Friday Review (2/4/22)

Each week we compile a list of helpful articles from other sites, in a variety of categories, for youth workers to read, reflect on, and/or discuss with parents and volunteers. If you have any articles you’d like to suggest, we’d love for you to share those in the Youth Pastor Theologian Facebook group. That’s a great way to bring them to our attention and to discuss them with like-minded youth workers! (Inclusion in this list does not imply complete agreement with the publishing source, but we have found these articles to be beneficial.)

Biblical/Theological Studies

How to Explain the Trinity to a 6-Year Old by Mary York (Core Christianity)

Without intending to, we often water down important doctrines because we want our children or new Christians or those to whom we’re evangelizing to be able to grasp hold of these great mysteries without becoming discouraged by their perplexity. This is a dangerous course. And yet, kids have to be told something.

Cannabis is in the Bible: Debunking an Interpretative Myth by J. Alan Branch (For the Church)

A sound principle of Biblical interpretation is this: the text cannot mean now what it did not mean then. Neither Exodus 30:23 nor Mark 6:13 referred to cannabis then and the text does not have cannabis in mind now.

Innovation Exists by God’s Design by Tony Reinke (Crossway)

The rejection of God and the accumulation of innovative brilliance doesn’t give you the power to operate apart from God, like a queen on a chess board who thinks she can move anywhere she wants, impervious to the Master’s ultimate plan. Your innovative brilliance is how God is choosing to wield you in the world.

Cultural Reflection/Contextualization

The Downside of Your Bible-Saturated Newsfeeds by Brianna Lambert (Gospel Centered Discipleship)

The amount of information that is not only available to us but that pings for our attention is enormous. In one sense, of course, it’s an incredible blessing... Yet this rush of availability comes with drawbacks.

This Is Sacred Space. Please Turn Off Your Phones. by Trevin Wax (The Gospel Coalition)

What would it look like if our churches set the cultural expectation of total abstinence from the phone’s “psychological cocktail”? What if we saw our sanctuaries as places of refuge from such distraction, a “counterspace,” or as Song puts it, a “counterliturgy”?

Our Hearts and Minds Turned Outward by Tim Challies (Challies)

Every coin has a head behind a tail, every die a 6 behind a 1, every stamp a sticker behind a face. And in much the same way, every technology has a virtue behind a vice, a benefit behind a drawback, something beneficial behind something sorely detrimental.

Pastoral Ministry

I’ve Reached My Breaking Point as a Pastor by Peter Chin (Christianity Today)

The advice that I have received is much like the season we find ourselves in: fragmented, chaotic, and unclear. But I have found some peace in this word found in Scripture: chesed.

Is There Such a Thing as Bad Missions? by Brooks Buser (Radius International)

But how do pastors evaluate what is good missions, especially when it comes to long-term, church-planting, missions? Let me offer three questions that can be a helpful baseline for overseas ministry. 

5 Things I Learned as a Pastor’s Kid by Samuel James (The Gospel Coalition)

What’s true of “working men” is even more true of pastors’ children. Pastors who cannot connect with their kids on a level beyond, say, reading (or, God forbid, politics) need to expand their horizons. Love is attention. Being attentive is the best way to tell a PK that their pastor-dad loves them for the K, not the P.

Don’t Blame the Pandemic for Low Church Attendance by Joe Carter (The Gospel Coalition)

We may be experiencing a decline in “cultural Christianity,” a general shift from medium to large churches, a decline exacerbated by a global pandemic, or all these trends at once. All that we can know with certainty is that, whether attendance shrinks or grows, God will continue to build his church (Mt. 16:13–26).

Family/Parents

Parenting Grieving Kids Through the Winter Doldrums by Clarissa Moll (Rooted)

As adults, we know that grief isn’t as easy as “this too shall pass,” but we can encourage our children to walk their course with hope as we remind them each day that God lights our way in deepest darkness and that his faithful presence can give us hope when all life’s other lights grow dim.

Shane & Shane releases ‘Worship in the Word’ Kingdom Kids album by Diana Chandler (Baptist Press)

After two decades of ministry, Worship in the Word is considered the debut release of Shane & Shane’s Kingdom Kids initiative to provide resources for children and families... Worship in the Word is an extension of humility mixed with Scripture, seen in songs on the release including “Come and See,” taken from Psalm 66; “Your Ways,” taken from Isaiah 55; and “Yes and Amen,” from Ephesians 1.

From YPT this week

Book Review: What’s Wrong With Religion, by Skye Jethani by Alex Tufano

One of the tensions I feel in youth ministry is between theory and practice - between teaching students theology and equipping them with the tools to practically live out their faith. Jethani’s book, What’s Wrong With Religion?, is an excellent resource to help with this tension. 

Integrating the Next Generation into the Church by Mike McGarry

When should children and teenagers start worshiping with the church? It’s a surprisingly complicated question, but the Bible isn’t silent and we aren’t entirely free to do “whatever works.” Here are a few key verses and suggestions to move towards intergenerational ministry in the church.