Right between the eyes. From a Calvinist.
HT: Justin Taylor, Crossway
Category Archives: Witnesses
Expression: Edith Schaeffer
Edith Schaeffer, 1914-2013. Expressing a heart for Christ, warts and all, and shaping several generations of Christians.
Edith Schaeffer died earlier this year, on March 30, so I would be remiss to let 2013 pass without remembering the life of this remarkable woman. Known to most people as the wife of influential evangelical philosopher and pastor Francis Schaeffer, Edith has had her own contribution to make to the life of the evangelical Christian church: mother, devoted wife, gracious host, prolific author, and creative artist, among other things.
To my knowledge, the only time a woman has ever occupied the pulpit to deliver a sermon in our church in over some thirty plus years was when Edith Schaeffer came to town in March of 1994…. and boy, was it a doozie!! Apparently, Edith (at age 79 back then!) had no concept of time and she kept going on… and on… and on. After well over an hour plus after she had started, our senior pastor was still sitting there sweating bullets as he watched couple after couple after couple get up and leave, all frustrated that she had gone on so terribly long and our pastor had done nothing to stop her! But how could you interrupt the wife of one of evangelicalism’s most influential voices of the 20th century?
Marketplace Disciples
Dick Woodward’s ministry partner, businessman Dois Rosser, asked Dick to write a how-to manual for:
- Leading a secular person to Christ,
- Discipling someone who has come to faith, and
- Turning every day you spend in the marketplace into an adventure with Christ.
After reading the final product, I’m certain Dois would agree that he got more than he hoped for.
Marketplace Disciples succeeds beyond the ‘marketplace’ where most of us earn a paycheck. In a greater sense it succeeds in the marketplace of ideas, where there is no shortage of ideas about how to live your life. Atheism, agnosticism, skepticism, religious ideologies, post-modernism, apathy, self-centeredness—you name it.
But here is the big idea: Until Jesus Christ is everything in your life, He really isn’t anything in your life. Dick learned this basic truth from his mother. It doesn’t take long to figure out that Dick takes discipleship very seriously. The difference between Dick and someone like David Platt is that, like the apostle Paul, Dick bears the marks of Jesus on his body.
Dick can’t type. He can’t move his fingers. Or sit up in bed, or scratch his nose. If his head slides off his pillow someone else has to prop him back up. You get the picture—it takes enormous energy and determination to produce even a small amount of text, let alone this 324-page book, using speech recognition software. His voice-control skills are quite impressive. I wouldn’t want to be Dick’s editor—he is a strict grammarian and a meticulous writer.
Pastor Dick Woodward
So why should you read Marketplace Disciples? Dick has 50 years of discipleship experience. The man knows what he is talking about, what works, why it works, and most importantly why it matters. He has walked with a lot of people, and has clearly earned his credentials. Even Ravi Zacharias has been deeply moved by Dick’s ministry.
But if I were to get to the heart of the matter, the best reason is that Dick is one of the most joy-filled people I know. You would be hard pressed to find anyone with a brighter outlook, or anyone who could offer more encouragement to those needing a kind word. Continue reading
Movement: Chuck Smith
Chuck Smith (1927-2013). A pastor on the move. A passion for the marginalized, but not without some conflict along the way.
In the 1960s, most American Christian churches wanted to have nothing to do with hippies. A young Southern California pastor, Chuck Smith, was determined to change all of that.
When an older member of the church posted a sign in the sanctuary with “no bare feet allowed”, Smith ripped it down. Smith believed that the church was called to reach out to the counter-culture community, even if it meant exchanging the standard suit and tie of the evangelical preacher for a more casual dress.
Chuck Smith’s critical moment came unexpectedly when he befriended a long-haired, bearded hippie teenager, Lonnie Frisbee. Frisbee became a pastor himself in Chuck Smith’s Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa. From there, by the sheer providence of God, the Jesus Movement was born.
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