The Glimpse Project: Taiwan Available 11:11 AM

The Glimpse Project: Taiwan is available on DVD and has been mailed to each congregation for their individual use. We invite you to use it in your ministry, whether it's during a "mission moment" or just to get to know your missionaries. A Japan and Chad series are also available, if you need them. These are also available for individual use as a family or small group Bible study.

To Purchase and Learn More visit > ffbooks.org/glimpseproject

A short preview of the third installment of the Glimpse Project. Shot in Taiwan in May 2010.

20th Annual A. A. Pedersen Lectureship 8:43 AM

20th Annual A. A. Pedersen Lectureship

Where
Bethel Lutheran Church
702 West Alcott
Fergus Falls, Minnesota

When
October 3 at 7:00 p.m. and October 4 -  TBA

Lectureship Speaker
Dr. Bryan Chapell

About the Speaker
Dr. Bryan Chapell is president and professor of practical theology at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri. His insightful Bible teaching can be heard daily via the Internet on Living Christ 360 (www.livingchrist360.com).

Raised in Memphis, Tennessee, Dr. Chapell was a pastor for approximately ten years before joining the faculty of Covenant Seminary, the seminary of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), in 1985. He served the Seminary for six years as vice president for academics and dean of faculty before becoming president in 1994. He has been active in a variety of leadership roles in the PCA and in cooperative ministries with numerous other national and international Christian ministries.

Dr. Chapell is a renowned preacher, teacher, and speaker who is much sought after by churches, colleges, seminaries, and conferences throughout this country and abroad. He is the author of many articles and numerous books, including Christ-Centered Worship, Ephesians, Praying Backwards: Transform Your Prayer Life by Beginning in Jesus’ Name, Why Do We Baptize Infants?, Holiness by Grace, I’ll Love You Anyway & Always, Each for the Other, The Wonder of It All, and Christ-Centered Preaching, a preaching textbook now in multiple editions and many languages that has established him as one of the nation’s foremost teachers of homiletics.

Lutheran Brethren Seminary website

CLB Book Club 3:21 PM

The Discussion Begins October 4th! 

Why This Book? (Buy it at F&F Bookstore Online)
The seminars at 2010 CLB Convention focused on reaching a changing culture. Postmodernism, whether you are familiar with that term or not, has permeated our culture. It has influenced the young and old alike, forcing the local church to seriously think about the way that it reaches its community. A common description of North America is that it is a melting pot of nationalities. It is also a melting pot of philosophy and religion. Christians can no longer expect their neighbor to understand the basics of Christianity, or care about attending church on Easter Sunday.

So what can the Church do? First, we need to understand our culture. Dr. Eugene Boe opened the seminar time with a session titled Ministry in a Post-Christian World (See video below). In it, he mentioned this book, Postmodernism 101 by Heath White. Heath White has also written an article in the current issue of Faith & Fellowship Magazine. We invite you to read this book and discuss a chapter each week, bringing us to a unified understanding of what kind of culture we are attempting to reach today.

Dr. Eugene Boe
Academic Dean, Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology, Lutheran Brethren Seminary
2010 CLB Convention
June 21, 2010

Book: The Strategically Small Church 2:28 PM

Brandon J. O'Brien is editor at large for Leadership Journal and has written a book, released this month, titled "The Strategically Small Church." It seems to be a wonderful analysis of the benefits and opportunities facing a small congregation. The issue is that many small congregations look to mega churches for inspiration and ideas in ministry. O'Brien responds, "The trouble is, operating like a big church can undermine the inherent strengths of being small."

He goes on to say:

For example, as I explain in the book, research suggests that one of the factors that contributes to whether or not young people stay active in church after high school is intergenerational relationships. The students who have more and deeper relationships with adults other than their parents are much more likely to remain in the church in college and beyond. Now, smaller congregations offer tons of opportunity for developing these intergenerational relationships. But the hallmark of large churches is age-segmented ministry, programs designed to separate children from youth, youth from adults, young adults from seniors. When small churches imitate this model, they undercut their advantage for fostering intergenerational relationships.

