WordLive

Scripture Union, a UK organization, now has up and running "WordLive". It's a multimedia Bible experience that lets you interact with the Word in whatever form you like.

• Choose the Bible translation you prefer
• Listen to music
• Listen to podcasts (voice)
• Look at images
• Look at video
• Download and print a Bible study

WordLive is now offering a five-week Lent study for small groups or individuals. As of January 5, Parts 1 and 2 area available.

Check out this nifty resource. As Scripture Union says, "Grab a God moment".

An incentive for Bible reading

Have you tried reading through the Bible but failed to read consistently? If so, Logos may have a helpful tool for you.

The Logos Global Bible Reader (GBR) software (now in beta) lets you pick a Bible reading schedule. When you open the program, you see Bible passages. You login to the reader, read the displayed passages, and then click on "Done Reading" when you finish.

The incentive part of the process is that you are part of a world-wide Bible reading community. Logging on via a free account at Logos, the Global Bible Reading program shows your general location on the globe with a red dot. When you select "Done Reading", your dot changes to green.

The program never identifies you by name, but just seeing red dots changing to green helps motivate you to "go green" by reading the Bible passages.

The program also fosters a sense of community by letting you post a comment about a passage and to read comments from other readers worldwide.

If this sounds interesting to you, surf on over to Logos, create a login account, and download the Global Bible Reader software.

Do we truly follow Christ?

Sometimes it seems that United Methodists are not truly united. Not that we all need to be of one mind on all issues, but it often seems that we deliberately strive for unloving discord.

Most often the strife is about either social and environmental issues or else spreading the Gospel. It need not and should not be an "either-or" proposition. It needs to be a "both-and" one. We need to bring the light of Christ into a world of darkness. But we also need to realize that a strong faith and truly following Christ expresses itself through Godly actions. That certainly includes social and environmental actions.

People who truly follow Christ consider themselves caretakers of God's earth. They wouldn't dream of spoiling God's wonderful planet, harming his people, or ignoring the plight of his plants and animals. True followers of Christ would not ignore mistreatment of any of God's children. They would also prefer to use their own riches to help others rather than to add more "bling" to their possessions.

Those who truly follow Christ have an "attitude of gratitude" that shows in their everyday actions, their generous giving, their love for all God's creatures, and in their love of others who are not like them.

Military "Biblestick"

The Military Ministry part of the Faith Comes By Hearing organization has a "Military Biblestick" program. The item is small and looks like a USB flash drive (a.k.a. jump stick). Military Chaplains can request the device to give out to their flock.

About the size of a pack of gum, the Military Biblestick is a portable digital audio player that FCBH pre-loads with the New Testament. A small set of ear plugs completes the package.

Since it's designed for members of the military, the Biblestick has a non-reflective matte black finish and uses only red light for operation.

Donations provide funding for these special Bible audio players for our military. For more details, see the Faith Comes By Hearing site.

Mary, did you know?

Membership is down - give more?

No sooner had I posted about Christian Stewardship being cheapened by equating with money than I noticed (on this blog) the news item from UM Reported, "Changing demographics impacts funds".

The article has several interesting facts and figures. One negative action popped out at me, though. The GCFA governing board, in response to the decline in giving, has penned legislation that, "among other things, the legislation aims to hold leaders at all levels of the church accountable in their responsibility to promote, support and model Christian giving."

Whoa! So let me get this straight. The denomination is seeing a decline in membership and a decline in giving. The solution is to give more? It sounds like the old semi-joke about some office managers, "Management has observed that morale is low. Beatings will commence until morale improves." Maybe we are getting more concerned with funding than with meeting the spiritual needs of the least, the lost, and the last.

Perhaps if we focused our actions on them, as Luke shows us Jesus did, we'd be getting more members, who would want to contribute to the great spiritual work being done. Are we putting the cart before the horse? Are we failing to see the spiritual forest for the financial trees?

