Terry Woodnorth

See Guidelinelines for Benevolence from Diaconal Ministries Canada at http://www.diaconalministries.com/resources/documents/guidelinesforbenevolence.pdf . I also encourage you to study the book When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor...and Yourself by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert - http://www.whenhelpinghurts.org/. Ministry training webinars based on the book are available at http://www.chalmers.org/when-helping-hurts/webinar/schedule.php.

Sorry for the delay in responding, but I just recently started paying attention to this forum and not just the blog.

I would encourage you to start out with Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) rather than online credit card donations. The fees associated with credit card donations may be relatively high for a small/mid-size church. My church has been using EFT for a few years and it has worked well (although not a lot people have participated). I recommend Vanco Services (http://www.vancoservices.com/), which provides EFT, website payments, and donations by text.

Has a similar survey been done recently with Christians in the US?

Planning to read Wild Hope: Stories for Lent from the Vanishing by Gayle Boss for Lent. (Check out http://justice.crcna.org/lent-2020-wild-hope.)

Thanks for introducing yourself and your new position, Jodi! Are you working in the Grand Rapids office or do you still live and work in Massachusetts?

Wow - can't believe it's been 10 years already!

From the Diakonia Remixed report:

"Another related principle is that the delegation of deacons to major assemblies is not about equal representation as such, as if there should be some balance of power, but rather it is about the full representation of the whole church which these offices represent. When deacons are missing from major assemblies, the full voice of the church is not heard, nor is the full ministry of the church under discussion. The purpose of the major assemblies is not simply governance and adjudication but deliberation about the church’s character and ministry, a deliberation in which the deacons ought surely to participate."

How about another bullet under reason 1? The whole church is fully represented when all the offices (deacon, elder, pastor) are represented.

The Center for Public Justice in Washington, DC, has developed a new Political Discipleship curriculum that is currently being piloted. It is a curriculum for small groups that provides a practical approach to Christian citizenship and engagement with public justice. If you'd like to read a summary of the curriculum and determine whether you think it would satisfy Overture 12, you can find it in Dropbox. I've also shared it with Steve Timmermans.

"Justice is what love looks like... in public." - Craig Greenfield

I found Mark Roberts' devotional Loving the God Who Loves Justice to be helpful in the context of this discussion. The words “justice” and “equity” are frequently found in Scripture in relationship both to God and to those who seek to obey him (cf., Psalm 9:8 and Psalm 99:4).

But then there is Jesus' response to "Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth" and "Love your neighbor and hate your enemy" in Matthew 5:38-48. I would prefer to take my direction from Jesus who fulfilled the law rather than trying to argue that the Persian law described in Esther is normative for our context.

Here's a resource I recently discovered - Halloween Brings the Mission to Your Doorstep.