Crossroads "blogging" in the City

Defiant Grace

2012-01-29T15:26:00.007+11:00

Here's some words to challenge and enthral from Dane Ortland's new book. I love the way he expresses the power of Jesus and our need to be apprehended by this kind of grace.

"The real question is not how to avoid becoming a Pharisee; the question is how to recover from being the Pharisees that we already are, right from the womb. Law feels safe; grace feels risky. Rule-keeping breeds a sense of manageability; grace feels like moral vertigo. After all, if all that we are is by grace, then there is no limit to what God can ask of us. But if some corner of our virtue is due to personal contribution, there is a ceiling to what God can ask of us. He can bring us only so far. He can only ask so much.
Such is not the call of Christ. The Jesus of the Gospel defies our domesticated. play-by-the-rules morality. It was the most extravagant sinner of Jesus' day who received his most compassionate welcome; it was the most scrupulously law-abiding people who were the objects of his most searing denunciation. The point is not that we should therefore take up sin. It is that we should lay down silly insistence on leveraging our sense of self-worth with an ongoing moral record. Better a life of sin with penitence that a life of obedience without it.
It's time to enjoy grace anew - not the decaffeinated grace that pats us on the hand, ignores our deepest rebellions and doesn't change us, but the high-octane grace that takes our conscience by the scrub of the neck and breathes new life into us with a pardon so scandalous that we cannot help but be changed. It's time to blow aside the hazy cloud of condemnation that hangs over us throughout the day with the strong wind of gospel grace. You 'are not under law but under grace' (Rom.6:14). Jesus is real; grace is defiant; life is short; risk is good. For many of us the time has come to abandon once and for all our play-it-safe, toe-dabbling Christianity dive in. It's time....to get drunk on grace - 200-hundred-prrof, defiant grace."

Do You Believe in the Reality of the Resurrection

2012-01-27T13:09:00.001+11:00

Here's something good, true, bold & encouraging.

The Reality of the Resurrection from Humble Beast Records on Vimeo.

Why God's jealousy is a good thing

2011-02-15T13:30:00.005+11:00

In 2 Corinthians 11 Paul mentions his divine jealousy the church (v.2) and also his feeling of being indignant (v.29) when people are led into sin. And James 4:5-6 speaks of God who 'yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us...' and that he 'opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble.'. Of course it's made explicit way back in Exodus 20:5 where God states that he is a jealous God.

Below is part of a sermon by B.B.Warfield entitled "The love of the Holy Ghost” where he speaks of how God's jealousy for us is something to rejoice in....

See us steeped in the sin of the world; loving evil for evil’s sake, hating God and all that God stands for, ever seeking to drain deeper and deeper the cup of our sinful indulgence.

The Spirit follows us unwaveringly through all.

He is not driven away because we are sinners. He comes to us because, being sinners, we need Him.

He is not cast off because we reject His loving offices. He abides with us because our rejection of Him would leave us helpless.

He does not condition His further help upon our recognizing and returning His love. His continuance with us is conditioned only on His own love for us. And that love for us is so strong, so mighty, and so constant that it can never fail.

When He sees us immersed in sin and rushing headlong to destruction, He does not turn from us, He yearns for us with jealous envy.

It is in the hands of such love that we have fallen.

And it is because we have fallen into the hands of such love that we have before us a future of eternal hope.

When we lose hope in ourselves, when the present becomes dark and the future black before us, when effort after effort has issued only in disheartening failure, and our sin looms big before our despairing eyes; when our hearts hate and despise themselves, and we remember that God is greater than our hearts and cannot abide the least iniquity; the Spirit whom He has sent to bring us to Him still labors with us, not in indifference or hatred, but in pitying love.

Yea, His love burns all the stronger because we so deeply need His help: He is yearning after us with jealous envy.

Shared from the Gospel Coalition blogsite

Reliability of the New Testament Manuscripts

2011-01-24T22:09:00.007+11:00

Just came across these clips on the reliability of the New Testament. It's from a new website called the Ehrman project.

This is Dan Wallace in fine form.

Christmas Is for Those Who Hate It Most

2010-12-20T00:01:00.000+11:00

Christmas Is for Those Who Hate It Most

A great article causing us to think Christmas a bit differently.

Theology Matters - Dug Down Deep - Joshua Harris

2010-10-29T13:23:00.000+11:00

If you've never read nor bought a book on theology, here's a great way to start. We're selling these on the bookstall at the moment.

Less than two minutes with Dave Irving

2010-10-01T21:15:00.002+10:00

It will be wonderful to have Dave join our team next year. He'll be heading up the FOCUS ministry at the ANU.

2 minutes with Andrew Lubbock

2010-09-17T09:01:00.002+10:00

The Lubbock's head back to Italy next week. They are doing an amazing work. How about watching this video and praying for them and what they're doing?

Two minutes with Andrew Lubbock from CMS NSW on Vimeo.

The difficult and wonderful need for forgiveness

2010-08-08T15:07:00.005+10:00

Forgiveness questions

What does the gospel show us when the person who has sinned against us doesn’t acknowledge the hurt they have caused us? What if that person is no longer around for us to even confront them in their sin against us? What if we have been the victim and someone else has got away with something with little hope of justice or reconciliation? Does this mean I am still called upon to forgive? Do I have to become a ‘doormat for Jesus’ and just cop it? How can I deal with ongoing residual anger and pain?

Well it’s not as if the Bible is silent in these areas indeed the gospel touches directly upon all these areas.

The need to point out someone’s sin against you.

Where possible someone’s sin against you should be pointed out in love with the desire to forgive and reconcile. Following the pattern in Matthew 18:15 this should be done not after you’ve had a big whinge about the person to everyone else, but to them. Perhaps one of the reasons some of us struggle to forgive someone their sin against us is because we’ve never actually articulated how they have wronged you. It is just hard to absorb pain and sin, and much easier if the person acknowledges their guilt and changes their ways.

It's not always that easy

However sometimes it’s far harder because they don’t repent or even see they’ve been at fault. Or, they continue to sin against you. What then?

So let’s take the hard example where someone divorces their Christian spouse. The Christian wants to stay married, but their spouse wants things to end. The hurt here is immense. Can someone come to the point of forgiving their ex-spouse this sin of walking out on a marriage? Well yes I believe they can and they should. This doesn’t mean hiding the truth of the hurt and pain it has caused, but it does mean the Christian will not slander nor fertilize revenge for what has happened. One is the fruit of bitterness, the other the fruit of forgiveness.

However, at the same time if the ex-spouse is being unreasonable and ruthless is seeking to take advantage from the new divorced situation, then applying for and seeking justice is entirely appropriate. Can forgiveness and justice be held together at the same time? Yes I believe so because that is actually what the gospel is all about.

But is there really forgiveness if there’s no repentance?

Well I suppose in a way at this point the person has scorned your desire for forgiveness and reconciliation. It is offered but it’s not enacted from their side so they will not benefit from it, but I think the willingness and desire to forgive needs to be there otherwise you’ll never be able to let go of the hurt.

Loving your enemies

This is an important and startling feature of God’s Word. A powerful enemy who continues to perpetrate evil against you is surely one of the gravest situations to be in. What does the Bible say in regards to this kind of situation. Well firstly the Bible seeks to comfort because God hears the voice of the oppressed. He is not far from those who suffer wrongs. Secondly those who oppress others arouse God’s anger. God is not passively sitting in the background, but his sovereign plans include justice being done. Both of these truths are great comforts to those sinned against. This means that God is always bigger than our enemies and they will not stop the progress of God’s good purposes. (Check out Psalm 10 & 73 to see something of this perspective)

The New Testament takes this even further in that we are told to love our enemies. To do good to those who hate us. Now this goes against every fibre of our being and yet God’s way will always bring blessing to the one who trusts in him so this will always be right for us. Check out Matthew 5:43-48 & Romans 12:14-21 where this is made explicit. What does loving your enemies mean? It means seeking their blessing, longing for them to know Christ and hoping they will turn from their sin. It seems in this situation seeking to forgive is a very powerful way of showing them the love of Christ they so desperately need.

But it’s not fair!

Yes I know it’s not. Which is why the only way we can ever actually do this is through recognition that we ourselves have been God’s enemies and yet in great mercy and kindness he has brought to forgiveness to us. And not just in saying the words, but in moving to action which involved the Cross of Christ. If I have truly seen the glory of Christ then I will know the weight and cost of his forgiveness to me. This will move me to want to reconcile (if possible), forgive and bless even those who have hurt me the most. Indeed the very occasion of my hurts draw me again to the very cross of my saviour who’s love for me frees me from the need for residual anger, the ongoing frustration that justice has not been done to me and the obsession to seek revenge. So the gospel, if understood rightly, makes it intolerable to harbour unforgiveness and to mutter curses against another. It leads you to do what might seem impossible, because you’ve been braced and thrilled by the impossible love and wonder of the cross.

Stepping out in forgiveness

If you are struggling with bitterness and hurt stemming from unforgiveness then I encourage you to really think through why. Have you approached the person with truth and love? Or is that even too hard? If so then you need to appreciate once again the depth of Christ’s love for you. Your bitterness and ongoing gripes will actually become a dangerous criticism and complaint against God, for in affect you are saying his ways are not to be trusted.

Perhaps it is not possible to speak to the person because they have died. If hatred or pain always wells up whenever you think of them you need to take this to the Lord and trust his abounding love and understanding. He is good and sovereign and the deeper reasons for holding onto hurt need to be addressed. The gospel has the power to do this because our very identity, joy, hope and purpose need no longer be captured by the oppression and sin of others, but by the grace of our saviour. The desire and the ability to forgive is not just a great blessing to the one who sinned, but also to the one sinned against. For at this point we are drawn ever closer to Christ whose love and mercy and forgiveness rules are hearts and conquers even our deepest hurts.

Grace in the here and now

2010-07-29T15:13:00.003+10:00

Paul Tripp has a really helpful post on the power of God's grace.

He explains four aspects of the “nowism” of the gospel and what grace will do to you:

1. Grace will decimate what you think of you, while it gives you a security of identity you’ve never had.
2. Grace will expose your deepest sins of heart, while it covers every failure with the blood of Jesus.
3. Grace will make you face how weak you are, while it blesses you with power beyond you ability to calculate.
4. Grace will take control out of your hands, while it blesses you with the care of One who plan is unshakable and perfect in every way.

I encourage you to check the whole post to see these unpacked.

Our natural drifts away from godliness

2010-06-18T10:52:00.003+10:00

Here's a great warning and encouragement to be proactive in our Christian life from Don Carson.

One of the most striking evidences of sinful human nature lies in the universal propensity for downward drift.

In other words, it takes thought, resolve, energy, and effort to bring about reform.

In the grace of God, sometimes human beings display such virtues. But where such virtues are absent, the drift is invariably toward compromise, comfort, indiscipline, sliding disobedience and decay that advances, sometimes at a crawl and sometimes at a gallop, across generations.

People do not drift toward holiness. Apart from grace-driven effort, people do not gravitate toward godliness, prayer, and obedience to Scripture, faith, and delight in the Lord.

We drift toward compromise and call it tolerance;

we drift toward disobedience and call it freedom;

we drift toward superstition and call it faith.

We cherish the indiscipline of lost self-control and call it relaxation;

we slouch toward prayerlessness and delude ourselves into thinking we have escaped legalism;

we slide toward godlessness and convince ourselves we have been liberated.

Taken from D.A. Carson, For the Love of God, volume 2, Jan. 23 entry:

It's a women's issue too

2010-06-18T10:51:00.001+10:00

Make it Count - Kevin Rudd and Tony Abbott live via webcast

2010-06-11T09:13:00.001+10:00

Here's a special opportunity to hear from our political leaders in view of this years federal election.
Crossroads will be hosting a webcast open to all from 7pm on June 21 in the Copland Theatre, ANU (end of Kingsley St).

Creative ideas for more generosity

2010-05-18T13:18:00.004+10:00

During last Sunday's sermon on Malachi 3 Dave encouraged us to think creatively about how we could be more generous and how we could actually enjoy God more by giving to his agenda and cares in our world. So he encouraged us to be creatively sacrificial and suggested that simply by not buying coffee and lunch so regularly each week, it could make such a difference in our capacity to give.

So imagine not buying coffee or lunch for just 3 days of the working week. Very conservatively, even after the expense of making your own salad and sandwiches at home (shock horror I know for some of us), that would mean we had at least $30 extra to give. That's $120 a month, a for 48 working weeks that's $1440 a year that can be used for gospel blessing. That's huge.

And that's not to say we can't enjoy lunch or coffee, or that working lunches are to be banned.....these are good things to be received with thankfulness to God. But as the Gospel excites us and fills our vision we'll actually enjoy making changes and sacrifice to avoid building treasures on earth in view of the wonders of heaven.

But forgoing buying lunches and coffee is one suggestion......what other ideas might people have in both big and small ways as to how we can avail ourselves of more generosity in the things of God?

Guilty feeling Christians?

2010-05-12T09:32:00.003+10:00

The reality of guilt within the Christian life something we have all probably thought about. Sometimes we feel guilty when don't need to. Sometime we don't feel guilty when we certainly need to. Check out Kevin deYoung's excellent little article that I think really helps in this whole area.

Are Christians Meant to Feel Guilty All the Time?

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Simply God |

2010-05-04T08:38:00.003+10:00

A great little article on understanding the attributes of God....well, trying to understand anyway...

Simply God | Culture analysis | Sydneyanglicans.net

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New TV show for Christian men.

2010-04-30T11:45:00.003+10:00

I hope it's not just for Christian men...

New TV show for Christian men. | News stories | Sydneyanglicans.net

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The struggle Christians have with the homosexual debate

2010-04-29T09:57:00.002+10:00

Here's an insightful article on why Christians always seem to come out as the losers in any debate on homosexuality.....and some helpful ways to steer things in more helpful directions.

Jennifer Knapp & Larry King: Why We Always Lose this Debate

The offence of the Prosperity Gospel

2010-03-17T09:55:00.003+11:00

I mentioned briefly how repulsive prosperity theology is to the Christian gospel.

I haven't heard it argued against in a stronger or more confronting way than this.

The Rage against God

2010-03-17T09:51:00.004+11:00

This looks really good.

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Atheists 'fuelling sectarian conflict'

2010-03-05T11:59:00.002+11:00

An expert in sociology says atheists or people without a specific religion are creating the most problems for inter-faith tolerance in Australia.

Check out the article on the ABC website here....you don't often have someone come out and say this, let alone the media publishing it.

Re-thinking ‘ministry’ and making it ‘incalculable’.

2010-02-26T11:02:00.012+11:00

Given our current series here’s few thoughts on the potential for ministry in our congregation and gospel groups. If we all took on board, it would be hard to even measure the gospel benefit to us all.

If we think that ministry is just the public preaching and teaching of the Bible, or the ‘pastoral counselling’ that the professional pastor types do, we are in strife as a church and so are our gospel groups. The public preaching and teaching of the Scriptures is vital, it sets the agenda, it should be powerfully making a difference. The pastors meeting up with and encouraging people to gospel living and trust in the midst of sin and difficulty is likewise is important, but we underestimate greatly what real ministry can be done outside of this. I believe it’s incalculable.

