The June 2012 PNEUMA INFORMER

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The June 2012 PNEUMA INFORMER

 

          In this issue

 

What's New at www.PneumaFoundation.org

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New Online Articles

New Links and Content Worth Noticing

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Reports from Around the World

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     Ethiopians come to Christ in droves after watching film

     Spain: thousands profess Christ during evangelistic outreach

     Laos: Imprisoned pastor set free after nearly 13 years

     T. D. Jakes moves away from Oneness view and embraces Trinitarianism

     Iran: Explosive Growth of Christianity

     USA: After a year-long battle, campus ministry must leave a Tennessee university

     News and Headlines

     Report the News

      

Excerpts from THE PNEUMA REVIEW

  Excerpt from "The Third Wave" by Henry I. Lederle

     http://www.pneumafoundation.org/pi.jsp?pi=/2012/pi_06_2012.xml#N65820

  JESUS, PAUL AND THE PEOPLE OF GOD, Reviewed by Amos Yong

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Prayer Requests

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Praise Reports/Congratulations

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Condolences

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New Online Articles New Links and Content Worth Noticing Help is Needed


 

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Reports from Around the World

Ethiopians come to Christ in droves after watching film
What happens when women are told for the first time that Christ loves them? Explosion. The Jesus Film Project has seen the film "Magdalena: Released from Shame" take off in Ethiopia. Women, who have often been ignored, are welcoming the Gospel with open arms. The Jesus Film Project planned to train 100 women to show the film in 3 years. But the demand is so great that in just six months, they've trained 564.
Source: Mission Network News, 29 February, 2012. http://www.mnnonline.org/article/16882

Spain: thousands profess Christ during evangelistic outreach
charismanews.com/world/32791-7400-people-accept-christ-at-spain-crusade

Laos: Imprisoned pastor set free after nearly 13 years
A pastor has been released from prison in Laos after being locked up for nearly 13 years because of his Christian activities.
Barnabas Fund www.barnabasfund.org reports that Bounchan Kanthavong was set free on February 2, having been arrested in June 1999 and then sentenced to twelve years in jail for treason and sedition.
Barnabas Fund says Bounchan's only "crimes" appear to have been receiving Bible training and sharing his faith with people who came into his clothing shop. Bounchan's witness led to around 70 people accepting Christ.
Bounchan had been introduced to Christianity in January 1997 when he spent the night with a Christian family while away on business. When he returned to his home in Vanghai village, Udomsai province, Bounchan began to spread his new faith. People came to his shop from other villages, keen to hear and embrace the Gospel.
According to Barnabas Fund, the Lao authorities repeatedly warned him to stop believing, practicing and spreading the Christian faith and ordered him to cease all worship activities at the shop.
In a media update, Barnabas Fund says: "They were concerned about people leaving the traditional Lao religion (spirit worship) and embracing what they consider a foreign religion, thus becoming loyal to a power other than the Lao authorities. Bounchan's actions were thus perceived as a threat to national security and interpreted as treason and sedition."
Bounchan is married with five children. Following his detention, his wife Sengkham took over the leadership of their Christian community, which has grown to more than 3,000 believers today.
Last April, the authorities told Bounchan that they were willing to release him if he renounced Christ and separated from Sengkham.
Barnabas Fund added: "But he clearly did not as his detention was prolonged. Bounchan's health, particularly his eyes, suffered during his time in jail, and his family struggled without his leadership and provision."
Source: Report by Michael Ireland, Senior International Correspondent, ASSIST News Service. http://www.assistnews.net/Stories/2012/s12030025.htm

T. D. Jakes moves away from Oneness view and embraces Trinitarianism
http://blog.christianitytoday.com/ctliveblog/archives/2012/01/td_jakes_embrac.html

Iran: Explosive Growth of Christianity
http://www.opendoorsusa.org/press/press-release/2012/March/Growth-of-Christianity-In-Iran-Explosive-According-to-Open-Doors

USA: After a year-long battle, campus ministry must leave a Tennessee university
After a year of conversations with school administration, campus ministries will leave Tennessee's Vanderbilt University. Trouble started when Vanderbilt created a policy requiring all campus groups to let anyone lead. InterVarsity Christian Fellowship's Greg Jao says, "We always welcome everybody to be members. However, at the level of leadership, we think leadership needs to be reserved for people who share the mission, the values and the doctrinal beliefs of our group." So InterVarsity and others spoke up: "The Tennessee state legislature actually passed legislation that would have penalized Vanderbilt for this position. The governors vetoed that. So our response at this point is we do not believe we'll be recognized on campus in the fall." The controversy has given students the chance to talk about their faith. And InterVarsity will keep a presence, if perhaps more off campus. But this could be setting a precedent. "In the past two years, InterVarsity's presence on campus has been challenged in 41 colleges and universities. We think the pace of challenge will increase over time." InterVarsity has asked for our prayers.
Source: Adapted from Mission Network News, 8 June, 2012. http://www.mnnonline.org/article/17309

News and Headlines
Visit links.jsp for Current News and Links

See other news to pray and praise God about in the Prayer Requests department below.

