Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City
Overview
Today many pastors are struggling to adapt to a post-Christian culture without abandoning orthodox theology. How do we communicate the concepts of grace and substitutionary atonement in our globalized culture and context?
In Center Church, Timothy Keller offers challenging insights and provocative questions based on over twenty years of ministry in New York City. This book outlines a theological vision for ministry—applying classic doctrines to our time and place—organized around three core commitments:
- Gospel-centered: The gospel of grace in Jesus Christ changes everything, from our hearts to our community to the world. It completely reshapes the content, tone and strategy of all that we do
- City-centered: With a positive approach toward our culture, we learn to affirm that cities are wonderful, strategic and underserved places for gospel ministry
- Movement-centered: Instead of building our own tribe, we seek the prosperity and peace of our community as we are led by the Holy Spirit.
Check out the expanded content from this volume in the Center Church Collection (3 vols.).
- Explores how to communicate grace and atonement in the modern church context
- Outlines a ministry vision centered around the Gospel, cities, and movement
- Introduction: Center Church Theological Vision
- Gospel
- Gospel Theology
- Gospel Renewal
- City
- Gospel Contextualization
- City Vision
- Cultural Engagement
- Movement
- Missional Community
- Integrative Ministry
- Movement Dynamics
- Epilogue: Late Modernity and the Center Church
Top Highlights
“So what is a theological vision? It is a faithful restatement of the gospel with rich implications for life, ministry, and mission in a type of culture at a moment in history.” (Page 19)
“Preaching is compelling to young secular adults not if preachers use video clips from their favorite movies and dress informally and sound sophisticated, but if the preachers understand their hearts and culture so well that listeners feel the force of the sermon’s reasoning, even if in the end they don’t agree with it. This is not a matter of style or program.” (Page 15)
“As I read, reflected, and taught, I came to the conclusion that a more biblical theme for ministerial evaluation than either success or faithfulness is fruitfulness.” (Page 13)
“When fruitfulness is our criterion for evaluation, we are held accountable but not crushed by the expectation that a certain number of lives will be changed dramatically under our ministry.” (Page 14)
“At the heart of all of the biblical writers’ theology is redemption through substitution.” (Page 40)
In this important book, Tim Keller unpacks the gospel and gently but firmly reminds us that it is nonnegotiable. At the same time, he enables us to think through how we can responsibly interact with the culture, how we can—indeed, must—appreciate good things within it, and how we can firmly and faithfully apply the gospel to it.
—D.A. Carson, research professor of New Testament, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School
- Title: Center Church: Doing Balanced, Gospel-Centered Ministry in Your City
- Author: Timothy Keller
- Publisher: Zondervan
- Print Publication Date: 2012
- Logos Release Date: 2012
- Pages: 395
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Church work; City churches; City missions; Evangelistic work
- ISBNs: 9780310499213, 0310499216
- Resource ID: LLS:9780310494195
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-06T20:40:40Z
Timothy Keller was born and raised in Pennsylvania and educated at Bucknell University, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and Westminster Theological Seminary. He previously served as pastor of West Hopewell Presbyterian Church in Hopewell, Virginia; associate professor of practical theology at Westminster Theological Seminary, and director of Mercy Ministries for the Presbyterian Church in America.
Timothy Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, which he started in 1989 with his wife, Kathy, and his three young sons. For over 20 years, he has led a diverse congregation of young professionals with a weekly attendance of over 5,000.
He is also president of Redeemer City to City, which starts new churches in New York and other global cities and publishes books and resources for faith in an urban culture. Over the past 10 years, the organization has helped launch over 200 churches in 35 cities. More recently, Dr. Keller’s books, including the New York Times bestselling The Reason for God and The Prodigal God, have sold over one million copies and been translated into 15 languages.
Christianity Today has said, “Fifty years from now, if evangelical Christians are widely known for their love of cities, their commitment to mercy and justice, and their love of their neighbors, Timothy Keller will be remembered as a pioneer of the new urban Christians.”
Reviews
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Shaun Lee
6/3/2018
I have read the print edition and thoroughly enjoyed the read. It's one book that you can keep referring to again and again. The logos pre-order price is more expensive than the print edition though, which is not cool, because I do not see myself using much of the logos features as I would read it as I would an ebook.
