The Nature of Ministry: Priestly or Prophetic?
In his penetrating volume The Genius of Puritanism, Peter Lewis draws a fascinating distinction between the priestly model and the prophetic model of public worship.
This distinction seems to me to be pertinent to the current debate over the nature of ministry.
Preaching in the Spirit
From the beginning, preaching was the major dynamic in Pentecostal evangelism. The standard method of winning people to God’s kingdom was to preach the gospel — on the streets, in the home, in hired halls, in tents — indeed wherever they could draw a crowd. Nothing else could compare with the proclamation of Christ in the power of the Spirit. The Spirit was given so that men and women could preach and it was by the hearing of the Word of God that people were saved.
Prophecies in Print?
In 1911, a small group of believers in Chicago, Illinois, launched a series of volumes which came to be known as the ‘Yellow Books’. Purporting to contain messages from Jesus himself, these books attracted many sincere and godly readers who longed to hear from their Lord but who were ultimately and inevitably disappointed.
In or about 1923, some of the early Pentecostals in Adelaide, South Australia, began to promote a series of publications known as the Yellow Books.
Waters to Swim In
In many ways, the history of the early Pentecostal work in Adelaide, South Australia, offers a microcosm of the early movement across the country. In this article Barry Chant offers some insights into the nature and development of that work.
Charismatic Spirituality
To define charismatic spirituality is no easy task. The fields are vast and the crops varied. Of course, this applies to some extent to any Christian modality. Anglicanism, for instance, is a variegated plant, as diverse as liturgical Anglo-Catholicism and conservative evangelicalism. And if we were to evaluate Baptist spirituality from the preaching of Rev Jerry Falwell we might gain a rather different impression than from the ministry of Dr Billy Graham.
Breaking The Power Of The Past
Rev Dr Michael Green – Dr Barry Chant has written an outstanding book to help Christians break the chains of their past life — the chains of guilt, rejection, fear, failure and the like. The treatment is biblical, wise and amply illustrated by a wealth of examples.
The whole thing is attractively written by an experienced and deeply spiritual counsellor and teacher.
Welcome with Video
Welcome to my website. Here you will find plenty to interest you – and a lot of it is free. Just yours for the taking. You can simply download any of the following. Short stories to entertain you. Articles to stimulate your thinking on many different subjects – the Bible, history, homosexuality, ministry, gifts of […]
Welcome Video Only
Four views of Spirit Baptism
The question of baptism in the Spirit has been a controversial one for a long time. Part of the problem lies in the different ways we use the term. It can easily mean different things to different people. It is this different usage which generally distinguishes Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Charismatics and Third Wavers from one another.
Charismata in the first five centuries
There is neither scriptural nor anecdotal evidence that the gifts of the Holy Spirit died out at the end of the apostolic era. Biblically, it is impossible to prove the case for cessationism. God established charismata in the Church (1 Corinthians 12:27-28) and all believers are urged to pray for them (1 Corinthians 12:31; 14:1). It is equally impossible to prove a cessationist viewpoint historically. It simply does not fit the facts.