Report the News
We are looking for stories about what God is doing in the world, reports about the persecution of Christians, and information about significant trends and ministry opportunities. If you have a news item to report, please send an email to the PNEUMA INFORMER. www.PneumaFoundation.org/ContactUs.jsp


 

Excerpts from THE PNEUMA REVIEW

THE PNEUMA REVIEW is a quarterly printed journal of ministry resources and theology for Pentecostal and charismatic ministries and leaders. For more information about THE PNEUMA REVIEW, and to learn how to subscribe, please visit: Introducing THE PNEUMA REVIEW. www.pneumafoundation.org/intro_pr.jsp

For a full index of the contents of all Pneuma Review issues, visit: http://www.pneumafoundation.org/pr_archive.jsp.




Excerpt from "The Third Wave" by Henry I. Lederle

From the Spring 2012 issue

An excerpt from:
"The Third Wave: New Independent Charismatic Churches"
Part 2 of 2

A Right to Healing?

With regard to the healing of the body, the Faith movement stands in direct continuity with Classical Pentecostalism. In fact, the recovery of the doctrine of divine healing in evangelical Christianity preceded the Pentecostal movement by a good fifty years, as has been pointed out above. On the fringes of Christianity, divine healing has probably never been absent. Through the Pietist and Holiness movements, physical healing became part of a crucial stream of Christianity. The first advocates were generally skeptical about medical work. In time, the anti-medical stance of such people as John Alexander Dowie of Zion City, Chicago, Illinois, was replaced by an integral or holistic approach in which medical, psychological, and spiritual aspects were all incorporated, as we see, for example, in the ministry of Francis MacNutt.

The Faith movement represents only one group of a broad spectrum that acknowledges the reality of divine healing today. There is a growing emphasis in all Three Waves of the whole Pentecostal-Charismatic movement that God desires wholeness and health for His children. Sickness and disease are of the devil, and Jesus came to liberate those under demonic influence and to destroy Satan's evil purposes. The term "Healing in the Atonement," which correctly links the biblical passages Isaiah 53:5, Matthew 8:17, and 1 Peter 2:24, was originally conceived in anti-medical circles and still carries that baggage. Today its focus is to emphasize that the death of Christ on the cross has consequences not only for our eternal salvation but also for our bodily healing. The reference is to the messianic prophecy in Isaiah that "by His wounds we are healed."

How this is worked out in practical details brings us to divergencies within the Pentecostal and Charismatic movements. The most radical form of the Word of Faith teaching claims absolute victory in this present life. Christians are entitled through Christ's atoning death to the blessings of Abraham, which include salvation, health, and material prosperity. Physical healing is considered a right of every believer that may be expected and claimed boldly after the devil has been rebuked. Sometimes it is even stated that praying is not necessary. The believer just needs to make a positive confession of faith. Most problematic are the situations in which people are taught that all lingering symptoms of illness are to be denied and not to be treated medically. Unfortunately, there have been examples where this has led to deaths that easily could have been avoided by timely medical treatment. (Denying symptoms is a more extreme approach than that of temporarily disregarding symptoms when one is convinced that this is what God is requiring.) One is often dealing with the hardness of human hearts that have difficulty focusing on the seen rather than the unseen dimension.

Inevitably, a one-sided focus on faith may lead to the loss of acknowledging God's sovereign freedom. It seems as if God has no choice but to respond to human proclamations and requests. Support for this view is offered from Isaiah 45:11, which in the King James Version states: "Concerning the work of my hands, command ye me." Modern translations capture the implied irony by rendering it: "Would you command me?" Once more it needs to be said that reality and experience soon trip up those who follow on this path. God, as a personal loving and responsive being, is our hope, not a particular key phrase from Scripture.

