For the Church

Church Planter, Be Happy

By eallcorn / Sep 21

I used to be a church planter. Maybe I still am. I don’t know.

All I know is that the church I planted more than a decade ago is no longer a church “plant.” It is an established church with elders, staff, property, and long-term plans for disciple-making.

I am also no longer there. A little over a year ago, I was called to serve as a lead pastor of BLDG 28 Church in Clearwater, Florida. Meanwhile, the church I planted, HighView Church, has carried on—advancing its mission and continuing to make disciples in that community.

The truth is, I didn’t stop being a church planter when I left the church I planted. In many ways, the church had ceased to be a plant years before my departure. By year three, it was financially self-sustaining, with a functioning membership, a plurality of elders, deacons, and countless faithful ministry leaders.

From my front-row seat as a church planter, I was able to watch God work in powerful ways. What began with a core team of five people and $200 in support became a vibrant, healthy, gospel-centered church through one act of God’s grace after another.

My time as a church planter was the most faith-building season of my life.

My biggest regret? That I didn’t enjoy it more.

The Burden of Always Looking Ahead

Church planters are a rare breed. Distant cousins of the international missionary, they are (usually) very driven people. While not every church planter is entrepreneurial—that’s a tired stereotype—most possess a deep, internal drive to reach people and start new things. They can instinctively gather a group of people with the gospel and then build that group of people into a functioning, institutional reality we call a local church.

This is a wonderful and desperately needed calling and work. But with some of these “future-facing” gifts comes a shadow. Church planters can become prisoners of then.

“Then” is a mythical time in the future when the church finally becomes what you imagined it would be. The problem is that then never quite arrives. Like Tantalus from Greek mythology—forever reaching for food he would never be able to grasp—our desires always remain out of reach.

Recently, a young pastor exploring church planting asked me, “What’s one word you rarely use to describe church planters.” I blurted out “happy.”

Most church planters I know are joyful people. After all, joy is possible because we rest in Christ regardless of our circumstances. But happy? For me, at least, happiness as a church planter was often elusive because it was tied to arrival—to becoming some final version of the church that was never truly attainable.

Three Lessons I Wish I Had Learned Earlier

If I had it to do over again, here are three lessons I would tell myself.

1. Look Back More Often.

When you are wired to build what isn’t there yet, gratitude takes discipline.

Your eyes are trained on the gap between where the church is and where you believe God is taking it, and that gap never fully closes. So you have to deliberately turn around.

Look. Remember. Keep a record. Write down the name of every person who comes to faith in Christ, every leader God raised up, every month the bills somehow get paid.

I wish I had built a habit of rehearsing those mercies out loud from the beginning—in elders’ meetings, around the dinner table, on the drives home. Looking back is not nostalgia; it is how you store up evidence of God’s faithfulness for the next valley.

2. Don’t Despise the Day of Small Things.

Zechariah spoke these words to a discouraged remnant laying a foundation that seemed insignificant next to the temple they remembered from Solomon (Zech. 4:10). These words are just as relevant for church planters.

The small gathering in a living room, the awkward first baptism, the volunteer team held together with duct tape and prayer. These are not the embarrassing prelude to the real church. They are the real church. God delights to work in such a way that only He can get the credit.

If I had believed that more deeply, I would have spent less time apologizing for what we did not yet have and more time appreciating and thanking God for what was already right in front of me.

The “small” day was never small to God.

3. Remember Who the Church Belongs to.

Jesus said He would build His Church and that the gates of hell would not prevail against it (Matt. 16:18). I believed that. I preached it. But somewhere along the way, I began to live as though the outcome rested on my next decision, my next hire, or my next sermon series.

That is a heavy way to plant a church, and it is an unhappy way to live.

If Christ is the builder, then I am not the one holding it together. The church I kept straining to produce was never mine to build in the first place. It is His to build, in His time and by His grace.

So, church planter, be happy. Not later, when the vision finally arrives. Now, while the work is small, unfinished, and unmistakably His. Christ is building His church. You have the privilege of watching Him do it.

Meeting Christ in the Wilderness: Seasons of Waiting, Pain, and Uncertainty

By eallcorn / Sep 17

Every Christian eventually experiences seasons they would never choose.

Some walk through chronic illness. Others bury loved ones, endure loneliness, face disappointment, or wait for answers that seem slow in coming. There are moments when life seems to stand still and prayers appear to go unanswered. During these difficult seasons, believers often ask a similar question: “Lord, why am I here?”

The Bible is filled with people who spent time in what we might call a wilderness.

Moses spent forty years in the wilderness before leading Israel. David spent years fleeing for his life before becoming king. Elijah found himself alone in the desert, exhausted and discouraged. Jesus Himself spent forty days in the wilderness before beginning His public ministry, fasting and resisting the temptation of Satan.

