Environmental Oops

52% Evangelicals who in 2004 agreed that "strict rules to protect the environment are necessary even if they cost jobs or result in higher prices."

43% Evangelicals who agree in 2008.

(Source: Henry Institute at Calvin College)

The Widow's Tithe

17.6% Widows and widowers in the U.S. who say they give 10 percent or more of their income to the church.

8.6% Non-widowed Americans who say they give 10 percent or more.

(Source: Baylor Religion Survey)

James 3: A Story

Churches Compete for the Obamas

According the Washington Post, local D.C. churches have got in the spirit of lobbying, going after the membership of Washington's newest Christian family. They have their own sales pitches, campaigns, and stategies. It is a prestigious thing to land a power player in a pew.

It makes me think, who would Jesus lobby?

How did the Sexperiment work?

Article from the NY Times

Pastor’s Advice for Better Marriage: More Sex
By GRETEL C. KOVACH

GRAPEVINE, Tex. — And on the seventh day, there was no rest for married couples. A week after the Rev. Ed Young challenged husbands and wives among his flock of 20,000 to strengthen their unions through Seven Days of Sex, his advice was — keep it going.

Mr. Young, an author, a television host and the pastor of the evangelical Fellowship Church, issued his call for a week of “congregational copulation” among married couples on Nov. 16, while pacing in front of a large bed. Sometimes he reclined on the paisley coverlet while flipping through a Bible, emphasizing his point that it is time for the church to put God back in the bed.

“Today we’re beginning this sexperiment, seven days of sex,” he said, with his characteristic mix of humor, showmanship and Scripture. “How to move from whining about the economy to whoopee!”

On Sunday parishioners at the Grapevine branch watched a prerecorded sermon from Mr. Young and his wife, Lisa, on jumbo screens over a candlelit stage. “I know there’s been a lot of love going around this week, among the married couples,” one of the church musicians said, strumming on a guitar before a crowd of about 3,000.

Mrs. Young, dressed in knee-high black boots and jeans, said that after a week of having sex every day, or close to it, “some of us are smiling.” For others grappling with infidelities, addictions to pornography or other bitter hurts, “there’s been some pain; hopefully there’s been some forgiveness, too.”

Mr. Young advised the couples to “keep on doing what you’ve been doing this week. We should try to double up the amount of intimacy we have in marriage. And when I say intimacy, I don’t mean holding hands in the park or a back rub.”

Mr. Young, known simply as Ed to his parishioners, and his wife, both 47, have been married for 26 years and have four children, including twins. They have firsthand experience with some of the barriers to an intimate sex life in marriage, including careers, exhaustion, outside commitments, and “kids,” a word that Mr. Young told church members stands for “keeping intimacy at a distance successfully.”

But if you make the time to have sex, it will bring you closer to your spouse and to God, he has said. You will perform better at work, leave a loving legacy for your children to follow and may even prevent an extramarital affair.

“If you’ve said, ‘I do,’ do it,” he said. As for single people, “I don’t know, try eating chocolate cake,” he said.

The sex-starved marriage has been the topic of at least two recent books, “365 Nights” and “Just Do It.” But Mr. Young’s call from the pulpit gave the discussion an added charge.

It should not, in his view. This is not a gimmick or a publicity stunt, Mr. Young says. Just look at the sensuousness of the Song of Solomon, or Genesis: “two shall become one flesh,” or Corinthians: “do not deprive each other of sexual relations.”

“For some reason the church has not talked about it, but we need to,” he said, speaking by telephone Friday night on his way to South Africa for a mission trip. There is no shame in marital sex, he added, “God thought it up, it was his idea.”

Those who attend Fellowship’s location here or one of several satellite churches in the Dallas area and one in Miami are used to Mr. Young’s provocative style. (The real “f word” in the marital boudoir, he says, is “forgiveness.”) But the sex challenge was a bit much for some of his church members, who sat with arms crossed in uncomfortable silence, he recalls, while many in the audience gave him an enthusiastic applause.

One parishioner, Rob Hulsey, 25, said his Baptist relatives raised their eyebrows about it, but he summed up the reaction of many husbands at Fellowship Church when he first heard about the sex challenge — “Yay!”

A week later, he and his wife, who are expecting a baby and have two older children, could not stop holding hands during the sermon. His wife, Madeline Hulsey, 32, said she was just as thrilled to spend a week focusing on her husband. Usually, “we start to kiss, and it’s knock knock knock, Mom!” she said.

Others found that, like smiling when you are not particularly happy, having sex when they did not feel like it improved their mood. Just eight months into their marriage, Amy and Cody Waddell had not been very amorous since Cody admitted he had had an affair.

