The post DCLM Daily Manna 16 August 2019 – Living To Eat appeared first on Flatimes.
Open Heaven 16 August 2019 – Called to a Glorious Career
The post Open Heaven 16 August 2019 – Called to a Glorious Career appeared first on Flatimes.
The U.S. Church Isn’t Dying and Young People Aren’t Fleeing, Says Myth-Busting Book
You’ve likely heard the conventional wisdom: The U.S. church is shrinking. Teenagers and young adults are leaving in droves. Atheism and unbelief are growing rapidly.
But a new book challenges those assumptions – and even says the truth is exactly the opposite.
The book, Myth of the Dying Church: How Christianity Is Actually Thriving in America and the World by author Glenn T. Stanton, asserts that church attendance in the United States is at an all-time high, both in raw numbers and as a percentage of the population. That includes the colonial days.
Stanton also says Americans are more attracted to Bible-believing churches that discuss sin and salvation than to liberal churches that avoid both topics.
Stanton – the director of family formation studies at Focus on the Family – examined multiple studies and bodies of research for the book.
Christian Headlines recently spoke to him. Following is a transcript:
We hear so often that the church is shrinking today – that young people are leaving the faith, and Christianity is disappearing. You say this is not so. Why?
First, as I got into the research while writing the book, I was really surprised how much stronger the data on this topic actually is. It tells this story: The best forms of Christianity, faithful, Bible-teaching churches calling its members to real discipleship and…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.
Lauren Daigle Earns Six Dove Award Nominations
Recording artist Lauren Daigle has received six nominations from the Gospel Music Association’s Dove Awards.
The 27-year-old Christian singer was nominated for Songwriter of the Year, Contemporary Christian Artist of the Year, and Artist of the Year, the Associated Press reports.
Her third studio album, Look Up Child, released in September 2018, was also nominated for Pop/Contemporary Album of the Year. Her song “You Say” on that album is in the running for Song of the Year and Pop/Contemporary Recorded Song of the Year.
Other musicians nominated for Artist of the Year were for KING & COUNTRY, Hillsong UNITED, MercyMe, and TobyMac.
The song “You Say” was written shortly after Daigle’s first Dove awards. According to CCM Magazine, she began to feel disconnected from her identity, wondering where to go next.
“So when writing ‘You Say,’ I just remember feeling for the first time pretty conflicted,” she shared. “It was definitely the first moment in just being an artist that I was like, ‘Okay, where is all this going exactly?’”
She hopes the song helps others who find themselves in a similar place.
“[This song] brought up the issue of identity and trying to figure out how to exist when I felt like so many things were pulling me in so many different directions. I think a lot of times we build these complexes based on insecurity, based on fear, based on…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.
Priest at Nora Quoirin’s church tells Premier the teenager will be a missed part of the church family
Malaysian police have revealed that Nora Quoirin, who went missing while on holiday with her family, died from intestinal damage, probably caused by starvation and stress.
She had been on holiday with her parents when she went missing on Sunday 4th August. She was found dead on Tuesday.
Father Marcus Holden, the priest at St Bede’s Roman Catholic church in Clapham Park, told Premier how the church had responded to the confirmation of her death: “People are obviously devastated and heartbroken because of this news but they are people of faith. Last night, they came together to find hope and strength in the Christian faith, which I think is very important at this time.”
He explained how Nora grew up in the church, saying: “she has spent her life in this parish, she was baptised here, she made her communion here,”
“The Quoirin family are very much a part of the church and Nora attended mass every week.
“They are a really good family and that makes it even harder, because everybody knows the family, they are part of us and it makes the situation much more difficult.
Her Irish-French parents, Meabh and Sebastian, previously said they did not believe she would have wandered off alone and feared she had been abducted.
Fr. Marcus explained how devastating the news had affected the church: “It’s hard and unimaginable to think of this kind of death at any time, but with the…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Premier Christianity News.