We have not read the book, yet, but there are a few pastors who will be reading it, so we will follow up with some reviews and opinions about the content of the book when they finish reading it. This topic seems to fit many of our congregations and where they are in terms of size and ministry focus. But, again, we are not promoting the book since no one that we know has read it, yet. We are only inviting a discussion and thoughts on this topic and this book seems to have touched on a relevant issue within our congregations. Please share your thoughts and opinions with us if you have read this book.

Here are some links related to Brandon O'Brien and this book

• Free download of the First Chapter of the book (PDF)
• Interview with Ed Stetzer
• Interview with Wrecked.org
• Audio interview with Chris Fabry of Moody Radio

In the meantime, if you are interested in diving into this you can order it through Amazon by clicking the following link:
Strategically Small Church, The: Intimate, Nimble, Authentic, and Effective by Brandon J. O'Brien.
(By using this link, Faith & Fellowship will receive a portion of the profits through our Amazon Associates account. Thank you.)

30 Days of Prayer For The Muslim World 9:59 AM

The next 30 days is Ramadan (the holy month of fasting in Islam). You can join Christians all over the world in praying for Muslims. 30 Days of Prayer for the Muslim World provides booklets and online material to guide you through the next 30 days. The following text is from the first page in the booklet. We have also provided links to resources and the prayer calendar below.

Welcome to the 19th annual 30 Days Muslim Prayer Focus.

It coincides yearly with Ramadan (the holy month of fasting in Islam). This prayer movement (currently coordinated out of France and previously from Australia) calls upon Christians to make a concerted but considerate effort during this time to learn about, pray for and reach out to Muslim neighbors - across the street and around the world.

It is not our intention with this prayer focus to disparage Islam or Muslim sentiments in any way. We recognize that humans and the Muslim world are far too complex to easily condense or explain with a mere booklet. Yet, as Christians, we long for all the world's people to have an opportunity to understand the grace of God incarnated in Jesus Christ. To this end we inform ourselves, pray for, and support respectful opportunities to make that grace also known among Muslims.

Each year a new illustrated prayer guide is published in dozens of languages and locations around the world.

Thank you for participating.

Follow the 30 Days of Prayer Online
Click here to view the Prayer Calendar and Guides

Downloads related to the Prayer Focus

• Is God Really Interested? (PDF)
• Basic Islam - Part One (PDF)
• Basic Islam - Part Two (PDF)

Book by Chaplain David Thompson (Ret.) Honored 12:09 PM

The May/June issue of Faith & Fellowship Magazine included a cover story by Retired Chaplain David Thompson. Chaplain Thompson is the co-author of the book Beyond the Yellow Ribbon. We received an email today mentioning that the book was chosen as one of the Top 10 Books for Parish Ministry in 2009 by Academy of Parish Clergy!

• View list of "Top 10 Books for Parish Ministry"

Read some reviews of Beyond the Yellow Ribbon:

• UMPH Review
• Review by Faith Reads

Purchase the book at Amazon.com:

Beyond the Yellow Ribbon: Ministering to Returning Combat Veterans

NY Times Article about Pastors 8:47 AM

A pastor forwarded this article from NY Times to our Lutheran Brethren Seminary President, Dr. David Veum. We hope that this article will continue to open our eyes to the stress and expectations that our pastors are under at times, and help us find new ways to support them in their ministry. The latest issue of Faith & Fellowship Magazine focused on taking care of our pastors. In fact, Dr. David Veum wrote an article for it. The NY Times article focuses on the reality of burnout and health issues in today's pastors. One quote from the article reads, "They think that taking care of themselves is selfish, and that serving God means never saying no." Please pray for our pastors and their congregations. They may never reveal their stress level or depression, so as another article in our latest issue of Faith & Fellowship reads, "Pastors need to be reassured that we understand at least some of the stress they are under and that it's safe for them to ask for help" (Pastors Need Self-Care Too by Nate Larsen).

