Reprinted from the Chalmers Center. If you’ve been following our work at the Chalmers Center for long, you know that what drives us as an organization is our commitment to equipping God’s people around the world for ministry through a biblical framework for addressing material poverty. This multifaceted framework includes understanding human beings, walking in God’s story of change, the causes of material…
By Brandon Beck, reprinted from Living God’s Mission. There is a new energy, a new feeling coming into our life. We cannot base our expectations about how we will feel tomorrow, or even a few hours from now, on how we feel at this moment. There are no two moments in time alike. We are recovering. We are changing. Our…
By Greg Forster, reprinted from The Gospel Coalition. As income disparities rise in the modern economy, it is becoming harder to maintain love and harmony between rich and poor. Paternalistic arrogance seems to be growing among the wealthy, and resentful envy seems to be growing among the poor. This estrangement is a major cause of our ongoing political and economic…
By David Gill, reprinted from the Bay Area Center for Faith, Work & Tech. In her recent book, Work, Pray, Code: When Work Becomes Religion in Silicon Valley, Berkeley sociologist Carolyn Chen shows how work has become, in effect, a replacement religion for many tech workers. Church attendance is down and what takes its place is work, the source of…
By Andy Mills, reprinted from the Theology of Work Project. The Bible makes it clear that work matters to God. No matter what your profession or occupation – whether you’re a parent, a bus driver, an artist or an engineer – God cares about your work. Here are ten key points about work drawn from the Bible. They provide a…
By Chris Armstrong, reprinted from Humanism as a Way of Life. “What we have here is a failure to integrate” I’ve become convinced that Christians in America need help preparing for working lives that are marked by faith integration rather than compartmentalization. Even if we do think there is a work-faith connection – and an older “marketplace ministries” model has…
By Isabelle Hamley, reprinted from the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. The LORD said to Moses, ‘Say to the Israelites: “When anyone sins unintentionally and does what is forbidden in any of the Lord’s commands – If the anointed priest sins, bringing guilt on the people, he must bring to the Lord a young bull without defect as a sin offering…
By Scott Rae, reprinted from the Oikonomia Network. The Economic Wisdom Project is best known for our Economic Wisdom Project Talks, which are short, accessible, engaging and rich presentations suitable for use in classrooms and group discussions. But the EWP also features print resources, including our vision paper and our twelve elements of economic wisdom. Economic Wisdom for Churches, our EWP book, is a small volume…
Reprinted from The Chalmers Center. Many poverty alleviation ministries include some type of training for their participants. Of course ministries would want to provide instruction in skills and habits that lead to long-term growth out of material poverty! Unfortunately, in some ways, people from Western cultural backgrounds are particularly ill-suited for the task of training people who are in material…
By Pam Tinsley, reprinted from Living God’s Mission. We decided to wait. I’m so glad that we did. We were at an assisted living residence to break bread together – communion. And it seemed as though one thing after another was trying to prevent it from happening. First Michael, who had arranged for our worship space – for the Feast…
The Green Room 