Today, November 2, 2009, I was part of this inaugural event of the Diane and  Guilford Glazer Institute for Jewish Studies at  Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA . Over 400 people spent the day listening and interacting with Jewish, Muslim and Christian religious and political leaders. It was a fantastic event. Here are some of the [...]

This is a beautiful expression of the Christian faith from an African perspective. This creed was composed in 1960 by the Masai people of East Africa in collaboration with missionaries from the Congregation of the Holy Ghost. The creed attempts to express the essentials of the Christian faith within the Masai culture. Jaroslav Pelikan, a [...]

It is not easy to pastor a church. Eugene Peterson describes the church as mysterious and messy. The mystery of the church is often overshadowed by the messiness of the church that we encounter on a regular basis. So Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s statement in Life Together always shocks me and humbles me: Pastors should not complain about [...]

Here is an insightful little quiz from Leadership Journal We certainly can look at ministry from a number of different vantage points. http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/buildingleaders/ministrystaff/determineyourministryage.html

Jim Belcher, author of Deep Church: A Third Way beyond Traditional and Emerging will be speaking at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena on Tuesday October 13th. The lecture/book signing will be in the new David Allan Hubbard Library on the Pasadena campus (135 North Oakland Avenue) at 4:00 pm. Jim’s book has been well received and [...]

Dancing in Public Places This video has been around for a while. Still it is quite whimsical.  A few people begin to dance in a train station. It is met with curiosity and suspicion.  But they continue to dance, and other dancers join in. Soon even more in the crowd catch the joy.  There is something [...]

Alan Hirsch and I are teaching our course THE LOCAL CONGREGATION AS A MISSIONAL OUTPOST in Hawaii November 8-13. This class is for Fuller Doctor of Ministry students and it is also available to pastors as a week long continuing education event.  If you are interested contact me at KurtF@fuller.edu This is a great class exploring [...]

I love the community I live in:  raised my family here, pastored a church here for 24 years, continue to live here even with a 41 mile commute one way to Pasadena Monday-Thursday. This is a town I love, where I continue to volunteer my time–at church, as a police chaplain, working with faith communities [...]

I am going to begin a couple of posts on life and ministry in the suburbs.  Suburban America is a wonderful and dangerous place.  This space characterized by safety, homogeneity,  and affluence shapes attitudes. These suburban attitudes, that usually remain unexamined and unchallenged, can warp the way we view the world and act in the [...]

Happy Fourth of July!  No matter what your politics. Whether today you are happy or annoyed by what is going on in our country. We who are citizens of the United States have a lot to be proud of. On July 4, 1776, a group of very courageous people, with the threat of execution for [...]