Should we be ‘nice’?
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
Dear Editor,
David Robertson (en March), poses the very relevant question of why many Christians today are so concerned about being ‘nice’. Robertson Biblically demonstrates the case at appropriate times, for preaching the gospel extremely vigorously. It is also obvious there would be no Christianity today without Christ’s unwavering mission stance and likewise that of His steadfast followers down the succeeding ages, whether Catholics or Protestants.
Praying in Parliament
Nicola Laver
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
The Prime Minister was among a bumper crop of MPs attending this year’s Parliamentary Breakfast on 27 June, alongside representatives from the Christian community.
More than 700 parliamentarians - including a record 180-plus MPs - and Christian leaders met together at Westminster Hall for the annual recognition of Christianity’s contribution to UK life.
A plea for pastoral brotherhood
Aaron Prelock
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
Between 1979 and 1999 the Pope, John Paul II, published a collection of essays titled ‘Letters to My Brother Priests’. That sentiment, that his fellow clergy were his brothers, is something we would do well to learn from in our Protestant circles.
Those who serve Christ’s sheep as shepherds should see themselves as being in a spiritual brotherhood, a brotherhood that’s in desperate need of each other. The church has struggled with pastoral abuse, scandals, burnouts, and dropouts. The last few years of Covid, war, civil unrest and political instability have only heightened the weight carried by pastors. These trials have taken their toll. But where are pastors to turn when they need help?
‘The central plank of women’s rights is the cross’
Rebecca McLaughlin
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
Rebecca McLaughlin holds a PhD from Cambridge University and a theology degree from Oak Hill Theological College in London. She is the author of several books including Confronting Christianity: 12 Hard Questions for the World’s Largest Religion. She spoke to Rebecca Chapman for en.
en: Tell me how you came to faith?
How can pastors go the distance?
Jeremy Brooks
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
It was my tenth anniversary in my current pastorate, and I was given a three-month sabbatical.
When contemplating potential sabbatical projects my thoughts went to surviving and thriving in pastoral ministry over the long haul, and then I hatched a plan.
everyday evangelism
Are you glad in your faith?
Glen Scrivener
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
For the last few columns we’ve been trying to follow Blaise Pascal’s advice about persuading the sceptical.
Before his death in 1662 he suggested that we make people of good will ‘wish it were true, then show them that it is.’ I promise we’ll move on from this Pascalian perspective next month, but allow me one last word on the subject. In this column it’s very much a case of ‘once more with feeling.’
Keswick: James Robson's personal reflections
James Robson
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
The Keswick Convention has been running since 1875. Over these years, much has stayed the same: the same passion for Christ, the same longing for lives transformed by God’s word, the same heart for global mission.
The event is open to everyone and is funded by donations. There is no fee to attend. The beautiful town of Keswick in the Lake District remains the home of the Convention.
Grief inspires ministry of grace in Romania
Slavic Gospel Association
Date posted: 1 Aug 2023
The tragic early death of a young man, Filip Faragau, after a long battle with cancer, is providing the inspiration for a unique ministry in the city of Cluj-Napoca, Romania.
Violeta, Filip’s widow, carried out their shared desire to provide affordable accommodation for cancer patients and their families in the city. In the months leading up to Filip’s death they met many who could not afford the cost of staying there, either to access treatment themselves or to care for loved ones receiving cancer care. The seed was sown for what is now ‘Casa Filip’, in Violeta’s own words, ‘a nice, comfortable place, where people could come and stay without having to spend a fortune for their accommodation’. Slavic Gospel Association (UK) have supported this vital work prayerfully and practically from the start. Filip and his family were valued, long-term friends of the mission.
The world’s most daring mission?
Iain Taylor
Date posted: 1 Sep 2022
An international humanitarian organisation whose director was previously imprisoned in a freezing cold metal container by the Taliban has become the first Christian group permitted to return to Afghanistan.
Shelter Now International (SNI) has been invited to return by the hardline Islamic regime to help with relief efforts in the country. And it has already provided humanitarian aid in the provinces of Khost and Paktika after severe earthquakes struck there recently.
Can the Church of England be revived?
Andy Mason
Date posted: 1 Jun 2023
It would be easy to answer that question with a quick ‘no’. After all, we Anglicans are facing huge problems: a loss of gospel truth, obstruction from bishops and ongoing spiritual compromise throughout the institution.
This present mess has been a long time coming, and it is, in many ways, no surprise. Surely, then, it is all over with the Church of England, and we should just leave such a moribund institution? There is, after all, nothing sacred about an ecclesiastical institution in and of itself, and we know that denominational borders are not the borders of spiritual Israel. Everything would be simpler if we just came out so that we could breathe freely once again!
PNG: Fifty years of a family’s faithful witness
In 2019, website devpolicy.org told the story of Sally’s life and background. Cleo Fleming wrote:
Sally’s family has lived and worked with the Bedamuni people of PNG since the late 1960s, when her parents, Tom and Salome Hoey, went to Western Province to establish a Christian mission there. Raised in farming families from Queensland, they were both immensely practical people who had a range of life skills to add to the training they received at Tahlee Bible College before leaving Australia.
Questioning students overflow outside at CU mission
Daniel Stafford
Date posted: 1 Apr 2023
An event hosted by Christian Unions in the city of Liverpool was so highly anticipated that students had to stand outside the venue to remain in earshot.