The wilderness is rarely comfortable, but it is often transformative.

The Wilderness Is a Place of Formation

Modern culture teaches us to value speed, success, and visible results. We want immediate answers, instant solutions, and clear direction. Yet God frequently works through waiting. Scripture repeatedly shows that spiritual maturity is often developed not during seasons of abundance but during seasons of dependence.

One of the greatest dangers in difficult seasons is believing that God has abandoned us. Circumstances can easily become louder than faith. Pain can distort perspective. Disappointment can convince us that our story has stalled. Yet the Bible consistently presents a different message.

God was present with Joseph in prison, Daniel in Babylon, Paul in prison, and Christ in Gethsemane. The absence of comfort does not mean the absence of God. The clearest proof of this is found in Christ Himself. Jesus entered our suffering, carried our grief, and walked through the ultimate wilderness of the cross so that His people would never walk alone.

Many Christians can testify that their deepest spiritual growth occurred during seasons that they would never choose to repeat. The wilderness often strips away false securities and reminds us where our hope truly belongs.

This does not mean suffering is beneficial in itself. Christianity never glorifies pain for its own sake. Jesus healed the sick, comforted the grieving, and fed the hungry. God cares deeply about human suffering. However, Scripture teaches that God can bring purpose from pain and hope from hardship.

Romans 8:28 remains one of the most beloved promises in the New Testament for this reason: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”

Notice that Paul does not say all things are good, but that God can work through all things for good. The “good” Paul describes is not necessarily comfort, success, or an easier path, but God’s purpose of making His people more like Christ. That distinction matters.

Christians are not called to deny reality or pretend that hardship is pleasant. Instead, they are invited to trust that God remains faithful even when circumstances are difficult to understand.

The wilderness also teaches dependence. When life is comfortable, it is easy to rely on our abilities. Success can create the illusion of self-sufficiency. Yet difficult seasons remind us how deeply we need God’s grace.

In the wilderness, we often discover how dependent we truly are. Prayer becomes less of a routine and more of a lifeline. Scripture becomes more precious and necessary. Faith becomes less theoretical and more personal. Perhaps this is why God meets people in unexpected places so often. The wilderness may feel empty, but throughout Scripture it often becomes a place of divine encounter.

The Wilderness Is Not Wasted

If you find yourself in such a season today, take heart because your waiting is not wasted, your struggles are seen, and your prayers are heard. God is still working even when His activity is difficult to recognize—and it is often these very seasons that are the most formative.

The wilderness is not the destination; it is part of the journey. And if Christ walks with us through the valley, then even the hardest road can become a place of hope. Through every season of waiting, uncertainty, and hardship, believers can trust that God remains faithful and that Christ walks with them. He has not forgotten His people, and He never wastes the wilderness.

How to Take Every Thought Captive

By adabbs / Sep 16

The phrase comes from 2 Corinthians 10:5 — “taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ.” But what does it mean? And how do we do it? In this episode of the FTC Podcast, Jared Wilson and Ronni Kurtz discuss how to cultivate a Christ-captivated imagination.

The Death of Religion?

By eallcorn / Sep 15

Two major storylines have dominated news coverage of American religion in recent years. One is the decline of Christianity. Writers have often based this theme on Pew Research Center reports about the rise of the “Nones,” or people who say they adhere to no religion in particular. One Pew headline, for example, declared, “In U.S., Decline of Christianity Continues at Rapid Pace.” The book The Great Dechurching, by Jim Davis and Michael Graham, helped to popularize the idea of American church decline for a Christian audience. Davis and Graham argue that “we are currently in the middle of the largest and fastest religious shift in the history of our country,” with tens of millions of Americans having stopped attending church in the past quarter century. Happily, Davis and Graham write as faithful church leaders who believe that the downturn in Christian adherents is reversible. But they still paint a grim picture of the contemporary church landscape. At the most popular level of dour predictions, Elon Musk even tweeted, “Unless there is more bravery to stand up for what is fair and right, Christianity will perish.”

The second and related storyline has been the politicization of self-identified white “evangelicals.” These accounts have often focused on the (allegedly) large number of people leaving evangelical churches, partly due to the churches’ alignment with Donald Trump’s Republican Party. One characteristic column from The Conversation investigated “Why Some Younger Evangelicals are Leaving the Faith.” This account was drawn from data publicized by the Public Religion Research Institute, an organization which regularly touts the decline of “white evangelicalism.”

