Wendy Virgo’s blog about her recent time with her husband, Bob Roberts, and some other key Christian leaders is well worth a read, here is an extract:

A few days ago I was travelling in a van with a bishop from Mombasa, a church leader from Cote d’Ivoire, a Christian Palestinian, a converted Muslim now church planter from Bangladesh, an Indian pastor from Tamil Nadu among others. The people in that car represented about 3 million Christians around the world.

What on earth do such giants talk about?  Food; family; language. There was a lot of laughter, tentative questions finding out a little about each other: in fact, the sort of inconsequential conversation that a diverse group might make anywhere in the world.   (How many children do you have? What do you like to eat?) These global leaders were drawn together by Bob Roberts, a Texan church planter from Dallas with a huge heart for mission, and it was a massive privilege to rub shoulders with them and for Terry to preach to them and a number of gathered church planters from across the USA . . .

Some live in danger of their lives; one had his house burned down; some had planted churches of tens of thousands; all had remarkable stories of how the love of Jesus had reached them and transformed their lives.  As they shared from the platform we heard moving testimonies, wise comments, and carefully worded opinions all delivered with humility and dignity. We were amazed by Dion Robert’s story of how his church has grown to 40,000 and his movement to 200,000; moved by Daniel’s search for truth in Vietnam; and not unsympathetic to Kenyan Joseph who refused to be confined to the required 20 mins and preached superbly on prayer for 55mins!

Terry and I were especially honoured to have lunch with Eddy and his wife Rosa from Jakarta in Indonesia. Eddy, embracing and utilizing all the Ephesians 4 ministries, has grown a massive cell church, in that vast city

Behind the Scenes with Giants | The Wendy House.

Today is a big day. An exciting brand new blog has been born. Confluence aims to be a meeting place where the reformed, charismatic, and missional streams coalesce. If like me you, “want it all” then this blog should immediately be added to your reading list. You can subscribe to it today by RSS or by email on the blog itself. It’s posts also appear on Twitter and I have added the feed to my list of Newfrontiers Twitterers.

I have had a sneak preview of some of what is coming, and like it very much! That is why today I make the unprecedented step of awarding this site a “Warnie” on the first day of its launch. The Warnie award is a recognition of blogging excellence which also means the headlines from the winning sites appear in my sidebar (or you can subscribe to the warnie feed, or follow it on twitter. This means that instead of managing your own reading list, if you want to stay in touch with the Christian blogosphere you can simply keep an eye on the links that are appearing on adrianwarnock.com. Only the very best in Christian blogs are afforded such an award, and this new site will not be a disappointment, of that I am sure.Here are some samples from the first two posts on the site.

John Lanferman tells us:

Newfrontiers is a family of churches together on mission comprised of many apostolic spheres joined by shared values, mission and relationship. We are essentially reformed in doctrine, charismatic in practice and take very seriously the Great Commission. We believe and are committed to the integrity of scripture while embracing the full expression of the Holy Spirit’s activity. The Holy Spirit is a Spirit of mission, empowering the church community to be effective witnesses to the ends of the earth. We are committed to training leaders and planting churches in every nation and people group in the world. We have a passion for local churches that celebrate the triumph of grace, are secure in the finished work of Christ, full of the Holy Spirit and committed together to our world mission to glorify Jesus among the nations.

The terms “reformed” and “charismatic” can seem to be incongruent since Reformed teachers have tended to be Cessationists and Charismatics are often Arminians. However, it is worthy to note that the Word and the Spirit are not in conflict. In fact, Word and Spirit are quite intimately connected throughout scripture and press us into apostolic mission.

The ideas presented in this blog are designed to both inform and challenge. We want “Confluence” to be a welcome place for those who stand firm on the integrity of scripture and embrace the full activity of the Spirit’s present empowering work, along with a commitment of taking the gospel and planting churches throughout the earth. . . READ MORE

I was honored to be asked to contribute to the blog, here is how my post began:

When I was asked to write for this site it was an easy decision to make. Why, when I have a blog of my own? Quite simply because I believe passionately in this vision of bringing together three often quite separate strands in the modern church. I am eager to pursue being reformed, charismatic and missional.

