Christian events in Australia in 2017

Steve Kryger, at Communicate Jesus, continues his helpful tradition of compiling a list of Christian events in Australia.

Here’s his 2017 Calendar.

Christian organisations campaigning against helping Christians flee the Middle East genocide?

“In the USA a terrible tragedy is happening. A nation that was founded by Christians fleeing religious persecution is tearing itself apart over its new president ordering the US refugee system to prioritise religious minorities fleeing persecution. Yet perhaps the greatest tragedy faces Christian refugees fleeing genocide in the Middle East.…”

– An editorial from Barnabas Fund. (via Anglican Mainstream.)

Canterbury Cathedral to host Service for Freemasons

“Canterbury Cathedral is hosting a service to “celebrate” 300 years of Freemasonry after receiving a donation from the Masons of £300,000. The Duke of Kent, who is the Grand Master of the Freemasons, will be among those attending the special service of thanksgiving on 18 February. …”

– Could be a wonderful opportunity. (Photo: Canterbury Cathedral.)

T.C. Hammond: The Value of the Old Testament

“There are three important declarations in Article Seven.

(1) The Old Testament is not contrary to the New.
(2) The Fathers looked for more than transitory promises.
(3) The moral injunctions in the Commandments of Moses are binding on all Christian men. …”

– The Australian Church Record continues to republish Archdeacon T.C. Hammond’s series on The Thirty Nine Articles of Religion. They’re up to Article 7.

‘Gender theory banned in NSW classrooms’

“NSW public school teachers have been banned from teaching gender theory in the classroom after an independent review into the state’s sex and health education resources.”

– Story from The Australian. (subscription only)

GAFGON Chairman’s February 2017 letter

“It seems … that the Church of England bishops have recommended the right thing for the wrong reason. They have retained the Church’s traditional teaching, but because they think that holding opposite views together will eventually produce a consensus, not because it represents an apostolic boundary.”

– from Archbishop Okoh’s February 2017 letter to GAFCON supporters.

GAFCON Statement on TEC voting in Lusaka

Here is a statement from GAFCON General Secretary, Dr. Peter Jensen:

“The agreement from the January Primates meeting in 2016 was broken when The Episcopal Church (TEC) took part in decision making on issues pertaining to polity and doctrine in Lusaka. Equally damaging, was an attempt by the Anglican Communion Office to deny the fact by claiming that, technically, the process included no formal votes. This is sophistry.

The Primates agreement in January was never limited to the narrow issue of the method of voting. It said that ‘[The Episcopal Church] will not to take part in decision making on issues pertaining to polity or doctrine.’ [Primates 2016 Communique]

Whether a meeting uses a consensus model, or a voice vote, or paper ballots, or electronic ballots is of no relevance. The Episcopal Church was not to take part in decision making on issues pertaining to polity or doctrine. They did.

As the GAFCON Primates Council has said: ‘The future of the Anglican Communion does not lie with manipulations, compromises, legal loopholes, or the presentation of half-truths; the future of our Communion lies in humble obedience to the truth of the Word of God written.’ [Gafcon Primates Communique, April 2016]

Archbishop Peter Jensen
General Secretary.”

From GAFCON.

With thanksgiving for Michael John Ovey — by Mark Thompson

“It has taken a little while to write this thanksgiving to God for the life of my dear friend Mike Ovey. I have indeed written tributes for other publications, news items, editorials, etc. But this is the one I knew I wanted to write and it has taken longer. This one is much more personal.

The reason for the delay is deep grief and a profound sense of loss. Another friend used the word ‘ambush’ to describe how grief can burst upon you unexpectedly and without notice. …”

– Dr. Mark Thompson, Principal of Moore College, has written this moving tribute to Mike Ovey, who was called home to be with Christ a month ago.

Update from Oak Hill College:

A service of thanksgiving for the life and ministry of Mike Ovey will be held on Monday 13 March 2017, at 2pm, at All Soul’s, Langham Place, London W1B 3DA. All are welcome to attend. Download the service invitation here.

(Photo: Oak Hill College.)

C of E college apologises for students’ attempt to ‘queer evening prayer’

“A leading theological college that trains priests for the Church of England has apologised after it hosted a service to mark LGBT history month that referred to God as ‘the Duchess’.

Student priests at Westcott House in Cambridge organised the evensong service on Tuesday in the college chapel. …”

– Story from The Guardian. Photo (not of the event described above) from Westcott House.

Related:

Westcott House History:

“Westcott House began its life in 1881 as the Cambridge Clergy Training School whose first president was the then Regius Professor of Divinity, Brooke Foss Westcott. A pioneering and respected New Testament scholar himself, the school was the product of Westcott’s own passionate concern to raise the standard of clergy education and so took the name of its founder after his death. … ”

Church of England Bishops’ Report: More Questions than Answers

“For the last week I have been digesting the ‘Report from the House of Bishops on Marriage and Same Sex Relationships after the Shared Conversations,’ known by its shorthand as GS (General Synod) 2055.

This “Report” was a document prepared by the Church of England’s Bishops and presented to the Church’s General Synod last week. The perspective of LGBT pressure groups within the Church of England is that they were betrayed by the Bishops’ upholding the Church’s traditional teaching on marriage. Some are even hinting at going ahead with same sex marriage in defiance of the bishops.

The disappointment of the LGBT community has been matched by suspicion and criticism from Biblically orthodox Anglicans in the Church of England. To them, GS 2055 is a Trojan Horse. The Bishops’ failure to define boundaries in a clearly Biblical way ensures a theological incoherence that will permit ‘generous pastoral provision’ for LGBT couples to will quickly become facts on the ground (new liturgies and blessings) that make the Church’s teaching on marriage a mere shell.

I sympathize with those suspicions because of my experience with such ‘Trojan Horse’ reports in The Episcopal Church as it marched to gay marriage.

Despite my sympathies, I have tried to find an objective point between the hermeneutics of suspicion and the hermeneutics of hope. I’ve tried to read all 19 pages of GS 2055 inductively, asking what the text really says. All 19 pages are agonizing to read—rather like an essay which reads ‘on the one hand’ and ‘on the other hand’ with no resolution. Except of course for the resolve that ‘it is hubristic for anyone to propose that there is one definitive answer which solves all the moral, ethical and missiological problems we face.’ (para. 7) …

Barbara Gauthier goes on to make a telling observation, from paragraph 65 of the Report:

‘65. ….To maintain an unambiguous position on [the] doctrine [of marriage] while enabling a generous freedom for pastoral practice that does not directly and publicly undermine it is entirely consistent with our traditions and is a perfectly coherent approach to take. (emphasis added)

The implication would seem to be that whatever might ‘directly and publicly’ undermine the doctrine of marriage may be perfectly admissible if done ‘indirectly and privately.’ The progressive wing of the Episcopal Church used that ploy for years, surreptitiously establishing facts on the ground, until it couldn’t be ignored any longer.’…”

– From The American Anglican Council’s Canon Phil Ashey. Read it all here.

Preaching to Reach the City

Weekend encouragement:

On November 26, 2016, William Taylor spoke on Preaching to Reach the City – at the City Bible Forum in Brisbane.

Audio of his talks is available from Ann Street Presbyterian Church. Direct links to audio files:

Session 1 – Preaching to Reach the City.

Session 2 – Training to reach the City.

Session 3 – Q & A. Partnering to reach the City.

Special Religious Education in NSW and “grooming”

“Over the course of three days the local Herald newspaper here in Newcastle (NSW) has been publishing a series of misleading and inflammatory articles designed to put pressure on the NSW Government to stop offering the Special Religious Education program (SRE, or sometimes popularly called ‘Scripture’) in public schools.

Here I want to address a particularly inflammatory accusation implied or made in these articles, that SRE material somehow supports ‘grooming’ of children for sexual purposes. These accusations are completely false and should not have been made in the first place. …”

– At Law and Religion Australia, Associate Professor in Law, Neil Foster, provides essential background. Important reading.

See also: Post-truth hits NSW – Murray Campbell.

500 years on – does the Reformation still matter?

“When all is said and done, the fundamental question for every human being is, ‘How can a sinner like me stand before God on the Day of Judgement?’

Does this still matter? There is only one answer. …”

– In the first of a series of posts on the Reformation, Dr. Peter Jensen writes on the sinfulness of the human race and the danger of the soul.

Preaching as a Means of Survival

“The church’s only recourse in a secular city is to continue to do what it has always done, preach the Word.

We cannot hope that somehow we might stumble upon a third epistle to Timothy, which gives alternative ministry options to what Paul exhorts his protégé to do in Second Timothy. Our only hope is to continue to do what Jesus and the Apostles’ commissioned us to do. Whether we find ourselves in circumstances of cultural acceptance or cultural hostility, we must preach the Word.”

– The third and final post in a series on Preaching in a Secular Age, by Albert Mohler, is essential reading.

See also Part 1 and Part 2.

Related: Why I value expository preaching – Murray Campbell at GoThereFor.com.

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