The similar phrase 'Worldly Christianity' is one used by Bonhoeffer. It's J Gresham Machen that I want to line up most closely with. See his Christianity and culture here. Having done commentaries on Proverbs (Heavenly Wisdom) and Song of Songs (Heavenly Love), a matching title for Ecclesiastes would be Heavenly Worldliness. For my stance on worldliness, see 3 posts here.

10 Reasons to be Cheerful

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I was at the Westminster Fellowship yesterday, a monthly ministers fraternal. Paul Levy had been invited to speak on the current scene. He was very helpful and balanced it out by considering positives and negatives. He had 12 positives and I thought they would be worth replicating here in our own style.

1. The unstoppable growth of the global church
2. The open mindedness that some outsiders seem to have to the gospel at the moment
3. The fact that angry atheism seems to have faded away
4. The fact that Islam appears tobe in retreat for the most part
5. Immigration means that the world is coming to us
6. Many churches have been planted in the last 30 years
7. The work of Christian camps for young people is thriving
8. The mulititude of Christian books that are available today
9. The way the Internet is being used for evangelism
10. The existence of many happy traditonal families who share meals together

(His other two were the abundant opportunities for Christians to speak up and be heard and the disputable fact that ministers tend to be better trained today).

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