The easiest conspiracy theory to debunk this Christmas

“Are you feeling a bit apprehensive about your conversations with family and friends this Christmas?

The restrictions and lockdowns of the last few years have helped to keep us safe physically, but they’ve also played a role in dividing us socially. The combination of physical isolation, fears for safety, and the overwhelming stream of digital information at our fingertips have opened us up to all sorts of problems…”

– Dreading talking about COVID or US politics over Christmas lunch?

Lionel and Bronwyn Windsor have a suggestion for you. At The Australian Church Record.

The New Two Ways to Live website

If you’ve been waiting for the Two Ways to Live website to be updated to reflect the new printed versions, then today is a happy day.

(If you prefer it as it was, the old version is still online.)

Jesus is off to the beach

“This week, Senior Pastor of Seaforth Anglican, Rich Wenden, explores his findings on how we, as God’s people, can better bring the good news of Jesus to these places.”

– from The Pastor’s Heart.

‘Passion for Life’ Down Under? — The Pastor’s Heart

“How might Australia and other countries take advantage of the united evangelism campaign being arranged for the UK and Ireland?

Can the campaign be used to give us a needed evangelistic shot in the arm?”

– At The Pastor’s Heart, Dominic Steele speaks with Jodie McNeill, Elliot Temple and Tom Melbourne.

28 minutes. Take the time to be encouraged and challenged.

Q&A with Phil Colgan

From Tony Payne –

“A broad-ranging chat with Phil Colgan about the opportunities and threats we face, about being proud of the gospel, about the two books everyone should read, and more.”

– Listen, or read the transcript, at The Payneful Truth.

(Image: Phil Colgan on The Pastor’s Heart, August 2018.)

5 Fish: A wonderful free gospel resource

Some might not be aware of a wonderful resource largely developed in Australia by Global Recordings Network.

5fish is available as a smartphone app on iOS and Android, and as a website – www.5fish.mobi.

“Listen to the Christian gospel spoken in virtually any language … Access Christian messages from the largest collection of languages in the world (6,175 speech varieties).

Download free content:

Bible stories, basic Bible teaching, Scripture, Christian songs and testimonies. The recordings are useful for learning about the Christian faith and sharing lessons with others.

Bible stories have been selected from the Old and New Testaments.

They include stories about significant events and people such as the creation of the world, Noah, Abraham, Moses, King David, the prophets and Jesus’ life, miracles and teaching. …

Languages are grouped by country. They can be identified by variant names or by listening to a sample online.

Gospel messages can be downloaded for future playback offline. Many recordings are audio-visual displaying high quality colourful illustrations.”

It’s well worth downloadling the app to your phone to be ready for any opportunity.

Dissecting the new Two Ways to Live – with Phillip Jensen and Tony Payne

“We are joined by the authors of Two Ways to Live, Phillip Jensen and Tony Payne, to talk through the changes they have made to the iconic gospel outline.

We talk through the what and why behind the changes.”

– Great encouragement in thinking how to share the gospel. At The Pastor’s Heart.

Back to the Word

“I’m just about ready to give up the rational conversational approach to social intercourse and to start quoting straight Bible to people.

The further we go, the more reason isn’t working anymore. In these sputtering last gasps of the Enlightenment, language itself is deconstructing before our eyes. …”

– At World Magazine Andrée Seu Peterson says we need to rethink our approach.

And Australia comes in for dishonourable mention.

Link via Tim Challies.

The End of Humanity Would Result in End of Meaning?

In his The Briefing for 21st October 2021, Albert Mohler begins by considering a recent statement by Professor Brian Cox (pictured) about humans and meaning.

Perhaps a good conversation-starter.

A Swiss Army knife for evangelism

Tony Payne writes about the forthcoming updated Two Ways to Live booklet:

“The new booklet has a number of … design changes that I think really improve its appeal as a give-away resource – a ‘modern classic’ look-and-feel, new versions of the drawings in badge form, a reworking of how text and graphics interact on the page, and a revision of all the explanatory text.

What of the updates to the 2WTL framework itself?

Apart from numerous small tweaks to the language here and there, these are the three main changes to the outline itself…”

– Read it all here.

Encouragement to use The Word One to One

John Mason, President and Chairman of Anglican Connection, is encouraging his North American readers to consider using The Word One to One as a very helpful tool in evangelism.

As part of that, he reminds us of this brief 2016 interview with the then Dean of Sydney, and now Archbishop, Kanishka Raffel.

The books are available locally from The Wandering Bookseller.

Jeff Bezos wants to live forever and I’d like to help him

“Jeff Bezos wants to live forever and I’d like to help him.”

– Here’s a short video from Not the Bee (the cousin of The Babylon Bee.)

Find Life that lasts: A national co-ordinated evangelism campaign

“How could we build back better after COVID? Could evangelicals unite together to rebuild the church with a national co-ordinated evangelistic campaign?

COVID has created an unprecedented opportunity for evangelism, but churches and church leaders are feeling fragile and weary.

In Great Britain, churches are getting set for a national campaign leading up to Easter 2022, under the banner ‘Find life that lasts. It’s closer than you think.’…”

– Watch at The Pastor’s Heart.

Review: ‘Christians’ by Greg Sheridan

Journalist and author Greg Sheridan has just released a new book titled ‘Christians: The Urgent Case for Jesus in Our World’. He opens with this explanation of why he wrote it:

This book is about the compelling, dramatic, gripping characters you meet in the New Testament. Above all, it is the search for Jesus. It seeks to meet him directly, in the New Testament, and in history, and to meet him indirectly through his friends, both his first friends, and some of his friends today…”

– At The Gospel Coalition Australia, Akos Balogh reviews Greg Sheridan’s new book, Christians: The Urgent Case for Jesus in Our World.

The book is available from The Wandering Bookseller.