A minister of Christ is not an essayist, nor an orator, nor a lecturer, nor a philosopher, but an ‘ambassador for Christ’ (2 Cor. 5.20); a ‘fisher of men’ (Matt.4:19). His work is not in the first place that of improving morals, or elevating character, or rectifying social evils, or redressing material wrongs, – but of SAVING.
- Horatius Bonar, The Life of John Milne of Perth (BoT, 2010)
I am at the Banner of Truth Conference in Leicester at the moment and I will get round to saying more about it in due course, I hope. However, one of the best things about the conference is the quality of the singing. There is nothing like 300+ men singing a great psalm in parts!
So, for your edification, I recorded Psalm 100 using my iPod. The quality of the recording does not do justice to the power of the experience, but here it is:
Dr Rosaria Butterfield has a remarkable story to tell. In one sense, conversion to Christ extraordinary (a miracle by the work of the Holy Spirit) and in another, ordinary (every true convert undergoes this transformative work). But what makes Dr Butterfield’s conversion interesting in our modern climate is that fact that she was a lesbian feminist activist at the top of her profession in academia.
Her conversion happened with the help of two instruments. The first was the Bible. As an English professor her job was to read books and talk about them. She did not like Christians and saw herself in a “war against stupid”. Yet she became curious about the Bible and began to study it. She treated it like any other book, reading voraciously, examining the words, thinking about the plot lines.
What’s interesting here is not just that she became aware of a few verses that might convince her. She read the whole Bible – several times – gaining something of the big picture of the God of salvation very quickly. This had a very powerful impact on her.
The second instrument was a local pastor and the Presbyterian church he led. They spent time with her, loved, showed hospitality, prayed. This has a great deal to teach the church about evangelism. As she says, she did not get the “sales talk” that she might have expected from these evangelicals. Her interaction with Christians was deeper than that.
In time (quite a lot of time) Dr Butterfield was converted, as she put it, from unbelief to Christ and everything changed for her.
I recommend that you listen as Dr Butterfield tells her story here:
After this presentation, there was a lengthy Q&A session which is also extremely helpful, full of practical advice for churches on relating to gay and lesbian people:
Her book, The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert , is available on Kindle, though I have not yet been able to find anywhere in the UK selling a print copy.
R Scott Clark
Here is an article which is a recent re-post of an one posted nearly two years ago by R Scott Clark. It is interesting for a number of reasons, but the matter that grabs my attention is the sheer number of pastors there seems to be to apply for vacant charges in reformed churches in the US. Clark asks the obvious question: why are there not more wanting to plant new churches in needy areas?
I could add to this question another: why, if there are so many, are so few willing to go to other parts of the world that need missionaries to plant churches cross-culturally? Here in England and Wales I think the numbers are even worse. Our denomination (EPCEW) has 13 churches in E & W. Our total membership would not even half fill one US minimally “mega” church! Our sister church (IPC) is in about the same situation. We are the only confessionally reformed/presbyterian churches in the E & W!
So why so few willing to do the pioneering work? What are the blockages? Is there a prevailing mindset? Is there a need (to use Apple-speak) to “think different”?
There is much that is good about Christian Concern. They are fighting for matters about which most Christians would bury their heads in the sand.
However this post (Court says Christians don’t keep Sunday special for it to be protected | Christian Concern) raises concerns for me.
The case is about a woman who took a job believing she was given exemption from working on Sunday only to find later that her employer does not stand by that exemption. The case goes on with CC’s help.
The argument invokes a wider issue than just that of Sunday employment. The article above states:
“In passing the ruling, Mr Justice Langstaff held that Sunday was not a ‘core’ component of the Christian faith because some Christians would be prepared to work on a Sunday; and therefore Christians as a whole do not need Sunday protected.
The article goes on to express concern that we have the officers of the State ruling on what are core Christian beliefs. This is a right concern – the State must keep its fingers out of this sort of matter.
But the question is this: who does decide? Who gets to pronounce what is a core belief? This is where I have the concern, and it is a concern not so much about the State, which will always want to stick its fingers where they are not wanted, but about the church generally, and particularly in the UK.
