We dare not try to cut Christ in pieces, as if we could receive him deliverer from sin's guilt but not from its dominion, or as Savior but not as Lord. Nor can we cut ourselves in pieces, severing our body from our soul—as if we could give our heart to Jesus and keep the title deed to our body. It's precisely because our bodies are too important to the biblical drama that they cannot be exempted from biblical discipleship.

“I did this not out of spite, but out of a feeling against the prevailing self-righteousness that stems from religion, particularly in Lancaster County,” the atheist said. “I don’t consider it an earthshaking affair, but in this area in particular, we seem to have so many self-righteous religious people, so it just annoys me.”

"Some people are just wired to do this," Lanier told me. "Sometimes it's men who know they're not equipped to work in the church nursery or to sing in the church choir. But if they're like me, they can feel the smile of God as they exercise their tool skills—and because they have a chance to relate one-on-one to someone who maybe never heard the gospel of Jesus before."

According to Kreider, what lies behind this busyness isn't simply ambition and drive; it's also a "dread [of] what they might have to face in its absence." That's because "busyness serves as a kind of existential reassurance, [and] a hedge against emptiness.It's our way of telling ourselves that our lives "cannot possibly be silly or trivial or meaningless" if we are "in demand every hour of the day."

The new amendment easily passed stating that the dissolution of the ministry of a bishop requires a two-third supermajority for all voting bodies. After the passing of the amendment, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori said nothing but appeared stunned.

My own conversion was intellectual. I didn't need a quick spiritual fix. Instead, I encountered a compelling and luminous vision of reality so powerful and attractive that it demanded a response.

There’s so much that’s encouraging, one respondent told the magazine, but he too perceived an “unmistakable climate of suspicion.” You see and feel it in presbytery and General Assembly, he said. Some are sure that the denomination is teetering on the brink of liberalism, while others fear that we’re becoming rigid and sectarian.

The Bishop and Deputation of the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina have withdrawn from the 77th General Convention. On 11 July 2012 the lay and clergy deputies released a statement confirming their withdrawal. “Due to the actions of General Convention, the South Carolina Deputation has concluded that we cannot continue with business as usual. We... Continue Reading

Then there was a major uptick in the use of the actual phrase “ask Jesus into your heart” in the 1970s, perhaps as children’s ministry became more formalized and leaders looked for very simple ways to explain to children what a decision for Christ would entail.

'Did his medical training impact the way he read the Bible?', 'Did personal rivalries within the British evangelical movement of the 50s shape the way things fell out in the 60s?' and 'Was his understanding of the Puritans something they themselves would have recognized or did it involve infusing a certain amount of whacky eighteenth century Welsh Methodist mysticism back into them?'