'Restoring hope in our church'
Steve Donald
Date posted: 1 Nov 2003
'Restoring Hope to the Church' was the title of a recent Anglican national initiative featuring church leaders and parishes engaging with their communities. However, hope for the Church of England rests in whether it will turn away from the liberal agenda that has dominated it for so many years to the gospel agenda outlined in the Bible.
There is great hope coming from the mainly orthodox and growing Anglican Communion which appears determined to exercise biblical discipline on the New Westminister decision to allow same-sex blessings and the New Hampshire decision to appoint the first gay Bishop, Gene Robinson. Manchester Cathedral has been caught up in this crisis by agreeing to host a service in October for the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement.
Monthly column for hymns and songs
Christopher Idle
Date posted: 1 Nov 2003
Worship & war
Before this series signs off (next month, after four years; believe it or not, it replaced Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones in the paper), and before postmodernism is eclipsed by something else, let's try out a bit of pm-ism here. That is, the text you are reading and singing from may sometimes be crucially defined by its context or its readers, whatever the author thought it meant.
For example, however you chose to remember September 11, November 11 still reverberates at least in the older national British consciousness. 'Armistice Day' may have been transferred to 'Remembrance Sunday', but it is 11/11 which defines the relevant religious observance-for some, the last surviving vestige of a liturgical year.
Monthly column on hymns and songs
Christopher Idle
Date posted: 1 Sep 2003
Unless a British Christian of the current generation has been stolidly attending only one church, or one kind of church, for the past 20 years, it is unlikely that he/she will have failed to encounter 'Mission Praise', in one of its many shapes or forms.
The success of this book has been phenomenal; in some congregations it has swept the board, and even in otherwise catholic, reformed, liberal or charismatic assemblies it has crept in at least as an alternative option for Sunday or the week night gathering. How come?
Bible isn't rubbish any more!
Terry White from Belfast found a Bible in a council skip. It changed his life.
I come from a non-Christian family. In 1985, while walking up the road one morning, a friend offered me a job. Immediately I said 'yes'. I wanted it because I had been unemployed for three years. He told me to come down to the council offices for an interview. After I had a medical, I got the job!
Monthly column on student work
UCCF
Date posted: 1 Sep 2003
It's been a scorcher of a summer. As I write, temperatures are climbing towards a record 100 degrees. So as Britain basked in the hottest summer and students dispersed to go on mission teams, family holidays, or to earn some cash, what have I been up to? Did I stop work in the absence of any student activity on campus? Have I spent the summer months topping up my tan and perfecting my barbecuing techniques?
I may have been tempted to, but instead a sweltering office in Victoria has been my home. But I'm not complaining, because I was given the exciting task of working with a team of students and UCCF staff around the country to prepare three new projects for launch in September.
Brief lives
John Benton
Date posted: 1 Oct 2003
Book Review
THE BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY OF EVANGELICALS
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Excellent
John Benton
Date posted: 1 Oct 2003
Book Review
THE BLURB 36 pages. £1.75 Published by UCCFThis month sees the launch of an excellent new magazine from UCCF who usually write this column for EN. For obvious reasons we couldn't let them review their own mag, so...
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Leadership, truth & witness
UCCF
Date posted: 1 Oct 2003
As UCCF gives thanks for 75 years of witness to Christ in the student world EN asked Dr. Oliver Barclay, a staff member of UCCF from 1945 and General Secretary 1964-1980, to reflect on his involvement with the Christian Union movement.
EB: What was your experience as a Christian student?
Taking a tough job
Jonathan Stephen, who for many years has pastored Carey Baptist Church in Reading, takes up the position of Director of British Evangelical Council from September. Known as a man who likes to get things done, EN asked Jonathan about what the future might hold . . .
EN: Can you remind us of the function of BEC and how it came into being?
IFES now in 150 nations
Fred Catherwood
Date posted: 1 Sep 2003
The apostle's vision of heaven, with saints 'from every nation, tribe, people and language' is brought vividly to life by the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students (IFES).
