Churches together again?
David Stone
Date posted: 1 Mar 2017
David Stone’s concluding article concerning lessons from the past about church cooperation
In last month’s article, we looked at the development of the Baptist Union (BUGB) and the Congregational Union (CUEW).
The Third Degree
Making friends in Kingston
Kate Duncan
Date posted: 1 Apr 2017
‘Would you be interested in our events this week?’
I was offering an information flyer to passersby in the university hallway, a busy thoroughfare en route to lectures. Most students had taken one. Some even stopped to chat, asking ‘What’s this about?’ or having a go on the ‘Question Wheel’ – discussing purpose, identity or love over a free bowl of cereal or cup of coffee.
Glasgow: planting the gospel
Paul Brennan
Date posted: 1 Apr 2017
Paul Brennan brings us up-to-date with new congregations linked to The Tron Church in Glasgow
The last year has been one of significant change for The Tron Church.
Before it’s too late
Tim Sunderland and Phil Walter ponder the sad case of a declining church putting things off for too long
Goodway Road was a small church on a housing estate in the north of Birmingham.
Reflecting on spiritual abuse
Karen Soole
Date posted: 1 Apr 2017
Karen Soole tells of her own experience and reminds us of some needed lessons
Horrific stories of historic abuse within the evangelical community were recently exposed by Channel 4 News.
Knowing God Better
Depending on God’s Spirit
Jonathan Lamb
Date posted: 1 Feb 2017
‘I believe in the Holy Ghost,
I believe in the Holy Ghost.’
It was apparently the habit of the great
Baptist preacher, C. H. Spurgeon, to say this
quietly under his breath every
time he
mounted
the
steps of
the pulpit at
the
Metropolitan Tabernacle in London. Even if
the story is apocryphal, Spurgeon’s ministry
affirmed the importance of the Spirit’s work:
‘Men might be poor and uneducated, their
words might be broken and ungrammatical;
but if the might of the Spirit attended them,
the humblest evangelist would be more
successful than the most learned divine
or the most eloquent of preachers.’
Crossing the Culture
Hearing God in Silence
Angeline Liles
Date posted: 1 Feb 2017
‘God still sees us even though we worship in secret.’
In rural 17th-century Japan, a native Christian convert assures two newly arrived Jesuit priests on a mission from Portugal that his faith, and the faith of his fellow villagers packed into the dimly lit hut, is fervent and resilient, even in their impoverished and persecuted state.
The Communist experiment
Richard Bewes
Date posted: 1 Mar 2017
Richard Bewes reflects on the revolution of 1917 and its fruit in the last 100 years
Forget Trump for the moment.
How evangelical is the Pope?
Leonardo De Chirico
Date posted: 1 Dec 2016
Leonardo De Chirico uncovers the particular brand of Catholicism that Pope Francis advocates and gives a biblical assessment
Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected as Pope Francis on 13 March, 2013.
Ever-present past
Joy Horn lists some of the Christian anniversaries coming up in 2017
Events
In 1517 Bernard Gilpin was born at Kentmere Hall, Westmorland, into a distinguished family. He became rector of Houghton-le-Spring, Co. Durham, and became known as ‘the apostle of the North’ for his constant tours, preaching the Reformation gospel.
pastoral care
How can I pray for you?
Steve Midgley
Date posted: 1 Jan 2017
An essential feature of biblical counselling is that we pray for those we counsel.
Not ‘pray about them in their absence’ but ‘pray with them in their presence’.
defending our faith
Reformation and reason
Chris Sinkinson
Date posted: 1 Feb 2017
2017 marks 500 years since the Reformation (dating it from Martin Luther nailing his 95 Theses to the Wittenberg Door).
Hopefully, for many Christians, this will reawaken an interest in our heritage. It is time to blow away the dust, if we have allowed it to settle, and read some classics of Christian history. John Calvin’s Institutes, Martin Luther’s Table Talk and later Puritan writings, like those of Jonathan Edwards, will all help remind us of the depths and riches of Reformation theology.
The first Amen
Besa Shapllo
Date posted: 1 Nov 2016
The story of Besa Shapllo and Mission Possible in Albania
I was born in Tirana, Albania.
Christianity without apology?
Kevin DeYoung
Date posted: 1 Jan 2017
Kevin DeYoung asks if it is biblical for Christians to defend their rights
Christians in the West are familiar with apologetics as an intellectual or worldview exercise.
The Third Degree
Carols
Kate Duncan
Date posted: 1 Jan 2017
‘I've got some questions’, Rachel began.
‘I think we can take things to another level with the carol service.’
A sense of place
George Moody
Date posted: 1 Nov 2016
George Moody gets us thinking about the meaning of locality
Over 40% of buildings on the English Heritage at Risk Register are churches.
We’ll see him at the Re-Org
Gavin Dickson
Date posted: 1 Nov 2016
Gavin Dickson, SASRA Army Scripture Reader with some thoughts for Remembrance Sunday
There is a saying in the army when someone dies: ‘We’ll see him at the Re-Org’.
The Third Degree
Great Forum
Kate Duncan
Date posted: 1 Oct 2016
I’m shivering in a tent!
I’m in a Shropshire field surrounded by over 1,000 students. It is Forum, UCCF’s national training conference for Christian Union (CU) leaders, and it’s hugely exciting.
Prisons: from despair to hope
Glynn Jones
Date posted: 1 Oct 2016
Glynn Jones challenges us to get involved with the mission field in UK prisons
The facts of hopelessness for those in prison are stark.
Letter from America
Trumped
Josh Moody
Date posted: 1 Dec 2016
I am a ‘legal alien’, I carry a Green Card and all our children have been born here, but I cannot vote in America.
With that in mind and also being a pastor, it is inimical, unwise, and probably unedifying for me to talk about party politics.
Purchased with blood
Tom Marcus
Date posted: 1 Oct 2016
Tom Marcus suggests the relevance of the story of the early Ugandan and English martyrs for today
To understand the African bishops’ stand on homosexual practice today, it is helpful to remember the heroic early days of the Ugandan church.
Knowing God Better
Uniting God’s people
Jonathan Lamb
Date posted: 1 Nov 2016
Social commentators frequently remind us of a paradox of our age.
Alongside the integration and cohesion of globalisation, there has been an accompanying and more troubling trend – the rise of nationalism and tribalism. Fracture lines are seen across nations, communities and eth-nicities. As Christians we joyfully affirm the counter-cultural unity which the gospel brings. But often we do not see this working as it should. A pastor was once asked if he had an active congregation. ‘Oh yes’, he replied. ‘Half of them are working with me, and half of them working against me’.
Missionary marriages in trouble
Mike Peterson
Date posted: 1 Aug 2016
Mike Peterson asks: ‘That missionary family might be smiling in the photo on your fridge, but is their marriage hanging by a thread?’
I winced as the lights suddenly cut off.
Capital Gains
The invisible mission field
Graham Miller
Date posted: 1 Nov 2015
Reading through Scripture I am struck by Christ’s commitment to those on the margins of society.
I feel challenged that he didn’t use clever strategies to aim first to reach the best and brightest from the Jerusalem temple school so that they could be useful for his efforts. Instead, Jesus spent time with lepers, tax collectors, fishermen, women and Samaritans. In recent years the movement to revitalise the church with new plants and initiatives has sometimes focused on the young, the bright and the mobile. If we are to be faithful to the Great Commission we must be careful that our outreach doesn’t leave out large segments of society.