I was just visiting the blog of a brother in Christ and found a whopping gem. Enjoy!

"often, we forget we're in a battle until we get hit. the north american gospel spreads this fallacy of xian ease and tranquility, proof-texting itself into a coma. Boulderdash!

Wake yourself, arise and stir yourself up in your most holy faith!!!

j.i packer calls the antithesis hot-tub religion: Who needs to be steward of songbooks at the first church of the fridgidaire, anyway?

"are you tired? burned out on religion?" Jesus says, as Peterson renders Matthew 11:28 in the Message.

Yup, says me.

But I am totally jazzed about the coming revival, the present awakening of the Joshua generation----yet I don't want to be Moses.

"When God calls . . God bids us to come and burn - burn with a new love, a new desire, that will take all the mixed and muddled desires and ambitions and burn till it had refined all that was God-given in them and purged out all that was going in other directions"
N.T. Wright, The Cross and the Fire.

Joshua, the general who took over for Moses, the lawgiver/comforter/counselor. Look at the difference in their language when talking to the people. Moses gives comfort, intercedes for the people. Joshua's language is more directive, less capitulating. When he tries to repent for the people, God says, "Stop praying! Get up!"

Ultramodern parallel: Apostolic launching centres are deploying faith souljers all over the globe; in the 80's and 90's counseling centers were attached to churcheslike crazy .

Joshua has taken over from Moses. Praise God from Whom all blessings flow!

And why, do you ask, do I not want to be Moses? Here's your answer:

"After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua son of Nun, Moses aide: 'Moses my servant is dead.'" One mixed motive. . . one outburst in anger, and he couldn't go in to the promised land. Thank God he is in the hall of faith of Hebrews 11

But I don't want to be outmoded and dismantled.....

For you 40-something (did i really say that?) leaders out there, you don't have to slash yourself, wear numerous piercings or dye your hair green to be too hip to be square, but there are some things you can do:

1-Be a spiritual father/ mother: the Joshua generation has had to travel through the desert without father or mother of faith (or sometimes family of origin)

2-Take somebody with you: Moses took Joshua into the Tent of Meeting and by acclimating him to the Presence, Joshua gained the prophetic insight and anointing to be a general.

3-Don't try to hard to be hip: You become a joke then.

4-Do get your illustrations into the late 20th Century at least. I was talking to my son Chaz, who is 7. He has no idea who Michael Jordan is. I've got to retool, fast.

5-Realize that the Joshua generation is techsavy, visual-audio-music-art driven, and that this is ESSENTIAL to the new wineskin.
So what you can't understand the words. It's not for you.

Marshall McLuhan, noted for his classic quote on television: "The medium is the message," also said that Christianity is best communicated en masse because the message and the medium are identical
[logos/eikon: word (John 1)/representation (Colossians 1, Hebrews 1) viz a viz., Jesus]

The recovery of ALL forms of art, music, literature, drama are essential for the new wineskin.
Rap, for example, is not new, nor is it solely gansta-related, but stems from the literature of Paul Lawrence Dunbar and Shakazulu.

So, please, please, please: scrape off your cultural accretions, they are like barnacles on the ship; they only serve to slow Joshua down (like that could really happen!)

6- Don't hold on too tightly to the form of things. Take on the theology of a loose grip.

7-Be a producer. DeGarmo & Key (who?) were hip during the 70's and 80's in CCM-world, but ain't playin now, they're producing. Find fresh new talent, new hungry lions. Pour the life of the Spirit into them. Pour your life, and spiritually reproduce the best of yourself."

pax Christi,

SoulPadre