“Intimacy has been a struggle for us, working through all that,” Ms. Waddell said. “This week really brought us back together, physically and emotionally.”

It is not always easy to devote time for your spouse, Pastor Young admitted. Just three days into the sex challenge he said he was so tired after getting up before dawn to talk about the importance of having more sex in marriage that he crashed on the bed around 8 p.m. on Tuesday night.

Mrs. Young tried to shake him awake, telling her husband, “Come on, it’s the sex challenge.” But Mr. Young murmured, “Let’s just double up tomorrow,” and went back to sleep.

Failed Faith

The only faith
that I have lost
is failed faith
for a lost few.

- Mumbling Truth

7 Days of Sex - He Said/She Said

Pastor Ed Young and his wife Lisa each share about the challenge they made to their church.

He (Ed) said:
The amount of press this challenge has gotten over the last several days has been a little surprising. I can't say I'm shocked, though. Our culture is so used to toilet water that it's refreshing when we get a taste of God's pure desire for sex in marriage. So no, I'm not shocked. I'm excited. But the most exciting aspect of this isn't the press. It's not the news coverage or the interviews.

The most exciting part of this right now is the potential that this challenge has to help heal and strengthen so many marriages and families. I pray over the next week that communication lines are opened, intimacy is restored and marriages are strengthened as they "do it" God's way. Please join me in this prayer.

She (Lisa) said:
I mentioned this at Flavour, but let me say it here. I'm so excited about this challenge! (And yes, ladies, I'm the one who brought the idea to Ed through a magazine article I'd found.) Why am I so excited? That's simple. Because God has revolutionized my view of sex and removed a lot of preconceived notions I had. And I can truly value intimacy done God's way.

This challenge is about so much more than the act of sex. This is an opportunity for marriages to get back to what God designed them to be. It's a chance for all of us to reinforce our love for our spouses.

So here's my prayer for this next week. First, to the ladies. I 'm praying that God expands your view of the importance of sex in marriage and that He gives you the diligence in prioritizing this aspect of your marriage. And for the men, my prayer is that you will lead out spiritually for your wife so that the oneness God has in mind will supernaturally flow through every aspect of your marriage. (And yes, that includes sex.)

You can follow their journey on their church blog.

Pastor Preaches Procreation

From The BlackChristianNews.com

Pastor Ed Young Wants Married Couples to have Sex Every Day for a Week

God may have rested on the seventh day, but the Rev. Ed Young wants married couples to have sex all week long. Once a day. Beginning this Sunday.

The call to action will headline his sermon that day at Grapevine-based Fellowship Church. He plans to deliver his challenge while sitting on a bed.

"I won't be dressed in pajamas," the pastor says.

In these days of financial crisis, rampant divorce and debates over same-sex marriage, it's time, he says, to turn the "whining" into "whoopee."

More fundamentally, he adds, the embracing of sex is about nurturing and strengthening marriages.

"Sex is like Super Glue. It's a spiritual thing, an emotional thing," he says.

And the marriage thing, he believes, should only involve a man and woman. God's way, he says.

Jim Dale of Coppell said he figures the pastor is trying to create more buzz for his five-church mega-ministry.

"Draw 'em in, no matter what or how," wrote the Coppell resident in a posting on dallasnews.com. "Sex? You betcha. That'll pack the pews (or theater seats)."

Mr. Dale, author of a book about individual relationships with God, said he has attended Fellowship Church a few times. And he offered some praise: "I've got to hand it to them, they are brilliant marketers."

Mr. Young says his challenge -- following a seminar called "Leaving Lust Vegas" -- isn't about filling seats. "We've got more people than we can say grace over," he says of his 20,000-worshipper Baptist ministry that video streams services from Grapevine to churches in downtown Dallas, Plano, Fort Worth and Miami.

Marketing is indeed at play, the pastor says. "It gets people thinking on a deeper level about sex. I want people talking about it," he says.

But doing it?

"God says sex should be between a married man and a woman. And do it," he says.

Whatever the motivation, the pastor's rousing words aren't unprecedented. A Florida church earlier this year issued a 30-day sex challenge.

Mr. Young said his words may well resonate more with the young and healthy. And at 47, he plans to practice what he's preaching.

"We're going to give it a try," he says, speaking for Lisa, his wife of 26 years and mother of their four children.

As for others, "I can't make them do it," the pastor says.

But he's hopeful. "I think people are going to have a Happy Thanksgiving."

You can watch his sermon here: Leaving Lust Vegas.

