Who was at Bethlehem?
John Peet
Date posted: 1 Dec 2019
John Peet sheds light on the central characters in the nativity scene and explains their significance of their presence.
Last Christmas my wife and I were talking about those who were at Bethlehem. We found it most instructive to think on who and why.
politics & policy
Dark side of the Internet
James Mildred
Date posted: 1 Dec 2019
Without a doubt, one of the most important responsibilities God gives to anyone is the one He gives to parents. Charged with raising their children in the fear of the Lord, theirs is a serious and difficult task. Joy and sorrow often go hand in hand in the mission and task of raising young people.
The challenge of raising children is all the more difficult today because of the Internet. First invented in 1990, it has grown enormously, in ways few predicted when it arrived on the scene. Like most things, there is plenty to enjoy about it. The Internet allows for greater connectivity and for the easier spread of information.
INVESTING IN THE FUTURE
Daniel Blanche
Date posted: 1 Dec 2019
In November, the Riviera International Centre, Torquay, hosted The FIEC Leaders’ Conference. This year’s theme, Leadership at Every Level, was perfectly timed; as attendance reached 1,000 and the FIEC continues to grow numerically, now is the time to carefully consider how to raise up leaders to ensure growth is lasting, sustainable, and deeply rooted in biblical truth.
John Stevens, FIEC President, opened proceedings by reminding the gathered pastors, elders, women’s workers, and other leaders of the biblical vision for leadership from Ephesians 4. Godly leadership, he instructed, proceeds from an identity rooted in the gospel; to lose sight of that is to build ministry on oneself. And the danger? A ministry that finds its worth in oneself will be slow to delegate, loathe showing humility or weakness, and will find pride in concentrating power. Only the gospel sets one free to serve.
50 years ago: 4 Christmases, 2 bishops, 1 gospel
Christopher Idle
Date posted: 1 Dec 2019
Christopher Idle reflects on two memorable Christmas Carol Services where two bishops shared their story of coming to Christ.
When David Sheppard came to live just across the road from us in Peckham, it seemed providential.
Slavic Gospel Association: 70 years young…
Mark Foster
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
Next year, Slavic Gospel Association [UK] will celebrate its 70th birthday. In 1950, Peter Deyneka, the founder of the mission in the USA some 13 years earlier, visited churches in the south of England. Believers caught the vision for reaching Slavic peoples for Christ and the UK branch of SGA was formed in that year.
The initially small efforts to bring encouragement and help to Eastern European people displaced by the Second World War and living in camps in England, Germany and Austria, quickly blossomed. It then burgeoned into a ministry which took Christians through the Iron Curtain, and into situations where the churches were severely persecuted for their faithfulness to Christ and the gospel.
history
Reformers and missions
Michael Haykin
Date posted: 1 Jul 2018
The 16th-century Reformers had a poorly-developed missiology and overseas mission was an area to which they gave little thought.
That is what is said. ‘Yes’, this argument runs, ‘they rediscovered the apostolic gospel, but they had no vision to spread it to the uttermost parts of the earth.’ Possibly the first author to raise the question about this failure of early Protestantism was the Roman Catholic theologian and controversialist, Robert Bellarmine (1542–1621). He argued that one of the marks of a true church was its continuity with the missionary passion of the apostles. In his mind, Roman Catholicism’s missionary activity was indisputable and this supplied a strong support for its claim to stand in solidarity with the apostles.
A tale of two cities: ten years on
Richard Hagan and Matthew Roberts
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
en interviews Richard Hagan and Matthew Roberts who moved to Canterbury and York respectively to plant new churches
Ten years ago this month, Matthew Roberts and Richard Hagan moved with their young families to York and Canterbury them to plant new churches. en asked about the story of Trinity Church York and Emmanuel Church Canterbury.
EFAC today: looking ahead to Lambeth 2020
Bishop Henry Scriven
Date posted: 1 Nov 2019
John Stott is one of my heroes and I had the privilege of meeting him several times. Among the vast number of signifi-cant things that he achieved in his life was the founding of the Evangelical Fellowship in the Anglican Communion in 1961.
