Lots-o-Links 1.18.12

The Death of the Fringe Suburb

For too long, we over-invested in the wrong places. Those retail centers and subdivisions will never be worth what they cost to build. We have to stop throwing good money after bad. It is time to instead build what the market wants: mixed-income, walkable cities and suburbs that will support the knowledge economy, promote environmental sustainability and create jobs.

Seven Tips for Talking with Your Neighbors About Jesus

For whatever reason, it’s easy for Christians to clam up and get weird when talking about their faith in the day-to-day. Here are a few tips to make bridge those inhibitions and get the conversation going...

An Appreciation of Bird By Bird by Anne LaMott (get it at Amazon or on Kindle)

I thought I was teetering on the edge of crazy with no way to explain to anyone for fear they would quickly need to catch a bus. I was not crazy, or at least not in an inordinate way. With each turn of the page a brilliant sky of possibility opened up to gaze in. Now I might look crazy to some when looking up into that firmament. But, I knew I wasn't the only one. 

Richard Baxter on Meditation

The duty which I press upon thee so earnestly, and in the practice of which I am now to direct thee, is, “The set and solemn acting of all the powers of thy soul in meditation upon thy everlasting rest.” More fully to explain the nature of this duty, I will here illustrate a little the description itself-then point out the fittest time, place, and temper of mind, for it.

Groundhog Day is coming, and it's Groundhog Days in Woodstock, IL -- the movie Groundhog Day was filmed in Woodstock, IL 1992 and released in 1993. Watch it again this Groundhog Day. And if you are in the Chicagoland area, stop by Woodstock for the festivities.

Open-Air Preaching

Here's my growing list of open-air preaching posts, quotes, and as I find ones worth recommending, resources. I'm only going to link the resources I like best, and there's a lot of stuff I don't like. For future reference, this page can be found under "Compass" on the right side-bar.

MY POSTS

1. *The Gospel in the Open-Air Again | start here
2. Guidelines for Open-Air Preaching
3. Open-Air Preaching is Optional?
4. Missional Open-Air Preaching
5. Steps Toward Open-Air Preaching
6. Open-Air Preaching, Gospel Power, & Interruption
7. Preaching Has Great POWER
8. The Future of the Evangelist

QUOTES

• The Dismissal of Open-Air Preaching | Spurgeon
• Open-Air Preaching and Revival | Richard Owen Roberts
• What Is Preaching? | John Frame
• Need for Hundreds of His Noble Order | Spurgeon on Flockhart
• The Great Benefit of Open-Air Preaching | Spurgeon
• Beyond the Walls of your Meeting House | Spurgeon
• Faces Set Like Flints | Spurgeon
• The Ultimatum of God | Spurgeon

MY RELATED POSTS

First three are precursors to the open-air series above. I didn't know they were going to spark so much on the blog. 

1. The Public Square and the Open-Air 
2. The Kids Downtown
3. Know Your City - Remember the Poor

• Why Jesus Taught In Parables: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 - these written with open-air in mind
• 10 Commandments for Reluctant Evangelists

RESOURCES

Charles Spurgeon

Lectures To My Students | Two chapters on open-air preaching. Easily the most helpful stuff I've read on the subject. I believe he shows the best grasp of the goodness of and need for open-air preaching. His teaching on the how, where, when is just as relevant today as ever. Principles stay the same.

Open-Air Preaching: A sketch of it's history and remarks thereon | Not sure how much of this is from Spurgeon's book or elsewhere. 

Michael Green

Evangelism in the Early Church | One of the key sources I've used to think about open-air preaching as seen in the Bible.

Thirty Years That Changed The World: The Book of Acts for Today | There's a small section in which Green talks about Acts preaching and then proposes some ways to do open-air today. I don't love all his suggestions, but it's worth checking out.