Let’s think about the ministry of encouragement. That’s not the patting on the back and telling someone their ok and the world is ok and everything will work out fine. No it’s the sharing, the speaking the truth, the urging, the speaking of biblical truths for the benefit of another. It sounds so unexciting, so….normal.

But it makes a gospel world of difference….

I believe the passages we’ve been looking at in church recently (Ephesians 4:11-16; Hebrews 10:19-25) and we could add Colossians 3:12-17 all urge us in this direction. That thoughtful, deliberate, considered gospel speech to one another will make a world of difference. Where the truth is spoken in love and where the glory of God and the honouring of Jesus are the goal and passion of our lives…what amazing ‘ministry’ would be done amongst us.

In fact imagine we had even 30% of people on Sunday night or at our Gospel groups during the week turning up having considered how God can use them to spur another on in the truth. Such that they sit beside someone deliberately, they think during the sermon who they can share God’s truth with and how they’ll do it. Where they will ask even just one person how they can pray for another. Where they call up that person during the week to see how there doing and tell them they’ve been praying. Where they even simply express quite genuinely how they appreciate having a conversation with another about the things of the Lord. What this person has done is to trust God and put his Word into practice and gracefully, lovingly, faithfully encourage and help others in the same.

Can you imagine how awesome your gospel group will be if half the group are switched on like that?

Can you imagine how awesome church would be Sunday night with that kind of humble, Christ-centred love and trust?

That’s powerful ministry going on and it leads exponentially to more gospel ministry and love and trust happening all over the place.

This is not meant as a criticism really, but often people say to me how they want to get involved at church and don’t know what to do. My response in always, ‘Look around’. Ministry fundamentally is not task or project or event management. Those things are important because they are meant to promote relationship and people and talking and sharing and obedience…the real stuff of ministry.

So the personal ministry of encouragement, revolutionises churches. And we all know the opposite kills churches. Gossip, jealousy, boasting, factionalism, vulgar speech, anger, disengagement….that ruins lives.Gospel love and encouragement saves and transforms them.

So let’s be a congregation excited to be involved in the incalculable potential of real ministry amongst us. Let’s come ready next time we meet and see how God will use us for his glorious purposes as we build each other up in love.

If you want to consider this whole area more download The Ministry of the Pew by Col Marshall here. Make sure you download the article marked 4.05

Talking about Jesus...back on the public agenda

2010-02-23T09:49:00.003+11:00

Check out Anton's thoughts on the Crossroads South blog.

Porndemic

2009-12-13T08:52:00.002+11:00

For more helpful and free resources in the battle for purity please check out this great list on Justin Taylor's Blog.

Tim Wong

2009-12-11T08:15:00.003+11:00

I note that Tim Wong's review of a new publication on Calvin, initially written for our blog (see here) is now in the latest addition of The Briefing. Well done Tim!

On the topic of The Briefing, may I suggest a 12 month subscription for yourself or your family and friends would be a wonderful thing to buy for this Christmas.

Dealing with Pornography

2009-11-23T11:23:00.005+11:00

Here's some extremely helpful material in the struggle to avoid and be freed from the tyranny and sin of using pornography. Simply titled Breaking Pornography Addiction Part 1 and Breaking Pornography Addiction Part 2, David Powlison offers plenty of Gospel help and hope. This is the sort of thing worth reading over and then meeting up with a friend to talk over.

Three books to change your world

2009-11-23T10:58:00.020+11:00

With the year quickly coming to a close I’d like to recommend three books which tie in with what we’ve been looking at recently in church.

You Can Change – by Tim Chester Don’t be fooled by the title, this is not a book that gives you a quick 5 step program to becoming the world’s happiest and most successful person. It’s much better than that. This book is about transformation of sinful behaviour and negative emotion through the wonder of the Gospel. Chester is so helpful in this book because he gets you to think about what’s underneath and driving sinful behaviour, and then showing how powerful and fulfilling Christ is to win us over to change. He even suggests as you read through the book you pick out an area of your life that you know is a problem and then he workshops that area right through the book…..it’s extremely helpful. He gets far beyond the guilt and shame that are so ineffective in seeing us live differently and at the same time he so helpfully shows how good Jesus really is so you wan to change.

So forget your new years resolutions….this book, if read and understood will bring great blessing for you and others.

Breaking the Idols of your Heart – by Dan B. Allender & Tremper Longman III

This book is different because each chapter starts with a well written fictional scenario and story which the second half of the chapter then analyses. The story continues to build as the authors look at issues of power, relationships, pleasure etc. Allender is the story teller, and Tremper is the theologian and it works really well. It deals with very believable situations for both men and women in their work, marriage and social settings and faithfully exposes what is going on largely through teaching from the book of Ecclesiastes. It’s very gospel focussed and will get you thinking more deeply about the why of your worries and stresses and distraction in life.

Counterfeit Gods – By Timothy Keller

It’s hard to be disappointed by anything Keller has written. He’s so good at nailing our problem and revealing the wonder of the solution in Jesus. If you love quotes, there are scores of them here that bolster his thesis that our great problems and our sinful behaviours are driven by the conveyor belt of idolatry which resides in our hearts which only Jesus can replace. Keller is anti-moralistic and anti-religious because he is so gospel focussed. He really does believe that Jesus is better than anything this world can ever offer and your heart rejoices as to why as you read through these chapters.

Hear about it from the author here.

Hosea and the shocking love of God

2009-11-02T10:07:00.009+11:00

Hosea…a desperately loving man during desperately evil times.

A few things stand out for me from our recent series.

1. Hosea’s amazing willingness to obey God.

Chapters 1-3 are a devastating and astonishing read. Would you do what this man was prepared to do? Could you find it in your heart to love like this and go through this?

2. How easily we forget God.

In chapter 4:1-3 Hosea writes,

‘Hear the word of the LORD, O children of Israel, for the LORD has a controversy with the inhabitants of the land. There is no faithfulness or steadfast love, and no knowledge of God in the land.’ (See also 4:6,14)

How on earth could a nation steeped in the most amazing history plummet to the point of forgetting their God? It’s not that they couldn’t recite their salvation story, it’s not that they believed those things didn’t happen. It’s that their heart moved from trusting and loving their God, to presuming and using him. And then things got very ugly.

3. How idols deceive and fill our hearts. The Puritans of old would speak of the human heart as a factory of idolatry. I think they read and knew Hosea. Israel should have been a great crucible for godliness and transformation, instead the very opposite was the reality. Quite simply my heart on it’s own will inevitably tend to gravitate in trust and hope to all the wrong things. I’ll yearn for all God’s good gifts, but seek it not from God, nor via his ways….but others. Without God doing something to change this, to awaken me, I will not be able to change.

4. How committed God is to us. The faithlessness of Gomer and Israel is contrasted so blatantly with the utter faithfulness of God. He is willing to take his wayward people back (who will not come) because he is committed to fulfilling his promises. Even though Hosea’s generation won’t return, there will be those who will in the future. God looks forward in love and commitment…and we are the ones who benefit.

5. How God’s justice and mercy meet. This is a huge question left unanswered in Hosea (and indeed in the whole Old Testament). How can mercy and judgement both be done? The price of forgiveness always means the one forgiving has to absorb hurt and pain. Hosea learnt this, but was moved to do it because he knew God in his tenderness and compassion was to be the very model of this. Jesus of course resolves the great question for his Cross is the astonishing collision of both justice and mercy where both are upheld perfectly.

6. How shocking God’s love is. The depth of emotion is so striking in Hosea. Yes God is angry and outraged at sin, it will be punished, and yet at the same time he is moved with warmth and tenderness, compassion and love. The depth of feeling highlight the significance of the action that will follow. If Hosea will take back and win back his adulterous wife, what will that look like as God takes back and wins back his wayward people. The turmoil of emotion that comes out especially in chapter 11 is understood once we see how the cross would be the way and means of drawing his people back.

7. How we need to celebrate our God. Hosea, the prophets are not all doom and gloom. A rich picture of future blessing and hope drives them on. Hosea celebrates even while for so long he languishes as God’s goodness and glory is so misconstrued and forgotten. But the day will come when it will be experienced and known again, God himself will see to it. Hope like this is so important because it helps us not hope in hopeless things….like idols. Surely we who are the beneficiaries of his amazing grace and love in Jesus have everything to celebrate in. A people who celebrate and live out the goodness of God are far less likely to wander to other things. How Hosea longed for that day. His generation did not share his longing nor did they see it. How kind God has been to us, to draw us to Jesus, the one Hosea longed for.

Friends don’t easily or quickly forget this book of Hosea. It shows us things about our God in ways that are unlike the rest of the Scriptures while being consistent with the rest of the Scriptures. Hosea draws us to our knees to Christ in humbleness and joy. Please keep reading it in the future, perhaps at times on your knees, because humbleness and joy is surely the response to God’s shocking love for us.

NTE 09

2009-10-28T09:19:00.004+11:00

For those at Uni I hope you're considering getting along to NTE in December. The conference has moved to Exhibition Park in Canberra (EPIC) and will be an amazing 5 days. Head here to get registered.

Crossroads in Garema Place

2009-10-26T08:08:00.002+11:00

Many thanks to those who put so much effort into this event. The rain stopped at just the right moment to make it possible and given the conditions of the afternoon and early evening, I was surprised by how many people showed up.

For those of you who made it along, feel free to share a thought or two...or a highlight.

Getting the right perspective

2009-10-24T22:20:00.001+11:00

This really is very clever...and very true.

Perspectives from Peacemaker Ministries on Vimeo.

New video for CitC

2009-09-27T17:25:00.006+10:00

Many thanks to Dean Halpin for putting this together.
Feel free to share it. To friends who want to know a bit about church and especially to people you know of who are moving to Canberra next year.

We'll keep it on the blog and website.

Invitation to Crossroads in the City from Crossroads in the City on Vimeo.

John Calvin: A heart for devotion, doctrine and doxology

2009-09-23T19:12:00.057+10:00

In the months leading up to 10 July 2009, any casual reader of Christian blogs would have had to have typed the keywords 'Calvin' and '500' into their parental control software to not know that John Calvin’s 500th birthday was approaching.

500 years on, Calvin is still read, argued over and often vilified.

Yes, Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion still stands up today as arguably the summary of the biblical Christian faith. Yes, he was a reformer of enormous influence – in the church, in civics and in science. But, I hear you say, wasn’t Calvin a harsh, authoritarian pointy‑head with a pointy beard? Wasn’t he, according to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, the ‘unopposed dictator of Geneva’? And wasn’t he the champion of the doctrine of predestination, which led to the emergence of the movement that stopped doing evangelism (often labelled ‘hyper‑Calvinism)?

Calvin evokes powerful images, most of these negative.

So given the online excitement about his 500th, I made it my personal project as a 20‑something, mere layperson to meet the man behind the stigma. I started by reading a number of papers and journal articles.

Then, at about the same time I discovered online shopping. So the first thing I did was to buy the Institutes. To accompany the Institutes, I bought a book called John Calvin: A heart for devotion, doctrine & doxology – based on endorsements from two of my favourite authors D A Carson and David F Wells.

A heart for devotion, doctrine & doxology gives an overview of the life, work and teaching of Calvin. Pitched at the ordinary reader, it consists of 19 short essays by a mainly North American all-star cast of scholars and pastors. Far from being dry, the book set out to capture the heart of Calvin through his life and his writings. The book can be broadly split into two parts.

Calvin's life and work

The first half of the book (chapters two to eight) is about Calvin’s life and work. The picture portrayed is that of a reformer, churchman, preacher, counsellor and prolific writer who made a difference. While it has been widely argued that Calvin played a pivotal role in transforming western society, his deepest imperative was to transform believers to conform their lives and minds to Scripture.

To this end he worked tirelessly, motivated by a single-minded service to the biblical God. Calvin’s motto Cor meum tibi offero Domine prompte et sincere was genuine. Freely translated, the motto reads: 'My heart for your cause I offer, my Lord, promptly and sincerely.'

For this cause, Calvin worked himself at a self‑destructing rate. Stories of him lecturing students from his deathbed and working through the pain of a stone in the urinary tract the size of a hazelnut are legendary. When he was seriously ill and confined to bed, his friends urged him to rest, but he replied, “Would you that the Lord, when He comes, find me idle?” He is also portrayed as a man gifted with a pastoral heart. Excerpts from his letter consoling a grieving father were particularly moving, powerfully demonstrating that doctrine and love were inseparable.

One thing about his ministry particularly stood out for me. Rather than stifling evangelism, Calvin’s ministry inspired generations of evangelists and apologists. He set up schools in Geneva which trained up legions of pastor and evangelists.

Many of these workers subsequently returned to France and were persecuted and martyred. Many of them were killed in the massacres of St Bartholomew’s Day in 1572, where Protestants in France were targeted and slaughtered following the assassination of the French Calvinist political leadership. The death toll relating to these massacres has been estimated at around 3000 in the provinces and 2000-4000 in Paris[1], although there are claims that these estimates are conservative.

Further, many of the great evangelists in the centuries to follow were avowed Calvinists. Just for starters, think Spurgeon, George Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards. The heroes of the faith that I have admired from my formative years — Messrs Jensen, Packer and Carson — all teach with a heavy ‘Reformed’ flavour (in the Calvin sense of the word).

Two observations about his teaching

The second part of the book seeks to grapple with his key teachings – drawing extensively from the Institutes and his commentaries. This section starts with one essay on Christ as the supreme King, Prophet and Priest followed by one on the work of the Spirit. Then there are five chapters that correspond to the ‘five points’: Man’s Radical Corruption, Election and Reprobation, Redemption Defined, Transforming Grace, and A Certain Inheritance. Finishing up are chapters on our union with Christ, justification, Christian life, and prayer.

The first thing that was immediately apparent was that Calvin’s work was far richer than the ‘five points’, often represented by the TULIP acronym. The five points, while attributed to Calvin, was not a doctrine summary championed by Calvin himself. As such, to focus solely on the five points oversimplifies Calvin, wherever you may stand on the five-point spectrum. As the author of chapter one puts it, ever the diplomat, ‘there are many self-proclaimed Calvinists whose Calvinism runs no deeper than the five points’:

They have perhaps found themselves prancing gleefully amid a valley of bright red tulips, but have not lifted their heads to behold the lush green forests and glorious mountains all around them. (p4)

The second observation was that Calvin was wholly and fundamentally established in the Scriptures. His imperative was not to, in technical terms, ‘make stuff up’.

As James Montgomery Boice points out, ‘Calvin had no weapon but the Bible’. Unlike many today, Calvin did not use the pulpit or his writings as a platform to unload a captivating story, a personal inspiration or his most recent liver shiver. Rather, consistent with the Reformation war-cry ad fontes (‘to the sources’), he urges:

Let us not take it into our heads either to seek out God anywhere else than his Sacred Word, or to think anything of him that is not prompted by his Word, or to speak anything that is not taken from that Word. (Institutes 1.13.21)

The foundation of Calvin’s 'Calvinism' was threefold: the heart’s devotion to the biblical God, the mind’s pursuit of the biblical doctrine of God, and the entire being’s surrender to the praise of the biblical God. Calvin’s legacy was a Bible-shaped pattern of thinking that inevitably led to a Christ-centred, Spirit‑armed, God-hungering, gospel‑driven life.

