Love That Understands
Holy communion, or eucharist, comes from the Greek eucharisto — I give thanks — because worshippers use this meal to give thanks to God. It […]
Feature
Against Idolizing Heroes
The Record has expended a fair amount of ink on John Calvin over the past year. It was a reasonable project, for Calvin was one […]
Doing Church
Twenty-seven per cent of Canadians live in communities of less than 10,000 people. Yet 54 per cent of Presbyterian congregations are found in such places, […]
“Our Church”
During my years within the Presbyterian Church in Canada, I have noticed we have a bad habit when it comes to our use of the […]
Rethinking Mission
“It was a common message at the Life and Mission Agency’s November meeting: The national church must change how it thinks about mission, or risk […]
The Rural Church : Pragmatic Presbyterians
It’s Canada Day and I am more than a little exhausted and disoriented as I write this. Linda and I just got back from New […]
Money Matters
Anyone who has seen the budgets of any church or ministry sees the myriad expenses. If bills and salaries are not paid, churches and ministries […]
Rooted and Grounded
Hanging out with a group of 20 teenagers at Canada Youth 2009, I learned a thing or two. For starters, they loved the worship. I […]
Underground Sausages
A couple of weeks ago we went to a small village in southern Malawi. We met with Pastor Rodney who was in his early sixties […]
A Taste of Pure Religion
“God by a sudden conversion subdued and brought my mind to a teachable frame,” John Calvin wrote in a rare moment of self-disclosure, “which was […]
How To Read The Holy Bible
How shall we read the Bible? In the many ways to read the Bible today, it seems there are as many interpretations as there are interpreters. Christians all over the world read the Bible in different ways. My hope is to consider the different contexts and different readings that have shaped how the Bible has been interpreted in recent years. The variety is indeed part of my point—variety makes a world of difference!
I will explore the biblical text from several angles—what lies “behind” the text, what lies “in” the text, and what lies “in front of” the text. So first we will look at the text in its ancient social location, that is, what lies behind the text. Then we will take a look at what’s in the text. In particular, my focus is Deuteronomy and the “family” of books related to it theologically (Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings) that tell the covenant history of Israel and Judah. Then I will consider those who read these ancient texts today, that is, what lies in front of the text. This approach might differ from your usual Bible study, but by looking at ancient writers and contemporary readers, we can think about how we might read and interpret responsibly amidst multiple voices in the contemporary world.
Reform, Reform, Reform
The Marxists were right about some things. Sixteenth century Geneva under Calvin was the storm centre of the Bourgoise revolution against the Feudal order, much as Moscow was the gathering point for Communist revolutionaries in the twentieth century. It was certainly not the only factor in the birth of the modern world but it was one of them. Robinson Crusoe is the patron saint of mercantile Puritanism and it is no accident that the cities in which the Reformation took firmest hold – Amsterdam, London, Edinburgh and Glasgow – became centres of early global capitalism.
Eventually this affinity would have consequences for Canada. The Presbyterian Scots who dominated the 19th century Montreal business community and built the C.P.R. conformed to type.
How Does Our Garden Grow?
Only God can make the seed grow,” observes Rev. John-Peter Smit, “and only God can make the church grow.” Smit made his comment before getting into the details of an ongoing survey on the health of the Presbyterian Church in Canada.
The details aren’t pretty. They suggest that if the church is soil for the seed, it is sorely in need of some tender care.
In all categories, Presbyterians ranked themselves poorer in spiritual health than other Christians in Canada. The lowest ratings are about how people live out their faith on a daily basis, what the survey calls “passionate spirituality,” and an ability to discern and meet the needs of people outside the church, what it labels “need-oriented evangelism.”
The survey results were compiled over a seven-year period under the auspices of Natural Church Development. NCD’s program is designed to help churches assess their own organizational health through a benchmarking survey of church members. Smit is congregational development consultant for the Synod of Central, Northeastern Ontario and Bermuda and the national church’s staff liaison with NCD.
Illuminating Tradition
The Saint John’s Bible follows in the tradition of the painstakingly crafted manuscripts of the Middle Ages. The seven volumes took a decade to create, and feature the work of artist and calligrapher Donald Jackson, who works in the Scriptorium in Wales.
In the 1970s, Jackson expressed his lifelong dream to create an illuminated Bible. The Saint John’s Bible was officially commissioned by Saint John’s University and Saint John’s (Benedictine) Abby in Collegeville, Minnesota in1998, and its first lines—the opening sentences of John’s gospel—were penned on Ash Wednesday in the year 2000.
The Power to Change
John Calvin’s influence on the Korean church is enormous. The largest Protestant denomination in Korea is Presbyterian, and there is not just one, but hundreds of Presbyterian denominations. Presbyterianism has become a big part of the Korean Christian spirituality. This tendency continues on with Korean immigrants in Canada. The majority of Korean Protestants in Canada have a Presbyterian background.
One of the most profound influences of Calvin on Korean Christians is his emphasis on the supreme authority of the word of God which is characteristic of the Korean Presbyterian spirituality. The preached word has been the most important aspect of the Korean Christian life. All church activity starts with worship and the preached word is a necessary part. Every worship must have some kind of scriptural reflection or meditation, for without it, it is not considered worship.
Healthy communities in Malawi
Malawi is plagued by drought and poverty, and its 550,000 orphans regularly struggle to find enough to eat. That's why the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, supported […]
Giving Ministry Away
Of the best rulers … when their task is accomplished and their work is done, the people all remark, “We have done it ourselves.”
– Lao-Tzu
It was a group of a dozen who gathered one November morning in a church sanctuary to start a long and arduous journey. Half of them are going to spend 2009 under a great deal of scrutiny, analyzing their own approach to being leaders in their community, in their church, and being analyzed by their congregation and others. These ministers have willingly and voluntarily submitted themselves to a process of further developing and sharpening their leadership skills. The next day, lay leaders from their congregation will join them. Together, they will face the challenges of being a church.
Sharing Rejection
When Andrew Faiz (Pop Christianity, May 2008) mentioned “a powerful letter … which spoke of the loneliness and pain a homosexual person felt within the church,” he touched a nerve for me.
I first came alive to the reality of homosexuality in my early 50s. I was then back at university as a mature student preparing to be a marriage and family therapist. One of my courses was on human sexuality and the professor spared us little as he introduced us to the variety and complexity of human behaviour. He brought three lesbians to address the class with their personal stories, in particular how they came to realize their sexual identity. As I listened, I experienced a jolt of identification as I realized: these people can no more help who they are than I can change the colour of my skin.
Caring for the Least
“People cried when we started these programs,” Rev. Grace Myung Chun Kim told the Record. “They were so excited. A lot of seniors homes don’t even have a chapel or a chaplain, so this was something new. They never had something like this before.” She is referring to the Korean-Canadian Family Ministry, which she founded in 1988 to bring hymn sings to seniors homes in the Toronto area. Today, the program reaches more than 900 senior citizens.
The ministry is run with the help of more than 130 volunteers who visit 16 different seniors homes twice a week, every week. The project has been so successful that Kim has helped start hymn sing programs at 14 seniors homes in Vancouver and in three states.