How then do these three influences come together? The simple answer, would be to say that I believe they are biblical and leave it at that. But the things that I grew up with and took for granted do need explaining. More than 30 years ago, I began attending a church that valued the Bible, believed God was sovereign, worshipped him passionately, experienced and eagerly sought the gifts, and, judging by the constant stream of baptisms, was engaged in mission. To understand why these strands not only can but must come together, let’s look at what happens when we emphasize only one of them. . . READ MORE

Today I want to highlight Jubilee Church, St Louis which is the home of John Lanferman, the leader of Newfrontiers USA. This is found in St Louis, which is the 52nd largest USA city. The church has two locations and is something of a beacon church, running a church planting training school.

As we drew to the close of the first segment of my interview with John Lanferman yesterday we began to speak about reformed charismatic churches. Today I begin by asking him if he believes there is a hunger for such churches in the USA. You can also download the audio of this interview.

Adrian
Yeah, that’s so important, isn’t it? So as you look out over the nation, do you feel that there is a hunger in the US for these kind of churches, a desire to see them?

John
Absolutely. I think especially an emerging generation, the 20’s and 30’s generation, pretty much in the US left the church. But we’re seeing a lot of these people coming back into the church. In our own church, that would be the largest demographic. And these are young people who really have a value of the foundations of the past, historical Christian faith would be important to them, but also a mixture of what the culture has created—a desire to experience something in the Spirit. They’re not afraid of that. So you have this desire to be rooted in something that’s stable—historical Christian faith—but at the same time, wanting to experience something of God in the Spirit. And are not afraid of spiritual manifestations; in fact, they’re hungry for that. Hungry to experience the very real presence of God for themselves in a very tangible way.

Adrian
Yeah. It’s interesting because a lot of people are talking about that kind of resurgence of reformed faith in the US in the 20’s and 30’s [age group]. It’s interesting to hear you saying that a lot of those guys are also looking for something quite experiential.

John
Absolutely.

Adrian
I guess people like John Piper are probably a major part of that, aren’t they? Because the way he preaches—it’s all about knowing God, and [having] a kind of relationship with God, and valuing God, rather than just purely as an intellectual thing.

John
Yes, and he’s taken some fairly strong stands. He actually is not a cessationist. He actually does believe . . .

Adrian
Most people are really surprised when they hear that. What? John Piper is not a cessationist? You’re kidding!

John
That’s true. And he has huge influence in our nation among the evangelical community. I think his welcoming in of people like C. J. Mahaney, and even embracing guys like Mark Driscoll . . .

Adrian
Yes!

John
. . . and just to see what’s happening there encourages me quite a great deal.

One of the negative things that’s happening in the US as well—you have the emerging church. On one end of it you have a very orthodox guy like Mark Driscoll, and a bit colorful as well. (Adrian laughing) While on the other end you have people who have a greater degree of relevancy, so doctrine and theology is kind of fluid, and they want to adapt that to culture, and so that leads to heresy. And that’s a frightening thing. But there’s a wing of that emerging church that is very much moving in that direction as well, as you probably well know. That’s a frightening thing in the US because there’s quite a large following of that group as well.

Adrian
That’s right. And I think some of those historic doctrines are being questioned . . .

John
They are!

Adrian
. . . in a way that you’d be surprised at. But that’s not unique to the US either. As you know, we’ve had some issues over here with that, particularly with regard to the atonement and things like that. I mean, is the atonement such a big issue in the US as it is over here in the UK, would you say?

John
It’s not with mainline evangelical groups, but I think with the emerging church, the people who are on one side of that very much—that’s one of the questions. And even the desire to be culturally relevant and accepting of alternative life styles has led people to make an adjustment as to how they approach that. And they won’t make categorical statements any more. So they’re standing on sand rather than the solid rock of the Book. So I think that’s a concern as well. These guys are fairly media savvy, and it’s a subtle thing . . . to find a way into churches.

Adrian
I think that’ right. With the advent of the media and the Internet, well, I know this only two well. It’s possible for people to hit above their weight. I mean, Here am I — just some guy in a church in London whose blog is read all around the world. And I think that happening with a lot of people, and you can have influence, either for good or not good, far above, actually, what you are accomplishing on the ground in that sense. Or over what you feel you should have influence.

John
Yes, absolutely, that’s true.

Adrian
I think it is a bit concerning, isn’t it? How some people are causing us to drift away from truth.

John
The thing that’s concerning about it is that—not [only] are they gifted and charismatic, but in actuality, there’s the element of Christianity about them. So you’re dealing with something different than people who are totally secular. So it’s a subtle thing. A lot of people are not very scripturally astute. It’s easy to be pulled along in that train.

Adrian
Don’t you think that it’s quite interesting when you look [at it] historically? A lot of these ideas have been tried before, haven’t they?

John
Yes, they have. And the thing is, they always end up on a dead-end street. They don’t have a long cycle. They come around, but ultimately God is very protective of his Church. He is very zealous for it. And the church that’s rooted in biblical value and persuasion continues on. I’m very encouraged in America about the uptick in church planting. I don’t know if you want to talk about that or not . . .

Adrian
Yeah, church planting is great, yeah.

John
In the US, over the last two decades, there has been a deterioration in people who are committed to regular church attendance. It’s averaged a 10 per cent decline in each of the last ten years—so 20 per cent less are now involved in church activities, or even actually community activities, than before. But now, groups like Acts 29, and on a much, much smaller scale, but I like to say, Sovereign Grace, and Newfrontiers, and various other church planting movements, Global Net—these groups that are coming to the forefront planting churches, training people, are based on orthodox Christian faith with a real sense of mission. So missional churches are emerging among us, and many of them are growing, seeing lots of people saved. So I actually—while we have these rather alarming trends, I see much to be very excited about in the US.

Adrian
Yes, oh yes. Just for the sake of those out there—I know some people sitting out there are thinking, “What exactly is a missional church, John?” How would you define that?

John
A church that understands that it exists for the express purpose of carrying the gospel to the next door neighbor, to the person in the next block, to the person in the next city, state, and nation, and they exist for the purpose of being carriers of the gospel. So they are involved, not only in proclamation, but they are involved in changing the whole culture of a community. They would be people who would be involved in cross-cultural evangelism. They would be people who would be involved in changing the social justice—be involved in that ministry to the poor—so they have a desire to see the whole community that they are involved with, the towns they are involved with, changed and made into a kingdom community. It’s people who understand, “We do not exist for ourselves, but we exist for them.” So the way we spend our money. the way we staff our churches, the way our churches feel, the way they operate, have that outward appeal. And it’s a God-centered approach to humanity rather than an inward, “What about me and my needs?” It’s a man-centered approach.

Adrian
That’s very good. So that’s really very much what’s on your heart as you go across the nation, isn’t it? I guess that’s what you’re saying—to see those kinds of churches multiplied.

John
Absolutely—if we can get outstanding churches in each of these 100 large cities, and out from that, begin to reproduce ourselves. Because I’m fanatical on reproducing churches. We must not just plant churches, but we [want to] see churches that view themselves as reproducing churches, multiply themselves, raise up leaders, give themselves away, spread out in the communities and the nations beyond.

Adrian
It’s just so exciting to see what God is doing in a nation, but also what he’s doing around the world, and to be able to link up with that. I guess we’re back to the conference in a way. Because that’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Together on a Mission.

John
Yes, it is. And I think what’s interesting is how we help each other. The different nations, different men, bring different things into the pool. I’m receiving from others. I’m receiving from my friends in Africa, or my friends in India, and so it’s even the in-between times when we’re kind of sharing ideas back and forth and getting on board how we can assist one another. Because it’s just not about our own little patch. It’s us owning the world together. It’s us saying, “We want to see the gospel of the kingdom of Jesus Christ grow and expand to all the nations of the world. So, I have just as much a vital interest in what’s happening in Africa, or what’s happening in Europe, as I would even in our own place. Because we have to own the whole vision of God. I do know that I have a particular responsibility for a sphere.

Adrian
Yeah.

John
But God has called us to work together. I think that’s the joy of what’s happening here in this conference, and who we are in Newfrontiers as well.

Adrian
Yeah. And I guess when we gather together like this, significant words can come as well, that shape us really.