Pastors Band Together to Convince Chick-Fil-A to Come to Ohio Town
Pastors of 101 Ohio churches of various denominations have united around their common love of Chick-fil-A. The pastors, who are members of the Richland Community Prayer Network, released a statement supporting the building of a stand-alone Chick-fil-A in Richland, Ohio after a food truck from the popular restaurant made several stops in the city in July, Frontlines Ohio reports.
The pastors’ statement reads, “The exceptional reputation of Chick-fil-A as a business and as a community stakeholder is unmatched. The company’s mission statement includes the goal of ‘glorifying GOD’ which provides perspective on the regal treatment it gives its customers. The faith community in Richland County, Ohio has a strong tradition and while this has not been the case in other parts of the country, we wholeheartedly support the prospects of Chick-fil-A choosing our neighborhood as its next franchise destination. We are eagerly ‘setting the table’ in anticipation for the arrival of Chick-fil-A, and firmly believe that our families will taste and see that the LORD is good.”
The pastors released the statement after a Chick-fil-A food truck came to the city over the summer. It made several stops in order to see if there was enough business to permanently build in the city.
Pastors were overwhelmingly positive in their praise for Chick-fil-A. Rev. Hank Webb said, “Any business that…
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Click here to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Christian Headlines.
What is the missing step in every 12-Step program?
When I was twenty-four, Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and the 12-Step program philosophy gave me the structure I needed to get sober. I’ll always be thankful for that.
At the time, I knew very little about it, but I stuck around “the rooms” because I consistently met people who had been addicted like me but were now sober. Seeing them gave me hope and reaffirmed that what I wanted was possible.
The fellowship of 12-Step programs not only helped me get sober, though. It also helped me stay sober for six years after that and helped me take steps that changed the entire direction of my life. I even went to Bible college and planned to enter full-time ministry after graduation.
After I finished Bible school, however, I was full of myself and overconfident. I thought I had life figured out—and that’s when my old habits and thought patterns came back to haunt me. While I was looking the other way, those addictions snuck up and completely engulfed my life for the next five years.
I tried going back to AA and “the rooms” many times in those years. I was even able to string together short spans of sobriety here and there.
As I was going through my five-year death spiral, what I longed for—what I needed but couldn’t verbalize—was transformation.
Sure, sobriety was good, but it was temporary. I needed something permanent or I was going to die.
Only transformation is permanent.
The only goal of a 12-step program
The 12-Step philosophy has had a larger effect on addiction recovery than any other philosophy worldwide. There are more former addicts who have achieved sobriety through the 12 Steps than through any other avenue.
What is less well known, though, is that even though the third of the 12 Steps is to “make a decision to turn your will and life over to God as you understand him,” the 12-Step philosophy leaves the entire concept of “God” or “higher power” up to the individual to figure…
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Denison Forum.
Christian debt service reaches full capacity
The charity which provides financial help to over 21,000 UK families a year said in a post on twitter that it has reached “full capacity” and would not be taking on any additional clients until the new year.
The tweet read: “We’ve made the difficult decision to temporarily stop taking on new debt clients. Our debt service is at full capacity and we want to support our current clients with the high level of service we’re known for and see them become debt free very soon.”
IMPORTANT INFO (a thread): We’ve made the difficult decision to temporarily stop taking on new debt clients. Our debt service is at full capacity and we want to support our current clients with the high level of service we’re known for and see them become debt free very soon.
— CAPuk (@CAPuk) August 13, 2019
CAP told Premier that they wish to maintain a high standard of care for their existing clients and stated they would be unable to do this with integrity if they continued to take on new clients.
Other services run by CAP, including Job Clubs, Life Skills, Fresh Start and the CAP Money Course will not be impacted by this change.
The organisation have insisted this is a temporary measure and has directed those in need of debt advice to contact their helpline to find alternative service providers.
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Click Read More to read the rest of the story from our content source/partners – Premier Christianity News.
