Author: Chris Boyd

The First Nations Version of Ephesians 3-4:16.

As he ministered among native tribes, pastor Terry Wildman would reword parts of Scripture to reflect the language and perspectives of his people. This year, his efforts to “indigenize” Bible translation turned into an official version of the New Testament published by InterVarsity Press.

The following is an excerpt from Ephesians in the First Nations Version, which released on Tuesday.

A Great Mystery Revealed

Because I, Small Man (Paul), follow the Chosen One and represent you Nations in this way, I have been arrested and put in chains. I am sure you have heard how the Great Spirit chose me, because of his great kindness, to be a wisdomkeeper to all Nations. Creator chose me, by a sacred vision, to make known this hidden wisdom that I have already spoken about.

When you hear this message, you will understand how I see the mystery of the Chosen One. This mystery was not made known to the generations of humankind that walked before us in the same way his Spirit has now told it to his holy message bearers and prophets.

This mystery is that the people of all Nations have equal share in the blessings promised to the tribes of Wrestles with Creator (Israel). They have full membership in the same body and are included in the promise through the Chosen One as told in the good story.

Chosen to Tell the Good Story

The gift of Creator’s great kindness came to me in a powerful way and created in me a desire to serve this good story. Even though I am small and weak among his holy people, he still chose me to tell all Nations about the mysterious treasures he has hidden in the Chosen One and about the unfolding of this ancient plan—a great mystery that was hidden away for many ages in Creator’s heart. So that …

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Participating in interfaith work at the Ivy League university is a help not a hindrance to the exclusivist claims of Christian faith.

Last week, The New York Times ran a provocative piece stating that the new president of the Harvard Chaplains is an atheist. Greg Epstein was elected unanimously last spring by his fellow Harvard chaplains. I am one of the people who voted for him.

For seven years, I have worked at Harvard as an evangelical campus minister employed by InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IVCF). I believe the Bible is authoritative and entirely trustworthy as God’s Word. I believe that Jesus alone is the way of salvation, and that no one comes to the Father except through him. So why would I vote for an atheist to lead the Harvard Chaplains?

The answer lies in the unique, decentralized approach of the Harvard Chaplains and how that group of leaders from many faiths (or no faith) has opened doors for gospel-centered ministry on the campus of a prestigious Ivy League school. The real Harvard Chaplains group—not the one poorly represented in the media—tells a different and very significant story of how evangelicals can flourish in interfaith spaces without compromising faith, truth, or mission.

In response to The New York Times profile, many Christian and conservative media outlets were quick to fuel the sense of aggrievement felt by religious people who are understandably trying to protect themselves against the rising tide of secularism. In so many words, they’re concerned that “even faith spaces will be ruled by secularists, should Harvard have its way.”

Had I not been in the room where it happened, I might have had a similar reaction to the news.

That room was of course a Zoom call. It took place in the spring. As a group of about 30, we voted on a slate of chaplains for next year’s executive board. I was …

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Welsh Nobel Prize-winner John Houghton saw sin at the heart of this ecological crisis.

The sixth report from the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is alarming—but not surprising.

The panel’s first assessment of scientific research on climate change in 1990 found that burning fossil fuels substantially increases the atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases—including carbon dioxide, methane, chlorofluorocarbons, and nitrous oxide—causing a rise in the global mean temperature and warming up the world’s oceans.

“Consequent changes,” the first report said, “may have a significant impact on society.”

The second, third, fourth, and fifth IPCC assessments found more evidence and growing consensus that human activity is causing climate change and that its impact will hurt a lot of people.

The sixth assessment, released in August, is more urgent and emphatic, but it reaches the same conclusion. The IPCC now says climate change not only may have a significant impact on society, it will.

Policy makers, scientists, and concerned citizens who pick up the final version of the report might be surprised by one thing, though: It is dedicated to an evangelical Christian who said the root problem of climate change is sin.

“Looking after the Earth is a God-given responsibility,” John Houghton once wrote. “Not to look after the Earth is a sin.”

Houghton, who died of complications related to COVID-19 in 2020 at the age of 88, was the chief editor of the first three IPCC reports and an early, influential leader calling for action on climate change.

His concerns about greenhouse gases, rising temperature averages, dying coral reefs, blistering heat waves, and increasingly extreme weather were informed by his training at as atmospheric …

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A recent abortion ban isn’t the victory it seems. But it is a test run for pro-life Christians.

Many people counted down until midnight last night, waiting not for a New Year but for the possibility of a post–Roe v. Wade America. That’s because, due to a legal technicality, the Supreme Court of the United States had until then to overturn a new Texas abortion law before it went into effect on September 1.

The fact that the Supreme Court didn’t intervene has some Christians wondering: Is Roe now effectively gone?

