This past Friday night Dr. Sally Holt, who teaches Christian ethics at Central Baptist Theological Seminary Tennessee, arranged for her class in Murfreesboro to meet for dinner with a rabbi who teaches at a local university and the imam of the local mosque. Her purpose was to simply engage everyone in a time of informal dialogue in a non-threatening setting. She was kind enough to invite me to participate. The discussion touched on a number of topics, and I came away with many ideas, but two things particularly stimulated my thinking. First, the imam provided a good insight for our students who will serve local congregations. He pointed out that their situation is very different from that of ministers just a few years ago. At one point when a pastor stepped into the pulpit on Sunday morning, there was a pretty good chance that the congregation was rather homogenous—they probably were born and raised in the local area, most were of the same ethnicit...
Comments from a Christ-follower on things that matter to him