{"id":281,"date":"2009-05-31T16:22:45","date_gmt":"2009-05-31T15:22:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/?p=281"},"modified":"2009-05-31T16:23:19","modified_gmt":"2009-05-31T15:23:19","slug":"reimagining-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/2009\/05\/31\/reimagining-church","title":{"rendered":"Reimagining church"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve just finished reading Frank Viola’s book “Reimagining church<\/a>“. I find it a good introduction to the reasoning and desires behind the organic church movement. His thoughts about the Lord’s supper opened my eyes to some aspects which I cannot remember having heard before. To quote him\u00a0(Chapter 3, p.\u00a078):<\/p>\n

It is a reproclamation of the Lord\u2019s sacrificial death for us in the past<\/em>. It\u2019s a redeclaration of his ever-abiding nearness with us in the present<\/em>. And it\u2019s a repronouncement of our hope of glory \u2013 His coming in the future<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He continues:<\/p>\n

The Lord\u2019s supper is a living testimony to the three chief virtues: faith, hope, and love. Through the supper, we reground ourselves in that glorious salvation which is ours by faith<\/em>. We reexpress our love<\/em> for the brethren as we reflect on the one body. And we rejoice in the hope<\/em> of our Lord\u2019s soon return.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I find both aspects touching and significant.
\nHis thoughts on church unity and the reasons for the great disunity often seen in the local church are also well worth reading.<\/p>\n

The second half of the book deals with leadership, structure, and existing renewal movements. On first reading, I found some of his critiques somewhat harsh and arrogant; after \u00a0a break of several weeks, I was able to approach the passages differently, and found his comments justified and tone more factual.<\/p>\n

He doesn’t say anything about the organic church which you won’t find in other books, but provides a lot of food for thought and helpful criteria for judging our own ideas and actions. The appendix dealing with common objections and misunderstandings of Biblical texts is valuable reading.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve just finished reading Frank Viola’s book “Reimagining church“. I find it a good introduction to the reasoning and desires behind the organic church movement. His thoughts about the Lord’s supper opened my eyes to some aspects which I cannot remember having heard before. To quote him\u00a0(Chapter 3, p.\u00a078): It is a reproclamation of the … Continue reading “Reimagining church”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,5,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bucher","category-gedanken-zu-religion","category-tagebuch"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=281"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":314,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281\/revisions\/314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bufton.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}