NY Times article "Taking a Break From the Lord’s Work":

The findings have surfaced with ominous regularity over the last few years, and with little notice: Members of the clergy now suffer from obesity, hypertension and depression at rates higher than most Americans. In the last decade, their use of antidepressants has risen, while their life expectancy has fallen. Many would change jobs if they could.

Public health experts who have led the studies caution that there is no simple explanation of why so many members of a profession once associated with rosy-cheeked longevity have become so unhealthy and unhappy.
Read the full article from NY TIMES >

The Gospel Coalition 2011 2:33 PM

Last year me and my buddy Tony got to go to The Gospel Coalition biennial conference in Chicago. Tim Keller, D.A. Carson, John Piper and a whole host of others preached through 2 Timothy, and needless to say, it was quite remarkable. So I was thrilled this morning when I saw that they have just announced their next conference in 2011!

The Conference will be held again in Chicago (Downtown), and this time their will be over 50 speakers from all different denominations being brought in to talk about how to preach Christ from the Old Testament (Professor Soenksen are you interested yet?). The title of the conference is, "They testify about me: Preaching Christ and the Gospel from the Old Testament," and the dates are April 12-14.

Check out the video below as Tim Keller and D.A. Carson talk about what to expect at this year's event:

Ministry in a Post-Christian World 7:19 PM

Ministry in a Post-Christian World
by Dr. Eugene Boe
Academic Dean
Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology
Lutheran Brethren Seminary

2010 CLB Convention
June 21, 2010

This seminar was the opening session that was meant to lay the foundation for the rest of the seminars at this year's Convention of the Church of the Lutheran Brethren.

Watch other videos from the 2010 Convention

Statement on Missional Theology Available 2:22 PM

Announced today on the CLB Blog:

Below you will be able to download a copy of the Report from the Study Committee on Missional Theology. The Report of the Study Committee on Missional Theology is being received by the Theological Council which will, through the Council of Directors, bring a recommendation to this year's Convention. This is an important subject worthy of your reading prior to the Convention and discussion during the hour it will be presented to the Church.

I, on behalf of the Church, thank the members of the Study Committee for their many hours of reading, deliberation, and writing. Presenting the summary backgrounds of many aspects of the missional theology conversation, they lead us to Biblical and confessional foundations for evaluation of that particular emphasis followed by affirmations and denials. This paper will be a teaching guide for mission that is domestic and international ministry and evangelism to those who do not yet confess Jesus Christ as Son of God and their Savior.

Anticipating your fellowship during the Convention, June 20-22nd,

Joel Egge, President

Download > Statement on Missional Theology
View > the committee's recommended reading list

CLB Youth Workers Resource 2:45 PM

Youth are the future of our churches and youth are the present of our churches. I’m guessing your hope for your church is that you are as effective as possible in reaching out to teens. The Church of the Lutheran Brethren wants to come along side each of our churches youth ministries and youth ministers as best as you see the need.

As we transition into our regional model of ministry the regional pastors have asked me, Mark Johannesen, if I would contract with them for a few hours for this type of ministry each week and for the last few months I have been trying to do that. Previously this work was contracted by staff at Inspiration Point Bible Camp and I thank them for the running start they gave me as I assumed this roll.

I was in youth ministry full time for over ten years and am currently pastoring at Good News Lutheran Brethren Church in McAlisterville, PA. I’m no expert, but I love teens and everything that comes across my desk that I think is beneficial to our youth workers I hope to pass on. I hope also to pass on national youth ministry resources like the 2011 Youth Convention in Estes Park.


Every week I hope to call and talk to as many of our youth workers as possible, blogging on the CLB Youth workers web page, feel free to take a look at it. If you’re on Facebook, I invite you to look me up and to look up the CLB Youth Workers group. We’re trying to interact online as best as possible.

I also send out 2-3 emails a month. If you haven’t received one from me, please email me at mjohannesen@clba.org and ask to be added to the e-list. Please also know I’m hoping to ask each one of you how ministry is going and how we can pray for each other. On the Facebook page there is a place for you to share your requests with one another as well.

Blessings as you are used by Jesus to love teens for Him,

Mark Johannesen