225 years on — will we be faithful?

Posted on February 2, 2013 
Filed under History, Resources

Richard Johnson monumentTwo hundred and twenty five years ago, on Sunday February 3rd 1788, the Rev. Richard Johnson, Chaplain to the First Fleet and first Chaplain to the Colony of New South Wales, preached at the first Christian church service in Australia.

Craig Schwarze has some resources here – and there’s our own page on Richard Johnson here.

And it’s also worth taking the time to read Johnson’s Address to The Inhabitants of The Colonies Established in New South Wales and Norfolk Island (PDF file) published in 1792.

Excerpt:

“This will be my daily prayer to God for you. I shall pray for your eternal salvation, for your present welfare, for the preservation, peace, and prosperity of this colony: and especially for the more abundant and manifest success of the Redeemer’s cause and kingdom, and for the effusion and out-pouring of his Holy Spirit, not only here, but in every part of the habitable globe.”

As the spiritual beneficiaries of men like Richard Johnson and John Newton (who recruited Johnson and who edited his ‘Address to the Inhabitants of the Colonies…’), the question remains: Will we remain faithful to the gospel of the Lord Jesus, and will we be as concerned as these men were for those without Christ?

Related: Lord hast thou not a time for these poor benighted souls? – John Newton’s diary entry as he considered the needs of those without Christ in far-off lands.

(Archbishop Peter Jensen will be preaching at a service to mark the anniversary – 10:15am at St. Philip’s York Street.)