Author: Zack Newsome

I spent this morning in a coffee shop that isn't my usual coffee shop. For some reason, in this coffee shop I seem to always overhear some sort of "discipleship" conversation.  I will admit, I feel it the moment I walk through the doors: a small group huddled around a table, bibles poised to lookup a common passage screams evangelical Christianity.  I know it well.

Today's group seem to be some sort of leadership team from a local church – probably the youth ministry leadership.  Again, something I know well.  T thing thst struck me during my eavesdropping, was how much the conversation resembled an AA meeting.  One by one they went around sharing their recent failures and asking one another to pray for these weaknesses.  Little focus is put on the successes and the joys of following Jesus.  I have been to enough AA meetings with to see a similarity. 

"By their example of a truly Christian understanding of the world, expressed in a living and active application of the Christian faith to the human problems of our own time, Christians manifest the love of Christ for men, and by that fact make him visibly present in the world."  

Thomas Merton in "Passion for Peace"

Not to sure how to feel about this. I feel for those who lost a friend, a dad, a husband, a pastor, and a friend, and yet part of me is relieved that an era that arguably did more harm than good is over.  Nash has said it much better here.