A heart for devotion, doctrine & doxology was a refreshing and enjoyable read. I was struck by the humility of the man and it motivated me to read more of his writings. However, I found the endnotes at the end of each chapter annoying (one chapter had more than 100). I would have preferred footnotes. Also, I would have liked to have seen the book do more to critique the parts of Calvin’s writings which, with the benefit of hindsight, showed his weaknesses – in particular his polarisations and intolerances about some of his contemporaries.

What are we to make of Calvin on his 500th birthday?

Whatever you might think of Calvin let me suggest that you follow the Reformation war cry – ‘to the sources!’ Be very careful reacting to cardboard cutouts. Download the Institutes. Buy the book. Either way, get it from the horse’s mouth. As JI Packer put it, ‘the amount of misrepresentation to which Calvin’s theology has been subjected has been enough to prove his doctrine of total depravity several times over!’

Rather than responding to the caricature, read Calvin for yourself and apply the biblical blowtorch. I know Calvin would have.

In him
Tim Wong

[1] Tulchin A (2006) ‘The Michelade in Nîmes, 1567’, French Historical Studies, 29(1); Knecht RJ (1996) The Rise and Fall of Renaissance France, 366

Date with Destiny - Steelo's book for you!

2009-09-14T11:49:00.005+10:00

Here's a shameless plug for Dave Steel's book on relationships Date with Destiny.

With so much confusion and so many unhelpful models of how people can and should connect together this is such a wise and helpful book to have. It's also very real and you'll enjoy Steelo's dry wit all the way through.

There'll be things in here you probably never would have thought about (I hadn't) and if people took this book seriously much heartache, frustration, hurt and time wasting will be avoided when it comes to connecting with the opposite sex. You'll also love the 'choose your own adventure' options and the really helpful questions to be asking yourself.

Sometimes people actually tell me that they are keen to start a friendship/relationship with someone. The first thing I do is tell them to read this. But even for those in our midst who are not looking to get 'involved' with someone at the moment, this will be so helpful for you.

Is this one of these plugs where you basically say the book is for everyone? For $5...you bet!

And hey, it's by our very own Steelo....so spread the word and may God revolutionize the way we think about this whole area.

Directions to the Coombs Lecture Centre

2009-08-23T15:00:00.004+10:00

On September 6, 13 & 20 CitC will be meeting in the Coombs Lecture Centre.
Check out the directions...

Untitled from Crossroads in the City on Vimeo.

Who not to become

2009-08-17T10:43:00.006+10:00

Here's something sobering.

Praise God that the real Jesus if trusted will not lead us into this and....has the power to break us out of it as well.

Some guidance from Michelle

2009-08-03T14:18:00.005+10:00

Michelle Philp has recently begun writing a series of reviews on the Equip Book Club Blog about the whole issue of Guidance. Even though Equip is a ministry targeted at women, I'm sure you guys would also benefit from what Michelle will be writing about. Check it out here.

The war within - our next series at CitC

2009-07-31T17:27:00.002+10:00

Hey guys, just letting you know that Dave McDonald will be taking us through a six part series starting August 9. It's going to be very helpful.

John Calvin 500 today

2009-07-10T10:05:00.005+10:00

Today is the 500th birthday of John Calvin.

Few of us really know much about him but his influence and legacy is huge. It's rare for the works of someone from the 16th century to be still used and revered and consulted so much.

Check out this article by W.Robert Godfrey about why Calvin still matters. Also Michael Jensen recently had this article in the Australian highlighting some of the controversy and misconceptions surrounding Calvin.

If you want to read a bit more here is a transcript by John Piper on Calvin's ministry, example and legacy.

John Newton on God's good plans through our suffering

2009-06-30T14:57:00.007+10:00

One of our number was reminded on Sunday night of the following words from John Newton in relation to suffering, Romans 8 and the goodness of God. This is certainly worth thinking over.

I Asked the Lord that I might Grow (1779)

I asked the Lord that I might grow

In faith, and love, and every grace;

Might more of His salvation know,

And seek, more earnestly, His face.

’Twas He who taught me thus to pray,

And He, I trust, has answered prayer!

But it has been in such a way,

As almost drove me to despair.

I hoped that in some favored hour,

At once He’d answer my request;

And by His love’s constraining pow’r,

Subdue my sins, and give me rest.

Instead of this, He made me feel

The hidden evils of my heart;

And let the angry pow’rs of hell

Assault my soul in every part.

Yea more, with His own hand He seemed

Intent to aggravate my woe;

Crossed all the fair designs I schemed,

Blasted my gourds*, and laid me low.

Lord, why is this, I trembling cried,

Wilt thou pursue thy worm to death?

“’Tis in this way, the Lord replied,

I answer prayer for grace and faith.

These inward trials I employ,

From self, and pride, to set thee free;

And break thy schemes of earthly joy,

That thou may’st find thy all in Me.”

* (a gourd, or fast growing vine is a term used to symbolize our idolatrous habit and desire to substitute God's gifts for God himself. Newton is picking up on Jonah who loved the plant God had given him (chapter 4), but not God and his good plans.)

C.S.Lewis on getting our desires right

2009-06-25T12:29:00.006+10:00

Here's a little quote from Lewis worth thinking over.

"When I have learnt to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now. Insofar as I learn to love my earthly dearest at the expense of God and instead of God, I shall be moving towards the state in which I shall not love my earthly dearest at all. When first things are put first, second things are not suppressed but increased."

- C. S. Lewis, Letters of C.S. Lewis (8 November, 1952)

Putting sin to death

2009-06-22T15:09:00.012+10:00

What is it about sin?

Often we are just far too simplistic in our understanding and appreciation of our own sinfulness.

We are so good at seeing it in others, and very accomplished in excusing it in ourselves.

My guess is the instruction to be putting sin to death (Romans 8:13 & Colossians 3:5) is one many of us have not spent much time considering. It doesn't seem a very happy topic of thought or consideration, nor perhaps do we even want to approach and diagnose what is really going on in our lives.

What is it about the leading of God's Spirit?

However God in his love and patience is not going to want us unaware of what we need to be doing and it is clear from Romans 8 that our appreciation of the Gospel will cause us to want to look sin in the face with a desire for it to lose it's grip upon us. In other words, the Holy Spirit will lead us to fight against sin in our lives.

What is the sin underneath the sin?

So often we have been told that certain behaviour is sinful. Lying, jealousy, lust, theft, greed etc. But being told something is wrong doesn't necessarily equip me to overcome it. The more helpful question is to ask 'what is actually driving these desires within me that lead me to a particular sinful action?' So, an example: If I lie, it is likely I do so because I cannot handle you knowing the truth about me. So my need for your approval and your good opinion feeds such a strong desire in me that I feel I must lie. What is driving me is great fear, insecurity and a belief that my well being and happiness rests in my status before you. It is not just the sin of lying that has occurred, rather, far more deeply, the sin of trusting in the things of man rather than God is driving my very motivations. I will not be able to stop lying if I don't address the deeper issue.

Sin...and the Gospel death blow

What the Gospel shows me is that my approval, happiness, joy, security is already fully met in Jesus. He loved me even in spite of my sin (which I'm afraid others won't) and he accepts me counter-conditionally on the grounds of his mercy and commitment (which others won't do ultimately either). Because I am united to his good name eternally, I don't need to fret and worry about establishing and keeping my own. Telling the truth then becomes far easier because I'm not held captive, indeed enslaved, to the opinions and approval of others. The gospel has released me from a terrible idolatry and set me free to actually want to tell the truth...even if it means I may lose your good opinion if I admit my failures to you.

This is certainly a battle, but can you see what is happening here. Through the wonder of Gospel truth, through the leading of God's Spirit I am putting this sin to death because I am cutting it out at the very source. My need and desires are transforming and so my life will transform as well.

Battle ground, not cafe

Hoping sin will suddenly stop tempting us is to 'cafe up' the Christian life. Sipping away at the Scriptures and being chatty with our friends simply won't cut into some of our deep and shameful sins. Think battle ground and our need to 'suit up' with the truth of the Gospel and you'll have a far more realistic, and I dare say, effective and enjoyable Christian life. Why? Because you're actually living out what you believe and you are being led by the Holy Spirit.

David Powlison speaks about this kind of thing in his excellent book Seeing with new Eyes.

I recommend you purchase it and read it.

Some questions for you in view of upcoming series

2009-05-28T15:32:00.008+10:00

Romans chapter 8....a favourite for many.

I can think of no better passage that exposes the experience of the Christian life in the light of the achievement of the work of Christ.

No richer passage it terms of the expectations of the Christian life.

It is real, it is raw. I believe it holds the key to not just hanging in there as a Christian, not just surviving….more than that, there is a yearning, a longing, a power in this chapter that draws you close to God, that teaches us how to live this earthly life, while being destined for heavenly life.

We'll be spending 5 weeks from June 14 working it through. But while I'm preparing I've got a candid series of questions for you to respond to:

What do you find especially difficult or perplexing about living in this age, while longing for the full reality of the next?

What do you find yourself most yearning for?

What things in this life cause you to doubt and waver in your passion and conviction about the next life?

Heavy questions I know, but I'd love people's honest stories. If you're uncomfortable about sharing your name in the blog comments, you can choose to remain anonymous. Either way, please read through Romans 8 and consider them.

For those who are interested, here's the series plan.

June 14 "The invasion of a new world" (8:1-11)

June 21 "War of the world's" (8:12-17)

June 28 "Hope through Suffering" (8:18-25)

July 5 "Glory through Weakness (8:26-30)

July 12 "Victory through Greatness" (8:31-39)

Con Campbell looking forward to Escape 09

2009-05-25T12:44:00.003+10:00

Here's a brief message Con Campbell about his talks at the upcoming Escape 09 conference.

Are you booked in yet?

A day in the life of CMS

2009-05-15T21:30:00.002+10:00

For your encouragement.
Please pray for our Global Partners serving with CMS. You'll see them on this.

Coming up at CitC

2009-05-01T13:53:00.003+10:00

Here's two great opportunities for our friends and family to hear about Jesus at Crossroads this month.

Dave McDonald will be doing the talks.

The Briefing - are you subscribed?

2009-04-07T14:20:00.007+10:00

When the current edition of The Briefing arrived in my mail box the other day I was inspired to urge more people to take advantage of this great monthly, Australian, Christian, provocative publication.

Issue #367 (as pictured) gives new readers a great idea about what the magazine seeks to achieve....and hey, it came with a free CD with the tope 21 articles over the last 21 years. So if you want to be encouraged and challenged in your Christians understanding, if you'd like to deepen your theological awareness, if you'd appreciate how to think through the key issues facing Christianity and our world more generally....subscribe right here!

The concession price is just $35 per year and the online subscription is even cheaper. That's less than one decent coffee per month....and would probably have a better effect anyway.

Seven tips for approaching Spiritual GIfts

2009-03-23T11:10:00.009+11:00

Just as gifts were controversial and led to much confusion (and destruction) in the Corinthian church, so to our attitudes and approach to this area can be just as damaging. I know of one person who left Christianity altogether because he was angry at God and other Christians for not allowing his perceived ‘gift’ to be honoured and appreciated. Our susceptibility to allow the world’s categories of thinking to shape our approach to this whole issue is very real.

Also I think there is a tendency amongst many Christians to sit back and not participate in such a way as to discover what areas of giftedness they may have for the benefit of the church. This is a great problem and means too many of us to expend our energies and talents for the benefit of ourselves and other causes…to the detriment of the great gospel cause.

So here are a few extra thoughts I had on how to approach this whole area. Feel free to add more into the discussion.

1) Be blown away by the most spiritual person ever.

Jesus built the church and changed the course of eternity through humble self-sacrifice towards the undeserving. If we are not grounded in Him, thrilled and amazed by his grace, shaken to our core by his radical example of servant leadership…we will muck up this whole area of spiritual gifts. If we grow in our appreciation of the gift of Christ, then we will be a great gift to the body of Christ. I will be protected from spiritual self-centeredness, spiritual pride and spiritual jealousy…all of which are terrible oxymorons, but I know they fester in my heart and the Gospel needs to shake it out of my system.

2) Don’t wait for a sign from God about your spiritual gift….just get serving

Just about every person I know of who we might say are really gifted in ministry have been filled with a passion and desire to serve…anywhere. I spoke to someone from another church last night who said they have realized they are not highly ‘gifted’ to work with teenagers. However because there is a need, she is going to keep serving. Now isn’t that a great attitude? Of course if she was absolutely hopeless and was causing damage to that area of ministry, then it would be good for her and others to be put out of the misery. After all, if you can’t play piano, sheer desire is not going to work for the common good in the music team.

3) Remember that gifts are identified in the body of Christ.

I know this sounds simple but you and others will never know how you can serve the body unless you are serving the body. I don’t think you can ascertain your gifts in isolation or through filling in questionnaires. Because serving has so much to do with your gospel attitude it is possible to be really good at doing something, but for you to forget it’s for the common good. This is again the Corinthian problem.

4) Ask God to gift you in whatever way for the common good

I wonder how many of us have actually done this with sincerity and passion before our great God in prayer. It’s a scary thing to do yes…and a wonderful thing. Asking to be gifted for the benefit of others drives you once again to the heart of the gospel. My suggestion is that we all pray this and then grab a hold of the next opportunity to benefit the church that comes along.

5) Don’t be too precious about ‘your’ gift.

I don’t think people should be ultimately identified by their gifts, rather our identification rests with the fact that we have the giver. Also, over the years God will use us in all manner of different ways to benefit others. Don’t typecast yourself, this will not be for the common good.

6) Don’t think it should all come naturally

It seems to me that people who are gifted at various things in church have spent a lot of deliberate time working out how they can do what they do for the common good. Patience, practice, training, frustration…will accompany any gospel service. A gifted ability in some area doesn’t mean exercising that gift is easy. Because of this, often we need others to tell us what we might be gifted at. This is because they are the ones who actually benefit from our service, while we are the ones exhausted from it.

7) Pray for and revel in the spiritual giftedness of others

Maybe this is the hardest one for many of us. Church should be a place where we benefit from and rejoice in what others contribute and bless us with. Pray earnestly for your friends at church that God will gift them for his glory, not just you.

One final note: 1 Corinthians 13 is deliberately placed and really sits behind a lot of what I'm suggesting here. We'll see why next Sunday.

New book on journeying out of homosexuality

2009-03-19T09:03:00.005+11:00

I've really appreciated reading this biography over the last couple of days. Christopher Keane shares his story about how he got into and then out of a homosexual lifestyle. He is very candid and open about his struggles and 'choices' in life and I think everyone would benefit from reading a book like this. Chris also deals with some of the controversial issues regarding same sex attraction and has much to say about how the church can be helpful in loving and encouraging those who struggle in this area.

