2012-03-05T11:50:58-05:00 GCI info@gospel.com /feeds/topics/christianese/ http://internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/7049 2012-03-05T11:50:58-05:00 In UK, we have a builders merchants called Travis Perkins. They are a great place to buy timber and other materials, and doubtless a business of the utmost probity, named after two companies that merged. But it is interesting to consider the hidden color, the resonance, in this name. No word exists in a vacuum. Words only have life because they create an image in our minds. And this image, different for each of us, will be an amalgam of our previous personal experience plus an overlay from our history and culture. http://internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/4800 2011-06-22T17:52:01-05:00 Effective communication has many strands. One is listening, asking questions and checking for feedback that the message we communicate is actually understood. A couple in UK arranging their marriage service requested the organist to play 'the Robin Hood theme' for the bride to come up the aisle. This was readily agreed to. No problems. Here's what they wanted... http://hutchcraft.com/a-word-with-you/your-mission/church-talk-6191 2010-10-04T09:33:28-05:00 We've got to ask God to help us get beyond our "Christianese" and to begin to explain the great words of God's rescue in non-religious words. http://internetevangelismday.com/blog/archives/2374 2010-08-16T08:45:07-05:00 Three funny but serious video clips highlight the importance of avoiding 'Christianese' jargon. http://internetevangelismday.com/idiom.php 2010-08-07T18:46:51-05:00 ‘Idiom’ is the use of language in a way that is not literal. The English language is full of idioms. Unfortunately, they are not even universal around the English-speaking world. For people who speak English as a second language, idiom is even harder to understand. We use idiom all the time without realizing. Here are some really obvious ones... http://internetevangelismday.com/preaching-effective-sermons.php 2010-08-07T18:44:26-05:00 When you seek to communicate the message of Jesus to those outside the faith, do you ever feel like you’re not getting through? There can be many reasons for this, including their own resistance, spiritual blindness, spiritual warfare, ego, personal pain, anger with God, disappointment with God or Christians, etc. But a major reason might be that you just aren’t speaking their language. http://internetevangelismday.com/jargon.php 2010-08-07T18:43:00-05:00 In most sermons for Christians, or any Christian magazine, there are usually very many jargon words and phrases. We feel comfortable with them! Using them makes us feel that we belong! In prayer too, we love to use these ‘Christianese’ words, as humorist Jim Watkins demonstrates. http://hutchcraft.com/a-word-with-you/your-mission/lost-in-our-language-6057 2010-03-31T11:01:22-05:00 The spiritually dying people around us hear us Christians announcing our all-important message, often in words they don't understand. We have life-or-death information that their eternity depends on. We can't afford for them to get lost in our language, or they may be lost forever.