We take a different approach to these matters. Our goals in The Death of Religion? are threefold. One is to argue that the decline of American and world religion—and Christianity, in particular—has been vastly overstated. The second objective is to show that predictions of religion’s demise have been commonplace in America since the Pilgrims stepped off the Mayflower in 1620. The third is to show what a terrible loss it would be if religion did collapse in America or around the world. Or, to put it more positively, we show that religion is one of the anchors of human flourishing worldwide.

We do not believe that it is impossible for religious groups to decline or even disappear. Indeed, we will demonstrate why and how some denominations have done so. But if the forecasts by media and pollsters of religion’s or Christianity’s doom came to pass, it would exact a terrible social and spiritual price.

This book is contrarian. It goes against dominant media and scholarly narratives regarding religion. We present conclusive data to show that religious people are thriving and that practicing religious people are thriving most of all. We further show that at almost every turn, commonly used polling and survey data on religion is misleading, confused, or grossly incomplete. Many self-identified evangelicals, for example, rarely, if ever, go to church, whereas many of the so-called Nones do go to church. We also demonstrate that typical surveys of American congregational life undercount the number of American churches by as much as 40 percent. The uncounted churches are disproportionately evangelical or Pentecostal, and often minister to immigrants and people of color.

We are not contrarian just for the sake of it. Decline is definitely happening among the Protestant mainline churches. Recent years have also seen weakening in major evangelical and Pentecostal churches in America (though not in their global counterparts). Media, polling agencies, and even some pastors have a vested interest in casting religion’s downturn as an unprecedented development.

In historical perspective, however, the storyline seems like a familiar prophecy of spiritual malaise. People in early America worried about the religiously unaffiliated too. They talked about them constantly, although they did not call them Nones, but by the long-forgotten term, nothingarians. The religiously unaffiliated were already stock characters in discussions of religion’s decline by the early nineteenth century. This fact should make us pause when we hear today’s alarm bells concerning the death of religion. Once again, it seems there is nothing new under the sun.

What Makes a Life Radical?

By eallcorn / Sep 10

I was discipled into what I call the “radical movement.” The year I went to college for a year-long missions program was the same year David Platt’s Radical was published. What had been building up in my heart—a desire to serve “the least of these” and go to the mission field—was fueled by not only this book, but the movement around it.

The most influential voices around me instilled the idea that obedience to Jesus was synonymous with giving up everything you have—all your comforts and success—to go to the nations and declare the gospel to those who have never heard.

I embraced that vision, spending two semesters overseas and committing to a life that meant my earthly gain would be set aside for the Kingdom of God. Much of the radical movement’s emphasis was undeniably necessary and transformative. Christians, especially in the West, should have our comfortable Christianity challenged, especially when our discipleship often shows no signs of sacrifice. Most of us can probably think of ways that we’re holding on to things we love more than Jesus, and every Christian is called to lay aside these lesser loves for the greatest Love of all (Luke 9:23).

Yet many of us who came of age in the radical era absorbed an unintended lesson: The highest form of obedience is leaving everything behind to become a missionary.

After graduating college, I began participating in other ministries and opportunities that weren’t necessarily as “radical” as I had learned I should be. As friends moved overseas, I wondered whether signing a lease, building a career, and furnishing an apartment were signs that I was settling for less than radical obedience. I believed that others around me would judge these choices for not being radical enough, and even received some comments in this vein. I still believed Jesus called me to radical, costly obedience, but my vision of what that meant was far too narrow.

Sometimes, obedience means leaving your home to go to the nations. Sometimes, obedience is remaining where God has you, laying down a dream, offering your gifts for God’s purposes, or loving your neighbors. Always, obedience is surrender. I didn’t need a smaller view of obedience, but a more robust one.

One of the most helpful guides for me when thinking about obedience is Lilias Trotter, an artist and missionary. Her story is not well known, but is often told as though she abandoned art entirely to become a missionary. While Trotter did surrender her pursuit of artistic recognition, she continued to use her art to share the gospel for forty years of ministry in Algeria. Her story helped me realize that obedience is not always about abandoning our gifts and ambitions.[1] It is about surrendering them to Christ and asking Him to establish the work of our hands (Ps. 90:17). Trotter did not stop being an artist when she became a missionary. She simply stopped pursuing artistic recognition as her primary aim. Obedience is surrendering everything to the lordship of Christ.

Today, I still believe we need more missionaries heading to unreached nations, not less. I believe we need more Christians who are foster parents, work in crisis pregnancy centers, feed the hungry, and provide medical care for those in need, not less. I believe we should regularly ask the Lord what we need to surrender to His will. And I also believe that whether you are a chief financial officer, a pastry chef, a cashier, a truck driver, an artist, or a missionary, you are called to do all things to the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31).

