The Thoughtful Pastorate: Resources to Strengthen Ministry and Christian Life, Pt. 3

I've tried to give the evangelical pastor (and interested layperson) some good resources by which to stay up on current trends in theology and culture. Day one covered explicitly Christian resources; day two provided a mix of blogs and magazines; today I offer up another scattered mix of outlets that you might check once in a while to see what's going on.

1. Relevant Magazine email list (click the link and look to the lower right of the page for a sign-up box) has some good links and gives you a little snapshot of what young, hip, "cool" evangelicals are thinking. Some of it will make you scratch your head, but if your goal is staying in touch with what various groups of people are thinking, this email will help.
2. The 9Marks blog provides lots of good thinking on the church. It asks great questions, questions that most people leading the church won't ask, such as "How does the Bible teach us to structure our churches?" Also, check out Mike McKinley's writing--he can be hilarious (he's the cool 9Marks guy).
3. For that matter, let me recommend the 9Marks site. Have you checked it out? I talk about it pretty often on this blog, but if you've never bookmarked, you really should. The site has a ton of good content--interviews, book reviews, and articles, all of which center around the church and its life. The bimonthly newsletter is nothing less than exceptional and will acquaint with current conversations on the church.
4. The Council for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood has a great blog called GenderBlog. Because gender issues are so important and contested right now, you should avail yourself of the content on this blog. Some pieces are brief, but you'll be able to stay up with current trends on this hugely important subject. Also, go to GirlTalk for helpful writing on Christian womanhood (and check out Carolyn McCulley's blog on womanhood from a single's perspective--excellent).
5. Once in a while, take a spin through some cutting-edge cultural reference points--sites like The New Yorker, Vanity Fair, People, Conde Nast, Sports Illustrated, the New York Times, and so on. You'll want to be careful on some of these sites about what content you view, but if you are, you'll gain a healthy perspective on what people in various pockets of culture are thinking, coveting, and struggling with.

One of the most helpful things you can do as a pastor and a thoughtful Christian person is to acquaint yourself with local media. For example, now that I'm in Chicago, I pick up the free RedEye magazine and read Sheridan Road magazine (also free) when it's sent to me. RedEye keeps me up to date on what hipsters and edgy twentysomethings are thinking, while Sheridan Road lets me know what the ultra-rich of the North Shore are into.

This is one of the most helpful ways you can think culturally as a Christian, and therefore minister more effectively in your setting (like Paul at Mars Hill in Acts 17). Identify the leading thought media of your area and browse it to learn what people are thinking and talking about. I learned to do this from my former boss, Dr. Al Mohler, and also from Seattle pastor Mark Driscoll, each of whom excels at reading, understanding, and speaking to the culture. I followed their example in DC, in Louisville, and I plan to do it wherever I go in order to connect with people better and minister to them.

I hope that this brief series has been helpful to you. There is an avalanche of resources I could recommend and there are many that readers will identify as personally helpful that I have not listed here. However, I'm confident that the fifteen to twenty resources listed here will greatly assist pastors across the nation (and perhaps the world) to stay up to date on both Christian and secular culture. You and I need to know the Word, preeminently, before anything else; but beyond this, it will really help us to know what people are thinking. The world is constantly changing, and we should not fall behind as we engage it.

Ministering as if we're in a vacuum may not prevent us from faithful ministry, but it won't do much to help us. Bookmark some of these links, get in touch with the world, and get passionate to reach all corners of your world for Christ.

Homemaking Is Not Drudgery (Just ask G. K. Chesterton)

I came across these words from G. K. Chesterton while (briefly) visiting the Girltalk blog (impressive sources, ladies!). For those who have not heard of this blog, I highly recommend it. It's probably the best resource out there today for women who want to learn about homemaking from a Christian perspective. Best of all, it's infused with the joy and God-saturated nature characteristic of resources from the world of Sovereign Grace. If you're a woman wondering what Christian homemaking looks like, you could not do better for a blog-based resource than Girltalk.

Chesterton's excellent commentary on the dignity and importance of homemaking, the vocation Christians believe stems from the apostle Paul's comment referring to young women "working at home" (Titus 2:5) :

"[Woman is surrounded] with very young children, who require to be taught not so much anything as everything. Babies need not to be taught a trade, but to be introduced to a world. To put the matter shortly, woman is generally shut up in a house with a human being at the time when he asks all the questions that there are, and some that there aren't...."

"[W]hen people begin to talk about this domestic duty as not merely difficult but trivial and dreary, I simply give up the question. For I cannot with the utmost energy of imagination conceive what they mean. When domesticity, for instance, is called drudgery, all the difficulty arises from a double meaning in the word. If drudgery only means dreadfully hard work, I admit the woman drudges in the home, as a man might drudge [at his work]. But if it means that the hard work is more heavy because it is trifling, colorless and of small import to the soul, then as I say, I give it up; I do not know what the words mean…. I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot imagine how it could narrow it. How can it be a large career to tell other people's children [arithmetic], and a small career to tell one's own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No; a woman's function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness.""

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Over against cultural derision toward homemaking, a mammoth literary figure affirms the vocation as hugely important. People can speak as they wish, but in my home, the domestic work of motherhood and homemaking will never, ever be spoken of in derogatory terms. How, after all, can I or my family call unholy what the Bible teaches is sacred? My wife does not despise this calling, and neither, I pray, will my daughter.

Of course, when you consider Chesterton's words and the actual responsibilities of a homemaker, you'll struggle not to underemphasize the importance of mothering and work around the house but to avoid overemphasizing it! Those who deride this work, in the end, seem to have less information about what it actually entails than do so many of the women I know. As I said recently in a sermon on 1 Timothy 2:11-15, I am called on a daily level to nurture my email account. My wife, on the other hand, is called to nurture a life, a soul, a person with an eternal existence.

Over against what the culture teaches us, does a Christian woman's work seem weightless and frivolous? You tell me.