Students in University of Liverpool, Liverpool John Moores, and Liverpool Hope universities (pictured left and centre) came together to host a week of daily, high-profile, evangelistic events entitled ‘Truth Defined’. With students facing a much more unsettled and uncertain future, greater numbers than ever are open to considering faith, with over 100 students crowded into a packed-out venue.
‘I’m in’ – stem cell transplant student comes to faith
Kitty Hardyman
Date posted: 1 Jul 2023
‘What’s stopping you taking the step to become a Christian?’ For Chris, a student at Nottingham Trent University, this Spring was the point at which he was able to answer ‘nothing’ – and give his life to Jesus Christ, writes Kitty Hardyman of Christian student organisation UCCF.
Chris made his commitment of faith attending the Word Alive conference alongside faithful friends from Nottingham Trent Christian Union who had walked with him during the past four years at university. The journey had been long, but surrounded by 800 other undergraduates and the wider church family, it was at Word Alive that the decision was set plainly before him, and he was able to say: ‘I’m in’.
Young French believers meet en masse
Iain Taylor
Date posted: 1 Jul 2023
Around 6,500 teenagers and young people from churches across France gathered in Zénith d’Auvergne at a large triennial congress – Echo 2023 – that seeks to encourage young members of evangelical churches to discover God’s calling. The theme of Echo 2023 was ‘See, I Am Doing Something New’ (Isa. 43:9).
The programme was based on three areas: ‘Me and God; Us and God; You and Me’. It included preaching, worship, workshops, concerts and special programmes for Ados (12–17 years old) and Jeunes (18 and over). Christian youth workers also offered training and connections. Seminars addressed issues such as Bible reading, Christian ethics, science and faith, and sexuality.
news in brief
Kenya: 36,000 hear the
gospel
The Message School of Evangelism (part
of the Message Trust) has held an exciting
week of mission in Nanyuki, Kenya, in
partnership with The Global Network of
Evangelists.
The initiative involved working in schools,
visiting prisons, street evangelism and an
evangelistic festival. During this time the
students
shared
the gospel with 36,150
people and 6,230
responded. One man,
initially
hostile,
eventually
listened
to
the gospel. He changed from being
loud
and aggressive to apologising and
feeling
peaceful. The team prayed with him as he
accepted Jesus into his life.
George Verwer through the decades: an appreciation
David Baker
Date posted: 1 May 2023
The impact of George Verwer, the mission pioneer who has just died (see obituary here), was so extensive that for me, as with many others, he has seemed like a constant influence, even though we never met.
My first encounter with his work was when one of the OM ships visited Bristol, where we lived, in the 1970s. To a small boy, the idea of Christians voyaging round the world giving out books seemed an exotic, alluring and rather exciting one, and I still remember the smiles of those serving on the ship.
New missionaries aim for first Bible
Nicola Laver
Date posted: 1 May 2023
Five years ago, a translation of the New Testament into Keliko – a South Sudanese language – was ceremoniously and joyfully carried into a Ugandan refugee camp church.
Today, new missionaries are preparing to fly to Uganda later in the year to join the Bible translation team. Philip and Heidi Knight will be working with the Keliko people – an ethnic group who have never had the Bible in their own language.
letter from the
Philippines: One year on, a new church plant
Reuben & Cathy Saywell
Date posted: 1 May 2023
One year here and the Lord has not only given us a clear mission to keep us busy, but also continued provisions to keep us going and countless blessings to keep us praising.
Just before our family took the big step onto the mission field, we were reminded at our commissioning service that the God who sends is also the God who supplies. The same Jesus who was described as Immanuel at His incarnation is the One who, at His ascension, was self-identified as the God who will be with us always, even to the end of the age. What a comfort to have studied, sensed, and seen that promise to be true over the past 12 months as missionaries, thousands of miles from home.
Ten Questions: A noisy prayer life!
Andy Bannister
1. How did you become a Christian?
Pain produces church growth in Krakow
One Polish church in the southern city
of Krakow has experienced remarkable
growth over the last two years in surprising
circumstances: the Covid-19 pandemic and
warfare, writes Tim Thornborough.
Christ
the Saviour Presbyterian Church
(CSPC) currently meets in a converted bank
and, as we entered, we were handed headsets to
enable us to listen to the live translation of the
service from Polish to English. Others picked
up the headsets marked ‘Ukrainian’. My main
contact in Krakow is Sashko – a Ukrainian from
Lviv, just over the border from Poland – who is
the assistant minister at the church.
Women in hard places
Judith Dennis
Date posted: 1 Jun 2023
Book Review
COME WITH ME TO KATHMANDU:
12 powerful stories of women’s
courageous faith in Nepal
Read review
The terrible quandary facing C of E evangelicals
An informal update on Living in Love and Faith in the York General Synod only shed light on division and stalemate.
After the vote in February, much was left to be brought back in July. Though the synod voted in favour of the House of Bishops’ proposals, vital questions remained unanswered about the final form of the prayers, the pastoral guidance for their use and the provision for those who in conscience could not accept them. In truth, it was a vote to continue with a process, a process which was instantly hampered by the same profound disagreements that were aired in the debate. Church Society Associate Director, Ros Clarke, a member of General Synod, shared in the session that, ‘despite all the good conversations, the sharing and the hearing, the growing fellowship and friendships, there is a profound disagreement which continues to exist on these issues.’