The question is not whether your life appears radical enough to other Christians. The question is whether all that you have—your gifts, ambitions, career, possessions, relationships, and future—is surrendered to Christ. Obedience may lead you across the ocean or across the street, but it will always result in a radical life, because a radical life is one that belongs to God.

[1] For more on Lilias Trotter, see Allyson Howell, “By Faith Women: Lilias Trotter,” Substack, June 9, 2026, https://allysonmhowell.substack.com/p/if-she-chose-another-path-you-might.

Theology For Life

By adabbs / Sep 9

Why do we experience such distance between the idea of doctrine and delight? Why do we insist on a separation between learning doctrine and practical life? This week Jared Wilson talks to Ronni Kurtz about Ronni’s new book Theology for Life: A Joy-Filled Introduction to Christian Doctrine (Baker Books) releasing this week. Theology for Life takes a distinctive approach to introducing Christian doctrine. Each chapter does two things: first, it explains a crucial doctrine clearly and accessibly; then, it shows you how to delight in that doctrine and be shaped by it into the person God calls you to be. Good theology, Kurtz argues, isn’t simply about learning–it’s about living. And it produces not division or drudgery, but joy. Available now wherever Christian books are sold.

When Theology Fails to Form Us

By eallcorn / Sep 8

There are many ways theology can be misused and abused.[1] Given this book aims to see doctrine as an avenue for delight, articulating ways theology and doctrine may be used for ill may prove helpful and can give us a diagnostic for the way theology moves us in our own time spent contemplating the Lord. Theology done well ought to lead us to delight in the Lord and pursue the good of our neighbor; theology done poorly can lead to many negative outcomes. The three pairs I have in mind here are (1) performance and pride, (2) division and discord, and (3) a poor substitute for wisdom and wholeness.

Performance and Pride

To say that theology can be misused in the direction of performance and pride is to recognize that there are those whose goal is applause, and theology just happens to be a convenient vehicle toward that end. Of course, this ultimate desire is not an expressed one, for few would come out and explicitly state that they strive for applause, yet the gravitational pull toward acceptance via doctrinal thinking is real. There are spaces in evangelicalism where it seems that theology has become something of a stage on which doctrinal pundits perform an act in hopes of riling an already agreeable base toward applause and acceptance. As we have seen various news outlets move from the business of information toward entertainment, we have also witnessed a growth—especially in our social media age—of theology-as-entertainment in which the goal is not the glory of God or love of our neighbor but the continued pursuit of outrage, clicks, and controversies.

When theology is pursued as a performance, it is often accompanied by pride. There is something intoxicating about receiving the applause of others, being the focal point, memorizing arguments, using fancy jargon, and being the most informed person in a room. When time spent developing theological ability is used toward the end of puffing someone up instead of in service to God and his people, corrosive pride often follows. We know pride has taken over the theological pursuit when the telos, or goal, of our theology shifts from loving our neighbor to getting the attention of our neighbor.

Division and Discord

Beyond the pull toward performance and pride that can accompany theology done poorly is the evergreen worry that theology may lead to division and discord. The worry here is that theological exploration will lead not to intellectual clarity leading to deeper community and more rooted belonging but to an ever- growing list of ideas over which the church may divide. This problem is accentuated by our cultural moment. It seems that some spheres of theological discourse have taken notes from modern political discourse, as many of the same divisive tactics are employed. When theology is framed merely in us- versus- them dynamics, it is easy to prioritize “winning” doctrinal arguments and “defeating opponents.” Rather than theological contemplation being a God- ordained means to steady our souls and form us into persons who are equipped and enabled to behold the glory of God, theology done poorly has the potential instead to become mere intellectual ammunition in our ever- shifting ideological wars.

Substitute Wisdom and Wholeness

The final malpractice I want to mention is mistaking theological knowledge for wisdom. To put it plainly: We must see Christian maturity and sanctification as more than mere theological intelligence. When Scripture describes faithful followers of Christ, it seems to have the whole person in mind. For example, when the Synoptic Gospels discuss “the greatest commandment,” we can see the emphasis in Matthew’s, Mark’s, and Luke’s lists. The disciples ask Jesus, “Which is the greatest commandment in the law?” In Matthew’s account, Jesus says the greatest commandment is to love the Lord with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind (Matt. 22:36–40). Mark’s and Luke’s accounts also include these three— heart, soul, mind— but also include a fourth: strength (Mark 12:28– 31; Luke 10:27).

Two observations about these passages are important for our purposes: First, any notion of holistic devotion to the Lord must include the life of the mind. Theological contemplation is not reserved for a special sect of super- Christians but is the glorious calling and task of all those who wish to follow Christ. Second, while all three lists include the mind, they also include other elements of the Christian life. These two observations come together to instruct us that the life of the mind is a necessary ingredient but is not sufficient for a holistic understanding of Christian maturity.