John
It’s true. I think it’s in the worship that God is speaking to us. It’s in the preaching as well. But also in prophetic words that come to us. And you can just see the impact that’s happening across the room . . .

Adrian
Yes!

John
. . . guys coming together and buzzing about this, and what God is saying. So it’s quite helpful actually.

Adrian
If my readers are sitting there in America somewhere thinking, “You know what?” This all sounds great. I’d love to be in a church like that.” How would they find out more?

John
Well, they can come to our website, of course. Just type into the search engine Newfrontiers USA, and there, of course, they can find us, and where our churches are located. Of course, I would welcome any contact there in St. Louis where we are based.

Adrian
Excellent. Do you run any conferences, or anything like that, there in the USA?

John
Yes, we do. We have an annual Leadership Conference that’s hosted by us there in St. Louis. But we have also moved out regionally. Originally we were just a small cluster of churches in Missouri, but now we have established cluster churches in New England, and we’ve moved into the Pacific Northwest, and now we’ve moved into the Southeast as well. So we’ve established regional events because we are a family of churches, just not a fraternity of leaders. So churches come together there for envisioning, and leadership events happen, as well as 20’s conferences, and events for teenagers. Just this next week, we’re gathering several hundred teenagers, not just to go to a camp and somehow be refreshed and go back all enthusiastic for a couple of weeks, but actually to be involved in a mission and social action. We’re going to go out into the streets. We’re going to get with children in the neighborhoods. We’re going to begin to work into that community. So we have lots of events by which we’re bringing people together. There’s something that can happen when a group of churches come together that simply cannot happen with a church on its own. And there is just a combined strength of coming together around the singleness of vision and purpose that not only helps with what we do together, but actually helps when people go back to their own churches. They’ve caught something, see? And they take it back with them. So we have several events like that. And men’s conferences and ladies conferences that are happening throughout the nation. So immediately when I go back, we will have a One Blaze event, which is the teen event, in St. Louis. And from there, I’ll leave the next week and go up to New England, and we’ll have a big family camp out there where we gather the churches. We bring in international speakers, as well as myself, and we’re envisioned.

Adrian
Great. Sounds great. It’s just so exciting to hear about what God’s doing over there in the States. Thank you so much for joining us, John. Is there anything else that you’d like to share with my readers before we close?

John
I’m very much enthused about what God is going to be doing in the US, and what he is doing now. I’m thrilled when I see the moving of his Spirit in more prononced ways, as well as the value of the Word. I’m particularly encouraged about missional churches that are sprining up all across our nation. So, I wouldn’t want to end here just with some of the other things we’ve talked about—alarming trends, etc. I’d like to says that I’m actually more encouraged today than I’ve ever been in my life in regard to what God’s doing in raising up his Church in the US.

Adrian
Excellent! Praise God for that. We wish you all the success in the future, John, and I look forward to hearing more about what goes on in the years to come when you’ve reached those 100 cities.

John
Yes, thank you, Adrian.

Adrian

Next week the main Newfrontiers International conference of the year starts. To whet your appetite, I thought I’d share the transcript of an interview I did at Together On A Mission 2007 with John Lanferman. The audio for this interview is also available here.

John oversees a team of leaders who serve the churches in the Newfrontiers—USA family. His primary focus is leadership training, church planting, and supporting churches in the States. John and his wife, Linda, are a part of Jubilee Church in St. Louis, Missouri. His blog is at http://johnlanferman.blogspot.com/.

If you can’t make it to this year’s TOAM conference, I will once again be live-blogging it right here. It’s still not too late to arrange to listen to one of Mark Driscoll’s other speaking engagements in the UK.

John
I think it’s magnificent. The preaching has been outstanding. The worship is amazing. God’s presence is here. He is speaking personally to people. He’s speaking to us as a family of churches as well. It’s wonderful to welcome 53 different nations into this setting.

Adrian
Yes, I think it’s so important to underline that, isn’t it, because people probably think, “Oh, it’s just a British thing,” when really it’s almost like a world conference, isn’t it?

