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Teachers Like Apollos
Alexandria was the intellectual center of ancient Greece, home to an ancient university and library that was packed full of some 700,000 resources. That being said, it shouldn’t come as a shock that it’s in this city that we meet a popular and wise teacher in the early church named Apollos. While the Bible says…
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Bi-Vocational Pastors
As tithing has dropped across the church over the years, many pastors have had to become bi-vocational. This seems odd to some who are unable to think of a pastor being anything other than a pastor, but bi-vocational pastors are not a new thing. Indeed, the Apostle Paul made a habit of generating income through…
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+3 to Wisdom
As my D&D players entered a beautiful garden, the King explained why he had called them there and gave them orders. When he was done, he invited them to take a look around the garden. They were soon called over to a glistening pond by an angelic being. “I see you just got done talking…
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“That’s You.”
Ten years ago I had a dream that I was in a desolate land where a bunch of people were being kept in a prison. While the intimidating appearance of the prison made it look like no one could escape, it actually seemed that it wouldn’t be that hard to break out of. That being…
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What God is Up to at 1208 Greenwood Church
Back in 2015, a congregant shared a dream he had about our church. In that dream he met a little Latino girl and her family, all of whom had been oppressed. Eventually in the dream, there was a white, dazzling tree and flying out of it was a pure white dove that got larger as…
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When Church Leaders Argue
“If you have a problem with your church, don’t split it. Just go somewhere else. The church has enough division in it already,” my college professor once taught. It’s unfortunate, but if you’re in leadership, you are bound to eventually butt heads with another leader—even in the church. This naturally comes with the territory of…
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The Four Rules
As the early Jewish Church began to reach non-Jewish people and they all took on the title, “Christians,” the Jewish Church had a big question to ask: “What of the 600+ Jewish laws did the non-Jewish Christians need to follow?” Such rules had long been identifying markers of the people of God, so it was…
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Discerning Theological Matters
Ever since the dawn of its existence, the church has been busy arguing about what’s essential to the Christian faith and what isn’t. This wasn’t too hard to figure out when the church was entirely Jewish, because they all knew what it meant to be a good Jew. From a Jewish perspective they just had…
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The Man in the Car
“There’s been an accident outside,” Dad yelled, as he flashed the basement lights to get me and my friend’s attention. The two of us put our instruments down and bolted out the door to find a woman lying on the ground across the street, her legs severed at the kneecap. It seemed impossible to make…
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When the Church Explodes from the Inside
We often like to blame stunted church growth on variables that are “out there.” But if we’re honest with ourselves, we’d likely realize that we are often our own problem. So many churches stall out because of drama and gossip. Indeed, I’ve seen this happen several times in my short pastoral career. Such drama is…
Jamin Bradley 