Fall2006

Community Christian Church (Naperville, Illinois) developed "The Big Idea" concept after launching her second location in the Chicago area. Today the idea provides consistency among more than half a dozen of Community’s campuses throughout the city and also assists many of the new churches Community helped to plant.

The Big Idea aligns campuses "horizontally" across the miles as well as "vertically" by ensuring that children, teens, and adults study the same concept at the same time. CCC staff members write new elementary curriculum and publish new small group material for every idea and sermon series; the leadership team brainstorms message content more than two months in advance to enable each staff member to plan effectively.

"It’s a lot of work to start the planning cycle, but it’s worth it to know family members can talk about the same idea on the way home from church," says Jon Ferguson, community pastor. After introducing it in weekend worship, the church incorporates The Big Idea into its Tuesday night support and recovery service, and even offers a two-minute weekly message delivered straight to cell phones.

Evangelicals have proven their ability to compete in a capitalist society, says Calvin College professor Debra Rienstra, "but can we regain the wherewithal to question consumer capitalism?"

Lauren F. Winner, author of Girl Meets God and Real Sex, says evangelicals . . . will also need to do their part to help save the environment from catastrophe due to global warming.

Evangelicals will have to get beyond their comfort zones on other issues as well, says Rienstra. "Evangelicals have largely dismissed and mostly reviled one of the most significant cultural movements in history: feminism." Though evangelicals will reject aspects of feminist idealogy [sic], she says "we can still receive the deepest and best gifts of feminism and recognize their consonance with the gospel."

Starting October 6th, Adventure will be offering a third worship service on Friday nights. The Service wll [sic] run from 7-8 pm and be very similar to our Sunday morning services. To start, we will only provide nursery, but may add more children's programming later. We're looking for 30 people who will commit to attend each week.

Teens Willing to Risk Health for Tans
As of October 2006, there were three times as many professional tanning parlors in the U.S. as there were Starbucks. Each year, an estimated 2.3 million teenagers enter those parlors, which has helped indoor tanning become a $5 billion-a-year industry. On their own, these numbers may not seem surprising, or even noteworthy. But they become dangerous when placed in the light of a recent medical discovery. Since 1975, the occurrence of melanoma—the most lethal form of skin cancer—has doubled in the United States among women ages 15–29.

Dr. James Spencer, a clinical professor of dermatology at New York City's Mount Sinai School of Medicine, has noticed the shift. "Skin cancer used to be something old people got," he said. "Now, not a month goes by that I don't see somebody in their 20s. That was unheard of 10 years ago." The World Health Organization is also taking notice. It estimates that 60,000 people die each year around the world because of excessive UV exposure, and urged youths under the age of 18 to avoid indoor tanning.

But many experts fear that teenagers will not change their behavior, even in the light of such dangerous consequences. Sabrina Hendershot, 16, knows that a year-round tan can go a long way in the current adolescent culture. "All the girls who are really tanned all through the year—they're the popular girls," she says. She added, "Guys are always complimenting girls on their tans."

Kylie-Ayn Kennedy, a 16-year-old friend of Sabrina's, is willing to risk her health for those kinds of rewards, which is why she visits a tanning parlor several times each week. "It may make my skin wrinkle a little bit earlier," she says, "but I'm going to look good while I can."

Sure, "look good" while you can, young ladies. If guys like it, why not? It's just UV exposure several times a week. Where's the harm? Melanoma is no big deal. I'm not surprised that sixteen-year-olds think this way. But my question is: where are the parents? It seems that a lot of parents today - far too many - are AWOL.

College Profs: More Religious than Thought: According to a study by Harvard and George Mason University, college professors are more religious than most people think. Only about one quarter of professors deny the existence of God or think it is impossible to know if God exists. The rest believe in God "at least part of the time" or in some kind of higher power.

These brand new, 3-inch stones are engraved with the inscription, "The First Stone," and then inlaid with gold. This paper weight makes an ideal gift for pastors, teachers, business people, YOURSELF - anyone.

Price is $9.95 plus shipping and handling. (For multi stone discounts, please call Dustin @ 619-227-5541).

Of course, once you own one of these, you can no longer say, "Silver and gold have I none." I, for one, would like to know more about those multi-stone discounts! If there are a lot of these stones, which one is really "the first stone"?

from the Kentucky Kernel Online, Posted: 9/28/06

Last fall some UK students started an attempt to create a gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and questioning resource center. This fall, that center is becoming a reality.

UK is renovating the waiting area of a women's restroom in the basement of the Student Center, approximately 288 square feet, to open it as the GLBTQ resource center in mid-October.