John
Absolutely, it is. And just to make connection with people and find out what’s happening in their nations, and to see that we’re really on the same page as it relates to the kingdom of God. There’s not really a national distinction there when it comes to that.

Adrian
Yeah, I know. It’s been great. Some of the preachers have come from South Africa and . . .

John
Absolutely.

Adrian
You’ve got guys from Africa, other parts, all over, haven’t we here?

John
Yes, it’s wonderful.

Adrian
I guess really as well, this conference is perhaps a little bit different to some other conferences, isn’t it, in terms of the family feel. I don’t know how easily we can get that across to people who are at home reading the blog.

John
I think that’s the interesting thing. When you come together and you see people, and some of the people, of course, we know as well. But even in meeting new people, there’s a sense of community that seems to be automatic, and it’s just great to see people mixing it up, enjoying each other.

Adrian
Yeah, I think that’s right, because that doesn’t happen everywhere we go in conferences, does it?

John
No, I know some conferences that you may visit, and some I’ve visited in the US — I mean, you arrive. If you don’t know anyone or if you have a friend or two, you’re really not connected. There’s not a sense of togetherness on the mission . . .

Adrian
Yeah . . .

John
. . . and you break off, you go to lunch, or you go to your hotel room. There’s a sense of — you’re there to pick up information primarily and download information that maybe you can employ in your own situation.

Adrian
Yeah.

John
But here it’s a totally different feel.

Adrian
That’s right. And there’s all these kind of little mini-meetings going on in all the breaks, isn’t there? I mean, the little breaks sort of get eaten up, don’t they?

John
All the time.

Adrian
(Laughing). And we’re sitting here and we’ve got what? I don’t know—another hour or so?—before the next session. And you squeeze in a meeting, don’t you?

John
That’s right, you do.

Adrian
But it’s good fun.

John
So it’s a pleasure, I think, as well, the in-between meeting times to connect relationally, talk to each other, find out what’s going on. It’s all part of the whole package.

Adrian
Yeah, exactly. John, I particularly wanted to chat with you because you head up the work of Newfrontiers in the USA, and so many of my readers are from that nation. So, are there many other Americans here at the conference?

John
Yes, there are several actually. We have four of our own local elders from St. Louis who are here, and some of our other staff members as well. But besides that, across the nation, we have representatives who lead churches that are here with us.

Adrian
So are there many Newfrontiers churches in the US?

John
Actually, there’s not at the time. We now have 23 churches in ten different states, but it was just a few years ago, like ten years ago, we had 7 churches in one state . . .

Adrian
Right.

John
. . . so these were churches that already had a history. Terry [Virgo] came over and spent a couple of years and left. It was in that setting, then, that we began to actually formulate who we were together, come together with a real sense of mission. We have churches that have a history, and we’ve been drawn together around Terry, and around the mission there, but obviously there are residual issues, so I think in the first few years there was a need for us to really come together to construct that all through, which we did, of course, and now we’re planting churches all across the nation.

Adrian
Okay, excellent. How do you decide where to go and plant a church?

John
I have, on my laptop, 100 cities, and I won’t be content until the top 100 cities in the U.S.—87 per cent of the nation’s population reside in these cities—so, one by one, we want to tick off these cities. When Newfrontiers started in the US, we were primarily a rural movement. We didn’t have any churches in any major cities. So, first of all, to come together around a mission and then begin to train leaders and set up training programs, to begin to envision people, and then see people move from the rural settings—although we’re very, very grateful; we’re still planting the rural settings—begin to make that big step into city centers. Kansas City was our first church plant; St. Louis (the one I led) was our second plant, and now we are in seven major cities. We’re in Seattle-Tacoma. We’re in Boston. We’re in Chicago. We’re in Nashville. We’re in Atlanta. We’re planting churches one by one into these major city centers, and we want these churches to become reproducing centers, so out from them churches are planted. So we have a fairly ambitious vision.

Adrian
Yeah, it sounds like it. So, what is it about a Newfrontiers church that is, say, different to other churches in the grand? Because I know some people might say, “Well, why bother planting churches? Surely we should just strengthen the ones that are there already.”

