Radical Reformission Quote #7

From the introduction: my personal reformission and the growing reformission movement. (See the previous quote for context.)

[...] the parachurch, which includes evangelistic ministries such as Young Life and Campus Crusade for Christ. [...] The failure of such ministries is that they are often disconnected from the local church, connecting unchurched people to Jesus without connecting them to the rest of Jesus' people. This can lead to theological immaturity. [...]

This is classic liberal Christianity, and it exists largely in the dying mainline churches. [...] Their failure is that they bring to the culture a false gospel of accommodation, rather than confrontation, by seeking to bless people as they are rather than calling them to a repentant faith that transforms them. [...]

Though they know the gospel theologically, they rarely take it out of their church. This is classic fundamentalist Christianity, which flourishes most widely in more independent-minded Bible-believing churches. [...] Pastors at these churches are prone to speak about the needs of the church, focusing on building up its people and keeping them from sinning.

Radical Reformission Quote #6

From the introduction: my personal reformission and the growing reformission movement.

Reformission is a radical call for Christians and Christian churches to recommit to living and speaking the gospel, and to do so regardless of the pressures to compromise the truth of the gospel or to conceal its power within the safety of the church. [...]

Reformission therefore begins with a simple return to Jesus, who by grace saves us and sends us into mission. Jesus has called us to (1) the gospel (loving our Lord), (2) the culture (loving our neighbor) and (3) the church (loving our brother). But one of the causes of our failure to fulfill our mission in the American church is that the various Christian traditions are faithful on only one or two of these counts.

Gospel + Culture - Church = Parachurch
Culture + Church - Gospel = Liberalism
Church + Gospel - Culture = Fundamentalism