Posted: July 3rd, 2009 | Author: ak | Filed under: Fuller, MC500, Seminary | No Comments »
Maybe it is just the Vineyard in me, but I loved our conversation about the Free Church/Anabaptists and the Pentecostals. I have real affinity toward each group and how they are similar (and different) and how they can instruct the future of the church. I’ve been particularly intrigued by the Pentecostal movement of late as it is such a fast growing and prolific movement. Having not grown up Pentecostal it is still a bit of a mystery to me, but one I want to dig into more. How is the Global Church – which is primarily (or almost so) a Pentecostal one – shaping the next 100 years of Christian faith? I’d also like to study more of the Wesleyan roots of Pentecostalism.
Posted: July 3rd, 2009 | Author: ak | Filed under: Fuller, MC500, Seminary | Tags: Fuller, holiness, MC500, Reformation, Seminary | No Comments »
I’m fascinated by the idea of “holiness” that seems to have arisen (at least in our conversations) during the Reformation with Luther and Calvin and later taken up (perhaps to a fever pitch) with Wesley and his ilk. Does the idea of “holiness” have a distinctive Reformation/Renaissance ring to it? I’m certain that generations of Christians before the Reformation were concerned with holy living and pure lives, but is there something about the increasing individualism of the Reformation or perhaps reading scripture in one’s native tongue specifically incline someone to think of holy-ness?
Posted: July 1st, 2009 | Author: ak | Filed under: Fuller, MC500, Seminary, leadership | Tags: clergy, Fuller, laity, MC500, Priesthood of All Believers, Seminary | No Comments »
One of the perplexing instances of the Reformation is the retrieval of the “Priesthood of All Believers” doctrine that Luther tied so much to the strong criticism of Roman Catholicism. Certainly, his was a step away from the doctrine of ontological change within the clergy class, but by maintaining a clergy class the ontological change is assumed, or becomes presumed or even subsumed! So while in principle the priesthood of all believers was promoted the function didn’t quite make it. Is there a progressive revelation at work here or is an adaptation and contextualization within culture (theirs versus mine) that is at work?