"It's in the process of renovation; they're making great progress," said Pat Terrell, UK's vice president of student affairs. Terrell said the creation sends a positive message to all UK students, straight and gay. "It sends a message that we support all students, that we provide resources and encouragement to every student who comes to this university," Terrell said.

University of Louisville and Western Kentucky University have similar resource centers on their campuses.

The pastor of an Atlanta church told us that Thanksgiving was becoming for them the new seeker's holiday. They found that people curious about faith would attend thanks-themed worship services with their believing friends. For seekers, Thanksgiving is a less demanding holiday than Christmas, which requires belief in the improbable (a Virgin birth?), or Easter, with its claims to exclusivity (must Christ be the only Way?). Everyone has something to be thankful for, and most people recognize that something beyond themselves must be credited with their blessings.

Note: in this next item, Kent's comments are inserted into the story in this format.

Pastors [I don't call them this, but we all know who we mean here] less informed about popular culture than are the people in their churches, from Facts & Trends, published bimonthly by LifeWay Christian Resources of the Southern Baptist Convention, November 9, 2006

Two studies were conducted for Facts & Trends by Ellison Research (Phoenix, Ariz.). One is a representative sample of 797 Protestant church ministers nationwide, and the other is a companion survey of 1,184 adults who attend Protestant churches at least once a month.

The area of today’s culture ministers tend to stay most informed about is politics, [of which there is plenty within the workings of most congregations] with 36 percent saying they are very informed about politics, and another 55 percent claiming to be somewhat informed on the subject. This is the only one of the 12 areas included in the study about which ministers actually feel better informed than the laity – 29 percent of all churchgoers feel very informed about politics, and another 47 percent feel somewhat informed about it. [An almost obvious fact given the way people tend to vote.]

Pastors and laity feel about equally informed about sports. [So far, so good. All ministers should also be football fans, at least. Otherwise they miss too many good illustration.] Twenty-four percent of clergy feel very informed about sports in today’s culture, and another 44 percent are somewhat informed about this topic, with laity providing answers which are very similar.

On each of the other ten topics, laity feel significantly more informed about the culture surrounding them than do ministers. [Naturally, since preachers have to prepare sermons, lessons, and so forth, they can't sit around watching "culture" all the time] Twenty percent of ministers feel very informed about the internet, [OK, guys, you should probably work on this a bit] compared to 43 percent of laity. Nineteen percent of ministers feel very informed about what’s on television today, [Why even worry about TV? There's nothing on worth watching anyway.] compared to 31 percent of laity. Eighteen percent are very informed about books, compared to 27 percent of laity, and 16 percent are very informed about movies today, compared to 24 percent of laity.

Pastors rarely feel very informed about the other culture topics on the list: radio and TV talk shows (12 percent, compared to 20 percent among laity), music (11 percent, versus 28 percent among laity), magazines (11 percent, compared to 17 percent among laity), clothing and fashion (7 percent, compared to 16 percent among laity), video and computer games (5 percent, compared to 16 percent among laity), and celebrities (4 percent, versus 10 percent among laity). [Isn't Jesus a celebrity anymore? Isn't He at least infamous for claiming to be the, Way, the Truth, and the Life?]

The areas where the greatest gaps exist between pastors and laity are in video and computer games, fashion, and celebrities. Fifty-nine percent of ministers are uninformed about fashion, [This becomes rather obvious when you notice how preachers dress - but aren't we supposed to be counter-cultural anyway?] compared to 37 percent of the people in the pews. [Let's face it, most of them are such hot dressers either.] Sixty-nine percent know next to nothing about celebrities, [And this is a bad thing?] while this is true of 49 percent of their congregations. And 71 percent are uninformed about video and computer games, [Speaking of which, someone should create a SIMS for church. It could be a growing, spiritually healthy groups of cyber-characters who are healthily ignorant of the worst parts of culture. Ministers might never leave their computers!] while 49 percent of their congregants know next to nothing on this subject. [But that is true of most subjects, so why even worry about it?]

In 2003, FCC Huntington Beach and Stadia decided to plant a new church in San Clemente. Scott was chosen to be Senior Pastor of that new church, called SeaPointe Christian Church. In January of this year, Saddleback Church, under the leadership of Rick Warren, decided to build a number of satellite churches to relieve the congestion and logistics of serving over 30,000 regular attendees. One of those satellite churches started in San Clemente. Rather than have two competing churches in the same vicinity, it was decided that SeaPointe would be absorbed by the Saddleback satellite church.