Articles from our weekly newsletter
On 27th July 2011, the writer of a great book titled “The Cross of Christ”, John Stott, went to be with his Lord and Saviour. As we give thanks to God for John Stott’s life, it is good to reflect on the cross of Christ and to ask the question how such a gruesome crucifixion could so transform the lives of generations…
As investigations into Norway’s “terror attack” continue, disturbing details have emerged. The shooting of children camping on Utoya Island and the car bomb outside government offices in Oslo, the capital of Norway, killed around 76 people. After initial claims that the attacks were the work of Al-Qaeda, reports now reveal the suspect, Anders Breivik, as a right-wing Christian Zionist of Norwegian descent.…
Last week I hoped that the article would get you thinking about sacrifice and your life as a follower of Jesus. I will not recap all that we covered, so you can revisit it here if you wish. An article I was recently reading on this theme of sacrifice spent some time critiquing our culture to expose why we struggle so much…
If sacrifice and self denial is the bread and butter of the Christian life, why do we struggle so much with it? For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel’s will save it. Mark 8:35 Howard Guinness, in a booklet he wrote in the theme of sacrifice makes the point…
Over this last week, I have been reading about the number of ethical issues our society is facing. With the Greens party taking control of the Senate, they are more determined than ever to destroy the value of human life (euthanasia and abortion), revise the definition and purpose of marriage, stop the work of school chaplains and reverse the prohibition of many…
“I’ll do it later.” “Tomorrow…!” “Not now…perhaps next week.” We’ve all done it, haven’t we? Procrastination seems to be part of human nature, especially when it comes to doing things we don’t like. In some things it doesn’t matter too much. The lawn can always be cut tomorrow, though if mother-in-law is coming today, it may be unwise to put it off!…
I was reading through Acts in my quiet times this last week when I was struck by the enormous cost, mission actually is for God’s people. It is not that our salvation costs us anything – we must affirm it is a gracious gift from a merciful saviour for all who come to him for forgiveness of their sin (Eph 2:8-10). But…
The distinguished American psychiatrist, Karl Menninger, when speaking at a conference was once asked, “what would you advise a person to do if he felt a nervous breakdown coming on?” Many evidently expected he would say go and consult a psychiatrist but instead he replied “lock up your house and go across the railroad tracks to find someone in need!” Many might…
A Christian friend recently made me think. In conversation, he stated, “we support Joe Bloggs, who does this for us in the public arena”. We had been talking about how we as Christians should personally stand up against injustice in our society – not as a replacement for evangelism as so often happens, but because God is not satisfied with injustice in…
On holidays, I was reading a book titled, “Disciplines of a Godly man” by Kent Hughes. It is a book I have read before but it is well worth a second (or third) read. The book reminded me that godliness is something we as God’s people need to work hard at. There are very few things in life that we can do…
