The Henry Center and the Jonathan Edwards Center at TEDS apologize to everyone who tried to view the live-stream of Thabiti Anyabwile’s Jonathan Edwards and the Church lecture (and the two pastoral responses from Charlie Dates and Louis Love). Our IT team was having technical difficulties and we were thus unable to broadcast the event live. We are very sorry for the inconvenience.

The audio and video of the entire event, including the Q&A, will be posted very soon.

The Henry Center is pleased to announce that Alistair Begg’s recent Scripture & Ministry lecture and interview sessions are now posted free of charge for the viewing of the general public.

October 26, 2011 | Alistair Begg | Parkside Church, Cleveland, Ohio

“Inadequacy: The Surprising Secret to Being Useful to God”

The NBA champions this year was a team made up of fewer stars and less glitz than their opponents.  We might say that humility triumphed over hubris.  There are lessons-a-plenty in this for an evangelical church that routinely produces all-stars.  Such an approach endangers the recipients of such adulation and discourages those who are by-passed in the process.  In this lecture, Alistair Begg will consider God’s pattern of using unlikely and ordinary characters and address the possibility that what we regard as a hindrance may be the key to usefulness in God’s service.

Lecture: Audio | Video

Interview: Audio | Video

The Henry Center is pleased to announce that Timothy Laniak’s recent Scripture & Ministry lecture and interview sessions are now posted free of charge for the viewing of the general public.

September  14, 2011 | Timothy Laniak | Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Charlotte, North Carolina

“Shepherds After My Own Heart: The Enduring Challenge of Pastoral Identity”

The most consistent biblical metaphor for leaders among the people of God is the shepherd. But what, really, is a spiritual shepherd? Beyond the specific job descriptions and role expectations of others, what does God expect of us? How does God see us? In this illustrated presentation, Dr. Laniak will take us into the world of Bedouin shepherds for unique perspectives on Scripture’s challenge to shepherd God’s flock. Come renew your pastoral calling with images and insights designed to keep you on course as you serve the Chief Shepherd. Let God reset your identity as his shepherd.

Lecture: Audio | Video

Interview: Audio | Video

As a part of the Kantzer Lectures in Revealed Theology, Dr. Bruce McCormack will present seven lectures on the doctrine of election. Dr. McCormack will present the lectures at various times from September 27 – October 4. Click on the graphic below to see the schedule!

The Henry Center welcomes Timothy Laniak who is the Academic Dean at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary (Charlotte Campus). Dr. Laniak has served as a missionary in 15 countries in Europe, Asia and the Middle East, as the director of the International Fellowship House in Boston, and as a welfare housing manager for elderly immigrants in Brookline, MA. He launched the Urban Ministry Program at the Charlotte campus and directed it for eight years.

Dr. Laniak also has a long-time interest in the relationship between Scripture and cultures. Those interests shape the talk he will be giving on the theme of “Shepherds After My Own Heart: The Enduring Challenge of Pastoral Identity.” The most consistent biblical metaphor for leaders among the people of God is the shepherd. But what, really, is a spiritual shepherd? Beyond the specific job descriptions and role expectations of others, what does God expect of us? How does God see us? In this illustrated presentation, Dr. Laniak will take us into the world of Bedouin shepherds for unique perspectives on Scripture’s challenge to shepherd God’s flock. Come renew your pastoral calling with images and insights designed to keep you on course as you serve the Chief Shepherd. Let God reset your identity as his shepherd.

All are welcome; the lecture is free and will take place in the ATO Chapel on Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 1pm.

The Henry Center is pleased to announce that Michael Glerup’s recent Scripture & Ministry lecture and interview sessions are now posted free of charge for the viewing of the general public.

Moses, a pivotal figure in the story of salvation, was a friend of God, who God spoke to “face to face, clearly and not in riddles.”  He was the most humble man on earth and a powerful intercessor for Israel yet was rejected and maligned by his community. The early church-apostles and later interpreters– steeped in scripture, encouraged by Jesus words “If you believed Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote about me” mined Moses’ life for insight into the Christian life and faith. In this lecture we will investigate with the early exegetes, particularly those from the African continent, the key events of Moses’ life and explore their implications for pastoral ministry, Christian formation, and the mission of the church.

Lecture: Audio | Video

Interview: Audio | Video

Mark your calendars for the next Henry Center debate!

October 27, 2011 | 7:00 pm | Is Social Justice an Essential Part of the Mission of the Church?

Participants | Jim Wallis and  Dr. R. Albert Mohler

Moderator | Chris Firestone

Location | ATO Chapel (TEDS)

Description:

North American Evangelicals have recently experienced a revival of interest in issues of social justice. The growing sentiment among many today is that Jesus preached “good news to the poor,” and was indeed among the poor and marginalized. These Christians believe that the implications of these facts should renew the church’s understanding of the gospel and its mission. Rightly or wrongly, this interest in social justice is transforming the blueprint and vision of ecclesial ministry.

For others, this blueprint conjures up concerns about 20th century liberal Protestantism and a watering down of the gospel’s message of salvation. The defining mission of the church, for them, continues to be the sharing of the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ to all nations, generations, and social classes. The issue of social justice, though important, is not to be considered as an essential part of the mission of the church.

