Book Review: Small Church Essentials: Field-Tested Principles for Leading a Healthy Congregation of Under 250
Small-church pastors often set out to read practical ministry books only to find that most of them are geared toward larger churches. The ideas they promote would not work in a smaller congregation, so the small-church pastor must take the general principle of what the book teaches and adapt them for his own setting. Of course, pastors of larger churches must also discern how to apply the principles set out in a book, since so much...
The Role of Mary in the Modern-day Church
by Hannah Goucher Church history offers two specific viewpoints on Mary, the mother of Jesus. Since the medieval period, the Roman Catholic Church has praised her with highest regard, esteeming her at the same level as Jesus. In contrast, modern evangelicals have seemingly done all they can to remove her from prominence, effectively resulting in the removal of a biblical example of faithfulness. When looking at the views of the...
An Invitation: Roger Scruton and the Intellectual Heritage of Conservatism
Early in 2020, as the nations of the world began tearing themselves apart in fear of a projected global pandemic, one of the most important minds of our time quietly passed away. Sir Roger Scruton (1944–2020) was a British philosopher and public intellectual who succumbed to lung cancer shortly after he was first diagnosed. More than any other intellectual of the late twentieth- and early twenty-first century, Scruton invited others...
Francis Schaeffer’s Politics: An Exploration
For many evangelicals Francis Schaeffer is a household name as an apologist and a cultural observer and commentator. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Schaeffer became more involved in politics than he had been previously. Political activists in favor of the prolife cause utilized books like A Christian Manifesto and What Ever Happened to the Human Race? as political and cultural resources. Other books had strong political-public...
The Community, the Call, the Comforter, and the Cure: A Pastoral Reflection on Anointing the Sick with Oil
Recently, a fellow pastor and I were discussing fruitful ways we have discovered to serve the sick in our congregations. Yet my friend was surprised by two narratives of ministering to the sick that I recounted for him. First, I spoke about one of my congregants who was bedridden with a cancer that began in her pancreas and rapidly spread throughout her body. Following one Sunday morning service, a deacon and I journeyed to her house...
Announcing a New Contributor to the HSF
The Helwys Society Forum is pleased to announce that we have added a new regular contributor: Josh Colson. Over the past year or so, he has contributed several guest posts, including one on evangelicalism and another on Free Will Baptists. Colson is a native of Southern Illinois but presently serves as the senior pastor of Brandon’s Chapel Free Will Baptist Church in Stewart County, Tennessee. In addition to pastoring, Josh is an...
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