Yes, theological wisdom is needed for a rooted stability in the Christian life. So is relational wisdom, emotional wisdom, ecclesial wisdom, and more. We must not make the mistake of confusing theological intelligence for Christian wisdom. Knowing a lot of facts about God does not mean one has an intimate relationship with God. Moreover, knowledge and wisdom are not synonymous. There is a substantial difference between being well- read in theology and knowing how the doctrines that make up the Christian faith cultivate our souls and enable us to administer reality in a world full of lies.

[1] There are, of course, others who have written about misuses and abuses of theology. See, for example, the three reasons Keith Johnson gives in his book Theology as Discipleship (IVP Academic, 2015), which has some overlap with the three I have listed here. Also see my chapter “Why Do the Theologians Rage?” in Ronni Kurtz, Fruitful Theology: How the Life of the Mind Leads to the Life of the Soul (B&H, 2022).

Three Ways to Respond to a Toxic Culture

By eallcorn / Sep 7

Little River

I grew up in eastern North Carolina, “in the sticks.” As a teenager, my folks built a house in the middle of nowhere, and my stepdad set out to “tame” the land—chasing critters, chopping down trees, and cleaning up the river.

Sometimes beavers dammed the river, flooding the woods and trapping trash. One day, he took me to clear a dam. I hated the idea: mosquitoes, spiders, leeches, the stench of stagnant water and garbage. Still, I pulled on chest-high waders, put on gloves, and stepped in. We tossed sticks aside, ripped out weeds, dragged trash to the bank.

When we climbed out, I peeled off the waders and realized I was still clean. No mud, no leeches—just a little sweat from the work. That day, I learned a valuable lesson: You can clean up a mess without becoming a mess.

That’s the challenge of toxic cultures—especially for people of faith. Surrounded by “it is what it is” and “that’s just how things work around here,” we’re still called to step into the mess and help change it, without letting it change who we are.

Living in a Dysfunctional Culture

Do you ever feel stuck in a dysfunctional culture—polarized, hostile, and fragmented? Or surrounded by superficiality, instant gratification, and “you do you” morality? Many of us face dysfunctional homes, office politics, toxic classmates, and constant manipulation. So how do Christians “clean up” the culture without the culture sticking to us? How do we pull apart the “toxic dams” around us without our clothes getting muddy?

Second Samuel begins with a bloody war between the dynasties of David and Saul. We see battle, bloodshed, civil war, rival generals, political maneuvering, deception, and betrayal. Many of the individuals in these dynasties grew up worshiping, singing psalms, offering sacrifices, and hearing Scripture. Stepping into the “real world” of adulthood was quite different as boys turned into soldiers and they were exposed to—and engaged in—manipulation and bloodshed. They were exposed to a broken and sinful culture, and many chose to participate in it and reinforce its patterns through the way they live.

But in 2 Samuel 3, David goes against the grain of the culture. As the long, messy war drags on, David refuses to seize power through revenge or manipulation when presented with the opportunity in this scene. He steps into the mess and shows us that you can clean up a mess without becoming a mess.

Following are three options for confronting a toxic culture that we observe in 2 Samuel 3.

Option 1: Avoid Culture — The Way of Ishbosheth

Avoidance is Ishbosheth’s specialty. He is a weak king caught in a leadership mess.

While war rages between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner is “making himself strong” in Saul’s house. Ishbosheth finally confronts him over Saul’s concubine, accusing him of betrayal (2 Sam. 3:6–8). Whether the accusation is true or not, the dynamic is clear: Ishbosheth is a weak leader and Abner is an underhanded, manipulative power player.

In chapters 3–4, Ishbosheth does only two things: He passively lets his general do whatever he wants, and he takes a nap he never wakes up from. He proves to be a passive king of avoidance. Even his name betrays him as, when translated from Hebrew, it means “man of shame.”

“Ishbosheth could not answer Abner another word, because he feared him” (2 Sam. 3:11). That is leadership by avoidance: refusing to engage the mess, confront problems, or take responsibility.

We feel this pull too. It is easier to ignore the dysfunction in our homes, to dodge office politics, to stay out of church conflicts. Sometimes you do have to walk away for safety or sanity. But when avoidance becomes our default mode, the mess doesn’t disappear. We leave others to deal with it, and the toxicity and manipulation only grow.

Option 2: Adopt Culture — The Way of Joab

If Ishbosheth avoids the culture, Joab adopts it. He is a product of his culture.