A basic question at the heart of the debate is this: Is social justice an essential part of the mission of the church?

The Henry Center for Theological Understanding, in its Trinity Debates forum, is pleased to provide a public venue for addressing this question by hosting two prominent voices from competing perspectives. Jim Wallis will answer “Yes” and R. Albert Mohler will answer “No.”

Note: The HCTU will simulcast this event. To view this event, click here.

By Rob Moll

Our world is one in which people, ideas, and products travel from everywhere on the globe to anywhere else. As a result, every place is a mission field, a home to people in need of the gospel. Yet bringing the gospel to them can be a serious challenge.

Typically, missionaries find ways to contextualize the gospel, to make it understandable and meaningful in a particular culture. In the U.S., where the gospel has to a large degree shaped the culture, the problem is not contextualization but over-contextualization, says Casely Essamuah. How do you make the gospel understood where it is such a familiar presence as to be unremarkable? This is the challenge of missionaries who come to the U.S.

Casely Essamuah is global missions pastor or Bay Area Community Church in Annapolis, Maryland. Originally from Ghana, Essamuah and his wife met while they were students in Boston. Angela Wakhweya-Essamuah, after receiving an MA in Economics at the London School of Economics, is now deputy director of infectious health for the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. The couple works with short term mission trips from Maryland to Africa as well as with immigrant communities planting churches in the U.S. The couple spoke at the Henry Center Scripture and Ministry Series (Lecture: Audio | Video; Interview: Audio | Video).

Around the world, the gospel has not been evenly contextualized. “In 1900,” Casely said, “33 percent of the world identified itself as Christian. That is the same as in the year 2000. The Christian market share has remained the same, but the real issue is where the growth took place.” In Africa and Latin America, growth of the church as been feverish, he said. “This is a testament to the successful contextualization of the gospel. God worked through southern church.”

However, Casely said, despite some success in South Korea and a few other countries, efforts at church planting in Asia have not gone far enough. In the West, the picture is ambiguous. “The church is alive and thriving,” he said. “Churches are active in relief among the global poor. The church seems to be meeting the challenge of the 21^st century, but there are clouds. The Western church suffers from an over-contextualizing of cultural forms.”

Reverse missions

Missionaries coming to the U.S. have so far only recognized the problem. These missionaries are not sent by their home churches specifically to share the good news on U.S. soil. Instead, they come to America as economic migrants and slowly their identity shifts toward that of a missionary.

Casely said that most Americans today don’t recognize what the rest of the world saw as a momentous decision when, in 1965, the government overturned the system of country quotas that preferred immigration from European countries. “That set the U.S. on a course that was different than past 300 years,” he said. “Today we have a president called Barak Obama.”

This allowed migrants from very different cultures to arrive on these shores, and they brought with them their religion, often Christianity. However, they are often shocked at the degree to which their faith is absent from American culture.

“One of the things we encounter around the world is the shock when Westerners are introduced to poverty,” Casely said. Immigrants to the U.S. don’t experience the same type of shock. They know what the U.S. looks like. They’ve seen television shows or movies, and they know what to expect. But what does shock these immigrants is the degree of secularization of American culture, Casely said, “especially when people come from where Christianity is strong. They see the U.S. as a place of dry bones.”

This is the start of their transition from economic migrants to missionaries, and these reverse missionaries are having incredible success, first with fellow immigrants and slowly with the rest of American society. “The church of Pentecost is 50 yrs old in Ghana,” Casely said, “and they have established 200 churches in the U.S. in 25 years.”

As a Ghanaian Methodist minister in Annapolis, Maryland, he said, “There are six Ghanaian Methodist churches within an hours’ drive.” They were formed to provide refuge for immigrants looking to worship in their language and a familiar culture. Now, however, “They are renegotiating their identity as Ghanaians in the U.S.”

The effect of their missionary efforts remains to be seen. Can reverse missionaries change American culture? Time will tell. We do know, however, that there is no need to wait for experts to travel around the world to find out. Americans can visit their local store-front church or neighborhood recreation center on a Sunday morning and see the whole world in worship.

The Henry Center is pleased to announce that the Essamuahs’ recent Scripture & Ministry lecture and interview sessions are now posted free of charge for the viewing of the general public.

An African evangelical family with almost two decades of experience in American church leadership reflects on the missions work of immigrants in light of the current state of Christianity in the world. Examples of global outreach and evangelism efforts through short term missions will be discussed, as well as the impact such experiences have on the participants. Highlights will be drawn from Uganda and Ghana short term missions trips by American Christians and what they learned from their experiences.

Lecture: Audio | Video

Interview: Audio | Video

Because of the heavy snowfall last week, Jackson Crum’s second Timothy Series sermon was canceled. Jackson Crum has been rescheduled to speak in TEDS chapel on Thursday April 28 at 11:00.

The sermon will take place at 11 am in chapel; this will be followed by a free lunch and Q&A session in Hinkson Hall. Come and join us to learn from Pastor Crum and his many years of pastoral ministry.