John
I think the thing that really draws us together is our sense of mission. Now there are other things, of course, that draw us together. Our very real value of Word and Spirit. We’re an interesting group because, in the US, you have evangelicals and people from various denominational persuasions. You have people who are charismatics. We’re a bit different because we are evangelical in that we are rooted in historic Christian faith. Most of our people would have a reformed theological perception. But we have a charismatic experience. And that’s quite unusual in the US. I think it sets us a bit apart from most other groups—not that there aren’t others that way—but it makes us different, I think, from what you would normally find in the US.

Adrian
Yeah. I sometimes have people writing to me, saying, “Is there a church like that in this place or in that place?” And I often wonder what other groups are there out there that are similar to Newfrontiers in some way. Are there other groups?

John
I would say Sovereign Grace would be similar to us. We’ve had good fellowship with that group. But there’s an interesting phenomenon that’s happening as well because in mainline evangelical circles, people that would have name recognition—guys like John Piper or Mark Driscoll—are, of course, well established in orthodox faith, but as well, are very open to and accepting and believing in certain charismatic expressions. So, it’s an interesting move that’s happening in the US in that regard.

Adrian
Yeah. So there’s a kind of—like what you’re saying—a coming together of the Word and the Spirit in a way.

John
I believe that’s exactly true. We do have other things. It’s a big country. The Christian television market, religious television market, and radio waves are fairly dominated by charismatics that would have a very experiential and often times a man-centered approach . . .

Adrian
Right.

John
. . . rather than a God-centered approach, which of course, is not helpful to be labeled in that particular camp because our root is indeed orthodox evangelical Christianity with a charismatic experience and expression.

Continued in part 2 . . .

UPDATE
The written transcript of this interview is now available. It can be read at the following pages:

• John Lanferman of Newfrontiers USA

• John Lanferman on Reformed Charismatic Churches in the USA

In case any of you think that Together On A Mission is just a UK conference, I decided to interview John Lanferman, who is the leader of Newfrontiers USA. There are, in fact, many here from a multitude of different nations.

This interview with John Lanferman was a lot of fun, and if you want to know what Newfrontiers is doing in the USA, then this interview is a great place to start. We also discussed the broader American church scene, and his understanding of just what a missional church is.

You can listen to that message right here or download it to your computer:

The next issue of the newfrontiers magazine is now available online. It has a special focus on healing. There are some great healing testimonies and some interesting articles about how we seem to be beginning to learn as a movement how to make room for God to heal.

Newfrontiers Magazine

• In Brief
• Firstline
• A Journey Into Healing
• Healing Testimonies
• Expecting the miraculous!
• Healing Testimonies (2)
• Confessions Of A Healing Sceptic
• Healing Testimonies (3)
• Friends First
• Book Reviews
• A healing King and a healing kingdom
• Healing Testimonies (4)
• Interview with John Lanferman

God moves in a mysterious way. I was thinking about revival and found a talk by John Lanferman on revival. I liked that talk, so I decided to listen to another talk by John Lanferman, which turned out to be on Elijah. Interestingly, I have been thinking about Elijah this week as well! I found the talk to be very encouraging, focusing on the idea of Elijah as a man of purpose. This Old Testament character is well worth spending some time studying and reflecting on his successes and setbacks. He really was a man like us. (James 5:17)

It’s been awhile, so I thought it would be a nice idea to do a blogspotting post today. Blogspotting was initiated by Phil Johnson and ruthlessly copied by me and others. It is simply a way for me to thank all of you for linking to this blog. Links are the lifeblood of the Internet, and the more of them we send each other’s way, the healthier the Internet is as a whole. They also help Google out a lot. Think of links as bonds of friendship that also form the signpost system for the Internet highway. It’s the nearest thing the Internet has to a good old fashioned library card index system. It is because links are so central to the workings of the Google search engine that it has taken them so long to figure out a way of diffusing Google bombs. So here goes with some reciprocal linky love.

First up is my friend, Andrew Fountain. He has linked twice recently. He liked my sermon on Revival and shared about his meeting with John Lanferman.

Speaking of new friends, in a post entitled Adrian Warnock on Mars Hill Church, Mark Moore is incredibly kind.

John Schroeder links to me in a post Rules of Interpretation and Lessons for the Church.

