depended on. If you are a parent with teenagers who profess their dying…

[asterisk-666666]

it’s terrible but funny seeing how many problems have been caused by nerds trying to gatekeep “nerdy” topics and extrapolating to terrible and bizarre political extremes (see Yarvin and Thiel).

meanwhile electric trains are anything but gatekept and still remain incurably nerdy in the Anglophone world. Just not something the algorithm pushes or that there’s much glamorized media for general public about. But then they’re so well documented and sources that do exist are all written by people who are electrical engineers, have worked with them for 30+ years, or have a PhD or close alignment with elite universities. Media that seriously discusses them is so slop-free it’s weirdly impressive, because they are the perfect mix of alien and unknowable to most but also 100+ year old tech that isn’t as “cool” anymore

[catenary-chad]

I joke about how I take the show way too seriously and have stupid political power fantasies about Electra but man

the weird erasure of US electric train history is such a great case study in anti-intellectualism and the irrationality of capitalism and privatization in such eerily relevant ways. And the amazing thing is that it actually is VERY well documented. There’s lots of good, detailed sources on it, you just have to go out of your way to find them and often shell out for older books or do some serious digging online because it’s such an “unsexy” and perpetually truly nerdy topic the algorithm doesn’t really push it.

I still don’t think it was deliberately suppressed vs just kind of ignored for being slow burn and not very charismatic vs steam engines but man it’s just so politically convenient to hide.

anyways 47 is a nightmare but when people joke about him reviving the show at the Kennedy Center I think about how he’d say the quietest parts out really loud and probably make the most thematically compelling version of the show ever. There’s no way he wouldn’t double down on the regressive pro-coal orange train crying about being surpressed by the “conservative establishment train” and “liberal agenda train” and weaponizing emotional appeal against intellectual sense

[an-unanonymous-messenger]

Here's a little message for all of those who are beginning to evangelise. You may not like it, but it is something to look out for. God bless!

[pastorjeremynorton]

Bridging the Gap Between Discipleship and Leadership Development

Is something missing in your church’s leadership? Discipleship alone isn’t enough. Discover how bridging the gap with mentorship and practical leadership training can transform your church’s future. #ChurchLeadership #Discipleship #Mentorship #Faith

Discovering the Missing Piece in Church Leadership Have you ever felt like something was missing in your church’s approach to leadership? If you were raised in an evangelical church, there was likely Biblical teaching, programs for all ages, and a strong focus on the Gospel—a standard discipleship model in Western Christianity. However, a crucial difference has emerged between discipleship and…

[souvlakicokane]

of all the aspects of ftm-ery there are 2 criticize dumb raddies rlly act like testosterone use is 9/11 as if plenty of men and women don’t moderately and safely use steroids

[i-will-not-be-caged]

Just saw the phrase “take your thoughts captive” and threw up a little in my mouth

[thegreenmeridian]

Idk lads I think what really makes me insane is like. There are sensible people, who will see a US media article about Black People Do Crime or a British media article about Trans People Are Perverts and think to themselves “hmm, the heavily ingrained societal bias is influencing the media reporting and a lot of these sources are from organisations like Protect the Whites/Radfem-Evangelical Alliance”.

These same people will see articles from Qatari state media or wherever else and go “if this article is using National Jew Murder Society as a source, the reports of Israel committing a genocide and training dogs to rape prisoners must be true and definitely aren’t at all influenced by millennia of the Christian and Muslim world’s most intensely ingrained bigotry”.

There’s just… there’s no thought, no hint of a musing, that maybe, just maybe, the vitriolic hate aimed at the one Jewish nation on earth might possibly be influenced by antisemitism. There’s no thought at all that maybe sources need checking, maybe a country that categorically refuses to extradite known war criminals isn’t the best judge of war crimes, maybe a dictatorship that had “genocide the Jews” as a stated goal might not be a reliable source of statistics.

Not a single bloody thought. Not one brain cell is firing to say “Jew hatred is so deeply ingrained in my culture, maybe this is a factor in what people are saying and what I’m willing to believe”.

There is so much about all this that is making me lose my damn mind but this particular flavour of hypocrisy is one of the worst.

