Bob Kauflin, in his latest blog post answering a question about worship leading and entering the presence of God, he makes note of a subtitle but significant difference:

So as I’m standing in front of the church, leading them in songs, Scripture reading, and prayer, my goal is not to “lead them into God’s presence,” but to help them remember and celebrate what Christ has accomplished for them through his righteous life, atoning death, and glorious resurrection. As they place their faith and trust in the perfect high priest, they will most likely experience a fresh awareness of God’s nearness. Their position in Christ hasn’t changed. Their appreciation of it has. The church will be built up and God will be glorified.

Understanding this area really brings freedom to me as a worship leader. I don’t have to try to pull off an impossible task. I don’t have to be anxious about whether or not people will “make it.” I simply have to present what Christ has done in a clear and compelling way to encourage people’s faith. The Holy Spirit takes care of the rest.

Seems like there’s been quite a hullabaloo over the gospel lately.A man named Chalke, echoing a McLaren, echoing a Green and a Baker, echoing a number of feminists, used the words “divine child abuse” to talk about the cross. In response, two major British evangelical institutions refused to let Chalke speak, thereby cutting ties with a third institution that has Chalke on its board.A book called Pierced For Our Transgressions responded to Chalke, which in turn provoked a heavy-weight named Wright to enter the ring, pound the book, and defend Chalke.The conservative blogosphering bleacher-sitters then jumped to their feet and started quarrelling with one another over whether or not Wright is one of them. Another heavy-weight named Piper now promises to leap in soon with a book that says “no” and argues that Wright is “harmful to the church and to the human soul.” Meanwhile, the U.S. counterpart to the British publisher that printed Pierced decided not to touch the book, telling the enquiring yours truly that the book “doesn’t add anything to the conversation.”

Those evangelicals. Always squabbling with one another instead of doing the work of the ministry. Isn’t that what this is?

Well, what does Jude mean when he says “to contend for the faith”? What does Peter mean when he says “be on your guard”? What does John mean when he warns a church to not “even greet” false teachers? What does Paul mean when he says to let anyone with an alternative gospel—my goodness—”be eternally condemned”?

Until this world is ended, the gospel will be challenged from places high and low. It will be tweaked and twisted, denounced and denied. And most fundamentally, Christ calls local churches—not seminaries, not presbyteries, not synods, not theologians, not publishers, and not even eJournals—to defend the gospel. It’s the people in the pews and the pulpits whom these apostles address.

Insofar as God permits, this issue of the 9Marks eJournal aims to equip local churches and pastors to do just that—defend the gospel. The sweet news is, defending the gospel means meditating on it. Start with Powlison, and you’ll see exactly what I mean.

–Jonathan Leeman, in his “Editor’s Note” to the
July/August 9News (PDF): CHALLENGES TO THE GOSPEL 

Individual Online Articles:

As first reported by The Christian Post, it is very interesting to see the theological background and position of the top 2 of the top 25 list multiplying churches in America! #1 is Tim Keller’s Redeemer Presbyterian Church (New York, NY), and #2 is Mark Driscoll’s Mars Hill Church (Seattle, WA) (–not to be confused with the highly emergent Mars Hill Bible Church of Grandville, MI that Rob Bell pastors). Given the misconception that Calvinists don’t care about evangelism and missions, the list clearly shows that we really do care and are doing the best we can at making the Good News known to the lost!

The top 25 list was compiled by ranking the top 40 respondents using such self-reported criteria as the total number of church plants, the average number of churches planted each year, the percentage of budget dedicated to church planting, and the number of daughter churches that have planted a new church.

Calvinists are not few but are plenty in this world — especially in the US of A — and especially among them “younger” evangelicals!

And as Mark Dever of 9 Marks Ministries correctly asks, Where’d All These Calvinists Come From?

“This life, therefore, is not righteousness but growth in righteousness,
not health but healing, not being but becoming, not rest but exercise.
We are not yet what we shall be but we are growing toward it.
The process is not yet finished but it is going on.
This is not the end but it is the road.
All does not yet gleam in glory but all is being purified.”

-Martin Luther