Examples of foolhardy and presumptuous faith in fact amount to over-realized eschatology. Claiming total healing as an absolute right in the here and now for every believer denies the element of mystery that remains in our fallen condition. There is a creative tension between the already and the not yet, as was explained above. The continued occurrence of death is a conclusive indication that some aspects of fallenness still remain and will be resolved only in the life hereafter.

Although this polarity or creative tension may bring some balance, it should nevertheless not come to function as a way to evade the biblical call to prevailing expectation and robust faith. The concept of the already / not yet tension itself is helpful, but the major episodes of salvation history illustrate that God works not only from the already to the not yet, but regularly does miracles - something totally new, that allows the power of the future to invade the present. Creation is a radical creation out of nothing. The exodus is encircled by the wondrous inflicting of plagues and miraculous deliverances. The incarnation, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus are all unexpected, apocalyptic events through which God reveals Himself and His majesty. The outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost, the Second Coming, and even individual rebirth are the not yet becoming the already through God's inbreaking grace and sovereign rule. Paul states that we live by faith and not by sight (2 Cor 5:7). Life in the Spirit walks the fine line of ongoing openness to the miraculous on a daily basis.

These insights of radical biblical truth the Word of Faith movement presents to Christianity at large.

. . .

__________

This is part of chapter six from Henry I. Lederle, Theology with Spirit: The Future of the Pentecostal & Charismatic Movements in the 21st Century (Tulsa: Word & Spirit Press, 2010). Used with permission.

Henry I. Lederle, Theology with Spirit: The Future of the Pentecostal & Charismatic Movements in the 21st Century. Tulsa: Word & Spirit Press, 2010. x + 246 pp.; bibliography, index. ISBN: 978-0-9819526-3-5.
Distributed by Ingram (ingrambook.com). Available at BarnesAndNoble.com and Amazon.com, also in the Kindle Store.
Query Wor...@gmail.com regarding discounts for quantity purchases.

Henry I. Lederle, D.Th. (University of South Africa) and M.A. (University of Orange Free State), is Professor of Theology and Ministry at Sterling College in Sterling, Kansas. He is the author of Treasures Old and New: Interpretations of Spirit-Baptism in the Charismatic Renewal Movement (Hendrickson, 1988) and several collections of essays, articles and reviews.

Read more articles in the Spring 2012 issue of THE PNEUMA REVIEW www.pneumafoundation.org/intro_pr.jsp


 


JESUS, PAUL AND THE PEOPLE OF GOD, Reviewed by Amos Yong

From the Spring 2012 issue

Nicholas Perrin and Richard B. Hays, eds., Jesus, Paul and the People of God: A Theological Dialogue with N. T. Wright (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2011), 294 pages.

Every time I read N. T. Wright I come away edified, instructed, inspired, and even transformed. This book is no exception. As in much if not all of his other work (I am reluctant to be emphatic about the all since I do not want to give the misleading impression that I have read all of Wright's books—I do not think that I will live long enough to do that, especially since the former bishop of Durham writes books faster than I can read!), Jesus is lifted up; the benefit of this book is that we also get a glimpse of how Wright sees St. Paul lifting Jesus up as well. Let me explain through a cursory overview of the two parts of this book.

As a product of the nineteenth annual Wheaton Theology Conference (at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois) held in April 2010, the volume features eight chapters responding to the work of the newly appointed chair of New Testament and Early Christianity at the University of St. Andrews. Half engage Wright's focus on Jesus (in part I) while the other half interact with Wright's understanding of Paul (part II). Each chapter includes a brief rejoinder by Wright at the end, while each part concludes with a lengthier reflection by Wright on whither historical Jesus and whither Pauline studies in the life of the church, respectively (in part I on Jesus, quite a bit lengthier—about 45 pages worth, the longest chapter of the book). To be sure, the conference organizers had to be selective in inviting respondents to Wright's work, so the essayists engage Wright's corpus from their respective vantage points.