Faith videos

Christianity Today has a slew of videos about faith. Though they sell them, you can watch a small version online for free. Some examples:

• An audience with God
• Money - the world's narcotic
• Follow (does it matter what we wear to church?)
• Jesus ministered slowly
• 3 minutes with 3 lost people

Atheists, Agnostics, Believers

Atheists are pessimistic Agnostics. Deep down they are not sure (Agnostic), but they'd hate to be made a fool of by believing the wrong thing. So they claim to not believe at all. It's a buffer against being put down. Maybe they have had great trials and sadness in their lives and cannot believe that a God would allow that. They need your compassion and understanding, help and encouragement. They need to know of any change that being a believer has made in your life. Don't try to make them a believer in one big step. If they become an Agnostic, they are on headed in the right direction. Don't give up on them.

Agnostics really amount to pessimistic believers. They want to believe, but cannot bring themselves to for one reason or another. Perhaps they could become a believer by seeing your faith in action and by your compassion toward their own concerns and needs. Maybe sharing a bit of why you are a believer would help. Just don't get too "preachy" or you'll turn them off.

Believers may be strong or weak in the faith. Those who declare they are new believers may really be optimistic Agnostics. So, as Paul cautions (Romans 14), beware of tempting those weaker in the faith. Encourage the faith of new believers, offer friendship, compassion, and understanding. Include them in your Sunday Schools, but try not to swamp them with detailed Bible study right away. Give them time to grow. Water that growth with agape love. Be available to talk with other believers about their faith challenges and life's trials.

PBS airs pioneer evangelist story

A conservative Protestant evangelist who knew how to pull in people and win souls. Pastor of one of America's first megachurches. Pioneer of Christian radio. Divorced at a time when divorce was a stigma (a topic for another day).

Canadian farm girl Aimee Semple McPherson (Sister Aimee) mixed religion and entertainment like nobody before her.

You can watch the PBS program on Sister Aimee Monday, April 2, at 9pm.

Other links:

• Sister Aimee (online UM Reporter site)
• Aimee Semple McPherson (Wikipedia)
• Photo Gallery
• Kidnapping of Aimee Semple McPherson

Know who you're evangelizing

Ben Gray, at "Blog Ministry," says that when we start to evangelize, we need to understand the culture of the people who are our "target audience". He briefly discusses boosting your effectiveness as a youth minister by understanding today's youth and pop culture. For example, he says that young kids prefer IM and MySpace to email. Read the comments, too -- there's some interesting stuff there.

Take the Pulse of evangelism

The Lausanne World Pulse free online magazine contains lots of interesting news, information, and analysis of evangelism, outreach, and missionaries. The home page always dishes up the current issue -- May as of this writing. The May issue has a mini-bio about Jennie Fowler Willing, a strong supporter of women's involvement in missions in North America.

Among other things, Mrs. Willing served as an officer in the Woman's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church. "In many ways, she was Methodism's Susan B. Anthony, and was certainly Evanston's and Illinois Methodism's most famous woman in history." [Quoted at "The Des Plaines Methodist Camp Ground", by CDCGA -- cached at Google].

The mini-bio in the magazine is topical and timely, since with Heritage Sunday 2006 on May 26th, the United Methodist Church celebrates 50 years of full clergy rights for women.
Related links:

• Professor recovers lost history of American women evangelists
• Empowered foremothers
• Social Holiness in New York City (scroll down to see the brief entry about Jennie Fowler Willing.

Evangelism and the Wesleyan Quadrilateral

In "The four-sided swimsuit", seminary student Jeff Slater describes how the Wesleyan Quadrilateral (don't be put off by the scholarly-sounding phrase) fits with evangelism. He declares that it gives evangelism a special place in United Methodism.

The church has left the building

Yes, for Steve Sjogren and the rest of Vineyard Community Church in Cincinnati, the church has left the building -- gone "outreaching". Steve is the pioneer of the Servant Evangelism movement. The movement implies that Christians can't be truly effective in Mission if they become introverted spiritually. Followers of Jesus need to reach out and help others, to share God's love. The Servant Evangelism site contains many great ideas for outreach. They also have a FAQ-type page.

So ... is your church reaching inward or outward -- involved in outreach or "inreach"? I have a suspicion that when churches collapse inward spiritually, they become like a black hole, which doesn't even let light escape. Except in those churches, it's the Light of Christ that isn't escaping.