The Tradition Of The Church Of Christ

This article, developing a Spiritual Assessment Toolbox: A Discussion of the Strengths and Limitations of Five Different Assessment Methods, discusses and reviews a variety of assessment methods developed to examine the spiritual lives of clients. According to Hodge (2005), “…for service provision to be as effective as possible, spiritual beliefs and practices often have to be taken into account (p. 314).” Because a client’s spiritual worldview is often a guiding principle for their lives, it is important to use an assessment method that takes this into account. This article looks at five different methods for this purpose: (1) spiritual histories, (2) spiritual lifemaps, (3) the spiritual

Consecrated life is a call to in which baptized men and women offer their entire selves solely to God. There are a variety of ways to live out the call to consecrated life, and it usually charactered three main components called the three evangelical counsels, and they are poverty, chastity, and obedience. The purpose of these three evangelical counsels require people to go “beyond the minimum rules of life required by God (such as the Ten Commandments and the precepts of the Church) and strive for spiritual perfection through a life” (Vocation 149) committed to the three components. Besides living out the evangelical counsels consecrated persons are also called to live out their communities’ charism; a unique gift or grace of the Holy Spirit

As we have peeled away the layers of what evangelicalism and fundamentalism means throughout history, especially in our Western culture I am intrigued as to both and their very intense presence in many of our modern-day congregations. “Yet, the vast majority of evangelicals around the world today hail from Holiness, Pentecostal, and charismatic congregations”. After visiting Grace Covenant Church of Austin Texas, much of those aforementioned ‘typical’ contributions that have been emphasized in books such as The American Evangelical Story by Douglas Sweeney and American Apocalypse by Matthew Sutton, I experienced ever present at Grace.

Author Dan Yarnell suggested seven characteristics of a Christ-honoring church in the 21st century: worship, fellowship, interaction with Scripture, discipleship, community, living sacrificially, and living missionally. However, Yarnell contradicted himself when he stated that the church originated at Pentecost (Acts 2) and proceeded to provide examples of the effects of cultural development and new missional opportunities on the church prior to Pentecost. While the term “church” or “” is unique to Acts and the following New Testament writings, its concept and precepts existed from the time of Genesis. In fact, Yarnell did not reference any Old Testament passages or practices. Therefore, Yarnell contradicted himself and ignored Old

The purpose of this project is to demonstrate how the Sacramental Life or Incarnational Tradition help me focus on my life as a harmonious unit and to illustrate how my life is impacted by my view of worship. In addition, I will give a theological analysis on how focusing on life as a harmonious unit is essential to the myself, the individuals I administer spiritual counseling to and my ministry constituents.

The differences in the churches exist because of a lack of central authority. However, the differences “varied in form, completeness, and clarity” create what MacMillan defines as the environing culture. These distinctions do not detract from the validity of the Holiness Church, but rather provides a religious framework in accordance with MacMillan’s definition.

Paul’s letter to the Romans reminds believers that they are holy, not on their own accord, but because of God’s mercy (12:1, NIV) “by virtue of our union with Christ” (Chappell, 2011, p. 48). As well, Hebrews 10:9-10 speaks to our state of holiness: “and by the will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all” and verse 14, “For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.” If one is already holy as Scripture points out, is it necessary to delve into spiritual disciplines? Is sanctification complete the moment our sins were washed away by Christ’s blood at the cross? This journal entry will examine the connection between the gospel message, specifically sanctification

Throughout the assignment, I have explored key themes that I connected with and considered how they relate to my spiritual and religious growth, both personally and professionally. Perhaps the themes that I connected with from Mackay’s book were not the most obvious, however, they allowed me to experience reflection on my journey of Christian Life. The personal reflection required for this assignment has in itself provided an opportunity for my spiritual growth as I was challenged to recall and deal with previous issues I had, up to this time, intentionally

Perhaps the lesson given the most support throughout the course of this semester is the healthy church is a church whose members are devoted to prayer.1 Powerful

In a contemporary Christian environment one of the most prominent practices to have a significant contribution to Christianity as a living religious tradition is Baptism. Baptism is of utmost importance for most Christian denominations. It has profound significance for the individual who is baptised and is also important for the Christian community as a whole. As a sacrament of initiation, Baptism calls its adherents to become missionary Disciples of Christ. It is through baptism that one’s faith journey begins and Christians are called to follow and live their lives in the light of Christ.

In this modern day, many people claim to be Christians, but I believe that there is a distinction between “Christians” and “disciples”. Throughout my day, I’ve realised that almost any person can call themselves Christians, but to be called a disciple is completely different. To call yourself a Christian you carry the gift of salvation with authenticity. A disciple also carries the responsibility of living in holiness. As scripture shows us in Hebrews 12:14 “follow peace with all man, and holiness, without which no man shall see The Lord.” Therefore there are various distinctions between those who claim they are Christian and those who are truly disciples. One value that the disciple must hold dear to his life is that he/she should know God, and J.I. packer shows us how to know The Lord by introducing us to the study of God.

Richard Foster’s Celebration of Discipline, was first published in 1978. It presented sets of Disciplines that, if followed, would serve as vehicles for a deeper relationship with Christ as well as preparation for service. These disciplines are divided into three broad categories: the Inward Disciplines, the Outward Disciplines, and the Corporate Disciplines (Foster, 2003). Each category contains four Disciplines, which indicated by their titles, moves the disciple from the very personal to the larger congregational community (Foster, 2003). Recognizing humanity’s trend to make any process a law or regulation to follow, Foster warned against this by reminding the disciple that to do so would turn

Theology has four major components that we use when practicing. These components give us the framework for how we practice. These components are the four questions “What does the Bible say?”, “ What has the church said?”, “ How do we put it all together?”, “ Why does it matter?”. ( Akin pg 3)

In his hardback titled The Church: Contours of Christian Theology, Edmund P. Clowney writes a systematic presentation about concerning the doctrine of the church. In chapter eight of his book, he describes the Marks of the Church. Clowney writes about the marks of a true church of Christ, which include the true preaching of the Word of God; the proper observation of the sacraments; and the faithful exercise of church discipline.

The term “tradition” comes from the Latin “traditio” meaning simply “a handing over”. Paul had many traditions handed over to him from his Jewish ancestry but he also had a revelation of salvation available through the grace of Jesus Christ both to the Jew and Gentile. Through tradition each generation accumulates wisdom, love and values from their ancestors. Salvation cannot be accumulated through tradition it must be experienced through the revelation of Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit and accepted as a gift from God.