How would you summarize the Gospel today? In your church planting and leading people to Christ for conversion and baptism, what message do you share with people so they can know the Good News of Jesus?

I appreciate the elaboration since there are so many ‘evangelical’ notions of the Gospel circulating these days, and of course there is only one true Gospel given to the apostles in the Great Commission for us to witness to the ends of the earth.

The main thing that left me hanging as a first time visitor was the thread about ‘What is the Gospel?’ It didn’t seem to be resolved, just gathered quotes from Goldsworthy and posters and poked fun at Tim Keller’s disagreement without coming to a Biblical-based conclusion on a fairly important issue.

Please as a favor to your blogging audience (and the Lord), resolve the issue of just exactly what you believe The Gospel to be as of today and what you share in church planting context to see God bring harvest of baptized converts to faith a la Book of Acts.

Thanks & Blessings!

My suggestions would be
1. delete any posts that you think inappropriate in tone.
2. in the unlikely event that you have made a theological statement that is seriously misleading, then delete it, or at least insert an editorial comment in the original post. Also do a follow up post explaining how you have shifted in your thinking.
3. where you have shifted theologically, but don’t have major regrets about views previously expressed, then simply add an editorial comment in the original post. You might consider adding a new post explaining the shift (for my benefit and others who have been influenced by past posts).

My view is that while a blog may be biographical, it is still a teaching medium.

As a fellow teacher, I’m greatly relieved that God does not hold past sins and indiscretions against me. But of course I do need to do what’s in my power to prevent past mistakes from continuing to misguide people.

Keep reforming, and help us to do the same.

Pierre

This is one of the realities of living your faith in public! I am of the mind that there is no other way – integrity demands that we admit when we have changed, or shifted, from a particular position without denying that we held it.

I use the collective ‘we’ because I was confronted with this very issue last night! Some years ago I made an inappropriate comment (in jest) about a South African figure who lived more than a century ago. This particular person holds great value for the Afrikaner population – I was chastised by two persons and so removed the comment and replaced it with an explanation.

However, there are some other places on my blog (and in my case in books, published articles, podcasts, radio and TV interviews) where I have made statements that I have had to ‘live with’. Sometimes they are issues about which I still feel the same, but don’t necessarily want to be known for (e.g., my stance on Christians of a same sex orientation – it is not a primary focus of my theology, yet because it is contentious people tend to get stuck on it). There are even some points of my earlier theology that I have moved beyond (perhaps in the same way that you state above). In these instances I have left them in public (since anyone with ‘the internet archive’ can go back and find them anyway!), but I have been open to explaining my shift, and the reasons for my shift, when asked to do so.

Perhaps an answer to all of this is to acknowledge in some ‘sticky post’ (e.g., a little disclosure in a footnote of your blog template) that theology is a journey, and sometimes we move to different places, places we find more hospitable, more life-giving, and of course closer to Christ. It does not mean that we deny what we previously were, it simply means that we have moved beyond it.

You may have read on my blog about Ken Wilber’s notion of hierarchical holons – each part of our identity is as important as the other parts. Who I am today is formed both by the agreeable and disagreeable parts of my history. He suggest that we view it in the same way as viewing the relationships between letters of the alphabet and a story… Letters of the alphabet have value in and of themselves, however, when they are arranged carefully they gain greater value by becoming words, and words can become sentences, and sentences can tell stories. But we must never forget that the story doesn’t exist if we don’t acknowledge and value the letters that make up the words, that make up the sentences….

Be blessed Stephen! Together with you in Christ,

Dion

One of the coolest things I’ve seen online was a blog of a theological clown (really this guy was all over the place). His antics weren’t what impressed me but rather his “recantation page”. It was a running list of statements he had made on his blog in the past which he’d come to realise were out of whack with Scripture. He linked to the original statement and then gave a brief explanation why the statement was incorrect Biblically.

On occasion after conviction as a church we’ve addressed a previous sermon on a Sunday prior to that day’s teaching to clarify or correct a point. It is a practise in line with passages like 1 Thessalonians 5:21 and Acts 17:11.

Either way you’ve got to carry on blogging. You’re part of the most important discussion in South Africa and the world today: Jesus Christ, The Gospel and living for the king.

In Christ,

Mark