Owen Strachan: Addressing the Work of the Spirit

Owen Strachan: Jesus is Not Your Accuser

Q&A Session from the 2025 War on Men Conference

Owen Strachan: Be Humble

Owen Strachan: Strong Men

Parenting Prosperity Gospel

What is the “Parenting Prosperity Gospel?” The following is a post from Owen Stratchan on Facebook:

Some years ago, there was what I'll call a "Parenting Prosperity Gospel." That's a bold term, but I'll use it. Buckle up for a lengthy post on this persistent problem and its devastating effects on the church.In simplified form, the Parenting Prosperity Gospel (PPG) taught a generation or two of Christian parents this: if you teach your kids to obey, if you set up a system in the home of authority and obedience, your kids will almost certainly become a believer. 

This thinking was based largely in Proverbs 22:6, which reads "Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it."Many parents who were taught this approach (notably by Bill Gothard and other legalists) had zero experience with Christian parenting. They got saved in adulthood and had no idea what they were getting into.

 Major Baptist and evangelical leaders recommended this vision of parenting, and platformed Gothard (and other legalists) to the skies. It is absolutely right to train children to obey rightful authority. Children need discipline, structure, order, moral training, and boundaries. (Be careful about systems like "Gentle Parenting" that soften these things in some ways.) In Ephesians 6:1, for example, Paul says this: "Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right." This is non-negotiable.But the generation raised on formulaic parenting, in which everything tends to boil down to obedience, sometimes found as their kids grew up that the system didn't work. That is, it didn't produce kids who professed faith as they aged. In many cases, there was an early profession (maybe aged 5-8), but as the child grew older, they didn't stick by it. In some cases, they rebelled, lost their way, or rejected the faith openly. 

Sometimes this prompted a blow-out fight in the family, with the child tragically going full prodigal on their parents.No father or mother can save their kids. This only God can do. However, we cannot miss that there is a generation or two of Christian parents and their kids who are very much recovering from the Parenting Prosperity Gospel. The parents thought if they did all the right things, then they would get the right result. That's what the mega-famous Christian expert told them. But they didn't get the right result. Their kids are distant from them or perhaps even openly estranged from them.The church needs to do a good bit of thinking and healing in this area. Parenting is an ordered art, not a reductionistic science. You do not take the variable of children, plug them into the parenting equation, and automatically get redeemed kids at the end. Nor does everything in parenting boil down to obedience. 

This is especially true with formulaic parenting, where it gets all too easy for rules to dominate the home, such that the rules system (with a good number of arbitrary rules) comes to be even bigger than God's grace, mercy, and forgiving love.The way forward here is not to abandon all rules. We have to have some! But we need to make sure, in our fatherhood and motherhood, that rules are not the focus of the home. The heart of our child is; loving our child is; living out the gospel is, by which I mean creating a home culture where there's moral order, but also a whole lot of kindness, joy, forgiveness, and grace; above all, the glory of God is our consuming passion.We also need to ramp up counseling and shepherding for those ravaged (and I use that word advisedly) by the Parenting Prosperity Gospel. In conservative evangelical circles, in some cases it has left us with a generation of grieving parents on the one hand (many of whom suffer in silence, endlessly adjudicating what they did and why the formula failed) and aggrieved children on the other hand (sorting out legalism, a difficult home background, and their own sin). Both sides need help--a whole lot of gospel help. Let's pray for better days ahead. Let's pray for us all to learn many lessons from the era of Gothardian influence. It's not that there was nothing true in that movement; no doubt some true things were taught. But overall, that system amounted to a Parenting Prosperity Gospel, and it wrought a lot of pain in the church. In some cases (not all), it made men iron and unbending and unloving, it left women confused and unstable and disconnected from their kids, and it left kids burned and angry.We are all thoroughly imperfect fathers and mothers. We all need the gospel every day we live. Even our best efforts will fail. 

For these reasons, let's parent in a ton of prayer, dependence on God, and trust that he will do all things well. Let's not set ourselves up as Olympian Kings and Queens who never falter or need to repent. Let's not only preach repentance to our kids, let's demonstrate it so they see it as normal, healthy, and good. Sin isn't something only that Really Bad People do; sin is our collective foe. We all struggle with it, but praise God, Jesus is way, way, way stronger than it. In all this, let's bring moral order to our homes, but let's set the center of the home culture to love: gracious, forgiving, self-sacrificing, joy-producing love. 

Faithful Unto Death: Understanding the Martyrs from Owen Strachan

A Q&A session with Owen Strachan, Darrell Harrison, and Jon Benzinger

In this video, Jon Benzinger asks questions to Owen Strachan and Darrell Harrison regarding issues in the culture.

Costi Hinn and Owen Strachan Discussing Hot Topics

In this video, Costi Hinn and Owen Strachan address topics that have been discussed within the church as well as social media. Such topics include head coverings, patriarchy, women teaching women.

Owen Strachan Preaching on Ephesians 2:12-22

Owen Strachan: Wokeness and the Gospel

Owen Strachan: Wokeness and Discernment

Book Review: Sola: How the Five Solas Are Still Reforming the Church

For over 500 years, Christians have celebrated the Protestant Reformation which was the beginning of a movement to breakaway from the Catholic Church's teaching on justification to embrace the gospel as proclaimed in the Bible. Throughout the years there have been five Latin phrases that have summed up the Reformation that has been taught in the church, which are known as the Five Solas:

Sola scriptura-Scripture alone

Sola fide-Faith alone

Sola gratia-grace alone

Solus Christus-Christ alone

Soli Dei Gloria-To the glory of God alone

Jason Allen says these phrases are "theological declarations, by they come with massive personal and congregational implications...they are the essence of the gospel." This quote comes to the introduction of a book, which Allen has put together along with four other authors, to address the Five Solas and how they apply today. The book is titled, Sola: How the Five Solas Are Still Reforming the Church.