After Ishbosheth’s weak confrontation, Abner crosses enemy lines to make a covenant with David, promising to “bring over all Israel” (2 Sam. 3:12). It looks like the civil war might finally end. Then the family mess erupts.

Joab, David’s commander, hears that Abner—who killed his brother Asahel in battle—is now making peace. Joab is furious and plots revenge. He secretly lures Abner back, pulls him aside as if to talk, and murders him “for the blood of Asahel his brother” (2 Sam. 3:26–27).

This is the logic of adoption: “You killed my brother; prepare to die.” It’s a bloody world, so I guess I need blood on my hands. It’s a muddy world, so I guess it doesn’t matter if I get muddy.

Saul mastered political maneuvering. Abner was skilled at manipulation. Joab embraced the same violent logic as everyone else.

We face the same temptation. Everyone cuts corners at work, so why shouldn’t you? Everyone gossips and manipulates in your friend group, so why not join in? However, just because the system is broken doesn’t mean you have to be. When we adopt the mess, we become part of the problem. We take on the culture’s manipulation and help perpetuate its dysfunction.

Option 3: Alter Culture — The Way of David

David chooses a different path: alteration. He doesn’t avoid the culture like Ishbosheth, and he doesn’t adopt it like Joab. He is countercultural.

In this story, David consistently acts with integrity. He seeks peace, uses diplomacy to end the civil war, and refuses to play the usual political games. The clearest window into his character comes in his response to Abner’s murder.

David orders Joab and the people to tear their clothes, put on sackcloth, and mourn. He himself walks behind Abner’s bier, weeps at his grave, and composes a public lament (2 Sam. 3:31–34). He even refuses to eat until sundown as an act of grief and protest. The people notice, and “it pleased them, as everything that the king did pleased all the people” (2 Sam. 3:36).

This is also the first time the narrator explicitly calls him “King David.” Up to this point, he has been anointed and called king by others, but now the story itself recognizes him as king—and repeats the title. At last, Israel has a leader who does not simply mirror the surrounding culture. David is not perfect, but he is transparent, ethical, and faithful. He is willing to get into the mud of leadership, yet he emerges clean.

How Can I Influence Without Sacrificing My Faith?

David wrestles with the same questions we all face:

How do I influence a toxic culture without letting it change me?
How do I speak up without losing my character?
How do I engage problems without compromising my integrity?
How do I clean up the mess without getting mud on my clothes or blood on my hands?

Like David, we are called to step into broken situations without adopting the world’s way of responding to them. We cannot avoid every difficult circumstance, nor should we mirror the manipulation, bitterness, or revenge around us. Instead, we are called to pursue integrity, faithfulness, and peace.

Step into the mess. Alter the culture by pursuing faithfulness where you are with integrity.

The Church, The Rule of Faith, and Interpreting Scripture

By eallcorn / Sep 4

Are creeds and confessions still useful today? The idea of such things leaves many Baptists with hesitation and suspicion. Today, creeds, confessions, and liturgies are often viewed as restrictive forms of formal religion and tradition—perhaps too Catholic or Eastern Orthodox. But throughout Christian history, these practices have served as longstanding means of protecting orthodoxy and preserving the faith once delivered to the saints.

“Faith That Believes” and “Faith That Is Believed”

There are two ways to conceive of faith: Faith that believes and faith that is believed. The first—faith that believes—is personal and internal. It is what the Scriptures mean when they instruct us to have faith in God. This faith exists in the heart and deals with one’s personal relationship with God.

The second conception of faith—faith that is believed—is objective and widely measured. It is the summary of Christian belief, often referred to as the faith. This is the purpose of creeds, confessions, and statements of faith. They provide concise summaries of how to understand the whole of the Christian faith.

Why Interpretation Needs Guardrails

These two concepts of faith are related. Faith that believes must have an object of faith that is believed. In other words, our faith isn’t vague or abstract; it is built upon a set of doctrines that are convictionally held and clearly articulated. It isn’t enough to say, “I believe the Bible,” without also saying what you believe about the Bible. Or, to put it another way, believing the Bible isn’t just a matter of content but also a matter of interpretation. To say, “I believe the Bible,” doesn’t mean much unless you say what you believe about the Bible (i.e., how you interpret it, apply it, understand it, use it, etc.).

Why not? For at least two reasons. First, Scripture wasn’t written in a vacuum. It was given to God’s people in real historical contexts and continues to address God’s people today. Second, and probably most important, you don’t live in a vacuum. Every reader approaches Scripture from a particular point of view. This is the danger. If we do not interpret the parts of Scripture in light of the whole of Scripture, we will interpret it through our worldview, culture, backgrounds, etc.

