Church, Culture, Book Reviews
John Beeson
The Long Journey of Self-Knowledge in a Culture ...

“We are currently experiencing the largest and fastest religious shift in US history. It is greater than the First and Second Great Awakening and every revival in our country combined...but in the opposite direction.” This is the conclusion of the largest and most comprehensive study of dechurching in America by sociologists Ryan Burge and Paul Djupe. In The Great DeChurching, pastors Jim Davis and Michael Graham unpack why and how over the past twenty-five years, forty million of those who formerly attended church no longer do so.

The Long Journey of Self-Knowledge in a Culture of Confusion
Christian Living, Prayer
John Beeson
The Air Raid Siren

Jerusalem, Israel

3:15 am, April 13

 

I sat up in bed to a wailing sound I had never heard before, but knew immediately: an air raid siren. Our building rattled to the booms of interceptors from Israel’s missile defense system hitting their inbound targets. I pulled back the curtains and watched as sprays of light streaked the sky.

 Iran launched 170 drones, 20 cruise missiles, and 120 ballistic missiles at Israel in retaliation for Israel’s purported attack on an Iranian embassy in Syria.

The Air Raid Siren
Christian Living, Nature
John Beeson
The Ground Where Saguaros Thrive

Nothing is more iconic to the Tucson landscape than the saguaro. The emblematic cactus is to the Sonoran Desert what the palm tree is to Miami: hard to imagine without it. Saguaros typically live between one hundred and fifty to one hundred and seventy-five years, not sprouting its trademark arms until around thirty to seventy years of its life and growing to around fifty feet tall.

For those Sonoran Desert natives, we intuitively know where saguaros thrive. They love the rocky (both granite and volcanic) soil at the foothills of the five beautiful mountain ranges that surround Tucson.

The Ground Where Saguaros Thrive
Leadership, Wisdom, Vocation
John Beeson
Anger, Retaliation, and My Scion xB

I drove a little manual 2005 Scion xB for about eight years. It finally gave out after 230,000 miles. I loved that little car. It was fuel-efficient and required minimal maintenance. But it is undeniably close to the least powerful car on the road. I’m pretty sure that on its specs, next to 0-60mph, it says, “Eventually!”

Unless I was lined up against someone from a nearby retirement community, I was the last car to reach the speed limit coming off a stoplight. Unsurprisingly, more aggressive drivers with more powerful vehicles tended to treat my little Scion like a safety cone on the road, more like an obstacle than a fellow traveler.

Anger, Retaliation, and My Scion xB
Family, Leadership, Parenting, Marriage
John Beeson
The Top Ten Ways to Lead in Your Home (and ...

In the past post we considered the biblical priority of leading in our homes before stepping into leadership callings outside of our home.

When I was asked to speak to our Mom’s Matter group on leading well in the home I was a bit intimidated. I felt far from equipped to speak as a man to women on the topic of leadership. And so, I did the only thing I could think of: I asked wise, godly women who were also great leaders. Starting with my wife, I began to listen to the advice my female friends offered on leadership in the home and beyond.

The Top Ten Ways to Lead in Your Home (and Organization, Too!)

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Teaching for Change: How I Learned to Stop Preaching

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Teaching for Change: How I Learned to Stop Preaching

When I signed up to serve as a pastoral intern during my seminary years in New Jersey, I was given the opportunity to teach our church’s adult Sunday school class. The popular and engaging regular teacher graciously handed me the reins for a chunk of the fall semester. I decided we would study the gospel of John together. I read through the gospel, paged through commentaries, crafted a syllabus, and prepared the manuscript for the class’s first week. I handed out the syllabus to the group (that included weekly homework) and launched in, hands gripped to the podium, with passion and verve.

I had mixed thoughts about how it went. On the one hand, my sermon lesson was well structured, thoroughly researched, and faithful to scripture. I intentionally added questions in the lessons, so it wasn’t just a monologue. I should have felt good about it. On the other hand, there seemed a disconnect between the class and myself that I couldn’t figure out how to bridge. My enthusiasm for the book didn’t seem to create engagement. The questions I asked were met with (mostly) silence or shallow answers. The faces in front of me seemed largely unaffected.

I got a friendly call from one of the campus ministers who attended our church (and that Sunday School class) that week and he invited me out to coffee. Over mugs at the local caffeine dive, Small World, I had a brief conversation that was worth a semester’s worth of seminary education. (Parenthetically, while I took four classes on preaching, I never took a class on teaching at seminary, and I am not sure if one was offered.) The conversation changed the way I have taught ever since.

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Why Don’t You Preach More About…?!

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Why Don’t You Preach More About…?!

What topics does your pastor avoid? When was the last time you heard sermon dealing with depression? Sexuality? Race? Immigration? I’ve been part of more than a few conversations with congregants who have complained either that we don’t preach enough on a particular topic (ironically, this often occurs right after we preach on that topic), or that they hope we will not be like their old church that never preached on a particular topic.

Christianity Today puts out periodic issues which focus on particular issues. In those issues, they often have polls where they report how often respondents say their pastors speak about that particular issue. Unsurprisingly, the polls always show severe neglect of the given topic. I’m grateful for Christianity Today—they do great work and I benefit from their excellent writing and reporting. But I’m wary of the criticism that pastors don’t preach often enough about any given issue for a few reasons:

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Teaching for Change, part I

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Teaching for Change, part I

When I signed up to serve as a pastoral intern during my seminary years, I knew I wouldn’t be able to preach on Sunday morning, but I would be given other opportunities to grow in preaching and teaching. One of those opportunities came in the form of our Adult Sunday School class. The popular and engaging regular teacher handed me the reigns for a half dozen or so weeks that first semester. I studied, I crafted a syllabus, and I wrote out a manuscript for the class’s first week. I handed out the syllabus (that included weekly homework) and launched in, hands gripped to the podium, with passion and verve.

I got a friendly call from one of the campus ministers who attended our church (and that Sunday School class) that week and he invited me out to coffee. Over mugs at the local caffeine dive, Small World, I had a brief conversation that was worth a semester’s worth of seminary education. It changed the way I have taught ever since.

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