Pondering on a Pietistic Week
One dictionary’s first definition of pious is “having or showing a dutiful reverence for God, or an earnest wish to fulfill religious obligations.” Another is “sacred rather than secular.” It is unfortunate, however, that two definitions in that same dictionary treat the word pious as a pejorative term: “practiced or used with real or pretended […]
A Week in the Life of a Pietist
In many ways, I represent the most unusual member of this gathering of Christian traditions. So I hope you’ll understand if my version of the lead essay seems atypical as well. Please join me in imagining a week in the life of a Pietist seeking to follow Jesus. The Power — and Limits — of […]
Responding to Eleven Very Gracious Christian Friends
It was a treat reading the engagement of the entire “Following Jesus” team with my little essay laying out my understanding of Baptist ways of following Jesus. I especially appreciated how my turn to spiritual autobiography elicited considerable storytelling from other sisters and brothers in Christ. There is something instructive there, I think. Certainly many […]
Conscience of a Baptist
My mother grew up a Southern Baptist. She was born a stone’s throw from the small clapboard church in Shiloh, Tennessee, where she first met the Lord and learned the hymns she sang throughout her life: Tell Me the Story of Jesus, I Love to Tell the Story, and In the Garden. Each one of […]
Not Your Average Baptist, Methinks
At the end of the day, I’m a sucker for a good conversion story. The tale Dr. David Gushee shares in his posting is a moving account of a soul moving toward the open arms of our Lord Jesus Christ. It conjured for me the youthful memories I share with him of what this encounter […]
Is Conversion Essential?
By way of context, I sometimes refer to myself as a lower-case baptist. I was baptized by my father by full immersion in the baptismal tank at the Evangelical Free Church in Bay City, Michigan. David Gushee’s captivating account of his own spiritual pilgrimage from Roman Catholicism to the Baptist tradition curiously reverses the pathway […]
Privileged to be an Ally with this Baptist Witness
Holland, Michigan is a city filled with churches. A majority belong to the Reformed or Christian Reformed denominations. But on Douglas Avenue after you turn to head toward Ottawa Beach, there is a large, red-brick church with while pillars bearing the name “Harbor Reformed Baptist Church.” It always struck me as bizarre. Putting “Reformed” and […]
Moving From The Individual To The Communal
In Dr. Gushee’s reflection about following Jesus from a Baptist perspective, there were several facets I connected with, as I also identify as Baptist and serve as an executive pastor in a Baptist congregation. More specifically, I see a significant benefit in his statement that to follow Jesus means “reorienting one’s life to serve Christ […]
Feeding the Hunger He Couldn’t Name
What a poignant, moving story of pursuing something he doesn’t know how to name David Gushee offers us in “One Account of a Baptist Way of Following Jesus.” Yet one thing becomes clear to his younger self once raised Catholic as he tries out a Sunday morning service, a Sunday evening service, a Monday night […]
Called to be Saints
Dear David, Thank you very much for your personal testimony of your conversion to Christ, and your very clear recognition and understanding that that was just the beginning of a lifetime of growing in Him. I very much liked how you wrote about “the task of learning how to become a faithful servant of a […]
Can Born-Again, Repentant, Freedom-Loving Lutherans Be Regarded As Companions On a Baptist Way To Jesus?
Lutherans tend to have innate suspicions of Baptists, second only to our historic hang-ups with Pentecostals. Of course this is a function of Luther’s bad experience with Anabaptists, and perhaps that makes his critique irrelevant to Lutheran-Baptist relations today. Alas, many modern Lutherans have this stereotype that Baptists are legalists, creeping Pelagians. But all […]
Preaching and Response
David Gushee’s story of inviting Jesus into his heart to become his Savior and Lord is very familiar to me. I grew up in Texas, and in that region, there is not much difference between Methodist and Baptist calls to conversion. In my early years, it was common to have an altar call to let […]
Reflections on How a Baptist Follows Jesus
I appreciated learning about how Professor David Gushee was led to accept Jesus Christ as the Son of God and our Savior. It really is quite impressive how young people are able to preach sermons by how they live and what they focus on. Very often their enthusiasm for Christ touches others who are searching […]
Gift and Task: A Swedish Baptist Pietist Understanding
Let me respond to autobiography with autobiography: it’s the best way I can explain why so much of David Gushee’s essay sounded so familiar, even though I’m not a Baptist. You see, while I’m a convinced pedobaptist, I’ve spent all of my adult life with Baptists— the last twenty years with Baptists who are also […]
Opening Doors
Concluding Response: “Opening Doors” Wesley Granberg-Michaelson Ecumenical dialogue, at its best, should prompt each of us to examine more critically and reflectively our own tradition in response to the faithful sharing of another’s witness of faith from his or her tradition. That’s one way in which the Spirit works to renew the understanding and living […]
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