[drdemonprince]

The New Atheist Movement posited that the greatest source of oppression and needless harm on the planet is the presence of people holding incorrect beliefs -- rather than understanding that structural abuses such as enslavement, assault, and war are caused by capitalist and colonialist incentives, which have often been justified and carried about by The Church, they located the problem in the The Church and its adherents' inaccurate worldviews. Because they lacked a decolonial frame, they had no reason to distinguish between the abuses of, say, the Catholic Church and the actions of a handful of CIA-trained operatives who happened to be Muslim, and blamed everything from the 9/11 attacks to the ritualistic abuses of young women in Evangelical Churches on the adherence to "religion." The damage wasn't the power that the US, its proxies, and its colonialst forebears held, or the greed that drove their plundering of the world; the problem was that people were foolish and superstitious and did harm wantonly because a Sky Man told them to. And so, in this worldview, the only solution to abuse and the only way to set the world straight is for individuals to stop thinking wrongly and to start thinking correctly -- meaning rationally, which of course, as Atheists, they believed they had the best authority to define. And that's what's really wrong with the New Atheist Movement and its offshoots -- because many of the points they make about religion, especially structural religion, actually could have some merit if they were more economically and politically literate when it comes to who wields power and why they wield it the ways they do. But instead of working to dismantle unjust systems of power and decolonize, the New Atheists believed it was their ethical duty to just argue with people and make them think more "rationally" or whatever on an individualistic level, which is more than just useless, it's liberal and often plays out in downright colonial ways itself.

[pastored123]

Christianity’s Version of D.E.I

Chapter 14 excerpt from my new book, Turning Around Christianity. Christianity’s Version of DEI By: Ed Schneider, MPTh Here’s a general overview of the historical premise of this chapter’s subtitle acronym, D.E.I. During the 1960s of the American experiment, a major cultural shift began tangible remediation attempts concerning social, racial, and institutional bias and formidable bigotry. At…

[nerdygaymormon]

Matt Bowman says that the LDS Church is sometimes critiqued for its conformity, but he thinks there are different ways of understanding the faith, different emphases and different visions of what the church might be. And these will be seen at General Conference.

Matt doesn't think that these various visions of what the church might be are mutually exclusive, and he thinks the leaders he names as the most emblematic of each vision of what the church can be would say that actually they’d identify with two or three or all of the categories.

By thinking about the influence of these leaders and these different approaches, perhaps we also can get a glimpse of where the LDS Church might move in the future.

The Church of Effort

President Russell M. Nelson’s sermons consistently have emphasized effort, trying harder, doing better, “thinking celestial.” His most controversial sermon links divine blessings to human behavior and argues that the fulness of those blessings derives from doing what's right. It's an appeal to reach our divine potential through proper belief and right behavior. Of course, it also presumes that humans can, theoretically, always choose to do right.

The Church of Natural Law

The idea behind natural law is that God created a universe which functions through knowable principles that could be learned by scientific investigation as well as divine revelation. That investigation would reveal a natural order of things built into the fabric of the world itself. As humans learn that order, they can conform to it and be happy.

Dallin H. Oaks, first counselor in the church’s governing First Presidency, has a reputation as perhaps the most consistent defender of “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” among the current general authorities. That document is steeped in the language of natural law. It does not merely state that God prefers human families to function in a certain way; it argues that, in fact, the universe is set up such that families who function in that way will thrive while those who do not will struggle.

For Oaks, a lawyer by training, these sorts of arguments, with their if-then constructions, their neat definition of terms, and their rational procession, are irresistible. He speaks of principles and rules, the comprehensible structure of a universe that functions according to clear law.

“To understand the teachings and examples of our Savior, we must understand the nature of God’s love and the eternal purpose of his laws and commandments,” Oaks teaches. “One does not replace or diminish the other.”

The Church of Grace

The idea here is that divine grace is not something earned but rather a gift that can bridge the gaps of human frailty and heal human weakness. President Emily Belle Freeman, head of the global Young Women organization, is the Latter-day Saint leader most fluent in this dialect. Her career before becoming a church officer was built on interfaith dialogue with evangelicals, and her writing and teachings are drenched with evangelical idioms — not merely in content but also in style. She calls for a personal relationship with Christ that provides healing, advances spiritual power and comes in great abundance. She speaks the language of dramatic intensity characteristic of Protestant evangelicals but increasingly appealing to Latter-day Saints who turn to their faith for aid in overcoming challenges.

“In that place where you feel bound, plead for his grace. Trust that it is available in abundance,” Freeman teaches. “Jesus Christ sees you. He can help you overcome.”

