Ten years closer to Eternity

Ten years ago, Sydney celebrated the beginning of 2000 by displaying on the Harbour Bridge the word Eternity in the iconic copperplate handwriting of Arthur Stace.

A lot of water has passed under the bridge (literally) since then, and in many ways the world has changed. But the basic need of men and women is the same – to hear the gospel and be saved.

In 2010, please be encouraged to continue to trust Christ, and to live in the light of eternity. Read the story of Arthur Stace in our Resources section.

Bible reading plans for the new year

Justin Taylor, at Between Two Worlds, has links to some helpful Bible reading plans.

Dr Theodore Williams

Tom Halls passes on the news that Rev Dr Theodore Williams, founder of the Indian Evangelical Mission, died yesterday after a brief illness. Tom describes him as “a great Bible teacher and missionary statesman”.

The glory of the Cross

“There is no greater cleavage between faith and unbelief than in their respective attitudes to the cross.

Where faith sees glory, unbelief sees only disgrace. What was foolishness to Greeks, and continues to be to modern intellectuals who trust in their own wisdom, is nevertheless the wisdom of God.

And what remains a stumbling-block to those who trust in their own righteousness, like the Jews of the first century, proves to be the saving power of God (1 Cor. 1:18-25).”

– John Stott, The Cross of Christ. (With thanks to Of First Importance.)

Leon Morris on The Person of Christ

Church Society has republished Leon Morris’ 1960 Church Book Room Press booklet “The Person of Christ’ on their website:

“When we want to understand the importance of a person we turn to his work. If we think, for example, of Winston Churchill our minds instinctively go back to the dark days of the war when he rallied the Empire. If we think of Napoleon we recall his mighty deeds on many battlefields. If we think of Einstein his enunciation of the theory of relativity gives us the measure of his greatness. What men do shows what men are.

Similarly in the religious world, if we wish to understand something of the person of Jesus Christ we do well to begin with what He has done. John sums it up for us in a sentence: ‘the Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world’ (1 Jn. 4:14). The greatness of Christ is to be seen in the fact that He brought salvation, not for just a few, but for ‘the world’…”

Read it here.

ANiC parishes Appeal Court Decision

24 December 2009

The trustees of four Anglican Network in Canada (ANiC) congregations in the greater Vancouver area have filed an appeal of Mr Justice Stephen Kelleher’s BC Supreme Court decision of November 25, 2009, in order to preserve their vibrant Anglican ministries. The four parishes, St Matthew’s (Abbotsford), St Matthias & St Luke’s (Vancouver), St John’s Shaughnessy (Vancouver) and Church of the Good Shepherd (Vancouver), have an average Sunday attendance of approximately 1500 people and are involved in many ministries throughout the week serving their communities. Read more

Despite the sceptics, there is real truth in the story of Christmas

“There are enough question marks over the Christmas story for dogmatic sceptics to have a field day at this time of year, but the core historical realities are not easily swept away…”

– John Dickson writes in The Sydney Morning Herald.

Paternoster sold to Koorong

“Press Release: Carlisle December 21st 2009

The Board of Trustees and Senior Management of leading Carlisle-based Christian Charity, IBS-STL UK, formerly known as STL are pleased to announce the sale of two of its three trading divisions: Authentic Media and STL Distribution…

Authentic Book Publishing and 8 Wesley Owen Stores (Bath Birmingham, Bristol, Bromley, Coleraine, Derby, Glasgow and York ) have been sold to Koorong, which is owned by the Bootes family. Based in Sydney, Koorong has 18 stores operating successfully throughout Australia. It has purchased all of the Authentic and Paternoster intellectual property and author contracts, the freehold properties in Glasgow and York, the Wesley Owen trading name, and the domain name, wesleyowen.com. They plan to continue to operate from the Milton Keynes area.”

– from the Church Times blog. (Image: STL Distribution)

Archbishop Peter Jensen’s Christmas message 2009

In his 2009 Christmas message, Archbishop Peter Jensen begins by speaking about leadership.

The full text is available at SydneyAnglicans.net (pdf) – or watch it here. (Here’s the SMH’s report.)

‘Equality and Diversity’ for Christians in Britain?

“Christians in the U.K. are continuing to warn that the government’s planned ‘equality’ legislation will drive Christian believers out of public life. The Christian Institute, Britain’s leading evangelical Christian lobby group, has issued a report titled ‘Marginalising Christians,’ detailing the many recent cases of Christians who have been disciplined or lost work because of conflicts between faith and the government-sponsored and increasingly aggressive secularism.

The government’s recent equality and diversity laws, the group says, leave Christians “the first to be punished and the last to be protected…”

– Story from LifeSiteNews.

Very different paths to God

“Everything I know about God comes from God himself.”

– Archbishop of Sydney Dr Peter Jensen and ‘militant agnostic’ Brian Schmidt are both featured in today’s Sydney Daily Telegraph on ‘seeking the truth of our existence’.

Objections to Christmas

“Column 8 of the Sydney Morning Herald last week had an interesting entry from a man identifying only as a ‘Canberra Anglican parish priest’. In the lead up to Christmas he had organised some community carols in his local shopping centre, but met some resistance.

‘To my great amusement,’ he wrote, ‘the manager of the centre objected, because she thinks the “[expletive] Christians want to take over Christmas.”

I’d always assumed that the “Christ” bit in both words might serve as a clue.’ …”

– read the full article by Simon Smart at the Centre for Public Christianity.

The saint(s) go marching in

Over at SydneyAnglicans.net, Glenn Davies, Bishop of North Sydney, provides some much-needed Biblical perspective for the current excitement about Mary MacKillop.