It's Friday: 'Platt’s McLean Bible Church Hit With Attempted Takeover, Lawsuit from Opposition' and More

The Pilgrim's Trail

Platt’s McLean Bible Church Hit With Attempted Takeover, Lawsuit from Opposition

To some observers, McLean’s conflict seems like a replay of other recent episodes from American evangelicalism, where leaders who appeal to Scripture to address social issues are accused of theological liberalism or secular influence even if they continue to hold traditional Christian views. The level of suspicion around such leaders appears to have grown during the Trump administration and during the reckoning over racism following George Floyd’s death last year.

How to Get Your Pastor Active on Social Media
Darrel Girardier has developed a seven-step process to help you get your pastor to try social media. Now, these steps can be customized to your situation and they don’t have to be followed in a certain order. What these steps should do is give you a roadmap to help you navigate conversations, develop trust and eventually help your pastor to try social media. Ready to give it a go? Here they are....

Pastors: What Happened to David Platt Could Happen to You
Pastors do need to start taking social media seriously. As Chris Martin points out, a lot of misinformation is infiltrating the local church. In some instances pastors are the ones who are spreading this misinformation.

Can Social Media Foster Persuasion (Not Polarization)?
While social media can "undermine civil discourse and lead to social division," they, Tim Keller writes, "have enormous benefits. They are deeply embedded in psyches, especially of the young. So Christians can’t ignore social media, and most of all we need to begin to understand them."

In his second letter to the Corinthians, Paul makes an important point. God gives pastors, elders, and other church leaders authority to build up. God does not give them authority to tear down.

Anglicans to Support Camino de Santiago
In a pilgrimage the journey for the pilgrim may be more like a walking silent retreat than anything else. The destination is not as important as the journey itself. As the early Celtic monks warned would-be pilgrims to Rome, "You won't find Christ in Rome unless you take him with you." Whatever the destination may be, what matters most is that Christ is our companion on the journey. Because pilgrimages can have spiritual benefits for those making them and as a practioner of what may be described as peregrinatory prayer, I welcome this development.

9 Possible Steps to Take When Praying Is Difficult
One of the biggest struggles that I have found in praying is the struggle against what I call "spiritual inertia," the tendency to do nothing or to make no effort. Lack of sleep, depression, and other factors can contribute to this condition. One way forward is to ask God to give us a greater yearning for him, a greater desire to commune with him.

Mobilizing for Missions When You Can’t Travel
Are we so focused on short-term missions that we are missing the opportunities closer to home? Is it time for us to pray that God will open our eyes to these opportunities? I think so.