Recovering Passion

My Friend Aida has a blog called Forgetting the Former Things. She recently wrote a great article on recovering passion. It stirred things in me. I know that in the attempts to nurture my own vision that I've stiffled others. During my time in the organized church I had a hard time fitting my vision underneath other's vision. At the same time I kept other people out of my sand box too.

Now I am on a journey of rediscovering that passion. It seems scary. Right now it is enough just for me to come to terms with what went wrong.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on Aida's entry.

A number of years ago, I became interested in the subject of leadership. I bought every book I could find that taught how to develop leadership skills and I went to several leadership conferences. Also, I spoke with everyone I could find who was interested in leadership principles.

Although there’s much that I could say about the institutional church’s concept of leadership, I really want to focus on only one aspect – passion.

One of the characteristics of a good leader as taught by the institution is passion. A good leader needs to be passionate about the particular cause he is promoting. Also, it’s his responsibility to meet regularly with his team in order to stir up their passion for the cause and to re-kindle it when it starts to die down.

As the leader, he is also responsible for imparting the vision to his team. He receives the vision and passes it on to the others. Therefore, it’s important that he describes it clearly so that the team will know and understand the direction in which they are to move. Everyone is expected to move together in order to fulfill the leader’s vision. In these conferences, there was much talk about running with the vision because it’s important that the leader’s vision be fulfilled. As a result, many workers are needed to serve the vision.

After growing in grace, I’ve come to believe that leadership as taught in the institutional church is not effective and has actually hurt the church.

In the institutional church, the only vision that matters is the pastor’s. Church members are expected to work to fulfill their pastor’s vision even if it means allowing theirs to die. As a result, we have thousands of believers sitting in pews who have no passion because their vision has died.

The early church as described in the book of Acts was a passionate church. The Leader was the Holy Spirit and it was he who instilled vision in the people and filled them with passion. As a result, their passion didn’t die so they didn’t need another person to constantly stir them up.

In the institutional system, intercession is strongly promoted so, for most of my life as a believer, I tried to make myself into an intercessor. I went to intercessory prayer meetings and I studied the lives and prayer techniques of well known intercessors. Although I talked about the importance of prayer and even taught it, there was never a burning passion in my heart for prayer. Basically, I was trying to function out of someone else’s passion and, since their passion never became mine, it wasn’t enough to carry me through to the end.

I believe that the religious system destroys passion. As I look at today’s church, I see a church that for the most part lacks passion. Its members depend on weekly sermons to pump them up because they don’t really care about what’s going on.

Darin Hufford in his audio series on prayer states that we depend on prayer lists and prayer chains to tell us what to pray for because we couldn’t care less about we’re praying for. As Darin puts it, “We’re just flapping our gums.” Instead, he says that we should pray for what we care about.

Wow!! How profound and yet so simple!! If you care, pray.

I believe Darin’s advice is the key to passion. As a free believer, I’m learning that I do care about issues and I don’t need weekly meetings to stir up my passion because the Holy Spirit is in me and he constantly fills me with his passion.

As I’ve re-connected with my heart, I’m discovering passions which are now coming alive after years of dormancy. I’ve found that the Holy Spirit is constantly stirring up those passions and directing my steps towards their fulfillment. The church that Jesus is building is a passionate church and he means for our lives to be filled with adventure as we follow the passions of our hearts.

Rub Another Back, Rub a Back Next To Ya

Found this article today in a blog response. I'd send you straight to her blog but it doesn't exist anymore. It made me laugh and I hope you get a kick out of it too. Thanks for sharing it Steph.

First: WHY do people massage in church?

A. They are nervous and feel like "massaging" their spouse will ease their own pain and somehow make them feel less "sinful"

B. They want to be sure that EVERYONE knows they are a couple.

C. They want to be sure that everyone knows they are a HAPPY couple.

D. They want to make sure everyone knows that they are a happy couple and that they are regularly having SEX.

E. They want their spouse to feel comforted in church since they are there-today-for-the-Easter service-which-is-the-only-time-the-hubby-shows-up-and-the-wife-thinks-that- if -she-massages-him-he-won't-bolt-for-the-door-in-the-middle-of-"Watch the Lamb" by Ray Boltz.

Second: If you are a member of "Pamic" (people against massaging in church) here are some ways to get people from stopping the massage disruption.

A. Lean forward (especially if you are a man) and ask: "Do you mind if I trade places with your husband?"

B. Make vomiting sounds that sound like "URGHstopthemassageURGH"

C. Start massaging the person being massaged along with the person massaging.

D. If you are in a *Calvary Chapel Church*, loudly ask " I think this guy is hurt, help!"

I submit, these are the reasons people massage each other in church and ways you can stop them. What do you think?