Whenever evangelicals have an experience of direct, personal access to God, we are tempted to think or act as if we can dispense with doctrine, sacraments, history, and all the other “superfluous paraphernalia” of the Church and make our experience the sum and soul of our faith. We are still attracted to movements that replace thinking and theology by other emphases relational, therapeutic, charismatic, and managerial (as in church growth). Whatever the other virtues of these movements and the unquestionable importance of piety, we must courageously repudiate anti-intellectualism for the sin it is.
— Os Guinness (b. 1941), Apologet, Soziologe, Kulturkritiker und Autor
Topics: Church & Congregation, Wisdom & Understanding, Discipleship
Occasions: For Reflection
Os Guinness
Der 1941 geborene britische Soziologe, Publizist und Kulturkritiker Os Guinness wirkt seit mehreren Jahrzehnten im evangelikalen Spektrum vor allem in den USA. Bekanntheit erlangte er durch Veröffentlichungen über christliche Berufung, Analysen moderner Gesellschaften sowie sein Engagement für weltweite Religions- und Gewissensfreiheit. Bibellesern vermittelt sein Werk Impulse für ein intellektuell reflektiertes Glaubenszeugnis im säkularen Raum, wobei er sowohl fortschreitende Säkularisierung als auch die parteipolitische Vereinnahmung des Evangeliums kritisiert.
All quotes by Os Guinness (26)
The church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.
Tim Keller
The Church is not a cultural club, but the family of Jesus.
Pope Francis
The Bible in the pulpit must never supersede the Bible at home.
John Charles Ryle
In essential unity; in nonessentials liberty; in all this charity.
Rupertus Meldenius
Henry Ward Beecher
Philip Yancey
Charles Haddon Spurgeon
In a congregation, every person must be able to be as their heart truly is.
Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf