Today denominationalism and the existence of institutional churches (buildings) abound across the fruited plain. Did you ever wonder where it all came from? In the church that Christ founded, a singular, simple but profoundly dynamic group of people quickly spread across the map of the then known world. There was no such thing as Baptist, Lutheran, Anglican or Assembly of God, to name a few. Now people who come to Christ are faced with a jungle of religious traditions to choose from. How does one choose? Should one have to choose? Another reality today is the explosion of house fellowships, where fellowship is really fellowship, spiritual growth is personal and there is an openness between people. These have come out of various religious backgrounds to share in a rich organic reality that truly helps people to know for themselves what it is to follow Jesus Christ. Join author Jon Zens in this book that takes a part traditions that have divided the body of Christ into groups, built walls under various guises and separated people of faith by distinctives that Christ did not author. Zens is a 25-year veteran of simple church and is editor of Searching Together magazine, a quarterly publication rooted in setting people free of religious bondage in its various forms.

A Church Building Every 1/2 Mile: What Makes American Christianity Tick?

Religion & Spirituality

Zens, Jon

Christian Books & Bibles

Quoir

1 Timothy 2:11-12 has been used as a "clear" mandate to silence women in the church for over 1500 years. In What's With Paul &amp; Women? Jon Zens exposes the fallacies of this interpretation, and opens up the meaning of 1 Timothy 2:9-15 using insights gleaned from the Artemis-saturated Ephesian culture where Timothy was left to stand against false teaching (1:3). Going beyond 1 Timothy 2, this book covers the major issues in gender inequality with three Appendices: one on the Ephesian social world in which 1 Timothy was written, another on 1 Corinthians 14:34-36 and an extensive review of John Piper's What's the Difference? Manhood &amp; Womanhood Defined According to the Bible. If 1 Timothy 2:11-12 and 1 Corinthians 14:34-36 have puzzled you, What's With Paul &amp; Women? will help in your quest to discern the mind of the Lord as the gender debate continues.

What's with Paul and Women?

History

Jon Zens

World

Protestantism carries on with the practice of making the "pastor" the focal point in church. In The Pastor Has No Clothes, Jon Zens demonstrates that putting all the ecclesiastical eggs in the pastor's basket has no precedent in the New Testament. Using 1 Corinthians 12:14, Zens shows the usual way of doing church contradicts Paul's self-evident remark that "the body indeed is not one part" and then goes on to unfold from that Epistle how the living church functions "with many parts." Jon dismembers the traditional pastor doctrine from various angles by combining two new essays and a response to Eugene Peterson's The Pastor: A Memoir, with three past articles and excerpts from his response to Dr. Ben Witherington's review of Pagan Christianity.

The Pastor Has No Clothes: Moving from Clergy-Centered Church to Christ Centered Ekklesia

Zens, Jon H.

The controversial book Love Wins suggests that all people will experience redemption, and that no one will face the permanent judgment of God. Christ Minimized? challenges such convictions, and concludes among other things that "Paul did not comfort the afflicted saints by saying that in the future their tormentors would be reconciled to God. Rather, he comforted them by saying they would be 'paid back' for touching God's anointed ones." Christ Minimized? examines some traditional views of popular Bible verses, hell, heaven, the afterlife and invites the reader to re-examine commonly-held assumptions. It is a book that will take you deeper into the eternal purpose of God in Christ.

Christ Minimized: A Response to Rob Bell's Love Wins

Katy Walton spent her life trying to be a good girl, or at least giving the appearance of one. When she marries into a long family line of Southern Baptist preachers, it becomes her job to maintain the image of the perfect family in the perfect church with a perfect future ahead. When the façade starts to crumble and even her best intentions fail to fool anyone, she finds herself alone and abandoned. It's not until she realizes how much living in the shadows of secrets and shame has damaged her daughter, Ivy Rose, that she learns to let go of all she once held in order to save what matters the most.

All I Once Held

Literature & Fiction

Sword, Gaylynne

Contemporary

Just as physical families have to face difficulties, so every group of believers will face challenges in their life together. In Christ Alone, Jon Zens opens up five crucial areas that every group will wrestle with at some point in their journey. The first challenge—for Christ to be everything—is the first priority and the other four challenges flow out of it. How do we show that we trust Christ as our Leader? How can we deepen our relationships with one another? Do we define ourselves and find our identity in Christ, or in Adam? When problems arise will we let the love of Christ reign in our midst? Stephen Crosby concluded, "Do yourself a favor—use Christ Alone as a roadmap to help you and those you love avoid common pitfalls in the journey." Searching Together is a quarterly journal exploring Christ with one another.