For these reasons and more, it is important for the church to consider its method of interpretation. The Bible isn’t open to whatever interpretation you personally prefer. You don’t get to impose your feelings or perspectives on it. What is at stake in our interpretation is a right understanding of God. Our interpretative practices will either lead us to see God as He has revealed Himself, or they will lead us to make up an idol and call it “God” when in fact it is our own perception of Him.

This leaves us with a glaring question: How do we rightly interpret the Bible?

I find this to be one of the most important questions facing the modern church. When everyone has a theory or an idea about a doctrine and can appeal to some portion of Scripture to support it, the issue is no longer simply fidelity to the Bible but of rightly handling the Word of truth (2 Tim. 2:15).

The Rule of Faith

To rightly handle the Bible, there must be some universal guidelines and parameters. Here enters the importance of historic creeds, confessions, and statements of faith—or the rule of faith. These rules of faith summarize the major tenets of the Christian faith in a clear and concise way. They do not replace the Bible, but they help articulate its central message.

Such rules of faith serve as fences of protection. They help readers interpret Scripture in light of the Bible rather than themselves. What we are after is the Bible interpreting the Bible, not the Bible being reshaped by an individual’s preferences, ideas, or assumptions.

How can we say that the Bible interprets the Bible if we need rules of faith like creeds to help keep us on the correct path?

The reason this is true is because our rules of faith themselves come from the Bible. It is a beautiful conundrum that our Bible reading informs our doctrine and our doctrine informs our Bible reading. The more we are exposed to Scripture the more we develop doctrinal convictions. And the more we develop doctrinal convictions the more they mold our interpretation. Therefore, if we begin with commonly held standards of orthodoxy—creeds and confessions from church history—we will start our journey of interpretation from the right place.

The Church’s Role in Interpretation

Here is another very important question: How do we get rules of faith? Who gets to decide what creeds or statements of faith are correct?

This is where the importance of the church enters the discussion. By God’s grace, we are a priesthood of believers (1 Pet. 2:9), each filled with the Holy Spirit who guides us into truth (John 16:13). It is a wonderful gift of God that we have the Bible in our own language, can read it, and can understand it with the Spirit’s help.

However, biblical interpretation isn’t just an individual practice. It should be done by the individual but also in conjunction with the Church. Why? Any student of the Bible will know that when left by themselves, they are more prone to error than when they are held accountable by the collective wisdom, memory, and studiousness of a group of believers. This is not to say that a group cannot get it wrong. It is to say, however, that we are better students of the Bible when we study it in the context of the Christian community, the Church. This is God’s design. So, while you can and should study the Bible as an individual, you must also study it under the accountability of the collective Church.

This is why it is the Church who determines the rules of faith. This is why churches need to take their Statement of Faith seriously. Churches must be wise and not abandon the collective study of Scripture from 2,000 years of church history. They need to help guide their people in biblical interpretation by defining what is the rule of faith—the central components of the Christian faith. The church must care about doctrine, truth, and guiding others according to that truth. This responsibility is not for a select few but for the whole body.

The need is only growing for not only a strong commitment to the Bible’s inerrancy, but also a strong commitment to faithful interpretation. The Bible is not a free-for-all to be read however we feel. There are right ways and wrong ways to approach it. As we work to understand it collectively as a church, we must make clear what is absolutely central—the deity of Christ, the Trinity, justification by faith—and study Scripture as individuals in light of these communal guardrails. Such an approach is God’s design, and it is for our good.

*Much of the underlying information came from Presley, Stephen O. Biblical Theology in the Life of the Early Church: Recovering an Ancient Vision. Grand Rapids, MI. Baker Academic, 2025.

What Wendell Berry Can Teach Pastors About Language

By jlumley / Sep 3

Mr. Wendell Berry of Port Royal, Kentucky, died on August 31, 2026. He was 92 years old, having lived most of his life in his hometown of Port Royal, farming on his property at Lane’s Landing since 1964. He is the author of many books, novels, essays, and poems.

Mr. Berry was a complex figure. He was “too liberal” for some conservatives, and “too conservative” for some liberals. His writing ranged widely, but he examined nearly every issue with an eye to the local, keenly aware that global problems are, in some sense, all local ones. Agriculture’s call to “get big or get out” sounded good on paper, but Mr. Berry showed how that USDA-led agenda, under Earl Butz, destroyed local communities and harmed the land. His 1977 book The Unsettling of America: Culture and Agriculture addressed such issues, and it is likely his most famous work.

Mr. Berry also rejected many modern conveniences, including television and computers. So, it is deeply ironic that I was introduced to his work in 2019 through the documentary Look and See: A Portrait of Wendell Berry, and that I’m writing this on a computer now. I once published an academic journal article on his work, and I sent him a copy along with a lengthy letter thanking him for how it had shaped my own. It wasn’t until after I sent the letter that I realized that sending him a two-page typed letter felt … weird. He was kind enough to send me a handwritten note in return.