The book is a testimony to God's kindness and grace and the unexpected things that can happen when we dare to trust Christ first.

One of the worst things we can do as a church is never to talk about the issues books like this address. If we never talk about it, those in our midst who struggle and grieve will never share how they are doing, and sadly, may well continue to struggle in isolation. This should not be.

Anyway, I thoroughly recommend it. Check out the above link and order a copy or give Christian Bookworld a call and they'll order it in.

Answers to your questions: 'One flesh' and marriage

2009-02-24T16:08:00.005+11:00

If I have had sex with someone and therefore 'one flesh' with them, does that mean I am obliged to get married to them? Has something permanent formed between two people in this situation that cannot be undone?

There seems to have been a few question and some confusion over this one. I offer a few thoughts.

1. Having sex with someone and therefore becoming 'one flesh' does not mean that you have entered into marriage with them. What Paul is arguing for in 1 Corinthians 6 is the inappropriateness of engaging in sex which is meant for marriage, when you're not married. He's not arguing that it is marriage, or that you need to get married if you have had sex with someone....wow, I can sense some more questions coming back at me on that one...

2. Some of us feel the pain and grief of the mistakes of our past and need to be embraced by the full and transforming power of Christ's forgiveness. Does it mean that you can call yourself a virgin again? No it doesn't, but in God's eyes if you have received Christ as Lord you cannot be any cleaner or purer or distanced from those events in your past. Though some regret and shame may remain, it becomes all the more a testimony to God's grace and kindness to you.

3. If you have been the victim of some abuse and have been sexually violated by someone else there is great pain and hurt which only Christ can ultimately deal with. He heals the broken hearted and comforts the abused. The gospel shows you how powerful and significant is the acceptance and plans of Christ who not only removes our own personal sin, but also deals with sin done to us. The gospel will protect us from feeling worthless and ashamed and will help us not to feed our bitterness and hatred of the perpetrator, and even of God himself.

I know these are very hard areas for some of us. But I know that God is the master of dealing with our sin ravaged world and making all things new. Please trust his Word and perhaps aim to talk to someone you can trust so as to further experience the newness of life he has called you to.

Answering your questions: Books and resources to recommend on sex and Christian living

2009-02-24T15:07:00.009+11:00

A good number of people ordered the books that were recommended on Sunday night. For those of you who weren't there (or were too afraid to order them) I suggested the following.

Pure Sex by Philip Jenson and Tony Payne.

Short, easy to read and to the point. A great corrective to various myths about Christians and sex and will inform you how to deal with the different views of sex that our championed in our secular world.

What Some of You Were edited by Christopher Keen

A sensitive and honest series of stories about Christians and homosexuality. Also has a helpful appendix dealing with biological questions and the issue of change. Again, it is short and won't cover everything, but what it does cover is done with great care and hope in God.

Porn-again Christian by Mark Driscoll (read it online)

The sub title says this is a frank discussion on pornography and masturbation...and yeah, it is.

Especially for guys it will probably bring up most of the questions you are too afraid to ask....and give great Biblical counsel and grace filled advice on these topics. I have been asked this week about the appropriateness and possibility of masturbation if you are not married, well that issue amongst a heap of others is discussed.

Other books I have not read, but which seek to address some of these issues especially for women are:

Restoring Sexual Identity, Hope for Women who struggle with Same Sex Attraction by Anne Paulk.

Every Young woman's Battle - by Etheridge & Arterburn

Every Woman's battle - Etheridge

You can order these through Christian Bookworld in Belconnen.

Feel free to add other resources in your comments if you've found other stuff helpful and Biblical.

Answers to your questions: How do I deal with my lust?

2009-02-24T14:45:00.004+11:00

How do I deal with my lust?

Disclaimer: This is a really big area and I've tried to keep this one short and helpful. I hope it is both.

   1 Corinthians 6:18 urges is to flee sexual immorality. That is, get yourself away from the source or pattern of temptation that is leading you to long for and express such sin. Flee to prayer, flee to the support of your Christian brothers and sisters, flee from situations where you know you’ll be tempted and where you know you’ve failed before.
   However the Bible also suggests that we don’t just run away from our problems, but that we have our thinking and motives changed so we pursue the things of the kingdom. I can think of three key motivating truths that help us overcome and put to death sin in our lives. The New Testament rarely urges us to a change in behaviour and thinking without being powerfully grounded in at least one of these…
   1. Our thankfulness is view of the Cross. Growing in our understanding and appreciation of what Christ has done to sin in his death has a profound affect upon our behaviour. In view of his mercy, I actually begin to want to live in honour and service of him. This is such a watershed moment for anyone and at times even those whose life was engrossed in sin can’t wait to be rid of it…out of joyful thanks to the Lord.

In our struggles with sin, to a certain degree at least we have not comprehended enough the wonder of the Cross. The cross helps me to hate sin and long to be ruthless with it, but at the same time the cross protects me from self-hatred…because Christ loved me so much. Being overwhelmed with thanks is about the ultimate remedy for new life and freedom, even from habitual and resilient sin in your life.

2. Our identity in Christ. This argument was employed by Paul in 1 Cor.5:6-8 where Paul reminds the Corinthians that Christ's sacrificial work changes completely our status and identity before God. To be ‘in Christ’ is to have a new heavenly destiny already secured. Even though Paul is seeking to correct terrible sin in Corinth, he appeals to who Christ has made them to be in order to motivate them to change. He does not appeal to the 10 Commandments to correct and rebuke them some new Christian morality list, he actually appeals to their unity with Christ who was sacrificed for them.

So he primarily inspires at this crucial point. He gives them a higher view of their value and significance and destiny. Our identity in Christ reminds us that in God’s eyes we are not locked in sin but belonging to Jesus for his service. When we realise more and more that our old identity was changed by one so awesome as Christ, our desire to ‘celebrate’ the reality of who we are in God begins to change and recalibrate our motives and desires.

3. The hope of the future. The hope of heaven is perhaps the least appreciated of these three. The fact that heaven is our home and that joy and wonder everlasting is on offer; the fact that our Lord and saviour will celebrate his reign with us; the fact that sin and its effects will not be seen or experienced anymore is another powerful motivator for change. If God is moving history to a certain outcome, then there should be an excitement and longing for that outcome. Knowing my future and destiny inspires and motivates especially through trial and suffering and even great temptation. If you read passages like Romans 8 (especially after reading chapters 6-7) you see how glorious the future is and how God's Spirit draws us with great expectation to the time when God's plans are fully realised.

I should say also that to struggle and fight with sin is actually the normal Christian experience. None of us will reach perfection this side of heaven, but God has given us his Holy Spirit to keep fighting on (see Galatians 5:16-26).

Further as we read in 1 Cor.10:13 God remains faithful and does not let us be tempted beyond what we can bear. He provides a way of escape for us, even as we are seriously considering sinning against him. How kind he is?!

Answers to your questions: What is lust?

2009-02-24T14:37:00.003+11:00

What is lust? Is it lustful only if you express it sexually?
The word lust is only used in the ESV translation 10 times (Psa. 68:30 ; Prov. 11:6 ; Is. 57:5 ; Jer. 2:24 ; Ezek. 16:36 ; Ezek. 23:8 ; Ezek. 23:11; Ezek. 23:17 ; 1Th. 4:5 ; 2Pet. 2:10) and is normally associated with the strong desire for sexual immorality. Indeed wayward desire is so often at the heart of our problems.

Appropriate desire and the fulfilment of that desire is actually a wonderful thing. Desiring what benefits others and what promotes the cause of the gospel is actually a powerful work of the gospel in our lives. All of us naturally crave for and seek after the things we believe will bring us happiness, security and blessing. The strength of desire to secure these can lead us to terrible sin and violence against our neighbour.

Lust is fundamentally self serving and ultimately idolatrous. The gospel reorientates our desires so we wish to please God and others. Indeed we actually want to be with God and be more like God the more we are shown how supreme Jesus is. So in changing what we live for, so will a change occur in what we long for and desire.

Finding someone very attractive is not lust. Nor even is finding yourself ‘aroused’. This is natural and if you never find yourself aroused (I speak especially, though not exclusively to the guys here), then maybe you need to go and see a doctor!

Lust is desire which seeks to fantasise and act upon such attraction. It is to covet a person who is not yours in order to gratify yourself. Lust is always disappointing. It is desire seeking to find fulfilment in the wrong place and the instant gratification only adds to further frustration and ironically fuels more lust to compensate.

Rick Warren's prayer at the Inauguration

2009-01-21T11:39:00.002+11:00

Check this out. ....very encouraging

Obama's Inauguration Speech

2009-01-21T11:23:00.003+11:00

President Obama’s inaugural speech was really quite stunning as far as presidential speeches go. Not only written and delivered well it hit on exactly the issues that fill people’s fears and joys and offered people hope at the same time. It was the kind of speech people love to hear from a leader who (for the time being) they want and will follow.

There was humbleness: The crisis America finds herself was the result of “…greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure…’

There was optimism: “We cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.”

There was generosity: “America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and that we are ready to lead once more.”

There was activism: “What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.”

And there was God!:

Obama concluded his speech saying, “…with eyes fixed on the horizon and God’s grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.”
He also quoted 1 Corinthians early on in his speech saying that, “…the time has come to set aside childish things.”.
He spoke also of the “…God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.”, and the fact that “God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.” …whatever that is??

But mostly there was America:
The President in human terms nailed it!
The President in American terms nailed it as well. Invoking the glories and principles of the past to change and inspire and renew the American future.
And although it was kind of encouraging (and expected) that God is brought into this great occasion, one kind of get the feeling that God is somehow our great distant helper. Human and national dreams will somehow be secured if we try hard enough and stick to the right principles. Which means God watches over but is not called upon to be trusted…well not directly at least.

God over Obama

We must pray for the new President, he has a very difficult task and his popularity is such that he is destined to disappoint. He may well be the best ‘man’ for the job but the goals of prosperity, unity, peace, generosity, happiness and hope can only be truly met through the ultimate governing work of Jesus…who’s name and work wasn’t invoked today.

We must pray for the new President, that he will work hard and serve with integrity, (oh to have leaders like this).
And we must remember that God is more than just our ‘helper’. He doesn’t help us succeed in our plans, rather he captures us for his…and so we want to and will follow him.

What does the final judgement hold for Christians

2009-01-19T12:19:00.004+11:00

It is like missing the wood for the trees when people insist on judgement by works for Christians, for in doing so they miss the whole point of the gospel. Christians are people who will not come into judgement, they are people who have already crossed over from death to life (John 5:24). Not only do explicit scriptures deny judgement by works, but the great doctrines of predestination, perseverance, atonement, eschatology, justification and sanctification don't permit it either. However, of all the doctrines of Christianity it is a believer's profound union with Christ, our substitute and representative, that won't allow any judgement of a believer's works. Jesus has been judged for us, to save us from that final judgement of God.

We cannot say that a Christian will lose their salvation in the final judgement. Nor can we say that God will hand out different levels of rewards for different believers; for though it is possible to think such a thought, nevertheless it is without exegetical foundation. When we look carefully at 1 Cor 3, the only reward on view is people who are saved through a particular Christian's planting or watering of the gospel message. The supposed levels of rewards, bigger mansions or better experiences of heaven, are without exegetical support. They also seem to be based on a wrong understanding of sanctification. That is, those who do better as Christians deserve rewards for their growth in holiness. But, sanctification in the NT is religious language to describe the same thing as Justification, both of which are wholy in Christ. There are no levels of holiness when God looks at us in Christ. So there are not special levels of Christians who warrant through their effort God's rewards (see Mt 20.1-16).

Nor does God need to vindicate Christians on judgement day based on whether his Holy Spirit has been at work in them as evidenced by fruit, as if his left hand wasn't aware of what his right hand had done at the cross. Quite the contrary, on that day God will uphold the decision he made to condemn sin in the flesh of Jesus (Rom 8:3). The declaration of righteousness that those in Christ are now granted will be revealed to the whole of creation on that day. We are not saying there is no summons to the eschatalogical courtroom along with all humanity. Rather that the Christian will stand before the judge and make the plea 'no merit of my own do I bring, but simply to his righteous life, his cross and the promise it contains and his ongoing mediation of its benefits do I cling' (You can see why I don't write songs). God's answer will be to reveal and welcome us as dearly loved children. Then he will give us the promised inheritance of eternity in fellowship with him and all his people.

Recommending the ESV Study Bible....just don't ever bring it to church!

2008-12-23T10:43:00.010+11:00

I've never been a great fan of study Bibles. Mainly because when people bring them to church or Bible study they inevitably recite the comments made in the notes at the bottom half of every page rather than focusing upon the actual Word of God in the top half of the page. Back in the 90's the NIV study Bible was the one many lugged around with them and I always wished they'd leave it at home for their private study.

My opinion hasn't changed much but having just picked up the new ESV Study Bible I'd like to encourage people to consider purchasing a copy.... but to still leave it at home.

Hear are 5 reasons for why I think it's worth getting.

1. This is a cross reference Bible. This is probably about the most wonderful tool you could ever have in your Bible reading as you can easily trace key words and themes and discover how a particular verse is linked to other parts of the Bible.

2. This is a scholarly study Bible with many very useful articles included. A pretty amazing list of evangelical scholars, writers and preachers have contributed not just to the individual books but a whole heap of other issues are written about as well.

3. This is a Bible! That is for all the extra features, notes, articles etc...all yield to the ultimate authority of the Word and the aim is to encourage your personal engagement with the 'top half' of the page.

4. You are given access to everything online. From what I can see all the articles and cross references are all there to use and it allows you to make and save your notes, thoughts, reflections as well. Oh, but you have to buy a copy to be given the online code.

5. This is a big book...so unless you a looking for physical punishment you'll not be hiring a truck and getting it to church or your Gospel group anytime soon.

And here are 4 reasons why I think you should leave it at home and not bring your ESV study Bible to church or Gospel Group.

1. You'll not be tempted to 'fake your own wisdom' by pretending that amazing insight into the passage is actually yours.

2. You'll not give yourself a spinal injury.

3. You'll be spending money on something that will most likely encourage you to read and love the Bible at home even more.

4. You'll prolong the life of your 'travel' Bible.

So if you score any Christmas money, or if someone is stuck on getting you a belated Christmas gift, this would be a good way to spend $50.

Head to the ESV website for more info and endless video's and endorsements.

Challenge to memorize the Scriptures in 2009

2008-12-10T13:43:00.006+11:00

One of the things that struck me at the recent SPRTE conference was a challenge to be memorizing Bible passages.

Check out this recent post by Justin Taylor and see if you're up to the challenge. Includes an awesome printout.

I'm going to try and give it a go for 2009 with my family.

CitC moved to Copland this week

2008-12-01T09:52:00.003+11:00

Watch for directions on how to get to the Copland lecture theatre for this week.
Many thanks to Michael who's always this enthusiastic to get to church.

SPRTE this Sunday night

2008-11-25T22:29:00.004+11:00

Friends just another reminder that Sunday (Nov.30) will be a very special and wonderful time as we join the booked out SPRTE conference this Sunday night. Get to the School of Music, ANU around 7pm to ensure a good seat. Parking from either Childers St or Marcus Clark St in Civic.

Better than Obama?

2008-11-10T16:14:00.006+11:00

Ken Mansell wrote the following and sent it to a few people. I thought it worth letting some others read it as well.

I watched the acceptance speech of Senator Obama last week and was struck, not be the words of this gifted speaker, but by the look on the faces of those listening. Their child-like joy reminded me of that indescribable look my son has when he sees his mother after slowly waking in the morning. Since then I have seen and read countless reviews of this speech, all delirious with a new hope…

But I have found it very hard to get as excited. I wanted to. I really did. But I just couldn’t. At first I thought this was because I have worked in a Minister’s office so I am a bit skeptical about the spin of politicians, but I have finally worked out why I find it hard to get excited by this, or any, political change.

I can’t get excited by “Yes we can!” when I have something of magnitudes better in “Yes he did!”.

I can’t be delirious in a new hope when I already have the ultimate hope.

And especially I can’t take more pride in my citizenry than I already have – I am of God’s chosen people.

I hope and will pray that the presidency of Senator Obama will be blessed by God. I know that God will use this presidency in his good plans.

However, just imagine if the passion that I saw on that day was the passion you and I had in what God has already done for us in Jesus. Just imagine if when we thought of the certain hope we have thanks to Jesus we where filled with the awe I saw on that day. Just imagine if we had the same pride those faces showed as we completely understood what being citizens of heaven actually means.

Let’s stop imagining... join with me in saying “Yes we can!”

Ken Mansell

Is God's judgement an unreasonable belief?

2008-10-27T09:14:00.012+11:00

One of the challenges of the book of Revelation is it confronts us with the reality of God's judgement. This issue is one of several 'problems' people have with Christianity but unfortunately the issue is often not given the chance to be dealt with in an informed and helpful way...from both Christians and non-Christians.

To think through this and other 'problem' issues more carefully I'd highly recommend Tim Keller's Reason for God. This really is a very helpful and liberating book which both sympathizes with those who doubt and shows the plausibility of faith in Christ.

Anyway, rather than me tell you about it, watch the author himself (below), or head to http://thereasonforgod.com

Please call or email the Crossroads office if you wish to order a copy. It will be about the best way you'll use $20 all year.

The Divine bail-out: What Jesus would say to Wall St

2008-10-22T10:37:00.003+11:00

Given the unchartered global economic waters we now seem to be in, and given everyone seems to have an opinion about what the problem is, I've been thinking about what Jesus might have to say if Wall St was prepared to listen for a few minutes. Surely a crisis of ‘Biblical proportions (as some have said), deserves some thought as to what the Divine might actually be thinking. So here’s a few thoughts about what Jesus would say.

Jesus would say, "Greed is dangerous"
“Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.” (Luke 12:15)
Now we all know that materialism is limited and empty, we know there are more things to live for than how many cars you can fit in your garage, but we are still so easily driven by senseless greed.

Jesus again says in Luke 9:25

"For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?" That is, there is something soul destroying about the storing up and pursuit of more stuff. What purpose does it serve? How does it actually help you? How can you go on accumulating more while others struggle to survive? What has happened to your soul if you keep pursuing this?

Jesus would say, "Money can’t bring security"
This is key to greed. Why do we want more and more and ever increasing returns? Because we want certitude, we want a grounding, we want security. And this is linked very closely to status, acceptance, social kudos, self-affirmation and importance.
For many, the key to success and enjoyment in life is, they hope, economic prosperity. But surely the very fact that people worry about money, is evidence that it is not secure.
So Jesus warns in the sermon on the mount

   “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal." (Matt. 6:19-20)
   Imagine what Wall St would do with that advice? So many would be out of a job!

Jesus would say, "Give to bless and prosper others"
   The Bible’s picture is to see people freed up from their love of money, because they are to love God and others more, and they use what they have for the blessing and prosperity of others. A radical generosity is what is urged.
   What’s the point of having 100 cars in your garage? You can only drive one at a time. So get rid of the excess, and bless others. What good is being payed 2 million a year if you just buy yet another property that you might visit someday? How does that help anyone? How does it help you?

Problem: You can’t legislate generosity
   Now that’s part of what Jesus would say, but it doesn’t actually do much good because you can’t legislate generosity. You can’t make people live this way, even if they know it’s right.

Problem: We can’t change the human condition
Jesus ultimately didn’t come to change economic policy, no he came to change something harder than that: the human condition. So what Jesus would say to Wall St is that the way you’re devoted to and worried about money is grounded in a deeper problem.

Jesus would say, "Greed is idolatry"
Ultimately what people have done is that they’ve put their confidence and hope in something that isn’t worth it and can’t actually help...it's idolatry, and it's diabolical! Idolatry is to build your self-image, your hopes, your future on something that is a God substitute.
We keep thinking money will bring that for us, it calls out to us, it looks so attractive.

But Jesus says,

“No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.(Matthew 6:24)
What a warning this is. You can’t ultimately trust both, one will rule over the other.

So if the condition of the human heart is to forsake God and create idols, and especially money in the west. And if you can’t legislate generosity so people will do what they should with their money what can be done?

The Jesus bail out: Jesus would say, "Get really rich!"
The only way I can change and see the world as I should is to realise that God offers me something better, richer, deeper and more lasting than Wall St. So the Jesus bail out is to get really rich, by grabbing a hold of what is far more valuable.

Don’t you love this picture we get in Matthew 13:44
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.
Jesus speaks about finding something so valuable, its’ worth is incomparable to all you have and you’d easily trade everything to have it. To know Jesus, to know you have his blessing and favour, to be in his family…well that is of far more value and importance than to know Wall St and to have it’s blessing and favour.

For Jesus brings and offers all the riches of heaven for eternity for free to us, but at the highest price to him. For he though God, became human and laid his life down, giving up his riches, to forgive our poor, idolatrous hearts. And if this be true, then to be connected to, to be part of the divine bail out is actually the best investment, the most beautiful and safest place to be.

Jesus would say, "What a difference I bring"
So what is the 'cash' value of all this? Well you can start treating money like money, rather than serving it as your God. It can now be used to bless and love others, it can be used to invest in things of eternal value. Indeed if I understand and am grabbed by the gospel, I want to put my money into the things that matter to Jesus, because nothing now matters more to me. And it means I've truly found happiness, joy, security, certitiude...all the things we long for.

Money, Wall St. is a brutal master. It will let us down and when you fail it offers no hope. Jesus, will never abuse you like this, cannot let you down, and when you fail will forgive and restore you.

Now there's a bail out plan we need.

Over to you: Your questions about Satan

2008-10-14T17:17:00.004+11:00

I'm wondering what questions you have about Satan and evil and the like. We all have a few tucked away there somewhere.

Given the back half of Revelation must be the most thorough treatment on the subject in Bible, I'm keen to know what you want to know.

So what worries and uncertainties do you have?

What gaps are there in your understanding that intrigue or frustrate you?

What have you heard said before that you're not sure about?

You ask, and we'll seek to give an answer both in the blog, but also in the talks in the weeks ahead.

Spring review: Discussion groups summary

2008-10-08T14:25:00.011+11:00

The following is a summary of the discussion group notes taken during our September review. Many thanks to Trish Collins for working through the hundreds of ideas, thoughts and comments that were shared. If you wish to see the notes in full just leave a comment and we can get them to you. We're not hiding anything...

My thoughts on what we discover.

It's important to read these comments alongside the survey (see post below). Also it needs to be said how well people were wanting to engage with these issues not to create the perfect 'me-church' but so we can be a more effective community growing followers of Jesus.

Probably the most common feature or critique is our ability to genuinely love, connect, care for and encourage each other and those we hope will become part of God's Kingdom. People want to connect more and see our congregation do a better, deeper job...and that's a great thing!

There are a number of good suggestions about how we can be making the most of our Sunday nights and a genuine desire for people to be engaged and serving more in the mission of the church.

It is clear that we need to work harder at loving and laying our lives down for each other. Many people are doing a great job seeking to already implement a number of these suggestions, but there is also a humble confession that more personal engagement needs to be encouraged in these matters.

You may not agree with some of the comments that are made. Or you may feel that your comments are not represented well. With 200 people discussing things in groups it's not always easy to get the perfect weighting. But hey, this is what our wonderful scribes heard and took note of on the night.

What will be done with all this feedback?

Next week the Gospel group leaders and the CitC task force will be meeting and going through the results. Given all the info we have got, we are in a position to not only assess how we are going as a group of people, but also to ensure we work on the key areas so we can see the gospel go forward in 2009. I will report back to the congregation what is discussed.

Please read through the following and keep praying for our church...well actually, Jesus' church. We want to ensure we do what we do for him first and foremost.

Comments, thoughts and further input is welcome.

___________________________

Q1) What is something that you really appreciate about CitC?
   There were a variety of responses to what people most appreciate at CiTC. A majority of groups mentioned the bible teaching. The faithful, biblical foundation to all the sermons was a highly appreciated factor. Also, the relevance, approachability and challenging nature of the teaching were noted. Two other areas that are also highly appreciated are the friendly, welcoming people and the songs/music program. The format of the service (the informal nature, the singing, supper after etc) and the atmosphere of the service (again informal, relaxed & friendly) were commented on a few times, and other areas such as the room we meet in, gospel groups & social events were included.
   The stand out factor of what people most appreciate about CiTC is the bible based preaching.

Q2) Do you think we are good at welcoming and connecting new people into our church?
   A ‘yes’ or ‘no’ category was used to collate answers to this question. Most groups filled out more responses in the ‘No’ column indicating a possible dissatisfaction with the welcoming and connecting at Crossroads.
Groups identified many reasons as to why CiTC is not good at welcoming and connecting people. Most of these comments fell into two categories – one was the difficulty of identifying newcomers the other was the difficulty in making friends. Within the newcomers section the size of the congregation seemed to be a major factor, which was the basis for comments like ‘hard it know if people are new or not’ and ‘some people spotted as new while others aren’t.’ Also mentioned was how people were left standing or sitting by themselves often and how everyone seems to leave it up to someone else to do the welcoming.
   Building meaningful friendships also seems to be a frustration, a highly noted cause for this is due to cliques within the congregation making it hard to break into groups or conversations and making it difficult to connect and engage with others. Some groups made mention of the segregated nature or our congregation, whether students and workers, or Australians and internationals that leads to these cliques.
   The ‘daunting’ foyer of Manning Clark is also seen as a hindrance to welcoming and connecting people.
   There were some very positive comments however that mentioned how everyone does mingle and there aren’t many cliques! And some that referred to the 5 minute breaks in service, and the pre-service coffee as useful times for connecting. The welcoming team were noted as doing a good job at targeting people however needing to do some more work on the follow up.

Q2a) How can we be doing welcoming and connecting of new people better?
   There were many helpful ideas and suggestions for how CiTC could improve on our welcoming and connecting. Most suggestions focussed on things that could be changed or improved on the night. This involved placing key welcoming people at strategic places (near doors, at back of room, first at supper etc), mentioning gospel groups each week and the opportunity to join them, mentioning the welcoming / info table, making everyone wear nametags and reminding everyone in the congregation to be mindful of people who are new and sitting or standing alone.
   There were other comments that also indicated that it is the responsibility of each individual to be connecting and welcoming. More encouragement and emphasis on the responsibility of each congregation member to be taking the initiative in this area is desired. And support for each other as we befriend new people was suggested.
Creating opportunities for smaller groups to interact and discuss the sermon on Sunday nights was a popular suggestion that would allow more connection and it was noted that the review discussion groups were already an example of how it could work and how good it was.
   There were some helpful comments for connecting with people beyond Sunday night. These included an increase in social events (lunches & coffees mid week, monthly or fortnightly events) and more encouragement to attend them, building a bridge between CIF & CitC, connecting people of similar age groups and having activities targeted at these groups, inviting people to events face to face (not on facebook), linking people with similar interests, having a regular ‘newcomers’ dinner before church and involving more people in organising events. It was also noted that gospel groups could be the initial group to be inviting new people to, so that when they come to church they already know some people.
   All these suggestions give possible ways to create a genuine culture of welcoming and connecting but also indicate that we are aware it is up to each of us individually to be looking out for new people and approaching them.

Q3) Do you think we are being faithful at making the gospel clear and relevant?
   Many of the responses to this question were contradictory – even just within singular groups. However there was definitely more of a positive response to the clarity and relevance of the gospel at CiTC.
Many groups noted the verse by verse approach to studying the bible and mentioned the concise, in-depth, contextual nature of the sermons as helpful in this area. Groups expressed other positive opinions including the consistent theme of the gospel at every service, the time to discuss during the sermon, the clear applications with practical examples, the outline/handouts, question time, use of powerpoint and technology, the courses offered to learn the basics, the connection between gospel groups and sermons and the openness of the pastors to discuss disagreements.
   Some comments indicated an uncertainty about the faithfulness of the gospel preached mentioning that without much existing bible knowledge the sermons are sometimes hard to understand, that the preaching can be very long and heavy and doesn’t always answer the questions we have.
Some groups thought that CiTC has not achieved clear and relevant gospel teaching mentioning that there is a very academic approach to our preaching which assumes a high educational standard and caters to a particular learning style that some people find difficult to connect with, along with the difficulty for non/new Christians to engage without the base understandings. Contradicting to this there was a comment that the sermons were too basic, and could be a bit more challenging.
   Most of the concern for this gospel teaching centres on less educated people or non-Christians.

Q3a) How can we be doing this better?
   There were lots of useful ideas for how the gospel could be taught with more clarity and relevance at CiTC. The comments were roughly divided into four main categories; how to do this for non Christians, ideas for Sunday night services, the intellectual nature of the sermons and the application area.
   Non Christians: A desire for more notification when it will be a sermon aimed at non christians was expressed. The suggestion that topical themed nights might be helpful or even dedicating one service each week to a simple evangelistic talk rather than the complex teaching. Engaging non Christians better through courses, discussion groups or question times are other ideas.
   On the night: Question times, testimonies, use of powerpoint and multimedia, explanation of why we do things (eg read bible, pray etc), shorter sermons, follow up questions and reviews of the basics were all ideas of how to improve this gospel clarity and relevance on the night. A particular, practical comment was giving time for people to find the place in their bibles before starting reading.
   Intellectual nature: Explanations of words, maybe even a glossary and awareness of complex language and concepts are suggested ways to balance the sermons a bit more.
   Application: A desire to have more in-depth, practical application from the sermons was a noted suggestion. This could be achieved by examples, discussion questions for after church, a better understanding of demographic (ie: not just students and workers), an encouragement to have and write questions to the pastors and running more courses for different stages.
   Letting people know about the blog and using it was also thought of was a way to engage better with the gospel.

Q4) Do you think we are good at loving and serving one another?
   A majority of groups discussed comments to this question that indicated an uncertainty about whether or not we are good at loving and serving one another. Some groups thought that the combining of congregations has created many opportunities to serve, that coffee and supper after church are helpful, small groups were highly noted as places where this love and service happen, and the fact that many non Christians keep coming regularly to church is a testament to the love and service present at CitC.
   However, the size, transitory nature, time constraints and lack of mingling at church are noted as reasons as to why we are dissatisfied with the love and service at CitC. A major factor seems to be that we don’t know how or where to love and serve and we don’t know who needs to be loved and served. Groups indicated that there are a few people who do lots of loving and serving and don’t give others the opportunity. Also that there are people who should be better cared for during the week (eg, the sick, the sad etc), that the noisy, public foyer makes it hard to have meaningful conversations, and that there aren’t any specific individuals asking for help.

Q4a) How can we be doing this better?
   The main way groups thought we could love and serve each other better is by knowing each other better and knowing needs. A desire for more information, opportunity, knowledge and understanding of how to serve each other was a definite theme. Along with more encouragement to be bold in this area and clearer teaching on how to reach out to others.
   Having forums for people with common interests to interact, knowing where people work, knowing who needs prayer, who is sick etc were ideas to improve on this. The practical implementation of these ideas involved creating smaller gospel groups, having a key contact person to go to for assistance or help, having a process to convey needs to the congregation and sharing prayer points somehow. More women’s and men’s events or prayer networks was also a common theme along with linking gospel groups together.
   Other ideas were encouraging the older/mature members to “adopt” newer/younger members for connection and growth together, encouraging more spontaneous hospitality and designated welcoming responsibilities (at supper, during service).

Q5) What is something that you think is an area of weakness as we seek to be "growing followers of Jesus" at CitC?
   There was diverse range of responses for areas of weakness at CiTC. Only a few were commented on more than once, they included connecting and linking people into church, the lack of community due to cliques and the intimidating size of the congregation. Many comments were reiterated from other sections of the review.

   Some new comments about areas of weakness included a lack in the community awareness and reaching out from CiTC, a lack of awareness about the other congregations of Crossroads, not enough prayer and that it’s not a very emotional and expressive church.
   Overall the main area that seemed to be of concern was the connection of people into the congregation.

Q6) What sort of things would you like to see more of at CitC?
   Again, the varied range of responses to this question were extensive. Clearly there are lots more things people would like to see at CiTC! Specifically, a desire for a more external focus was evident (evangelism, outreach events, local missions, hospital visiting groups).

   However, most comments related to things within CiTC that there could be more of. Super suppers featured, as did more songs / time allocated for music and more practical applications from the sermons. Regular men’s and women’s events that are targeted at specific needs, prayer breakfasts, workers interacting with each other more during week, more prayer, more communication with other churches, more question time, more training were all noted. But the most commonly expressed desire was for more social events outside of church. Groups wanted more opportunities to meet random people, more random dinners, more mixing between churchgoers, more activities, more social contact etc.

Q7) What sort of things are you personally being challenged to do in regards to serving God's kingdom At CitC?
   Many groups noted lots of different ways they were being challenged at CiTC. A lot of comments related to serving (knowing where and who and how), interacting with non Christian friends and sharing the gospel with them and most of all people are challenged to prioritise God and put Jesus at the centre.
   People are challenged to meet someone new at church each week, or welcome a newcomer, they are encouraged into various practical ministries (kids / youth, welcoming, church set up, CIF, in the workplace etc) and groups mentioned the challenge to be fostering deeper relationships and loving each other to build community.

Book review - 666 and all that

2008-10-08T06:52:00.004+11:00

This really is a very helpful book that guides us through some of the scary and confusing issues that come up when we start thinking about the future and God's plans. John & Greg do a fair bit of 'mythbusting' especially regarding some of those vexed and much argued areas of the rapture, the tribulation, the millenium, the anti-Christ, the end of the world,...and of course that particular number. There's some great stuff on how to be reading apocalyptic literature properly without having to do some theological degree.

I especially appreciated chapter 9 'The fate of those who have never heard the Gospel', which is no doubt an issue we've all struggled with. Also there is some wonderful stuff on the hope we have in Christ, the reality and expectation of heaven and what happens when we die.

This book is a great companion to our current series on Revelation and it covers the breadth of the Bibles teaching on some key issues we perhaps don't always talk about really succinctly...the book is only 200 pages. It will give you great confidence in the future....and probably clear up a whole heap of areas you often 'muse' over, but don't quite know what to do about. Get yourself a copy!

Letting Jesus reign...now!

2008-10-05T17:13:00.009+11:00

In Revelation 11:17-18 the 24 elders worship God and say:

“We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was,
for you have taken your great power and begun to reign.
The nations raged, but your wrath came,
and the time for the dead to be judged,
and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints,
and those who fear your name, both small and great,
and for destroying the destroyers of the earth.”

I wonder, how often do we really give some time to thinking through how good it is that Jesus reigns on the heavenly throne?

How often do we really look forward to fully experiencing the new creation according to Jesus?

Can you imagine a world where things work, where true authority is expressed and followed as it should be, where whatever the King says, everybody willingly follows?

There are so many aspects of heaven in view in Revelation but the good, powerful and just rule of Jesus is one that we really need to come to terms with. In heaven no-one can or would ever want to argue with the perfect will of Jesus. There is no heavenly suggestion box as to how things could be run better. Heaven is relentlessly and joyously good because the forever king rules both for and over his precious people.

But here’s my thought: if the heavenly reign of the King is enjoyed forever, what are we doing to ensure he reigns right now in our earthly experience? Yeah I know we are not in heaven yet, but do we perhaps fail to appreciate how the reign of the King is to reign in our lives today?
When Jesus speaks through his word to us today, should we not be as quick to respond in joy and thanks as those in heaven? How so many problems and struggles we face would be avoided if we simply trusted what our King said in the first place.

So here’s the challenge: are you prepared to really let him reign, to let the gospel set the direction and agenda for your life? Would set your sights and your heart on the glorious end point in heaven, and make decisions in your life that affirm and point to what will be happening for your eternal life?

Have a read of Rev.7:9-17 again, and then read chapter 21 and 22. Be excited by John’s heavenly vision….and let Jesus reign in your life…he’s very good at it.

Full survey results

2008-09-29T08:58:00.010+10:00

Well here are the results from our CitC survey conducted on September 21. A total of 191 people took part. I wonder what particularly stands out? What is worrying? What things do we need to be praying and acting upon?

Q1) How long have you been coming along to Crossroads?
1 month 12%
3 months 4%
6 months 9%
9 months 12%
12 months 7%
18 months 9%
2 years 9%
3 years 10%

4 years 10%
5+ years 11%
10+ years 6%

Q2) How did you find out about CitC?
Friend 76%
Website 4%
Yellow Pages <1%

Advertising 3%

Referred 16%

Q3) Have you found CitC to be a friendly and welcoming congregation to be part of?
Strong yes 37%
Yes 54%
No 7%
Strong No 2%

Music
Q4) Do you find the music and singing at CitC encouraging and enjoyable?
Strong yes 53%
Yes 41%
No 4%
Strong No 2%

Q5) Do you think the style of music at CitC connects and works with most people you know?
Strong Yes 36%
Yes 52%
No 9%
Strong No 3%

Q6) How much singing should we be doing at CitC?
Much more 3%
Little More 27%
It’s about right 67%
A little Less 3%
Much less 0%

Our service
Q7) Do you think our Sunday night gatherings succeed in helping people genuinely engage with God?
Strong Yes 47%
Yes 48%
No 3%
Strong No 2%

Q8) Do you think our Sunday night gatherings succeed in helping people genuinely engage with each other?
Strong Yes 15%
Yes 60%
No 20%
Strong No 5%

Preaching
Q9) Overall the preaching at CitC is encouraging and challenging.
Strong Yes 72%
Yes 25%
No 2%
Strong No 1%

Q10) Overall the preaching at CitC is easy to follow.
Strong Yes 55%
Yes 40%
No 3%
Strong No 2%

Q11) Overall the preaching at CitC is faithful to the Bible.
Strong Yes 82%
Yes 1 6%
No <1%

Strong No 1%

Q12) Overall the preaching at CitC connects well with me.
Strong Yes 56%
Yes 37%
No 6%
Strong No 1%

Q13) Would the preaching ‘style’ and content connect well with your friends & family?
Strong Yes 24%
Yes 56%
No 17%
Strong No 3%

Feeling connected and cared for
Q14) CitC is a place where I feel I am connected well with people?
Strong Yes 24%
Yes 47%
No 25%
Strong No 4%

Q15) At CitC I don’t really know how to connect with others and/or I know very few people.
Strong Yes 8%
Yes 31%
No 42%
Strong No 19%

Q16) I consider CitC to be a place where people genuinely care for each other.
Strong Yes 28%
Yes 60%
No 11%
Strong No 1%

Q17) I find it easy to find out what is happening at CitC and that information is communicated well about what is going on.
Strong Yes 49%
Yes 40%
No 9%
Strong No 2%

Being involved in CitC
Q18) I understand the purpose of our Sunday gatherings.
Strong Yes 61%
Yes 34%
No 4%
Strong No <1%

Q19) I feel I am involved in building Christ’s kingdom at CitC.
Strong Yes 27%
Yes 46%
No 22%
Strong No 4%

Q20) I regularly feel encouraged to get involved in serving at church.
Strong Yes 29%
Yes 44%
No 23%
Strong No 5%

Q21) There are things that I would like to be doing more of at CitC but I’m not sure how to go about it.
Strong Yes 15%
Yes 21%
No 46%
Strong No 18%

This year
Q22) I have grown in my love and understanding of Jesus through my involvement with CitC.
Strong Yes 48%
Yes 36%
No 14%
Strong No 2%

Q23) I have been shown clearly how the gospel applies to my life.
Strong Yes 54%
Yes 35%
No 7%
Strong No 3%

Q24) I financially support Crossroads.
Regularly 31%
Sometimes 18%
Irregularly 22%
Not at all 11%
Yet to organise18%

Thinking of others
Q25) Do you think we generally conduct our meetings and events in such a way so as to make the gospel attractive and compelling for those who don’t yet know Christ?
Strong Yes 30%
Yes 57%
No 11%
Strong No 3%

Q26) Would you be happy to invite your friends or family along to CitC?
Strong Yes 41%
Yes 44%
No 11%
Strong No 3%

Q27) Have you asked any of your friends or family what are not Christian to come along to church with you this year?
Yes 58%
No 42%

Generally
Q28) Do you think CitC is a place where a hunger and love for God is experienced, encouraged and modelled?
Strong Yes 49%
Yes 43%
No 5%
Strong No 3%

Q29) Do you think CitC is a place where a love for others is experienced, encouraged and modelled?
Strong Yes 26%
Yes 61%
No 11%
Strong No 2%

Q30) Do you think the facilities that we use for CitC are suitable?
Strong Yes 44%
Yes 49%
No 6%
Strong No 1%

Q31) Do you find the 6:30-8pm Sunday night timeslot is one that works well for you?
Agree 71%
Prefer earlier 19%
Prefer later 9%
Earlier & later 1%

Q32) Do you come to pre-church coffee?
Regularly 15%
Sometimes 32%
Hardly ever 24%
Never been 30%

Q33) Do you hang around and talk to people after church?
Regularly 61%
Sometimes 31%
Hardly ever 6%
Never been 2%

Q34) Do you plan to be involved and committed to CitC in 2009?
Yes 73%
No 7%
Unsure 21%

So, what do you think?

A couple of survey thoughts...and results.

2008-09-25T11:08:00.005+10:00

I’ve got to admit I’m generally not too crazy about surveys. They’re inevitably restrictive in that my answer never seems to be listed as one of the options. Also they are impersonal…I don’t like becoming a statistic. So trying do an anonymous ‘personal’ survey at church made me rather nervous. And yes the survey was deliberately restrictive. We didn’t want to fall into the ‘me-church’ problem (see previous video post) where we find out what people do or don’t like and then seek to accommodate everyone’s wish list. This would have been a disastrous mistake. Can you image Jesus handing out ‘felt need’ surveys? Can you imagine the apostles running little focus groups to work out how to make their ministry more fun and happy for everyone?

Truth and love and the glory of God are the things that should be driving all that we do in Church and all that we do as Christians. So we wanted to survey how we think we are going as a community in view of the Biblical picture of how church should be. And also survey how ‘you’ think you are going as an individual in our congregation. Now this is hard to do and kind of sets us up for a fall. But I think what we did on Sunday night, combined with our discussion groups was a very helpful exercise.

We are still distilling all the info but let me share with you a couple of the results.

We asked two questions relating to our Sunday night gatherings and genuine engagement.

Do you think our Sunday night gatherings succeed in helping people genuinely engage with God?
Strong Yes 47%
Yes 48%
No 3%
Strong No 2%

Do you think our Sunday night gatherings succeed in helping people genuinely engage with each other?
Strong Yes 15%
Yes 60%
No 20%
Strong No 5%

Now in some ways you could sum up what church is all about under these themes. If we are genuinely engaging with God and each other then we’re likely to be ‘growing followers of Jesus’. So what do these results show?
Well clearly most people think we do a good job of the first, and significantly less feel we succeed in the second, and perhaps succeed as well.
It shows us there is difference of opinion amongst us about these issues. One in twenty don’t think people are being helped to genuinely engaging with God at church. One in four don’t think we are good at helping people engage well with each other.

Now of course what these results don’t show us is why people think like this…and there’s the problem with surveys.
Further info will follow as we go through all the results. But overall people seemed very pleased we spent some time doing our Spring review.

Thanks guys for putting your thoughts into all this.

Feel free to add your comments about how you found the whole process.

Me Church

2008-09-17T00:02:00.003+10:00

Here's the video we played at church last Sunday night...for your enjoyment, and perhaps a little more.

Augustine's confession

2008-08-27T09:43:00.005+10:00

For those of you interested, here's the full prayer from Augustine I mentioned last Sunday night. It may be 1600 years old, but how powerful still?

“Too late have I loved you, O Beauty of ancient days, yet ever new! Too late I loved you! And behold, you were within, and I abroad, and there I searched for you; I was deformed, plunging amid those fair forms, which you had made. You were with me, but I was not with you. Things held me far from you—things which, if they were not in you, were not at all. You called, and shouted, and burst my deafness. You flashed and shone, and scattered my blindness. You breathed odors and I drew in breath—and I pant for you. I tasted, and I hunger and thirst. You touched me, and I burned for your peace” (St. Augustine, Confessions).

The Scandal of Repentance

2008-08-27T09:40:00.002+10:00

To be called to repent is surely one of the severest and sweetest things to come from Jesus lips. Severe in that it involves a fundamental acknowledgment of our worthlessness and need and sin. Sweet in that the one who repents experiences great joy and confidence because Christ and all his blessings are now freely theirs to enjoy. So repentance it is both scandalously hard, and scandalously good at the same time.
Last Sunday’s talk: Outraged by the Scandal (Luke 13:1-17) was one of the more difficult for me. It is hard to be faithful to the text and to bring out the severity and the sweetness at the same time. But it is even harder knowing there are people in our midst and in our lives who have not yet yielded to the call of Jesus and so God’s judgement hangs over them. To those unwilling to submit to the wonder and authority of Jesus the news from passages like this is not good. Yes it is doom and gloom…forever. But to the one willing to trust the unfailing and merciful gift of Christ for us, there is perfect joy and comfort….forever.
Please pray that more and more people would both feel the gravity of Jesus warnings and the wonder of his work for us. It will mean being brought to our knees in great sorrow. But it will also mean we will stay happily on our knees in awe and praise.