Christ Alone: Five Challenges Every Group Will Face (Searching Together)

Is marriage the ultimate human relationship? Since the dawn of mankind, marriage was understood to be the only relationship that expressed the most intimate union possible—the mystery of two people becoming one. With the advent of Jesus, however, an entirely new and revolutionary paradigm for relationships came into view. What does it mean to 'love one another' in the same way that Jesus loved? When Jesus prayed for His disciples (and us) to be ‘one’ in the same way that He and His Father are one, it was the ﬁrst time the dynamic of oneness was introduced outside the conﬁnes of marriage. Free to Love sets out on a journey to explore: the depths that are possible within relational oneness, how this oneness transcends every human category—including gender—and why oneness lies at the heart of Jesus’ New Commandment to love one another in the same way that He has loved us. An essential read for those seeking to experience depth in Christian community.

Free to Love: How Oneness Transcends Marriage and Singleness

Jivanjee, Jamal

Sustainable Church is a thorough, Bible-based exposition of how the ministry of every church should be organically built around all of the Spirit-gifted followers of Jesus within that local body. It critiques the shallow pragmatism and unsustainability of non-organic churches and biblically showcases the sustainability of the organic church. "Body Discipleship" is a key part of the church's sustainability and the author explains biblically how it corrects the model of discipleship that has been popular for the last 2-3 generations. Additionally, Sustainable Church showcases the servant-model of biblical leaders who are supposed to equip the saints to do the work of ministry on behalf of Jesus, the true Pastor/Shepherd of every local church!

Sustainable Church: Growing Ministry Around the Sheep, Not Just the Shepherds

Russell, Walt

To Preach or Not to Preach? questions one of the scared cows in the modern church, namely “the sermon,” and the preeminence it’s given. Norrington’s premise is not built on novelty or questioning just to question. He goes back to the New Testament and shows that there is no evidence for a “a regular weekly” sermon that believers are to lean upon, and the whole “church” experience is to be wrapped around. This book also shows how “the sermon” as it has come to be practiced supplants the one-another ministries of everyday believers, and stifles the expression of Christ in the ekklesia. To Preach was originally published in Britain by Paternoster Press in 1996.It had virtually no circulation in the States. Norrington died in 2007, and his book nearly passed into oblivion. However, several supporters banded together to reoffer this work. And with it, a large additional section was added where Norrington responds to reviews of his book. To Preach is a well-documented study that will challenge traditional ideas, restore hope and function in the body of Christ, and help us understand that "preaching" in the NT was primarily a vital evangelistic activity directed toward unbelievers.

To Preach or Not To Preach: The Church's Urgent Question

David C. Norrington

There are 58 "one anothers" in the New Testament, 0 information about "the pastor." According to how "church" is done in most quarters, the existence of the church and all its eggs are put into the one basket of "the pastor." C. Peter Wagner reflects this general outlook when he asserts, "The local church is like a company with one company commander, the pastor, who gets his orders from the Commander-in-Chief... The pastor has the power in the growing church... The pastor of a growing church may appear to outsiders as a dictator, but to the people of the church, his decisions are their decisions." There have been thousands of books published about the aspects of church leadership, but comparatively very little time has been spent on the necessity of the church to "love one another," and all the rest of the one anothers that flow out of Christ's new command. Based on observations since 1965, Jon Zens' conclusion is that we need more and more of Christ, and less and less of the traditional views of "leadership." This book sets forth the Jesus-centered way of functioning as brother and sisters in the Body of Christ... Contributors span from 1937 - 2013: Hans van Campenhausen, Judy Schindler, Bruce Davidson, Daryl Erkel, Matthew &amp; Christa McKirkland, Hendrik Hart, Russ Ross, Lawrence Burkholder, R.L. Wysong, Norbert Ward, Katt Huff, Stephen Crosby, Fydor Dosteyevsky, H.L. Mencken, John Howard Yoder, and Frank Viola... These authors take issue with the traditional understandings of church life, and point the way to Christ, the only rightful Leader of the ekklesia

58 to 0: How Christ Leads Through the One Anothers

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