The reason this case, in particular, is of such intense interest to both sides of the abortion debate is because the law in question, Senate Bill 8, seems to effectively ban abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy. Unlike the Mississippi law that will come before the Court this year, this law is different. It is not enforced by the state but rather by private persons who can sue anyone involved in an abortion—except the woman seeking the procedure.

Still, because a law seeming to prohibit abortion is now technically on the books, some have wondered if this means the almost fifty-year era of Roe v. Wade is at its end. And the answer to that is probably not—at least not yet.

Thought it’s hard to discern the motives of nine justices, it is well within the realm of possibility that the Court’s decision to stay silent was not a way of undoing Roe but rather a means of not making such a decision before the Mississippi Dobbs case.

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization pertains to the State of Mississippi’s law banning most abortions after fifteen weeks from conception. If the law is upheld, it would directly challenge Roe’s framework of an almost unlimited right to abortion, especially before fetal viability (as defined by the Court). That case does …

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As leaders, how do we avoid the faults of online life without shirking our public responsibility?

Recently, Caitlin Flanagan argued in The Atlantic that we really need to quit Twitter. She joins a long line of people who’ve sworn off the medium (at least for a time). Andrew Sullivan, Chrissy Teigen, Alec Baldwin, and other celebrities have publicly quit social media. Ta-Nehisi Coates famously left Twitter (and his 1.25 million followers) after an online argument with Cornel West in 2017.

In her essay, Flanagan examines how Twitter destroyed her “ability for private thought” and enjoyment of reading. She even admits to being a Twitter addict.

I am too. I have committed a thousand times to take a break from social media, just to find myself sneaking a look, consumed by shame, as if I huffed some glue real quick between work and picking up the kids. There are nights when I’m up too late, reddened eyes locked onto a screen, finally shaking myself out of my stupor with a cry: “Why am I doing this?”

We’ve all heard the studies. Social media decreases our ability to think critically, increases rates of depression, and fuels anxiety and distraction. Facebook and Twitter often make our conversations more combative. And online advocacy often usurps the more enduring (and more boring) work of governance and institutional change.

Nevertheless, most public discourse is now online. So even if social media is a cesspool, we still have to ask the question: Do some Christians have a moral responsibility to wade into the mire to voice opposition to bad legislation, promote good work, or amplify the concerns of the marginalized?

To cite one particularly disheartening example, sexual abuse victims of a lay leader in my own denomination took to Twitter this summer to highlight the ways leaders and systems …

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Tired of failures at the ballot box and in courts, some turn to community declarations.

Ryan Sullivan didn’t give much thought to his pro-life position as a Christian beyond voting for pro-life politicians. Then he studied Exodus 21:22–24, where God prescribed the death penalty for any Israelite who assaulted a woman and caused her to miscarry.

“In that Scripture, the life inside the womb is treated with the exact same value as the life outside the womb,” said the pastor of Grace Community Church in Jackson, Mississippi. “Once I started thinking that way, I noticed that so much of the world around me—and even the Christian world around me—almost thinks of this abortion issue as merely a political one.”

The realization led Sullivan to embrace a new pro-life strategy: pushing local governments to declare themselves “safe” for the unborn. Members of Grace played key roles in establishing several safe cities in Mississippi. To date, 11 cities and two counties in Mississippi, North Carolina, and Alabama have done the same.

According to Les Riley, president of the pro-life Personhood Alliance, the Safe Cities and Counties Initiative shifts the strategic focus from federal-level efforts to overturn Roe v. Wade to local arenas.

Since 1973, the pro-life movement has “built huge organizations, raised millions of dollars, elected pro-life politicians and pro-life majorities, and, at the federal, state, and local levels, we’ve had control of the courts,” Riley said, “yet tens of millions of children are dead.”

The Personhood Alliance decided in 2018 it was time for another approach and started pushing for cities and counties to pass resolutions saying they are safe for the unborn. Other grassroots groups, such as Sanctuary Cities for the …

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Industry study says church bands are core business.

Fender Musical Instruments Corporation sold a record number of guitars in 2020, driven in part by people forced to stay at home during the pandemic. The company calculates that nearly a third of those new musical instruments were purchased by people who play in praise and worship bands.

This may not be surprising to anyone who knows a worship leader.

“Worship leaders are always commenting about wanting to get a new guitar,” said Adam Perez, a postdoctoral fellow in liturgical studies at Duke Divinity School. “There are conversations about needing to ‘up my guitar’ and discussions about types of guitar. For a lot of worship leaders, the guitar is that companion that marks your journey and marks your development as an authentic worship leader.”

No one knows the first person to bring a guitar into church, but it became common in charismatic congregations in Southern California in the 1970s.

Folk, rock, and folk-rock went to church with the hippies who converted during the Jesus People movement, and guitars became staples of the Calvary Chapel and Vineyard church style before spreading to other evangelical churches.