This summer its' World Assembly drew delegates from 115 national student movements, and from most of the other 35 countries where work has started. As the names of one country after another came up on the screen in the opening meeting, it was hard to keep back the tears. The last countries to appear were those who would formally join the Fellowship that week: Russia, Rwanda, Indonesia, Belize, Lesotho and St. Lucia. They rolled up the screen to spontaneous applause.
Monthly column on student work
UCCF
Date posted: 1 Jul 2003
If you want a long history of Christian work at university, and a wide variety of local churches to choose from, then Queen's campus in Stockton is not the place to go.
However, in the last five years the Christian Union has grown from non-existence to one of the fastest growing groups in the country. Their aim is simple: to proclaim the gospel to as many students as possible. God has honoured their work and people are sitting up and taking notice; not just their fellow students, but other CUs in the North East too.
'That excellent society!'
Andy Banton
Date posted: 1 Jun 2003
Recently I met a man who, five years before, had been converted to Christ after no less than 15 years as a heroin addict.
The Lord's means of his deliverance and salvation was an open-air preacher who had faithfully made Christ known outside Whitechapel Tube Station in London.
Future hopes for the Church of England
Nigel Scotland
Date posted: 1 Jun 2003
R.V.G. Tasker, a former Professor of New Testament at Kings College, London, once wrote that 'hope is a psychological necessity'.
Such is certainly the case at the beginning of a new year for those of us who are members of the Church of England as we face many uncertainties in matters of belief, finance and strategy. Thankfully 'hope springs eternal in the human breast' and, although there is much gloom on the horizon, most of us still find ourselves harbouring some hopes of better things to come.
Preachers: coming or going?
Ken Brownell
Date posted: 1 Jul 2003
Why are ministers going to North America and why should they think of staying here? Ken Brownell has investigated this pressing question...
I have been thinking about writing this for some time. Every so often we hear of a good minister leaving this country and moving to North America. When recently I heard that two very well-known ministers are planning to do just that, I decided the time has come. Because I am an American, but have lived here for 27 years, I may be able to say what a Briton could not without sounding like sour grapes.
EZ36 - Rebuild the ruined cities
Dai Hankey
Date posted: 1 Aug 2003
8.00 am. The park has been abandoned for years. Only the frame of the swings is left - the rest has been ripped up or burned down. Just yards away the smouldering corpse of another car continues to send up smoke to the heavens. A mother and her children scurry past on their way to school. The picture is bleak. The future...
Like many other council estates, the St. Mellons estate in Cardiff has had its fair share of problems over the years. The large out-of-town estate was written off by the former Welsh Secretary, John Redwood, as a den of single mothers and scroungers.
Hotel Kupendeshwa?
Noel and Margaret Todd
Date posted: 1 Jun 2003
Six months managing the Africa Inland Mission Guest House in Kampala in 2002. Fascinating (kupendeshwa is the Swahili). Missionaries are particularly interesting people. . . .
Here comes Wayne from Texas. True, he does not have six guns and a stetson. But the laconic drawl and the laid-back ambience are vintage Wild West. He is 'just down from Sudan'.
The changing face of Christian engagement with Muslims
Peter Riddell
Date posted: 1 May 2003
The withdrawal of Western powers from former colonies after World War II was accompanied by a developing sense of guilt at Europe's colonial past.
Hand in hand went a progressive disengagement by post-colonial Western societies from Christian mission activities. Within Western societies in general, and even within some parts of the church, mission came to be regarded as controversial at best, and with downright hostility in certain quarters. It came to be seen by many as just another form of colonialism.
Justice, Mercy and Humility: integral mission and the poor
It seems that very few churches or Christian mission organisations make any effort to consider how the context of their mission is likely to change before they plan. There is a tendency to plan as though the future is simply an extension of the present.
Futurists seek to identify driving forces for change. There is a widespread consensus that one of the major driving forces for change as we race into the 21st century is globalisation. It is our belief that globalisation is already changing the world in which we live, seek to serve Christ and think about mission. We join others and use 'McWorld' as a metaphor to characterise the globalisation of our planetary society.