As you may suspect, as with many churches, reaching our community with the Gospel was one of the main focuses. Great! Our church is situated in the Northwest of Calgary in an older more established area that has a lot of potential for Kingdom Work. It is a culturally and socio-economically diverse area with few evangelical churches reaching the people.

However the question came up during weekend: How do we do mission when the majority of our church commute in from elsewhere in the city? (My paraphrase)

This is so true. A large proportion of our church including key leadership travel upwards of 20 minutes to get to the church. Though quite a few understand the need to reach those neighbours in the area that they live in – some find it hard to be invested in reaching the community around the church as they don’t live in it.

So my question is this:

How do we do mission in our community as a commuter church in the city when a lot of our people are invested in the area that they live in more than the community around the church?  

Don Carson and Tim Keller reflect on six important theological issues that arose from the Elephant Room 2.

Carson and Keller on Jakes and the Elephant Room:

But controversy can also provide a teaching moment, not least because the interest of many people is focused on the disputed issues. It is hard to deny that such a moment has arrived.

(Via The Gospel Coalition Blog)

A hospice chaplain writes about the kind of things that people talk about just before dying.

My Faith: What people talk about before they die – CNN Belief Blog – CNN.com Blogs:

They talk about the love they felt, and the love they gave.  Often they talk about love they did not receive, or the love they did not know how to offer, the love they withheld, or maybe never felt for the ones they should have loved unconditionally.

Finally, a great little video that illustrates what discipleship is

(via Dining with Sinners)

It’s interesting that such a line can be profound in so many ways. In the case of the movie, it’s in regards to education being affected by race and socio-economic class.  That said, it got me also thinking about us as Christians. See I have been brought up and firmly believe that there is a vast wealth, a richness to be had when we read.

This is something that I have come to greatly admire in the mature Christians that I know. They have this constant hunger not only to be in God’s Word but to also read a wide range of books, blogs, newspapers etc. They do this because they desire to keep learning, growing and be up to date with the different issues that face the church.

They are rich because they read…

I have found the one thing that helps me to keep up to date with pretty much everything and provides for a rich and challenging read are the 50 or so blogs that I’m subscribed to.

With that in mind, I thought I’d share 11 of my most favorite blogs. These blogs have challenged and richly blessed me over the last little while. I hope they can do the same for you. Enjoy!

• Tim Challies
• The Gospel Coalition
• Kevin DeYoung
• Tim Chester
• Mike Breen
• Russell Moore
• Dining with Sinners
• Jonathan Dodson
• Verge Network
• Redeemer City to City
• Desiring God 

Are there any other good blogs that I don’t know about? Let me know below…