For instance, Marianne Meye Thompson (Fuller Theological Seminary) probes the relative absence of the Fourth Gospel in Wright's christology that has so far been the focus of his multi-volume Christian Origins and the Question of God series, while Richard Hays (Duke Divinity School) takes up methodological questions (in dialogue with Karl Barth and Hans Frei, among others) in Wright's quest for the historical Jesus. The contemporary socio-economic relevance of Wright's understanding of Jesus' inauguration of the reign of God is dialogically and creatively presented by Sylvia Keesmaat (Institute for Christian Studies and Toronto School of Theology) and Brian Walsh (University of Toronto). Jesus' eschatology is also discussed by Nicholas Perrin (Wheaton College) vis-a-vis the ethics of the reign of God. On the Pauline side, topics such as the gospel and of the righteousness of God (Edith Humphrey, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary), the doctrine of the church in relationship to "Emerging" ecclesiologies (Jeremy Begbie, Duke University), St. Paul's eschatology (Markus Bockmuehl, University of Oxford), and the Reformation doctrine of justification (Kevin Vanhoozer, Wheaton College) are taken up. Each of the authors writes insightfully and engages with the broad spectrum of relevant scholarship, while the back-and-forth "theological dialogue with N. T. Wright" (the book's subtitle) effectively keeps readers tuned in.

As Vanhoozer points out, Wright's body of scholarship is slowly but surely initiating a paradigm change, not just in historical Jesus or historical Paul scholarship but also in the fields of New Testament Studies and even of historical, dogmatic/doctrinal, and systematic theology. Of course, this is happening in tandem with other developments such as postliberal theology and the New Perspective on Paul initiatives, the latter especially to which Wright has made his own substantive, even if also critical, contributions. The result, methodologically, is a sure-footed via media between conservativism and liberalism, between orthodoxy and historicism, between modernism and postmodernism, between biblical theology and theological interpretation, etc. More importantly, it is precisely in and through a careful rereading of the New Testament in particular and the biblical canon as a whole that Wright is forging a fresh understanding of the Gospel in Jesus Christ as it relates to God's election of Israel, to the formation of the church as new people of God in relationship to the restoration of Israel, and to the mission of the people of God in the present time. To be sure, there will be detractors a plenty given all of the ground covered across the Wrightian corpus, but even if he is only half right, there are many implications for what that means for faithful Christian discipleship in our present time. (And again, even if Wright is only half right, there will be even more implications to be discerned from out of the process of correcting his proposals.)

Renewalists—those who find themselves within and/or identify with pentecostal and charismatic Christianity—need to take up and read Tom Wright's many books, if they have not begun to do so already. For the uninitiated, this volume under review will serve as an excellent introduction to what Wright has been up to, in particular his two chapters concluding each part of the book. Four major points of intersection deserve mention (among many others that constraints of space and time prevent from registration here). First, Wright's dogged quest for the historical Jesus presents us with a fresh perspective on the identity of the Galilean Jew occluded by the theological tradition. This is a fully-human Jesus who yet fulfills through his life, death, resurrection, and ascension into heaven God's plans to restore Israel and redeem the world. The Gospel is thus about what God accomplishes in Jesus of Nazareth. I wonder what might ensue in a conversation about Jesus, about God, and about God's saving purposes when, for instance, Oneness pentecostals engage with the work of N. T. Wright? Renewalists in the pentecostal tradition—both Oneness and trinitarian—love Jesus; it is also palpably evident that N. T. Wright does as well. How might a reconsideration of the person and work of Christ unfold in a dialogue between pentecostal renewalists and Wright's understanding of Jesus? Such a conversation may be best positioned to revisit the scriptural witness afresh, especially in light of the anti-creedal postures that animate Oneness readings of the Bible.

Second, renewalists are people of mission. What shows forth plainly in Wright's scholarship is not only that Jesus was a person on a divinely ordained mission, but also that those who embrace his name—beginning with St. Paul, for example—are also called and empowered to engage with that same mission, one that involves the renewal of Israel and the redemption of the world. Renewal missiologies, however, can receive a major boost in light of Wright's insistence that the salvation intended by Jesus involves not only individual hearts and lives but also has sociopolitical and economic dimensions. Renewalists who proclaim a "five-fold" or "full" gospel often still are not as holistic as they might be. N. T. Wright shows how the basic thrust of the Gospel involves these domains as well. In turn, might renewalists also show that the full Gospel includes the charismatic and empowering work of the Holy Spirit that transforms even the ends of the earth?

Third, renewalists are eschatologically oriented. They are, as Steven Land notes, people who have a passion for the kingdom or reign of God. Wright's Jesus is the eschatological king who inaugurates God's final plans to save the world, and Wright's Paul proclaims this eschatological Gospel while inviting the people of God to inhabit, embrace, and work out its meaning in the world. Here then is a vision of the coming reign of God that does not get hung up with elaborate "end-time" charts but is nevertheless deeply and palpably motivated by what the Spirit of Jesus is doing in these "last days" (Acts 2:17) to save the world. What emerges is a partially realized eschatology, but one that is replete with ecclesiological, discipleship, ethical, and missional implications. In conversation with Wright, renewal missiologies not only can affirm the basic thrust of at least some versions of the prosperity theology (those emphasizing the difference God makes in the material aspects of our lives) without embracing its greed, consumerism, and materialism, but also can be emboldened to bear the kind of prophetic witness to the world that characterized the ministry of Jesus and the message of Paul.

