I ended up doing a lot of copy and paste, putting all the sermons in one long text. I surfed the web and goggled for a tool that would help me to create some kind of a word-cloud (like tag clouds on blogs). It turns out that there actually is a page called Wordle that does exactly that. With Wordle you can create word clouds from websites and texts, with different options (fonts, colors, positions and more).

So what was the result? Not exact science I guess, but pretty interesting! (Words like “Guds rike” and “Helig Ande” are difficult to see in this picture, since they are separate words but still belong together.)

The sermons are only available in swedish (mp3/audio and pdf/notes).

After sign-up and login, you will be able to browse through the sermons, by clicking on “Sermon” at the very top of the website. Enjoy and please leave a comment.

Please visit the webgallery and feel welcome to leave a comment or two if there is any photo you like or not.

And by the way, it kind of makes you wonder, how come the chairman of Humanisterna, Christer Sturmark, decided to register the domain “gudfinnsnog.se” [God probably does exist]. Fear of having a discussion or what?

There are plenty of reasons to believe in the existence of God;

1 – Creation as we know it must have an origin. If we assume that the Big Bang was the time of birth of the universe. Then we need to ask ourselves: What happened before “the Big Bang” or what is the origin of it? Have a look at Francis Chan’s video and decide yourself.

2 – Watching Yann Arthus-Bertrands last movie called the Home project 2009 (it can be viewed for free here), I was once again reminded about the fact that earth has (or used to have) a perfect balance.

3 – What about the experience of billions of people? And what about moral. Where did moral come from in the first place?

It is logical to believe in God – it’s not unscientific
It’s the smartest thing to believe in – it’s the best explanation
It’s right to believe in God – there is justice
So get in touch with the Creator who has created the universe and loves you!

Gardell previously wrote a book called About God (2003) and this easter his new book About Jesus (2009) was published. I haven’t had the time to read the book, but meet a lot of people who wonders about the message of this new book. In his 1,5 hour talk Gardell shared his view on who Jesus was.

As we arrived in the church 20 minutes before the talk started, we came into a packed church. Basically all the seats were taken and you could almost feel the expectation in the air. Gardell attracts listeners in a fascinating way. But, despite the fact that the church was full, you need to ask yourself who this Jesus is that Gardell is talking about.

What Gardell does is a fascinating attempt to reconstruct a Jesus that fits a certain agenda. It’s a prime example of how contextual theology can be used in a way that results in a distorted theology. Gardell puts an emphasis on experiences from the present instead of putting more weight on the experiences from the past (i.e tradition and the Bible). Already in the beginning of his talk, Gardell spoke about two diffrent Jesus’ – one created by the church and the true one; Yeshua, a jewish man living in the “shadow” of Jesus Christ, escaping the spotlight. This is just one of many tragic conclusions.

I will have a series of sermons on the subject of Jesus and will return to Gardells talk at a later point here at my blog. I just realise that it’s of great importance to share a different alternative to this book, a perspective that begins in the biblical texts.

Update: my sermons on this topic can be found here on my website and at the website of Korskyrkan, Uppsala.

This definition can be done in a numerous of ways. One way to define what this theology (read ecclesiology) is all about, could be to put in a model and compare it with other parameters. Stephen B. Bevans has tried to explain this in his book Models of Contextual Theology. Bevans shares some really interesting thoughts concerning how we do this translation and how we shape different theologies. Bevans’ main thesis and starting point is that “There is no such thing as “theology”; there is only contextual theology. Contextual theology is an imperative, according to Bevans.

Bevans means that we create theology by adjusting two basic parameters; the experience of the past and the present. The past has to do with the Bible and with the tradition. Experiences from the present has to do with values such as culture, social status and social change and both personal and collective experiences (see my illustration below; in Swedish).

In his book Bevans shares a few different models that he has discovered in his studies. These are the Translation, Anthropological, Praxis, Synthetic, Transcendental and the Counter-cultural model. More about these in my next posting.

At the end of 2008 I decided to end my employment at EFS-kapellet, Lund and headed back to Stockholm again. As I was preparing to return to Stockholm, Korskyrkan in Uppsala contacted me about a pastors vacancy opportunity and it turned out to be exactly what I’ve been looking for! Korskyrkan is part of  Evangeliska Frikyrkan (EFK), a network of  314 congregations and with a huge work in some 45 countries outside Sweden.

But best of all though – I’m a happily engaged fella!

I will soon return to my blog – the list of future posts are growing (at least inside my head).

In Kapolo I got to spend some time with the staff at Christian Volunteer Service (CVS). I also got to meet the kids that go to school at Lars English Medium School, founded by help from a Swedish pastor some five or ten years ago.

The biggest the longest lasting memory from the trip, belongs to the kids in blue, who are the most underprivileged ones in the whole area. Some of them live in families that every now and then has to eat the cortex of the trees in order to survive. Even though we didn’t understand each other 100%, we still managed to have a great time with lots of laughter and playing games.

It is difficult to understand their situation. Some friends in Sweden thought Tanzania was doing pretty well and that there isn’t much of poverty left. Well, that is not the picture I got. In fact it actually seems as if Tanzania is backsliding in some areas.

I have just updated the photo gallery with some photos from the trip. You can browse my new gallery by clicking here or by clicking “Photos” in the menu above.

Enjoy and feel free to comment!