Love Truth Blog

October 31, 1517 was the day Martin Luther nailed ninety-five theses on the door of the church at Wittenberg. It is hard to believe that about five centuries have elapsed since, but what resulted was the birthing of the Protestant Reformation. Things had certainly gone awry in the earthly church and a corrective needed be set in place. What Luther did was a common practice at the time for inviting others into theological debate. The issue concerned the abuse of the indulgences, particularly with the preaching of John Tetzel, who would implore peasant Christians to give form their poverty towards the building of Saint Peter’s Basilica otherwise their deceased loved ones would remain in the sufferings of a fiery Purgatory for venial sins committed. Tetzel’s jingle “As soon as the coin in the coffer rings the soul from purgatory springs.” Luther’s intent was to demonstrate this message undermined the sufficiency of the Gospel. Reading over the ninety-five theses again as a thing apro...

Well this is another election year, which makes the Tuesday after the first Monday in November the terminus ad quem for all the political madness that comes beforehand in the USA. With all the mudslinging, rioting, and overall incivility, it is hard to believe were still have over five months to go. I am going through the Book of 1-2 Kings at the moment, and the refrain “Only the high places were not taken away” caught my eye, and as I began to meditate upon them, I found them to be a bit helpful in grappling with all that goes on during these turbulent election years. Here a little background is needed. After the days of Solomon there came about a civil war that divided the children of Abraham living in the promise land into two nations—the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah. There eventually came about a series of rulers in the kingdom of Judah whose reigns the biblical writer describes this way: Jehoash did right in the sight of the LORD…Only ...

I was skimming through The Great Evangelical Recession: 6 Factors that will Crash the American Church…and How to Prepare (Baker) by John S. Dickerson and I found things he had to say to be quite chilling. Dickerson is far from a fear mongering “Chicken Little” crying out “The sky is falling;” rather, the guy has done his homework. Looking at various studies on the evangelical Christian church, picking out the common trends observed through those studies, Dickerson forecasts, In the next decade we will see a massive decease in evangelical influence politically, economically, culturally, and financially… We are losing influence because we are shrinking.      We are losing influence because the host culture is changing so much faster than we (or even it) can understand.      We are losing influence because the United States population is booming faster than it was during the Baby Boom, and our movement is not keeping up with the growth....