Terry Pruitt's Blog

Whole Person Education is a Foundational Ministry of the Church The teaching ministry of the church enables evangelism, discipleship, leadership development, and individual growth.  The central teaching ministry of the church is the Sunday worship service.  The worship should engage the heart, emotions, will, mind, social capacities, attitudes, moral compass, and behavioral attributes so that the whole being grows in grace.  Worship directs us to God by being focused on Scripture.  Worship is where we hear God’s Word.  Prayer in worship allows the covenant community to express our hearts to God.  Music aids in engaging the whole being by praying in song, proclaiming the gospel in song, and singing Scripture in song.  Corporate singing is preferred in worship as prayer and learning rather than performance pieces, although sharing performance has a place too.  While the preaching ministry is normally to be done by ordained or licensed leaders, the...

And they said to him, "The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink."   And Jesus said to them, "Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?   The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days."   He also told them a parable: "No one tears a piece from a new garment and puts it on an old garment. If he does, he will tear the new, and the piece from the new will not match the old. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the new wine will burst the skins and it will be spilled, and the skins will be destroyed. But new wine must be put into fresh wineskins.   And no one after drinking old wine desires new, for he says, 'The old is good.' "   (Lk. 5:33-39 ESV) Are we being disobedient to God’s Word by giving up face to face meeting for church during the COVID-19 global pandemic?   The...

How should we respond when someone asks us to pray that her dead mother will watch over her like a guardian angel? The question has several components to it.  Let’s deal with the emotional part first.  This lady is likely missing her mother and is grieving.  As Christians we are to “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” (Rom 12:15 ESV)  We share in the emotion of someone who is sad.  Christian counselor Robert Kellemen in his book Soul Physicians describes soul care as sustaining and healing.  An important part of caring for your spiritual friend is sensing your spiritual friend’s story of despair.  One must truly weep with those who weep.  To do so one must empathize and embrace the friend.  If someone is suffering, we as Christian brothers and sisters enter into their suffering with them.  An important part of community is bearing one another’s burdens. (Gal 6:2)  So, listening with a trajectory of making su...