The Church of Community

This is a vision of the church that emphasizes its communal aspects. To be a member is, in part, to take the sacramental bread and water on Sundays, but most of all to look after each other by contributing labor and resources to the well-being of the community, such as visiting people in the hospital or those who are lonely.

The titles of three of apostle Gerrit W. Gong’s recent conference addresses share a similar focus on the church as a community of mutual care. In April 2021, he spoke on “Room in the Inn,” analogizing the church to the inns of the New Testament. There he asked members to “make [the Lord’s] inn a place of grace and space, where each can gather, with room for all.” In October 2023, he elaborated on the lyrics to the hymn “Love Is Spoken Here,” describing the ideal ward as a place where love is evident through service. That April, in a talk called “Ministering,” he stated “think of your ward or branch as a spiritual ecosystem.” For Gong, the church is a series of bound covenant relationships among humans as much as between humans and God. He emphasizes the social aspects of religious life, seeing salvation coming through bonds with one another.

[iplaywithstring]

I've been having some Thoughts lately regarding the whole tradwife rightwing pipeline thing.

For context, I am an elder millennial. I grew up during in the midst of evangelical purity culture. I had a TrueLoveWaits bible. I was part of an evangelical church and went to university to become a minister. I knew people whose first kiss was "you may now kiss the bride".

My husband and I married in 2005 - it caused a stir because I was training to be a minister and my husband wasn't. Which meant I was going to hold a higher position in the church than he was. I was told not to apply for jobs in certain areas.

I had multiple meetings evaluating me for ordination in which I was asked if pursuing ordination was "part of a feminist agenda".

Outside of church life, I was a feminist. I was raised by feminists. My aunt is on lists somewhere. My dad is a feminist. I was getting very conflicting messages is what I'm saying.

In 2006 I had my first kid, and while on maternity leave (up to a year long in Canada!) I realized - due to the above and MANY other reasons - that I couldn't be a minister. My theology had shifted. It wasn't going to work.

At the time, tradwives as they are now were just starting to take shape. There was a push within evangelical churches to "go back to basics". It was tied up with prosperity gospel - if you could afford a good life on one income, it meant you were blessed and God liked you better, right?

and I have to admit I tried. I was already feeling like I had done something horrible by abandoning my "calling". And I was already staying at home. I tried to submit. My husband is deeply egalitarian, we were both miserable and felt like we were failing. I wasn't good at it which had a really negative effect on my sense of self.

I had always intended to work though - before I'd gone on maternity leave I made more money than my husband, and neither of us minded. While on leave I got pregnant again. Ok, stay home another year or two, saves on childcare cost, and then figure out what's next.

That's when the "you're wasting your time/brain/education" stuff started. I was told I was setting a horrible example for my children. Then I became chronically ill and could not work. I was told by other women - other mothers - that taking time off to raise my kids and be at home was antifeminist and letting the patriarchy win. I was told I wasn't valued as a mother.

Then there were all the concerns - you don't have income? What if your husband cheats/lies/dies? You'll be one of those welfare moms. At that point I could not work - I was sleeping up to 20 hours a day, trying to manage debilitating pain and chronic illness. Nothing I did was good enough. And I was scared about being on a single income. We were not one of those "blessed" families. One year our net income was 24k - for a family of 4! It was hard, but we kept food in the fridge and a roof over our heads. It was enough. But I wasn't enough, I was doing it wrong.

Now I'm almost 42. My daughter is in university. My husband makes a lot more money. My health has stabilized and I went back to work in 2022. I'm finishing a master's program and I'll be working more next year. Our finances are stable, and if I needed to, I could live independently (I'd have to stop school to do it and working full time would wreck my health, but hey, we don't think about that part because capitalism....).

I still feel like I'm not good enough for either world - I failed at being a tradwife and at being a feminist, depending on who you talk to.

Except that's wrong. I did not fail at anything. I navigated a lot of challenges and found a solution that worked, I created stability for my family and I found a way to achieve things I'm proud of.

I don't know if I really have a point here, except maybe things aren't quite so binary as we tend to think. People don't always get to choose their circumstances, and where someone is at one point might not be where they end up. I didn't need the (I'm sure well meaning) women pushing me down when I was in a hard spot. It didn't help, and it didn't make me want to join with them.