The Parable of the rich fool

2008-08-13T17:38:00.006+10:00

Anthony writes the following for this week's blog:

The parable of the rich fool cuts to the heart of the sin of our age, living without a deep reference to God. The rich fool makes no account of the fact that it is God who makes the land produce bountifully, he finds security in wealth rather than knowing God and he operates with a godless perspective limiting time to the here and now rather than eternity. But like the rich fool we are fools if we live without a deep reference to God in all we do and all we have. Jesus will not arbitrate between two fools both of whom are living without deep reference to God, because Jesus' kingdom is not of this world, and it isn't concerned with the things of this world. It is in Jesus' kingdom that we find true security that lasts for eternity. So the scandal of wealth as Jesus portrays it is that wealth can lead a person who treasures it away from God as surely as I can lead a thirsty dog to water. The scandal of wealth is that rich people who trust Jesus can and do enter his kingdom. The scandal of wealth is that in our society and our culture there are countless millions of rich fools. Don't make the rich fool's mistake.

Further thoughts on the disaster of religion

2008-08-08T09:40:00.005+10:00

Luke's Gospel really does have one of the sharpest critiques of religion. The amount of meals, confrontations and explicit teaching from Jesus that undermines our natural approach to God is staggering. Chief tax collectors and criminals find there way into the Kingdom of God - religious experts find themselves excluded. It is a confronting read.

In reflecting further on Jesus rather confrontational dinner tactics in Luke 11:37-53, (remember those woes?) I can't help but think ahead into Luke 15 and how Jesus nails the religious yet again. But do we miss it? This chapter contains the much loved Prodigal Son story, but I think calling it this can lead us into the very religious trap Jesus is seeking to demolish! Really it should be called the "Prodigal God" for the one who is excessive (prodigal means excessive) in the story is not the younger squandering Son, but the gracious forgiving Father. I think this title may help us sit up and take more note of the strong warning about 'older brotherness' that is highly likely to be alive and resident in our "churchy" hearts.

We easily see the rebellion of the younger son who represents an open defiance to God expressed in immoral excess. However we don't often consider that the older brother is just as sinful. He needs salvation too - from his 'damnable good works' done is self righteousness.

It means there are two ways you can rebel against God. You can either be really, really bad...or you can be really, really good! How can a legalistic really good religious life be a way of rebelling against God? Well it's a way of effectively shutting who God is out of our lives. The older brother syndrome believes that God owes us something. We force God's hand of favour...and we get cranky when God doesn't pay up. God becomes a means to an end. Indeed what happens is the legalist will end up railing against the God he/she says they serve.

How the Pharisees and scribes hated Jesus....to death. How Jesus shattered their world.

The question Luke would ask us is this: Is the real Jesus shattering ours...for the better? Are we allowing the scandalous Jesus to be reprogramming our natural religious default setting so we relate to God in humbleness, confidence and joy. This is something religion promises, but can never deliver.

Some thoughts on blasphemy against the Holy Spirit

2008-08-06T00:04:00.003+10:00

Have I done it?
   I suspect just about every Christian has worried at least a little about Jesus words in Luke.12:10 “…everyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but the one who blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven.”(see also Matthew 12:32 & Mark 3:29). This is so full-on, so final, so scary. And some people are brought to the point of thinking, “Have I committed this sin and so am I not a real Christian”, “Am I disqualified from heaven”, “Am I not really chosen by God”.
   Of course these questions arise because we’re unsure of what Jesus means and in particular how can Jesus distinguish between blasphemy against the Son of Man (himself), as being forgivable; but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit as being unforgivable?
   Well, as I hinted at on Sunday night, if you worry about this issue, I suspect it’s a clear indication that you haven’t done it. Indeed to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit will lead to you having no authentic interest in Jesus at all.

What’s the context?
   When Jesus mentions this issue it is always closely tied to his dealing with his religious opponents. In Matthew 12 and Mark 3 Jesus is being accused of sourcing his powers from Satan. That is, the religious leaders, in defiance and desperation at Jesus wonderful powers to heal and restore, attribute it to the devil. It is a terrible evil to deliberately call something that is so good to be bad; or to accuse the innocent and pure of being in collusion with the devil.
   In Luke, Jesus warns the religious leaders that they stand condemned for their failure to hear the prophets and for their hypocrisy. They of course retaliate and Jesus once again brings up this issue of blaspheming against the Holy Spirit.

Blaspheming Jesus Vs Blaspheming the Holy Spirit – what’s the go?
   Jesus makes a clear and deliberate distinction between blaspheming against him and blaspheming the Holy Spirit. And I think he does this because instant rejection of Jesus is not as significant as we might first think. Have not we all rejected Jesus in our past? Does not Peter reject Jesus and deny him three times? (Luke 22:65) Did not Paul reject Jesus to the point of killing Christians?
   The more important issue I believe Jesus is pointing to is continued rejection of him in defiance of what the Holy Spirit is revealing. And if we go into Acts we see examples of this very thing where rejection of Christ is solidified and unyielding. Acts 7:51,13:40-49 & 28:23-28 are all examples of hard-hearted Jews who have refused to listen to the Spirit’s teaching and revelation in the Scriptures about Jesus. They just will not soften their hearts to the Spirit’s Word of truth. This ongoing refusal means the door to forgiveness is closed because they have categorically denied the Spirit’s testimony to the one who brings forgiveness.

The vast extent of forgiveness
   What I find remarkable as I think about this issue is that even those who were involved in Jesus murder at the end of Luke’s gospel, are able to receive forgiveness and indeed do! It’s harder to find a more blasphemous event to have been involved in than the crucifixion of God’s own Son. And yet at Pentecost these men are forgiven and blessed with the Holy Spirit (Acts 2:36- 41).
   How amazing that those who killed Jesus are brought to eternal life by Jesus through the power of the Holy Spirit? They are moved and respond in trust to Jesus. Which means even the worst of sinners can be forgiven.
However, if you continue to discount any need for forgiveness, or so ridicule what the Scriptures are pointing to when the speak of Christ – what possibility is there of being forgiven? You have ruled out the one you need, and offended the one who reveals him.

The bottom line: Don’t continue to refuse the Spirit’s call for you to trust Jesus. Come and seek life and forgiveness in him…no-matter what you may have done in the past, (even if you have rejected Jesus) God will forgive all who come to Christ.

Are we too afraid to ask?

2008-07-24T16:17:00.007+10:00

Why am I so afraid to ask people to come to church? Why do I simply expect them to say no? What makes me think they’ll be offended or judged by my asking? What if me asking someone to church results in a ‘religious’ argument that goes so bad the person is even more anti-Christian than before?

I wonder how many of us have had these fearful thoughts when thinking about asking people to church…? But then, what of the even more fearful prospect of your friend actually turning up to church? Does that thought put us off as well? So we end up saying to ourselves….

"No they’ll never connect with the way our church works."

"No they’ll find it too weird and uncomfortable."

"No I’ve got a long term friendship strategy in place and coming to church now would be too soon for them."

"No they are too smart and would find intellectual holes that our pastors couldn’t deal with or won’t address."

"No they are not intellectual at all and will find a 30 minute monologue too boring."

"No there are too many people at church and they will find it overwhelming."

"No there are not enough people at church and they will find it too intense."

"No they only sing when drunk at the footy, so being sober in church won’t work."

I’m sure we can have some fun and you could add any number of creative reasons why not to invite people to come and join you at church. And I’m sure we could all reel off some horror story of how a church experience was really terrible for someone. But I wonder how many of these fears really stack up?

Perhaps it is more likely that we keep forgetting that God does actually want to save people and bring them into His church.

Perhaps we fail to remember that Jesus promises never to leave nor forsake us and will be with us to the end of the age.

Perhaps we ‘under-estimate’ people assuming they just wouldn’t really be interested in spiritual things and considering Jesus’ take on the world.

Perhaps we fail to remember that God does the miracle work of conversion and it’s through the proclamation of the truth that most people come to know it and love it.

Looking back at my own experiences it seems very few of my fears have been grounded in reality. Very few of the scenarios I muse over come to pass…indeed even if church hasn’t gone as well as it could on the night my friend or family member shows up, there’s always been helpful discussion as a result anyway.

I think I’m becoming more convinced that people hearing the truth and wonder of Jesus in the midst of a group of people who love Jesus and love each other is a very powerful and effective witness. What a gospel driven and gospel loving church offers is very compelling and my hope is that every week at church is an opportunity to invite someone else along.

After all, we are asking people to come and hear news that is better than any other.

Yes the Gospel is humbling.

Yes the Gospel may be offensive.

Yes the Gospel is exclusive.

But:

Yes the Gospel is the power of salvation.

Yes the Gospel is far better than all your Christmases at once.

Yes the Gospel makes you fully alive!

I dearly want people to know that and see it and taste it. I long for our church to be a place where that’s exactly the discoveries people make…the very ones you and I have made thanks to the mercy and wonder of Jesus....at church.

An inviting, opportunistic and gracious people who work together so as many as possible can hear the Gospel....that sounds like the kind of church we should be. I'd be more afraid if we really didn't want to be.

Which reminds me of one final truth I’ve been convinced of for a long time. That is, people will and can say "no" to our invitations to join us at church. Sad, but true, it will happen. However they certainly can never say "yes", indeed they don’t ever have the option of saying "yes"….unless we ask.

Is that a "yes" or a "no" from you?

Focal Point wrap

2008-07-23T09:47:00.007+10:00

Truly Focal Point has got to be about the best thing FOCUS does each year. The word 'intense' is the one that traditionally comes up to describe what happens. But even with hours and hours in the Bible and discussion each day for many people the enthusiasm and desire for God increases all the more as the week goes on.

This year the theme of 'church' was the one we tackled. Not perhaps the most marketable or exciting topic we could have picked...but one that catches you by surprise because it's so important.

Jesus said in Matthew 16 that he would build his church and the gates of death itself would not stop it. I can't imagine how Jesus could have more bluntly pointed out the significance of the church and by the end of Focal Point I can't recall seeing a more enthusiastic group keen to get involved in the task of serving Jesus and building his church.

Please pray for those who were able to attend that the week of learning will turn into a life of fruitful church living. There was plenty of excitement and indeed plenty of repentance as people were more and more gripped by God's agenda. Let's pray it's followed up and lived out.

Please also ask those who were able to attend not just what they may have learnt and enjoyed about the week, but what it now means for them. I hope we find their answers encouraging and I hope together as a congregation we can work together more and more to see Jesus' church built in number and maturity for God's glory.

Put them out of my misery! Psalm 35

2008-07-14T00:46:00.004+10:00

How do you apply a Psalm to your life about God’s chosen king experiencing a serious diplomatic incident? Not only that, how are we to respond to his undiplomatic and brutal call for God to sort it out? Asking to hit the ejector seat on our enemies (when and if we get them) seems pretty intolerant and extreme. But it is a big issue. How can persecution and evil exist in a world where God is good and promises to bless? Why do we or anyone else suffer at the hands of others? What if we are the cause of suffering?

King David has no doubt that God can handle evil. This might explain his outrageous and comprehensive ‘to do’ list for the LORD. He knew that God will do it properly and not like him. He asks God to punish those who seek his life in a way that the punishment fits the crime. The crime in this case is a nation that is breaking a treaty with Israel but making David look like the bad guy. Ancient treaties were signed with consequences. Blessings for abiding by the covenant and curses for a failure to deliver.

David is confident that God will do this as he has already started thinking about how he will praise God. But that won’t happen until it is done. The readers of the psalm are to have the same confidence and to rejoice in David’s vindication.

So, do you have that confidence in God dealing with evil? Can you make outrageous demands of God regarding evil?

Since David there are 3 key outrageous demands that reflect this Psalm.

Outrageous Demand #1 - Crucify him! The treachery not only of the nations but of God’s chosen people in betraying their king unjustly. All of humanity is guilty of wishing God were dead (many times we think and act wishing God were not there to enjoy life with us).

Outrageous Demand #2 – Father Forgive them! Jesus response to the world’s rebelion?

Outrageous Demand #3 – Vindicate me! Jesus is vindicated because he was innocent. Through Jesus we can be right with God. Vindicated through Jesus’ righteousness and not our own. You can ask that of God. Trust in Jesus and you benefit from his righteousness. Even though you are wrong, God can declare you right as a free gift through Jesus. This is worth rejoicing in.

Ps 33 Holy Power Ballad

2008-07-09T17:18:00.003+10:00

When it comes to over the top singers, there are many who screech or wail at the top of their lungs - Mariah Carey, Aretha Franklin, Steve Tyler… (OK so I don’t know any recent ones). And when people do a karaoke version of these songs they often fall short because the big voice is not part of their style and they probably don’t feel as passionate about the subject matter. So it is a big ask when Psalm 33 asks you to praise so powerfully.
Shout for joy in the LORD, O you righteous!
Praise befits the upright.
Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre;
make melody to him with the harp of ten strings!
Sing to him a new song;
play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts.

For the word of the LORD is upright,
and all his work is done in faithfulness.
He loves righteousness and justice;
the earth is full of the steadfast love of the LORD.

What is praise? What makes it powerful? Praise is a heartfelt endorsement. In this case the endorsement is for Yahweh (The LORD). It is divine advertising. There are two things that make the Psalmist want to praise God like this.
• Yahweh’s character – his faithful steadfast love
• What Yahweh has done – creation of the world, Israel and each person

The loving God who made the cosmos, who created the nation of Israel also creates every heart with the same attention. He spoke and the world came to be. He breaths life into us. To know Yahweh’s hand in your life personally will help you to rejoice in his creation and in his King who brings the kingdom of heaven into the world.

Praise is our response to Yahweh’s word with our words. Through our words we tell others about how great Yahweh is. Our response is to praise him. It is an expression of our relationship and trust in him.

The Psalm ends on a confident but a dependent note.
Let your steadfast love, O LORD, be upon us,
even as we hope in you.

Show us some more love. We want the next chapter. There is more love to be experienced from Yahweh and with that will come more praise – a new song.

Certainly the major event in salvation history is Jesus delivering us from sin, death and Satan. We’ve seen so much more of God’s character and actions through Jesus. Yet our praise seems weak and we feel oppressed to tell it in a world that does not want to hear about Jesus.

Rev 5 shows heaven erupting at the good news about Jesus - elders, angels a multitude of people praising through song. But it doesn’t feel like that here. Often it is like the decaf of praise. John, in Revelation, shows us the heavenly reality of the praise that happens in heaven even though we are in a world that wants to suck God out of our lives. Jesus is the King where heaven and earth intersect and through him a new creation will come for every heart that trusts in him. Each time we tell others the gospel we are singing this same song of ultimate praise. It may not look like an over the top power ballad but it is an intense and personal song.

