Oct. 21, 2019: Church size, counseling and discipleship study; UAE helps rebuild churches; New film about Norm Geisler
Daily Radio Script - Monday, Oct. 21, 2019
Here are the latest headlines, brought to you by The Christian Post.
Pastors of larger churches more likely to prioritize counseling and discipleship
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While a majority of Protestant pastors prioritize counseling and discipleship among their ministry meetings, pastors of larger churches are more likely to invest in these meetings, according to the results of a new study by LifeWay Research.
1,000 Protestant pastors were asked if they regularly have six types of common ministry meetings to: counsel church members; encourage members to step into leadership roles; meet individuals one-on-one to personally disciple them; meet with visitors or new attendees; lead a small group Bible study; or meet with two or three individuals together to personally disciple them.
While it was found that a significant majority of the pastors had at least one of these meetings a week, pastors of churches with attendance of 100 to 249 and those with 250 or more were found to be more likely to say they have meetings for counseling and discipleship more regularly than pastors of churches with attendance of 50 to 99 and those with less than 50 in attendance.
Scott McConnell, executive director of LifeWay Research, told The Christian Post: “On one hand it comes as a surprise that they’re not delegating that, especially something like counseling but at the same time I think they understand as the lead face for the church that people are gonna turn to them in times of difficulty and they’re not neglecting that pastoral responsibility."
Muslim-majority UAE commits to rebuilding 2 churches destroyed by ISIS in Iraq
The Muslim-majority United Arab Emirates announced plans this week to help rebuild two Christian churches destroyed by the Islamic State.
UAE has expanded its collaboration with a United Nations initiative called Revive the Spirit of Mosul. The initiative is an international effort to reconstruct Iraq’s once second-largest city ravaged by the Islamic State’s reign of destruction in the Nineveh region.
The new agreement commits UAE to restore the historic Al-Tahira Syriac-Catholic Church and Al-Saa’a Church in Mosul, a city that was conquered by the Islamic State terrorist group in 2014 and officially liberated by U.S.-backed coalition forces in July 2017.
Al Mohler: Complementarian theology 'can and has' led to the abuse of women in the church
During a chapel message delivered at Southern Seminary on Oct. 15, Southern Baptist Theological Seminary President Albert Mohler Jr. answered the question: “Is complementarianism a cause of the abuse of women and girls?”
“It can be, and it sometimes is,” Mohler admitted. “Sinful men will use anything in vanity and in anger, in sin of every form. Sinful men will distort anything and will take advantage of any argument that seems to their advantage, even to the abuse of women."
“There is a real sex abuse crisis in our midst ... We need to recognize that we have sinned against women when we have allowed complementarian to be presented in a way that implies male superiority and leads in sinfulness to male tyranny and terror and sin."
“We need to take responsibility for the fact that we as a denomination, as churches, have often failed to hear the cries of women who have spoken of their abuse, and we bear the responsibility for a failure to deal adequately, christianly, responsively as husbands who love their wives as Christ loves the church should respond to the cries of any women. Thus, we have work to do.”
Norm Geisler film ‘Not Qualified’ set to release in 2020
A film about notable Christian apologist, professor, and prolific author Norman Geisler, titled “Norm Geisler: Not Qualified,” who died earlier this year, will be released next year.
“We’re in the process of putting that together and it will be out next year,” said David Geisler, who added that “it wasn’t easy to get my father to agree to let me make a documentary on his life.”
The teaser trailer notes that Geisler was basically illiterate until high school, yet eventually ended up writing around 100 books.
https://www.christianpost.com/news/norm-geisler-film-not-qualified-set-to-release-in-2020.html
Hillsong Worship invites listeners into ‘revelation’ of who God really is in new album, 'Awake'
Grammy Award-winning group Hillsong Worship released their latest studio album Awake, and the popular band hopes listeners will have their own “awakening” with God.
Featuring the vocals of Brooke Ligertwood, Joel Houston, Taya, and Aodhan King, the album is comprised of 12 new tracks that they hope will help listeners participate in a deeper exchange with God.
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