Bible Guidelines for Christian Music

Cookeville Tennessee (TN)

Need: Bi-Vocational, Self-Supporting, or Missionary Pastor

Need: Bi-Vocational, Self-Supported, or Missionary Pastor

Seeking a bi-vocational pastor

What The Bible Says Good Samaritan's Penny Pulpit by Pastor Ed Rice

Study: 24 percent of clergy in North Carolina are still opposed to same-sex marriage.After the departure of thousands of traditionalist United Methodist churches from the denomination over the past five years, it might stand to reason that those congregations remaining in the fold are more progressive and open to ordination and marriage of people in same-sex relationships.But the picture is far more mixed.A new report from the Religion and Social Change Lab at Duke University that looked at disaffiliating clergy from North Carolina’s two United Methodist conferences or regions found that even after the departures, 24 percent of North Carolina clergy remaining in the denomination disagree with allowing LGBTQ people to get married or ordained within the denomination.“At least some amount of ambivalence over LGBTQ+ issues among UMC clergy is likely to persist for years to come,” the report concluded.After a four-year COVID-19 delay and the departure of about 7,600 churches—a loss of 25 percent of all its US congregations—the denomination is likely to reconsider the issue of human sexuality when it convenes its top legislative body April 23–May 3 in Charlotte, North Carolina.Given that the denomination is a worldwide body, with hundreds of delegates from Africa and the Philippines, areas far more conservative in their views of human sexuality, it’s unclear whether the measures stand a chance of passing, even as the US delegation is far more open to such changes.Overall, the Duke report finds that disaffiliating North Carolina clergy were much more politically and theologically conservative than those who chose to remain. Some 85 percent of clergy who left the denomination disagreed with the notion that “all religious leadership positions should be open to people ...Continue reading...

Study: 24 percent of clergy in North Carolina are still opposed to same-sex marriage.After the departure of thousands of traditionalist United Methodist churches from the denomination over the past five years, it might stand to reason that those congregations remaining in the fold are more progressive and open to ordination and marriage of people in same-sex relationships.But the picture is far more mixed.A new report from the Religion and Social Change Lab at Duke University that looked at disaffiliating clergy from North Carolina’s two United Methodist conferences or regions found that even after the departures, 24 percent of North Carolina clergy remaining in the denomination disagree with allowing LGBTQ people to get married or ordained within the denomination.“At least some amount of ambivalence over LGBTQ+ issues among UMC clergy is likely to persist for years to come,” the report concluded.After a four-year COVID-19 delay and the departure of about 7,600 churches—a loss of 25 percent of all its US congregations—the denomination is likely to reconsider the issue of human sexuality when it convenes its top legislative body April 23–May 3 in Charlotte, North Carolina.Given that the denomination is a worldwide body, with hundreds of delegates from Africa and the Philippines, areas far more conservative in their views of human sexuality, it’s unclear whether the measures stand a chance of passing, even as the US delegation is far more open to such changes.Overall, the Duke report finds that disaffiliating North Carolina clergy were much more politically and theologically conservative than those who chose to remain. Some 85 percent of clergy who left the denomination disagreed with the notion that “all religious leadership positions should be open to people ...Continue reading...

Study: 24 percent of clergy in North Carolina are still opposed to same-sex marriage.After the departure of thousands of traditionalist United Methodist churches from the denomination over the past five years, it might stand to reason that those congregations remaining in the fold are more progressive and open to ordination and marriage of people in same-sex relationships.But the picture is far more mixed.A new report from the Religion and Social Change Lab at Duke University that looked at disaffiliating clergy from North Carolina’s two United Methodist conferences or regions found that even after the departures, 24 percent of North Carolina clergy remaining in the denomination disagree with allowing LGBTQ people to get married or ordained within the denomination.“At least some amount of ambivalence over LGBTQ+ issues among UMC clergy is likely to persist for years to come,” the report concluded.After a four-year COVID-19 delay and the departure of about 7,600 churches—a loss of 25 percent of all its US congregations—the denomination is likely to reconsider the issue of human sexuality when it convenes its top legislative body April 23–May 3 in Charlotte, North Carolina.Given that the denomination is a worldwide body, with hundreds of delegates from Africa and the Philippines, areas far more conservative in their views of human sexuality, it’s unclear whether the measures stand a chance of passing, even as the US delegation is far more open to such changes.Overall, the Duke report finds that disaffiliating North Carolina clergy were much more politically and theologically conservative than those who chose to remain. Some 85 percent of clergy who left the denomination disagreed with the notion that “all religious leadership positions should be open to people ...Continue reading...

As Haiti is uprooted by violence, church leaders treat gunshot wounds, give up homes for strangers, and rescue dignitaries.Pastor Frederic Nozil has learned to keep his head down.Last year, the year he turned 53, gangs attacked his neighborhood in Pétion-Ville, a suburb overlooking Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They ransacked the house Nozil was renting and set it on fire. Nozil moved with his wife and two daughters to a safer community a couple of miles away.Still, he took few chances. This year, he turned 54 at home, quietly. A few people from his church brought a cake. They stayed no more than an hour. “Parties attract attention,” Nozil said. “You can’t celebrate too much.”He schedules church activities to wrap up before a mandatory curfew. He will cut a prayer service short if he has a bad feeling about a police vehicle he noticed on the street. Some of his congregation risk their lives crossing gang checkpoints on their way to the church, the Centre Chrétien International Maison d’Adoration, so he knows to expect a smaller turnout.Ministry looks different, he figures, at the end of the world. “We are living in an eschatological time,” Nozil said.That’s how it felt in the early hours of March 18. It was a Monday, and the bespectacled minister should have been recovering from the usual slate of Sunday demands. Instead, he shut himself in his home for two days straight as heavy gunfire echoed through the hills.Gang members in balaclavas wound past Nozil’s neighborhood in cars and motorcycles, ascending the main road into the mountains. They shot automatic weapons and left at least a dozen pedestrians dead in their wake. They stopped in a wealthy enclave called Laboule and laid siege to its walled residences. In one home, security cameras recorded armed young ...Continue reading...

An Indiana man who advertised himself as a "Christian chiropractor" is facing several criminal charges as at least eight former clients have accused him of rape and sexual assault.?