We sing this new song but we also ask God to show us the love that Jesus has secured when we will meet him face to face in heaven. We praise the God that has the power to transform us and our praise. It is in his power that our praise has power.
• Power to bring us joy as we express our gratitude to God.
• Power to encourage Christians with true words of hope.
• Power to save lives as people have a chance to place their trust in Jesus.

Why am I so popular!!! Psalm 32

2008-07-02T14:36:00.006+10:00

Ever wanted your time in the spotlight? Ever wanted to walk down the red carpet? Ever want the praise of the elite and the lifestyle that goes with it? It would be nice but it seems to out of reach. The good life or the blessed life is for those at the top of the tree but not for me. The bar seems too high to get over. Or it is to fickle to find out how to get it.

But listen to what King David says Ps 32 says:

Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven,
whose sin is covered.
Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity,
and in whose spirit there is no deceit. (32:1-2)

This head of state believes Blessed are the wicked forgiven. This is the blessed life. Do you think you could live up to that?

Many a PR officer has been enrolled to lift the profile of people chasing lasting popularity and the perks that come with it. Regularly we see Politicians, rocks stars, sports heroes and others that seem to have a charmed life try to distance themselves from events at a nightclub, bad behaviour, words ‘misquoted’, women ‘they’ve never met’ or ‘heard of’, men they've not had sexual relations with.

What was King David’s strategy to attain the blessed life?

I acknowledged my sin to you,
and I did not cover my iniquity;
I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,”
and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. (32:5-6)

Why don’t you do the same? Say sorry to God and you have God’s approval. He already knows who you are and what you need. Turn to him. You are a real person not some media liaison officer’s airbrushed and packaged stooge who is scared the rest of the world is going to find them out as a fake. God knows (and deep down you may well know too) that you need to be reconnected with him. He is the one who holds life, death and riches of life and relationships in his hand.

True popularity comes from the approval of the Lord of the universe. This popularity is secured through Jesus who died for our sin and rose again to put us right with God. He did this so we might live the full life. Live it for eternity and live it in the presence of the God who blesses us and longs to give us every good thing.

Escape 08 ... a month on...

2008-07-02T10:41:00.007+10:00

Even though it's been a month now since some of us workers found our way to that gorgeous campsite at Canyonleigh I still feel quite refreshed thinking back on it! It was a fantastic weekend away - retreatful, relaxing, refreshing - & I was meant to be organising everything!!! I enjoyed having some chilled out hours to get to talk to people over cups of steaming tea at breakfast, & on our bushwalk climbing mountains to the most spectacular views. The massive bonfire was such a winner & sharing the Lord's supper next to the heat & huge flames - especially after learning about God's gracious act of salvation in the Exodus. It was really special to reflect on the completion of that salvation for us in Jesus under the stars there together...

I thought it'd be good to share some other comments that I've received back...

'relaxed yet we achieved a lot, and had plenty of bonding time with people. '

'The "casualness" was a real winner I think. The talks fit in well with the atmosphere of the weekend and created a deep appreciation of God's salvation.'

'it was important to think about escaping the 'working world' and reflect on the link between escaping and the Exodus!'

'I loved the relaxed timetable! Late starts, and plenty of free time... it made it way better than when you have a strict schedule and go home feeling like you need a weekend to get over your weekend!'

'the site was peaceful, and the spa was wonderful''

I really hope many of you other workers were encouraged by our time away! Encouraged by meeting and getting to know our brothers and sisters, encouraged by God's word which helps us know & understand what it means to be saved & encouraged by the peace and beauty of parts of God's creation! I know I certainly was!!

What about My reputation?!!!! Psalm 31

2008-06-26T09:17:00.007+10:00

Do daggy Christians give God a bad name? Do dodgy Christians give God a bad name? Do you think it is harder to tell people about the good news of Jesus when another scandal happens – ‘Priest in Paedophilia Ring’, ‘Pastor Caught with Gay Prostitute’, ‘Church Leader’s Fingers in the Till’? Certainly when Christians are dragged through the mud either deservingly or not it seems that the message about Jesus is less attractive.

Maybe you just find it hard to tell people about Jesus when you think that others don’t respect you? How does reputation and God’s reputation fit together?

An Outrageous Prayer
In Psalm 31 we get a ballsy prayer from King David. Not only is it ballsy it is a bold command and he has enlisted the choir to sing it loud and proud to God. The main gist of it is ‘What about my reputation God?!’ He asks Yahweh to ‘Let me never be put to shame (v.1).’

But in the same song David recognises his shame and how it is zapping him of his very life.
My strength fails because of my iniquity,
And my bones waste away. (v.10)

Yet David’s reputation is linked to Yahweh’s reputation.
‘for your name’s sake you lead me and guide me’(v.3).

It seems a pretty outrageous prayer, doesn’t it. ‘Make me look good even though I look bad….because, as your chosen King leading your chosen people you’ll look good!’.
But it is a prayer David is confident will be answered and this should encourage the faithful.

Is your life in Yahweh’s hands?
David prays to Yahweh (the LORD) – he doesn’t dress up his life to be acceptable. Instead he throws himself upon Yahweh and his promises. This is the only place for life, true reputation and meaning. Without Yahweh, David would be lost. So he says ‘into your hands I commit me spirit’ (v.5).

Jesus prays the same prayer – not so that his life would be spared but as his life is being taken. He was so confident in his heavenly father bringing him back to life. It was because he was dying for the iniquity of his people and not his own that death could not hold him in judgement. Death would not diminish or cause Jesus’ reputation to fade. Instead his reputation is higher than anyone else’s because of his outrageous love and service for us.

If you trust in Jesus you will not bear the consequences of sin and failure but will be glorified when our king returns. Our reputation is only anything because of Jesus' reputation. Are you praying this outrageous prayer with confidence? Jesus gives us a reputation before our reputation reflects his. It is to God’s glory.

Why Sample the Psalms?

2008-06-24T21:18:00.006+10:00

Often when it comes to the Bible people say to the Holy Spirit, ‘I like your new stuff better than your old stuff’ because it is about Jesus. The New Testament seems more tangible and is clear on exactly what Jesus has done for us. When you come to the Psalms you might think 'What is all this mess of emotion, random thoughts and touchy feely stuff'. But think on this: Jesus said the whole Old testament is about him (Luke 24:44-47). He even says Psalms are about him and are proof that he had to die and rise again for the forgiveness of sins (Luke 24:44).

Not only that, Jesus sampled the Psalms. It's a bit like a rap or R&B artist that resurrects some old rock or soul classic. They sample it to get the mood and groove for a new personal expression of the original vibe of the song. Jesus takes the Psalms and uses their lyrics bringing to our mind the whole vibes of the Psalm they come from.

The big exception to Jesus' sampling is that the Psalms are about him. When modern artists sample James Brown they sample songs that James Brown wrote about another time, another place and other people. The original authors of the Psalms knew that they were writing scripture for Christians and trying to work out what this meant for the Christ (1 Peter 1:10-12). So we are to Sample the Psalms and make them part of our life because Jesus is now part of our life if we trust in him.

Songs for Saints.
It is interesting where the Psalms are on Jesus’ lips in the Gospels. When things seem out of control and the world turned upside down – when God’s chosen King is facing death.

‘My God, why have you forsaken me?’ Ps 22
‘Into your hands I commit my spirit’ Ps 31
‘I thirst’ Ps 69

As followers of King Jesus we will cop some of the treatment he did in a world that wars against him (1 Peter 4). The Psalms cover the range of Christian experience and Psalms 1 & 2 anchor us in what it means to be God's people.

Ps 1 - Are you righteous or wicked? Do you pay attention to what God says in the Bible?

Ps 2 - Are you following Yahweh's King? He is the one who dispenses blessing or wrath?

The Psalms are Songs for Saints. A collection of bold, raw, majestic, beautiful, broken, joyful, disconcerting and at times unPC songs that can shake you to the core or sooth your soul. Some of them leave you thinking ‘Can anyone talk to God like that?’. ‘Can I talk to God like that?’.

If you are trying to keep a lid on your relationship with God or hold back from the richness of your conversation with your heavenly Father, you would be inclined to skip over them. Certainly when I was preparing this series I was thinking about cherry picking a few psalms to fit in with some themes I’d thought of talking on. However, a friend of mine challenged me to stick to a section so that God's word would bring up the themes. I have found this confronting but exciting, disconcerting, invigorating and challenging. But enough of my feelings.

Why don’t you sample the Psalms? Open them up! Let God’s word guide and enrich your life and help you in every season of your life - in every blessing, in every disappointment, in every heartbreak, in joy, in anger, in sadness, in success, in failure …. Your heavenly Father knows you, cares for you and wants you to be refreshed in him. That is why by His Holy Spirit he wrote this book for you through a number of authors and their experiences of life trusting in Yahweh.

Get yourself subscribed

2008-06-22T16:37:00.004+10:00

This month's issue of The Briefing has some excellent articles on the 'underworld' theme including a great piece by Con Campbell (former Pastor at Crossroads and now lecturer at Moore Theological College, Sydney). If you are not subscribed please consider adding a regular dietof The Briefing to help with your reading, thinking and effectiveness for Christ. Subscription info available here.

Being strong in the Lord

2008-06-03T15:01:00.017+10:00

10 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might. 11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. (Ephesians 6:10-11)

Although the realms of evil and darkness may be of some mild fascination for us, Ephesians 6 urges us to prepare for and enter into the battle. Indeed we probably don't realize the seriousness of the battle as much as we should.

If for example I knew of some plot to rob my home of it's possessions, or bring harm to my family, I'd be moved to act and protect those things that are important to me. I'd want to be aware of such plans so as to act to stop such things happening. God's enemy wishes to steal away and bring harm to Christ's loving supremacy over our lives - something more precious than anything. Should we not heed words such as these that call upon us to be aware of such schemes and to be drawn ever closer to the Lord Jesus who overcomes all that the Devil will throw at us?

Paul's metaphor of the Roman soldier is a call to be standing on the promises of the Gospel. This is the very heart of spiritual warfare and the book of Ephesians as a whole brilliantly demonstrates the power and wonder of such promises.

So, to be wisee for the battle, I'd recommend reading 6:10-20 and then reading through the entire letter again to see the many rich links between this passage and the letter as a whole. This is no mere theological exercise to stimulate your thinking, but is highly practical to engage your whole being.

Also I'd do some thinking through when you find yourself most vulnerable to sin and temptation. What factors are at play? What are you being tempted to think? How are you feeling about yourself and others at the time? Why has Christ and his promises and goodness been shifted?

To do some further thinking about how the Bible deals with many of these issues I'd recommend Living with the Underworld by Peter Bolt (picture above). Not only does he help you get a handle on the whole evil spiritual world (he does this very well), but he also explains how the Gospel is to inform the way we approach and deal with this whole arena. Demons and other evil forces are not at the heart of the Bible's message, they are, as Peter describes, more on the periphery. But the book very wisely allows what is at the heart of the Bible's message, to inform us and help us understand the reality of evil.

Paul does the same as he grounds all of reality in the Gospel, in Christ. If you are in Christ, clothed with his good promises...the devil will not be able to mess with you....though he may try.

Without Christ, we are not just vulnerable to evil, but are captivated by it. With Christ, we are wise to the Evil One's schemes and free from such tyranny and power. For faith in Christ, expressing itself in love cannot be overcome.

Why not pray the following?

Father please keep reminding me and showing me how awesome Jesus really is. Keep reminding me of the riches that I have in the Gospel. Keep reminding me that I belong to you because of Christ and show me the good deeds you have planned for me to walk in each day. Keep showing me in the time of temptation that this world belongs to Jesus and that in Christ I’ve got something I can never lose, which outshines and outlasts all of this life’s momentary treasures. Fill me with your Spirit so that my strength and energy for life come from my saviour and victor, the one who has overcome all evil for me already. Amen.

"Living with the Underworld" is currently available on the church bookstall.

Marriage and the cultural cringe

2008-05-27T15:39:00.017+10:00

When Paul addresses husbands and wives in Ephesians 5 our cultural senstitivites begin to rise. I can't think of many more controversial parts of the Bible and as it's read you can almost feel the collective cringe. Although this is a hard part of Scripture for us to come to terms with, it seems to me that we must give such a passage a fair and humble reading. Is it possible that we potentially de-canonize and 'right off' parts of the Bible by putting them in the too hard basket? Is Ephesians lurking in the bottom of the basket somewhere?

What a shame this would be because what is said on marriage here is the most important not only in the Bible, but (of course) anywhere else as well. No passage honours marriage so highly, nor effectively protects marriage from destructive and ungodly habits. This is so because Paul grounds and frames mariage in the truth of the Gospel itself. Indeed he is actually using marriage to talk again about the wonder of Christ and our relationship and blessing in him.

Lots of great questions came out from Sunday's talk and a loving church will engage with these honestly and lovingly. Perople were keen to explore issues like:

How can a single person really be an encouragement to someone who is married?

How does Ephesians 5 work out when the marriage relationship has been so poorly modeled to you?

Are you meant to 'practice' sacrificial leadership and humble submission before you get married?

How can someone submit to another if they really, really disagree with the other person?

I'm keen that we explore these issues together...hopefully without the cultural cringe. Indeed feel free to explore them in this forum.

Also, for those of us who are married, those of us planning to get married some day, or those of us who know anyone who might be married... "Married for God" pictured above, is a very helpful book. The author really nails it on some key issues on what marriage is really for and how it is grounded in the reality of Christian faith. So you'll learn as much about God as you will abou marriage from this book....and it's very challenging, whether you're married or not.

Finally, I was really pleased that people were seeking to think through how we care for each other as a congregation. Whether single or married we are all Christ's body and Ephesians 4 & 5 gives us a great model for how to be caring for one another. Christ focussed and other person centered. Let's keep praying for each other and considering how we can best glorify God in our midst.

Married for God by Christopher Ash: Available at the bookstall after church.

Understanding Catholicism

2008-05-20T14:10:00.009+10:00

This is a really timely book and for those of us who've got friends or family who are Catholic, (and most of us do), this is an important one for you to read. The author, Ray Galea works in Sydney as an Anglican minster, but his heritage is Catholic and he understands Catholic culture (especially Maltese) as well as Catholic theology.

The book is helpful for a number of reasons.

1. Ray clearly and sympathetically helps us understand not only what is distinct about Catholicism, but also why it matters.

2. It de-mystifies and explains what is going on in the Mass and how Catholics understand grace and the significance of Mary.

3. It will help you lovingly engage in conversation not just with catholics, but also with many others who are intrigued by it. It would be really helpful to have something informed to say when someone asks you if all Christians are going to the World Youth Day.

4. The book helps you understand the Gospel, its implications and why at times it really matters that certain differences are acknowledged and protected.

5. For you non readers (although I believe all Christians should be reading), the book is written by a great preacher, so it's short, loving and to the point...(ie it's an easy read).

6. It's the kind of book you can 'pass on' to your catholic friends (after you've read it yourself) and ask them what they think.

It seems to me that the prominence and massive scale of World Youth Day is actually a wonderful gospel opportunity for us all. This book will prepare you well for it.

Now available at the bookstall at church.