John Stonestreet – Page 32

Intentionally Empty Churches?

Jan 31, 2022John StonestreetChristianityChristianity, Church, COVID-19

*John Stonestreet, Radio Host and Director of the Colson Center for Christian Worldview*

Many churches have shut their doors in the face of Covid, but one large church in Denver hasn’t just shut their doors; they’ve sold them. According to Christianity Today, “The Potter’s House Denver will sell its property in Arapahoe County and continue to worship exclusively online.”

We often hear that because the Church isn’t a building, it doesn’t matter whether it meets in one. But trading in-person worship for an online experience misses what the Church actually is. It isn’t just a place for individual contemplation on “spiritual things.” That’s not the Christianity of the Bible but the pietism of Gnosticism. Embodied worship is an essential part of a Christian worldview.

If our faith is the sort of thing we can live out alone, never needing the presence of others, then are we truly still the Church? The Church is the ecclesia, the called ones, the gathered ones, the community of the saints of God. If we aren’t a “we,” we are not the Church.

Quarantining with Screens Was a Bad Idea

Jan 24, 2022John StonestreetCOVID-19Child Welfare, COVID-19

A horrifying new survey found the number of pre-adolescent children in the U.S. who admit to sharing nude images of themselves more than doubled last year.

Fourteen percent of kids aged 9-12 say they have shared inappropriate pictures of themselves. This is up from just six percent in 2019. Of that number, over a third said they shared those images with someone they believed to be 18 or older.

As WORLD notes, this spike in dangerous behavior coincides with the pandemic, which meant increased screen time for many folks. An obvious takeaway is that preteens are not mature enough to handle all that comes with unsupervised smartphone use. The more time they spend alone with their devices, the more opportunity for pornography and predators.

At the very least, we must take active roles in our kids’ tech use. Quarantining with screens is more dangerous for kids than COVID ever was. It may keep the virus at bay, but for children especially, it lets in things far worse.

Invitro Heartbreak

Jan 17, 2022John StonestreetBioethicsBioethics, Invitro

Last week, The Wall Street Journal published the heartbreaking story of a 27-year-old man who died from a drug overdose back in 2020. Steven Gunner was conceived through the use of a sperm donor. He also struggled with schizophrenia.

After his death, his mom and adoptive dad reached out to other children who were also fathered by Steven’s donor, in order to let them know that their son’s mental illness may have been genetically inherited.

Their research confirmed that the sperm donor — known to them as just a number — had also suffered from schizophrenia, had also died by a drug overdose, and had not disclosed his mental health issues on health history forms – which American sperm clinics are not required to verify.

The Gunners’ research also revealed that Steven’s father has at least 18 other children.

It’s unknown whether they also inherited schizophrenia from the father, but the Gunners’ tragedy is yet another chapter in the larger story of assisted reproduction: when we rip apart God’s design for families, there is pain in every direction.