There was a time when the church (that is, the visible church as a whole) expressed its core beliefs in creeds and confessions. It was a simple matter to point to what the core beliefs were: look up your confession of faith. Nowadays, with the wholesale fragmentation of the church under the pressure of enlightenment individualism (and, dare I say it, an erroneous belief in independency of the local church gone to seed) ask 100 people/churches what the core beliefs of Christianity are, and you get 100 different answers.
What we are left with, and I think it appears in this Christian Concern case, is not the defence of a Biblical and confessional position of the historic Christian church, but the defence of a particular personal belief as a core article of his/her Christian practice. What Christian Concern is defending is not the principle of Sabbath, which is Biblical and confessional, but what ultimately for them is more fundamental: the right to personal religious belief, which isn’t (see Acts 17:30 – “The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent” ESV, and then think about its implications). It is actually standing on a principle that derives from the Enlightenment.
This highlights for me how ill-equipped the modern Christian church is to fight the battles that are coming to keep the State’s sticky fingers out of the church’s affairs. The State wants to, but the church is confused about what it believes. So, it is unprepared and, for the most part, unconcerned about what should really be Christian concerns.
Here is an email I sent out to our church today. I hope you find it helpful too. Thanks to Tim Challies for pointing me to the first two links.
—
Dear All,
Happy New Year! I pray that you will know a genuinely prosperous and good 2013.
We are a day into 2013 but it is not too late to use the occasion of a new year to think about how you are going to read the Bible during it. It ought to be the goal of every Christian to have their minds increasingly shaped and formed by the Bible. Our Lord wants our minds to be transformed rather than be conformed to the world (Romans 12:2). That means moving on from knowing a few isolated texts here and there to really knowing the Bible, what it is about and who it is about. This then shapes how we think about everything else. It is a lifetime activity, but every day is a an opportunity to be changed.
Ligonier Ministries has produced a list of Bible-reading plans from a variety of sources for getting into good Bible-reading habits in 2013 and have put it on their website here:
http://www.ligonier.org/blog/bible-reading-plans/
Please take time to look at these plans, then choose one and go! I pray that by Christmas 2013, you will be able to say that you have read the Bible, and that you have been richly blessed by doing so!
In passing, here are some advice about how not to read your Bible:
http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/tgc/2012/12/30/how-not-to-read-your-bible-in-2013/
Finally, one lecture I found really helpful to listen to over the holiday period was Sinclair Ferguson’s “How to read the Bible” as part of his church’s regular programme of midweek teaching. You can download it from here:
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=926121712269
It’s greatest value is in showing us how to think as we read i.e. who is the Bible about? what is the main plot line of the Bible? what are the main sub-plots? how do we handle different types of books in the Bible? There are many other practical issues he covers. The lecture is well worth spending an hour listening to.
Have a blessed 2013.
Yours,
S.
–
Rev Dr Stephen N Dancer
Minister, Solihull Presbyterian Church
church: www.solihullpres.org.uk
blog: doggiesbreakfast.wordpress.com
twitter: @stephendancer
It makes sense for the Church of Scotland to make a go of using its St George’s Tron building, especially over Christmas, given their recent legal actions. Hence the announcement of a Presbytery Carol Service next Sunday afternoon in the building should come as no surprise. They even have the moderator of the General Assembly coming to preach.
However, what is interesting is how the news is being distributed. It is limited data, I know, but I found that the Provost of St Mary’s Cathedral (Scottish Episcopal), Kelvin Holdsworth, has also blogged the notice of the service. The Scottish Episcopal Church is extremely liberal, as is Mr Holdsworth and his Cathedral ministry team.
The notice looks like a direct quotation of a notice from Very Rev Bill Hewitt, the presbytery-appointed Clerk of the St George’s Tron Session. It is interesting that
Apart from the make-believe that there is a “living church” in Buchanan Street, what is clear is that this is an event for show, and needs a big congregation to make a point for people to see. Hence, dissemination across all liberal churches, including the extremely liberal Scottish Episcopals to generate an attendance.
Much has been made by the Presbytery of its desire to establish a ministry in the evangelical tradition in the centre of Glasgow. But this event and its publicity grates. I have learned that when you are seeking to establish a genuine gospel ministry and invite people to come, then you need to start as you mean to continue. There must be no deceit, no bait-and-switch.
So what is going on? Is this establishing a ministry “in the evangelical tradition”, or something else hiding behind a form of words?
SPC Sermons