Last, but not least, I read N. T. Wright and am driven back to the scriptures that he carefully attends to. Wright is no bibliolater; but he is committed to the apostolic testimony as preserved in the biblical canon. Renewalists are also people of the book, although their "this-is-that" hermeneutic oftentimes collapses the distance between the scriptural and the present horizons. Wright's critical and historical realism is a solid reminder to renewalists that "what happened back then" is fundamentally important for Christian life today; but renewalists can also contribute to Wright's accomplishments the testimony that what happened back then continues to happen today—thereby providing concrete witness to the possibilities inherent in Wright's own emphasis that the drama of scripture needs to be lived into, replayed, and improvised by each generation. The point is that the Bible is a living book, and Wright's writings and renewal testimonies both bear complementary witnesses to that fact.

In each of these ways, I as a renewal theologian am challenged by Tom Wright. Reading Wright invites me to love Jesus more, to be more emboldened in testifying to the risen Christ, to long for the coming of the ascended one to finally redeem all of creation, and to return again and again to the wellsprings of the Gospel message of Jesus Christ as mediated through the apostolic testimony. When I was a child I went to the altar regularly to give my heart to Jesus. N. T. Wright invites me not to stop converting to Jesus even as an adult.

Reviewed by Amos Yong

Preview Jesus, Paul and the People of God:
books.google.com/books?id=k3u14Gz_dboC

__________

Amos Yong is J. Rodman Williams Professor of Theology at Regent University School of Divinity in Virginia Beach, Virginia, where he also is director of the PhD in Renewal Studies program. His graduate education includes degrees in theology, history, and religious studies from Western Evangelical Seminary and Portland State University, Portland, Oregon, and Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts, and an undergraduate degree from Bethany University of the Assemblies of God. He is the author of numerous papers and books including Afro-Pentecostalism: Black Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity in History and Culture (New York University Press, 2011), Who is the Holy Spirit: The Acts of the Spirit, the Apostles, and Empire (Paraclete Press, 2011), The Spirit of Creation: Modern Science and Divine Action in the Pentecostal-Charismatic Imagination (Eerdmans, 2011), and The Bible, Disability, and the Church: A New Vision of the People of God (Eerdmans, 2011). For a full list of publications, see regent.edu/acad/schdiv/faculty_staff/faculty/yong.cfm

Read more reviews and other articles in the Spring 2012 issue of THE PNEUMA REVIEW www.pneumafoundation.org/intro_pr.jsp



 

Prayer Requests

  • Pastor Harun writes: "Praise God. I am Pastor Harun from Kenya, Africa. Please for me that God may provide finances for me to be able to join a bible college in the USA. God bless you." Reference Number: 90047972
  • Praying for the Beja People: The Beja are an unreached people group living in Egypt (83,000), Eritrea (211,000), and Sudan (1,930,000). They are 99.99% Islamic and in desperate need of the gospel of Jesus Christ. A traditionally pastoral people, they are sometimes aloof and withdrawn. They still follow a nomadic lifestyle centered around herding and are best known as camel traders, moving up and down the Red Sea area. Most Beja are not devout Muslims, but rather practice a "folk Islam," blending Islamic faith with their traditional beliefs. Thank God, it has been reported that in 1991, after centuries of darkness, a small response to the gospel began anew among the Beja. You can join Brother Jerry in praying for the Beja and other Islamic Rim peoples on the Link-Up Africa website. http://www.linkupafrica.com/peoples/rim/beja
    Source: Adapted from Intercessory Prayer Call, March 2012. Used with permission.


 

Praise Reports/Congratulations

  • Congratulations to Jonathan Downie and his wife on the birth of their first child, Joshua Isaac Downie. Jonathan is a professional translator that has contributed to the publications of the Pneuma Foundation.


 

Condolences

  • Condolences to the family and friends of Laurie Carrin, who went home to be with the Lord on March 25, 2012. She is survived by her husband of 60 years, Charles Carrin, who has been a contributor to the publications of the Pneuma Foundation.


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