The style signaled openness and authenticity to white baby boomers raised on the Beatles, but guitars also had some practical advantages, according to Perez. They were portable. When a new church started in a school, or someone’s house, or even on the beach, no one had to haul over an organ. Guitars are also easier to learn to play than the pianos and organs traditionally used in church music.

“People joke about how simple it is—three chords or four chords—but that was a strength, not a weakness,” Perez said. “You could have a beginner guitar player …

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The ministry’s former spokesman had appeared in national media explaining why he as a Christian trusts the COVID-19 vaccine.

Daniel Darling, an evangelical author and the spokesman for NRB (National Religious Broadcasters), spoke out this month about his decision to get the COVID-19 vaccine in an op-ed in USA Today and a segment on MSNBC.

As of Friday, his remarks cost him his job with the ministry.

Darling was fired from NRB this week when he refused to sign a statement saying his pro-vaccine messaging amounted to insubordination, a source told CT on his behalf.

In a statement, Darling said he was “sad and disappointed that [his] time at NRB has come to a close.”

Darling joined NRB as its senior vice president of communications in April 2020, after a six-year stint as the vice president for communications at the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission (ERLC).

NRB, which calls itself the largest association of Christian communicators, has more than 1,100 members working in Christian radio, TV, and other media. Part of the group’s purpose, it says, is to advocate for the “free speech rights of our members.”

In the aftermath of Darling’s firing, some evangelicals raised concerns that NRB was defying its own stances around free speech and anti-censorship, or that it was aligning with conservative radio pundits at the expense of a leader like Darling.

NRB CEO Troy Miller confirmed Darling’s departure in an email to Religion News Service, which first reported the story, but did not elaborate on the reason. “Dan is an excellent communicator and a great friend,” Miller said. “I wish him God’s best in all his future endeavors.”

This summer, the spread of the delta variant has officials and community leaders once again urging vaccination. White evangelicals …

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Oregon lawsuit sought to hold national organization liable for crimes committed in a Royal Rangers program in the 1980s.

The Assemblies of God has settled a sexual abuse lawsuit in Oregon. If it had gone to trial, the suit would have been the first to put the Pentecostal denomination before a jury as a defendant in a sexual abuse case, allowing citizens of Portland to decide whether the Assemblies is legally liable for abuse that happened in the church scouting organization in the 1980s.

The denomination filed more than a dozen motions to get the case dismissed, according to Gilion Dumas, the attorney representing three men suing the denomination. The Assemblies also filed three appeals with the state supreme court.

The motions were rejected and appeals dismissed. When a trial date was set for September 7, the denomination agreed to a settlement.

“The trial court concluded that our legal theories of liability were viable, but they were not tested, ultimately, by a jury,” Dumas told CT. “It was the first time that the national organization was named and successfully kept in a sex abuse case. They tried to get out of it, but the court denied those motions and denied them consistently.”

A previous lawsuit was settled in 1990. Another was settled in 2017. The lawsuits sought damages between $5 million and $42 million, but the settlement amounts are secret. The dollar figures are protected by nondisclosure agreements, Dumas said.

Assemblies of God legal counsel Richard R. Hammar was unavailable to comment, according to church spokesman Mark Forrester. (Hammar is the cofounder and senior editor of CT’s sister publication, Church Law and Tax.) He authored Reducing the Risk in the early 1990s, one of the first abuse prevention programs for churches. Assemblies leadership recommends the 14-point plan to all its congregations. …

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TPLF forces have taken control of one of Christianity’s oldest heritage sites.

The fate of the ancient rock-hewn churches of northern Ethiopia has become a grave concern for Ethiopian Americans, as a civil war between the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Tigray rebels imperil the fate of many religious sites across the country.

For months, Ethiopian troops have fought a rebellion by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which began after TPLF forces attacked an Ethiopian military installation in early November 2020. Tensions had risen after Ahmed’s government withheld funds for elections held in Tigray province in defiance of federal COVID-19 restrictions on gatherings.

In recent weeks, the TPLF forces have captured the town of Lalibela, in the northern Amhara region, the site of a cluster of some of Christianity’s oldest houses of worship. The Lalibela churches were carved by medieval Ethiopian Christians as an alternative pilgrimage site to Jerusalem, whose geography the complex loosely follows.

“The recent military intrusion of the TPLF into Lalibela threatens the home of the ‘New Bethlehem,’ where 11 rock-hewn churches built in the 12th century are still places of worship today,” said a longtime analyst of the region.

The churches are also a favorite with foreign tourists to Ethiopia. “We call on the TPLF to protect this cultural heritage. We also call on all parties to the conflict to end the violence,” the State Department said in a statement following the seizure of Lalibela on August 5.

The churches were declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1978. Ironically, that designation came during the height of the Ethiopian Civil War, which pitted a number of rebel groups against the Communist dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam.

“My …

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