Another friend, Phil Johnson, is almost as excited as I am about the revival of Charles Simeon’s works.

In a move that might spark surprise in both the Warnock and Phillips camps, the Christian Reconciliation Carnival #1 holds us both up as examples of how to debate with brotherly love.

Jollyblogger tells the world I have joined LinkedIn, and is trying to encourage everybody to do that. Requests to join my network and complimentary testimonials gratefully received!

Steve Bishop has discovered my interview with Wayne Grudem. A visitor to our church, who at the time was clearly at the brink of conversion, now publicly identifies himself as a Christian and claims I wink a lot!

Wayne Leman predictably linked my quote from Lewis on translating into the vernacular to Bible translation. Kevin also links to my writings about the ESV Bible.

Morning Highlights and Mark Olson both describe Lloyd-Jones as “early modern,” which seems like a strange phrase to me and makes me wonder which of them didn’t “hat tip” the other.

Joe Carter’s Outtakes of 02.06.07 linked to my still unsolved Spurgeon challenge.

In a post entitled “Revival and the Baptism with the Holy Spirit” the wonderfully-named A Debtor to Mercy blog linked to my post on Piper’s view of the Doctor.

I received to my knowledge my first link in a foreign language blog “Confissões de Um Reformado Carismático“—a machine translation of the post reads reasonably well. Also, in a post entitled “Lütuf Doktrini (Seçilmişlik Öğretisi) ile ilgili ingilizce websiteler” by Les Huguenots, I noticed a link to a very old post of mine on Limited Atonement.

Speaking of new links to old posts, there was one to my definiton of the term “Reformed Charismatic“.

My interview with a deacon at Mars Hill generated a few links, with one blogger saying Remember Wendy? Another asked Ever Heard of Wendy Alsup? And yet another replied I’ve heard of Wendy Alsup! One blogger surely gets the last word with “When Wendy Speaks, Everybody Listens.”

One blogger is glad they followed the link for one of my adverts and says “LOGOS: Truly an Amazing Resource.” Another agrees with my book review of What is Reformed Theology? Another linked to a post I wrote On Theological Argument for Argument’s Sake. Jeff Wright provides one of the few links I could find to anything I have written on revival. Priorities likes an observation I made about blogging.

Russell very kindly nominated me for one of the 2007 Weblog Awards. I didn’t win!

The Pulpit Magazine is in the middle of a series Revisiting the Charismatic Question and links to me. I am not sure whether to go over there and see if they have any new arguments to interact with. Do you want to see more on this blog about that issue? I haven’t forgotten, by the way, my intention to publish a summary post listing arguments in favor of a charismatic position or reviews of a couple more useful books on the subject.

UPDATE - I had the pleasure of interviewing John Lanferman at the newfrontiers TOAM conference.

OK, if the truth be told, I have never met John Lanferman, nor have I exchanged e-mails with him. I have, however, listened to a couple of messages he preached just recently at a newfrontiers Canada conference. The mp3s from John Lanferman and others are available. It sounds like they all had a lot of fun at this conference. John is the USA leader of newfrontiers.

As you can see from this photo, my friend, Andrew Fountain, got to meet John Lanferman whilst he was there. John would also have got to hear about my blog at the conference as Andrew Fountain began his preach by quoting from it.

I appreciated having the chance to listen to John Lanferman on Jeremiah and on revival. I found them both very helpful messages, and encouraging as I was preparing for my own sermon on revival.

Listening to those two talks, I concluded John was definitely a man who had been with Terry Virgo. Having something of the same character as Terry is one of the highest compliments I can give someone.

If you are interested in some more information about this man, here are some other links:

• John Lanferman’s home church
• Sermons preached by John Lanferman and others
• The place of John Lanferman in the history of newfrontiers.
• John Lanferman – one of the speakers at Together On A Mission
• Resources by John Lanferman – includes FREE MP3 downloads
• How to download a podcast of messages by John Lanferman and others
• Review of David & Liz Holden and John & Linda Lanferman speaking on Marriage
• John Lanferman and others speaking at a USA conference
• Review of a conference that John Lanferman was speaking at
• newfrontiers USA which John Lanferman leads.

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