Allen is joined by Jared C Wilson, Jason G Duesing, Matthew Barrett, and Owen Strachan. The authors deal with each Sola and their theological distinctives. Allen begins with Sola Scriptura in defining what it is, the history behind it, and its application to the church today.

Wilson writes on Sola Gratia and how we see God's grace throughout the Bible. Duesing deals with Sola Fide and gives us the theological background into why we are saved by faith alone. Barrett tackles Solus Christus and how Christ is the only One who can save us. Finally, Strachan addresses Soli Dei Gloria where our salvation is for the glory of God alone and not ourselves.

At first, I thought this book was going to be a huge theological book that might take a while to read. This is not the case. Sola is a easy to read book designed to give the reader an introduction to the Reformation and Reformed Theology. This is also a good read when it comes time to reflect on the Reformation later this year.

Thanks Moody Publishers for letting me review this book.

God, Gender, and the Gospel

Jason K Allen:

Around the Web-November 6, 2015

Apologia Radio interviews Denny Burk about his new book, Transforming Homosexuality

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40 Thoughts For My 40th Birthday by Jared C Wilson

Glamour Magazine Names Planned Parenthood Abortionist Woman of the Year

U.S. Public Becoming Less Religious

Can You Be A Sold-Out Christian in the Suburbs? by Owen Strachan

Does James 2:24 Deny Justification by Faith Alone? R.C. Sproul

Westminster Bookstore shows how an order gets ready to be shipped.

Book Review: The Colson Way by Owen Strachan

In this hostile culture, there is the temptation to sound retreat. After the Supreme Court decision to legalize gay marriage in the United States, many Christians were panicking. Many posts on social media were written saying that we are no longer a Christian nation. Yet, the Bible does tell us that we are "sojourners and exiles" (1 Peter 2:11) in this world.

Can Christians speak truth mixed with grace in the public square? Can Christians continue to be faithful in a culture that tells us to shut it about our faith? Owen Strachan addresses living the Christian life and loving other in the world around us that is hostile in his latest book, The Colson Way. Some of you are probably wondering who is this Colson person. For starters, it is not Phil Colson from "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D."

Chuck Colson is known throughout the evangelical world for starting Prison Fellowship after he served time in prison for his part in the Watergate scandal during the presidency of Richard Nixon. Colson was known for communicating the Christian message in setting that were anti-Christian but did not do it with hate but with grace and truth.

What Strachan does in this book is to take parts of Colson's life and see how we, as Christians living in a hostile culture, can learn form him. Strachan makes a disclaimer that this is not a biography of Colson which is true even though we do learn about him in the book. Strachan said this book is ground in the Lord Jesus Christ in which He still rules the world and this book is not in respond to the fears that many Christians have today. What need to learn from Colson is how bold he was in his faith during his life.

What I love about this book is that even though it does give us facts about Colson, it always points back to the gospel. Strachan knows that while Colson is a great example for the faith, we should always lean back on Jesus. This book couldn't have come at a better time when Christians are wondering how they are going to live out their faith in America. Of course, this does not just apply to Christians living in the United States, but for all Christians living in places where Christianity is met with hostility. I highly recommend this book.

Thanks BookLook Bloggers for letting me review this book.

Book Review: Risky Gospel by Owen Strachan

Comfort is what people seek at times. When comes to following God, some Christians will only do what is comfortable. Take witnessing for example. Some Christians will say they witness with their life and not their words. The problem is witnessing with their life is more comfortable then using words.

The Christian life has never been one of comfort. I believe it was C.S. Lewis who said, "If you are looking for a religion that is comfortable, I would not recommend Christianity." However, there are some Christians who take risks for the glory of God such as leaving the country to be a missionary or plant a church in a city that corrupted by crime. Christians are called to trust in a big God who will comfort us in our discomfort as we follow him.

In his book, Risky Gospel, Owen Strachan says, "We're saved to plunge headlong into a life of God-inspired, Christ-centered, gospel-driven risk. We don't know when the Master is returning; we don't know what may come of our efforts. We're not guaranteed any earthly results. But we are called to work while there is still time" (pg. 30). Risky Gospel is a call for Christians to embrace a growing, vibrant faith that risks everything for the glory of God. Strachan talks about building our identity in Christ, working for the glory of God in our jobs, raising our families, as well as taking risks that could lead in failure. Strachan said, "Christianity isn't foremost about fun or adventure or extreme sports. It's about following Christ, which may mean hardship and even death." (pg. 65).

What amazes me is some Christians will read other books that talk about your best life now or your entitlement because you a child of God. Risky Gospel, thankfully, is not one of those books because it talks about having faith in God when there are no guarantees. As a personal testimony, I know about taking risks. One of the last things I ever wanted to in ministry was to build a youth ministry from the ground up. Yet God, in his grace, allowed me over three years ago to do just that. I went in with no guarantee of success but I knew what God was calling me to do and I took that risk. There have been hardships as well as some successes.

If you are looking for a book to make you comfortable in your walk with the Lord, this is not the book for you. If you are looking for a book that will challenge you to take risks for the glory of God, this is the book for you.

Thanks Booksneeze for letting me review this book.