As I began to read through Mr. Berry’s work, I was struck by the deeply pastoral tone running through much of it. Of course, I don’t agree with everything he wrote. If I did, I suspect Mr. Berry would cast a sideward glance at me, wondering whether I had even read his material. I’d like to address one issue that he returns to often: language that is spoken but not understood.

The Unknown Tongue

Mr. Berry is best known for his essays, but I’ve always been drawn to his Port William novels. It isn’t “world-building” in the Tolkien or Lewis sense, but Mr. Berry does construct a small community that mirrors his native Kentucky. And what is most fascinating to me is how simple and ordinary the lives of these people are. They work together, fellowship with one another, and live out an old, unseen world slowly being taken over by the “new” world of fast-paced living and “greener pastures.”

Mr. Berry makes this case for a responsible language throughout his work, and two stories illustrate it well.^[1] In the novel Remembering, Andy Catlett attends a conference on “The Future of the American Food System” in San Diego. Andy is not impressed with what he hears; these former farmers are now living luxurious lives despite the harm their policies have caused many communities and—importantly—the soil. What is seen as “progress” is nothing more than harm to families, healthy communities, and good land. The language they’re speaking, Andy concludes, is only known to themselves. The average, everyday farmer hasn’t the slightest idea what is being discussed.

The same thing is seen with Nathan and Hannah Coulter’s son. Caleb loved farming, but his professors convinced him there was no future in it. To help farmers like his father, he’d have to not farm. So, Caleb became Dr. Coulter, a respected academic who taught agriculture to fewer and fewer students who wanted to farm. But his publications, Hannah says, are written in the Unknown Tongue. “Reading them always makes me think of this farm and how it has emerged, out of ‘agriculture’ and its ‘soil types’ and its collections of ‘species,’ as itself, our place, a place like no other, yielding to Nathan and me a life like no other.”^[2] Her point is clear: farming, and the life it provides, cannot be so easily dissected.

Pastoral Responsibility

This has vast implications for pastoral ministry, especially for young pastors fresh from seminary and seasoned scholars alike. It’s simply this—know your people. Mr. Berry wrote, “We must speak, and teach our children to speak, a language precise and articulate and lively enough to tell the truth about the world as we know it. And to do this we must know something of the roots and resources of our language; we must know its literature.”^[3] Mr. Berry wouldn’t object to learning and specialization, so long as they’re rightly used and understood.

But what we must do, as he points out, is not read merely to learn about something, but to be shaped by it. We learn from it, not just about it. His criticism of those who treat the Bible as mere literature is, in my opinion, vintage Mr. Berry:

It is conceivable that the Bible could be well taught by a teacher who believes that it is true, by a teacher who believes that it is untrue, or by a teacher who believes that it is partly true. That it could be well taught by a teacher uninterested in the question of truth is not conceivable.^[4]

So, pastors: Preach in a language that is coherent, not unknown. Academic jargon has its place, but the truths of Scripture must come in clear, effective, and persuasive language. I’m always reminded of this whenever I attend an academic conference. How does what they’re saying translate to our local church? Would Mrs. Bonnie understand what they’re saying? Can we make it accessible without dumbing it down? I’m not saying specialized study is unimportant; it is. But we must speak in the known tongue of our people, and that means actually being among them and learning their language.

I think of this most when I remember the note that Mr. Berry sent me a few years ago. It is brief, only a few handwritten lines, but it was written by a man who spent his whole life speaking a language that his neighbors could read. That, among other things, is something I thought about when I learned of his death. Mr. Berry never traded Port Royal for the lecture circuit, and he refused to write in Caleb’s “Unknown Tongue.” And perhaps that is one reason why his reach is so far.

I never had the privilege of meeting Mr. Berry, but I do have this letter and a stack of books by him. By reading his books again and again, I learned his language and how the patient, local way of seeing helped shape him. Pastors would do well to learn that language. Know your people, love your place, and speak so that the ones in front of you can understand what you’re saying. Mr. Berry did, and I intend to keep learning how.

^[1] See “Standing by Our Words: Learning a Responsible Language,” in Wendell Berry and Higher Education: Cultivating Virtues of Place, eds. Jack R. Baker and Jeffrey Bilbro (University of Kentucky Press, 2017), 47–69.

^[2] Wendell Berry, Hannah Coulter (Counterpoint, 2004), 132.

^[3] Quoted from Baker and Bilbro, 63.

^[4] Quoted from Baker and Bilbro, 64.