Author: Eugene Cho

Pastor. Speaker. Christ Follower. President of Bread for the World. Visionary at One Day's Wages. Founder & Former Senior Pastor, Quest Church.
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women’s day, girl effect, and 10 reasons

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I am joining others on this day to mark International Women’s Day and in this small way, contribute to the celebration of their voices, gifts, and presence and highlight the need for continual justice.

Each year on March 8 the world takes time to observe International Women’s Day. It is a day dedicated to the celebration of women’s social, economic and political achievements worldwide. In the United States, this official day of observance is rooted in women’s efforts to campaign for rights to work, vote and hold public office, culminating on March 8, 1908, when 15,000 women marched through New York City demanding shorter work hours, better pay, voting rights, and an end to sweatshop conditions and child labor. In the early 1910s, the concept gained recognition in the international community and grew momentum as women across Europe continued to fight for the right to work and protest against ensuing world conflict.

There are also others on the blogosphere also highlighting the voices of women in the Bible.  One female voice that has recently spoken to me in surprising new ways is Lydia from Acts 16:11-15.  My church is currently going through the book of Acts and I recently preached on that text [mp3] covering Paul, Lydia, power, and transformation.  Paul went to Phillipi and likely sought out the synagogue [and men] but it did not exist.  He went outside the city gate to the river – again expecting and hoping to meet men since that was his strategy.  I love this passage because we see how it wasn’t Paul’s intent, strategy, or plan but God surprises and blesses him nevertheless by introducing him to Lydia Continue reading “women’s day, girl effect, and 10 reasons”

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Christian books that should NOT be published.

Is it ok to sometimes poke fun and laugh at ourselves? I hope so because if not, I’m in some big trouble. As in, I might get blacklisted by the Christian evangelical subculture.

In reponse to the question about the 10 Most Essential Christian Books, I received some fabulous and interesting suggestions. But I also started getting a list from people regarding the most anti-essential Christian books or in other words, books that should never be published so I’ve taken the liberty of listing some of them here.  And if you’re gonna get offended, I have two things to say:  1) It’s not my list or umm, it’s not all mine.  Don’t kill the messenger! and 2) Relax. It’s okay to make fun of ourselves sometimes. I hope.

If you want to laugh even more, check out 10 reasons why men shouldn’t be ordained.

I’ll share my list of essential book soon but for now, enjoy this list of the Christian Books that should NOT be Published from various commenters from this blog.  You folks are mean!

And dare I ask:

What would you add to the list?

Update: I’m adding the American Patriot’s Bible to this list.  The crazy thing is that it’s a real book unlike the list below.

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10 most essential books for christians

I get numerous emails from both blog readers and folks at my church asking me the following question:

What are the essential books I should be reading as a Christian?

Honestly, I have a hard time coming up with my list because it changes so often and I’m biased towards dead people.  So, I’d like to ask you for your help in putting together a list of the 10 Most Essential Books for Christians.  You don’t need to give me your entire list but what are couple books that you would absolutely include on anyone’s list?

Because there’s ten, think broadly so that we’re not just thinking about one aspect of Christianity.  We should include theology, leadership, spirituality, etc., right?  

This should be interesting.

And if you’re interested, you may also want to check a post from last year about people’s personal  influential book.

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the blog post no one wants to read

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Let’s be honest.  There are some posts you naturally want to read and there are others that just don’t interest you at all.  I can post about Rob Bell, Mark Driscoll, talk politics, or the uber traffic magnet – Mac computers – and attract at least 4000 reads/post.  But bring up something like homelessness and I might be lucky to get 200 readers.  That’s 5% for those that don’t have my mad math skills.  

So, I’d like to challenge you to do your good deed for the day and read this post about homelessness.  

There are two main things I have learned over the years of living and engaging in the urban context.

  • Homeless is a very broad word that unfairly is used to portray the totality of a very diverse group of people.
  • Homelessness is a very complex and real problem that will only increase in light of the economic downturn.

I don’t have all the answers but it’s simply not acceptable to not do anything.  Several weeks ago, a group of pastors I meet with regularly hosted a representative from the mayor’s office of Seattle to ask, push back, and learn about what the city is doing.   It was actually pretty helpful.  We learned that the city devotes 38 million dollars in various ways to serve the homeless and displaced.  But is it making an impact?

But how is the [C]hurch responding? Continue reading “the blog post no one wants to read”

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an update on our global poverty initiative

Thank you for your support and interest in our vision to engage the fight against extreme global poverty.  While we’re not ready to publicly release the name of our initiative and organization, this is our attempt to keep folks updated on the progress of our initiative and organization.

I have some both good and bad news to share during this Feb/March update.   As I shared in the December ’08 update, this has been one of the most humbling seasons of our life. When we went public with our vision to give our year’s salary to start this poverty initiative, we had absolutely no idea what was in store with the financial crisis and meltdown. Our convictions have been tested but each time we think about how “bad” we have it, we’re reminded of the grave situation for the poorest of the poor – those affected by “extreme global poverty” – some of whom I saw with my own eyes during a recent trip to South Africa.

Here’s 6 Updates on our Progress:

  • VISION TRIP TO SOUTH AFRICA. I had a chance to visit South Africa recently.  Through the generosity of an anonymous benefactor from New York, I went to visit the Kwazulu Natal area of South Africa for research, relationship building, and visioning.  The Kwazulu Natal area is marked by much poverty and nearly 40% of its residents are infected with the HIV/AIDS virus.  There are some pictures below and I also shot this video of some observations during my visit to SA.  We hope to partner with couple NGOs there for the great work that they are doing to empower people to lift themselves out of poverty.  While I am a Christian pastor, our vision seeks to change global issues of injustice effecting millions of people regardless of race, culture, sex, age, or religion.

Continue reading “an update on our global poverty initiative”

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the church video venue coming near you

I ran into a fellow pastor/acquaintance at the Q Cafe yesterday.  He’s a good guy.  We ended up having a short but substantive talk since I haven’t seen him for several months.  When I last chatted with him, he asked for some advice about churchplanting and so I did the good midrash thing and asked him a few questions which he said he really took to heart and got him thinking. Those questions led him down a road where he eventually left his denomination and go figure, joined the Mars Hill Church network.  He’ll soon be pastoring one of their zillion “campuses.”   That’s just kind of funny to me that my advice got another pastor to join Mars Hill. 

Mark Driscoll and Mars Hill has been on the national news a lot recently.  The NY Times published an article couple months ago entitled, Who Would Jesus Smack Down?  The reporter called last year and asked me for some quotes but I said, “No thanks.”  My ego was tempted since it would have been nice to be mentioned in the NY Times but not that way.  I’ve got my differences with Mark but heck, we’re still Facebook friends.  BFF  KIT  TTYL.  Meme me.

In previous entries on this blog, I’ve shared both the concerns and respect I have for Mark here and here.   But my conversation yesterday with this soon to be MH elder got me thinking [again] about the church video venue. Continue reading “the church video venue coming near you”