Reaching people with the gospel

Archbishop Peter Jensen has long been an advocate of looking for opportunities to share the gospel in taxis – and he was sure to carry a copy of The Essential Jesus (The Gospel According to Luke) to give away.

Tim Challies recently spoke at a bookshop in Scotland, and was asked about good ways to share the gospel with people.

His reply? “Uber!”. Good advice.

What is the gospel? — An appeal for clarity

“I remember, more than twenty years ago now, an international visitor to Sydney being asked this question. Throughout the week that he had been here, the speaker had appealed to the gospel many times.

Clearly in a part of the world well-known for the strength of its evangelical witness, such an appeal was essential if he was to get a hearing. But the appeal had not been convincing and it had become increasingly obvious that at this most basic level our guest had a very different idea of what exactly it was that he was appealing to repeatedly throughout the week. So some brave soul — someone braver than me — publicly asked him the question. What is the gospel?…”

– Dr. Mark Thompson, Principal of Moore College, tackles a crucial question in a new essay.

Take the time to read it all here. [This is a re-post from 2015.]

You can also download it as a 240kb PDF file.

John Piper’s reflections after a mainline church service

“Since our church has a Saturday night service and my wife was out of town, I was feeling perhaps especially venturesome a couple of weeks ago and decided to go to our church on Saturday night, and then go to a mainline Protestant church in downtown Minneapolis. …

If you walk into that church, and you didn’t know any better, you’d say this looks like a church from forever ago — this is what church is. Big stained-glass windows, and pastors at the front, a big organ, lots of music, singing about Jesus — what could be more churchy than this? Except there’s nothing there of any ultimate reality.”

– John Piper shares his reflections after visiting a liberal, progressive church.

It may be that many Bible-believing Anglicans have had little experience of what is taught in some other churches. A taste of bland, liberal heresy can be a strong incentive to value Bible-focussed and Christ-honouring worship.

What do you do when there is conflict in your church?

“What do you do when there’s conflict in your church?

Because there will be at some point.

How can you deal with conflict well?

What do you do when there’s no conflict to prepare for the times when conflict will come? How to you give your people a framework for understanding and resolving conflict?

What do you do when a couple comes to you and the marriage is a warzone? What should you outsource? What should you do yourself?

Bruce Burgess is the Australian Director of Peacewise.”

– Bruce was interviewed by Dominic Steele on this week’s episode of The Pastors Heart.

The value of training women for ministry

“Tracey Gowing helps oversee evangelical student ministry across Australia. In her role she has trained and influenced countless women, and worked with plenty of men.

Tracey is full of practical wisdom on how to live out the Bible’s teaching on men and women. I thought I’d pick her brains, firstly on how she trains women, and then next time on how she works with men.”

– At GoThereFor.com, Lauren Driscoll speaks with Tracey Gowing.

NSW CMS Summer School applications open

Gary Millar is the main speaker at the 2019 NSW & ACT CMS Summer School.

Applications are now open.

The Judges of Jesus

“Luke brilliantly plots the intersection of the eternal with the temporal (Luke 3:1–2). It was in Tiberius Caesar’s fifteenth year, AD 28, that John the Baptist began proclaiming the word of God.

He also remarkably captures the political complexity of Palestine. Pontius Pilate was military governor of Judea, Herod’s son Herod Antipas was tetrarch of Galilee, and Caiaphas was high priest of the temple city, Jerusalem.

In the narrative that follows Luke traces the movements of Jesus within the jurisdictions of those three men. …”

– At his blog, Bishop Paul Barnett reflects on the legacy of the three judges of Jesus.

Jesus never directly said “I’m God!”: Answering our Muslim friends (Part 1)

“A common objection we hear from our Muslim friends regarding the deity of Jesus is this: Jesus never directly said “I’m God”.

How would you defend the deity of Jesus using his own words? …”

– At The Australian Church Record, Ryan van der Avoort provides some very helpful resources.

Five things I learnt in Birth class about welcoming people to church

“Everyone else looked right at home. I probably did too, but in reality, I was terrified. …”

– At The Gospel Coalition Australia, Dave Chiswell shares wisdom you can use this Sunday.

(Photo: GAFCON media.)

Moore College Open Events coming up — Sept 2018

Moore College has an Open Night on Monday 3rd September, at the start of its Open Week.

Considering finding out about Moore College? This is your opportunity!

Or perhaps there is someone you could encourage to think in that direction.

See the College website for details.

‘My Body, My Choice’

“What do we worship?

If aliens from another planet were to conduct a research expedition to earth, tasked with answering this question, what would they come up with?

They might ask people, but I doubt the answers would match up with what the aliens saw all around them. Various gods would be offered up as objects of worship. Some would say, “I’m spiritual, just not religious.” Others would claim to worship nothing.

But the evidence speaks louder than words. …”

– What does “My body, my choice!” say about us? Martyn Iles from the Australian Christian Lobby takes a biblical perspective.

Four ways Christians can support our farmers

“Take a drive into the country and you’ll see rolling hills of red dirt and crispy yellow grass. The drought is crippling farmers and rural economies, and it doesn’t look like relief is coming any time soon.

‘The short version is that it’s pretty tough,’ says Rev Ted Brush, the Bush Church Aid’s NSW & ACT Regional Officer. Since stepping into the role in January, Mr Brush has seen the toll that the drought is taking on towns.…”

– Story from SydneyAnglicans.net.

Passing it on

“Earlier this year I was driving my youngest son home from a school event. Not long into the trip he asked me, ‘Dad, how did you become a Christian?’

Naturally that was a question that I was more than happy to answer, and we had a wonderful ride as I shared my story with him and as he probed me with further questions. It was a precious father-son moment.

However, I must confess that I was also a bit taken aback by the question.…”

– At GoThereFor.com, David Mears shares a great reminder about passing on the saving gospel to our children.

Spirit-inspired Christian Living — Phillip Jensen

“What does the Spirit want Christians to do? What does the Spirit enable Christians to do?

There are two common errors in answering these common questions:

at one extreme, the humanistic Christians have no place for the Spirit, but lay burdens of morality upon us;

at another extreme, the mystical Christians expect the Spirit to magically solve all our problems.

But what do the Spirit-inspired Scriptures tell us to expect about the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives?”

At Moore College’s Centre for Christian Living, Phillip Jensen is speaking about “Spirit-inspired Christian Living” on Monday 20th August, from 7:30pm.

– Booking details here.