EFAC has the clear aim and purpose to encourage and develop biblically faithful fellowship, teaching and mission throughout the Anglican world. Such an all-encompassing purpose must necessarily be honed down to goals that are realistic.
Hope in Vauxhall: one year on…
FIEC
Date posted: 1 Sep 2019
A church plant on an urban housing estate will this month celebrate its first anniversary and its success in building a congregation that represents around a dozen nationalities.
While Hope Church Vauxhall’s first year has brought some challenges, including the death of one of its young couples, Senior Pastor Sam Gibb says he is seeing tremendous gospel progress.
REVIVE: power of the cross
Co-Mission
Date posted: 1 Aug 2019
‘The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved it is the very power of God.’
The words of the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians opened REVIVE, Co-Mission’s Annual Bible Festival which took place at the University of Kent at Canterbury in June. In a Big Top filled with attendees from 28 Co-Mission churches across London, the weekend began with an evening of praise, prayer, interviews and a talk by Richard Coekin, CEO of Co-Mission, on ‘The Power of the Cross’. While the message of Christ crucified is despised as weak and foolish by the world, it is central to the Bible, history and Co-Mission. Indeed, it remains the only way that Co-Mission will grow as a network.
Mission comes front and centre
Keswick Ministries
Date posted: 1 Aug 2018
Tim Chester is our guide along the Keswick Convention’s path to world mission
‘Unknown to me, I had been waiting for this moment. Every part of me tingled with fervent joy and happiness that I was allowed the privilege of responding, and that Christ was inviting me to serve him, to be called his ambassador, his missionary.’
New CEO for Evangelical Alliance
Evangelical Alliance
Date posted: 1 Sep 2019
The Evangelical Alliance announced in July
that Gavin Calver will be its new Chief
Executive Officer. He will succeed general
director Steve Clifford, who announced in
April that he is stepping down.
Dr Tani Omideyi, chair of the Evangelical
Alliance’s board of trustees, said:
‘With a
strong field of applicants, Gavin impressed
the board with his extensive expertise and
his vision for the future, and he left us with
a sense of excitement and great expectation.
We came out of the process feeling confident
that we have found someone chosen of God for this new season.’
Freedom for the captives
Graham Miller
Date posted: 1 Sep 2019
I long to see people come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ all over London – particularly people from other cultures or faith backgrounds, or those who are marginalised by society or living in some of London’s most deprived communities.
Well before the horror of the 2017 fire at Grenfell Tower brought the area to national attention, my colleagues at London City Mission were talking with churches, praying and planning how to bring the good news of Jesus Christ to more people in the area. Having marked the two-year anniversary since that terrible night on 14 June 2017, I want to share with you some of the stories I’ve heard from people who are now ministering in the area alongside local churches.
Indonesia: cannibals come to Christ in Papua
Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF)
Date posted: 1 Sep 2019
According to Unus Walilo, pastor of the church in Apahapsili, a village high in the mountains, the Yali people ‘didn’t know anything about the outside world.
‘We lived in the Stone Age, killing each other, eating our enemies. We didn’t know any other life’, said Unus.
Free Church of Scotland: the next generation
Free Church of Scotland
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
The Free Church of Scotland will facili-tate a focused outreach initiative called ‘Generation19’ which aims to encourage local churches to reach out to their com-munities with the gospel.
In 2017 a census of Scottish churches was carried out by Brierley Consultancy which indicated a sharp decline in church attendance and engagement. The report showed that ‘some 390,000 people regularly attended church, being 7.2% of the Scottish population, down from 17% in 1984.’ This decline was the equivalent of ‘losing ten congregations per month’.
Bahamas: on the front line
CBN news
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
North Carolina-based global humanitarian organisation Operation Blessing sent a relief team on 4 September to Nassau, Bahamas, to bring emergency aid after Hurricane Dorian’s devastation.
Dorian ripped through the Bahamas destroying or severely damaging over 13,000 homes. The death toll is still unknown.
1,000 students equipped for witness
Harriet Delahoy
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
In the last week of August 1,000 Christian Union leaders gathered at the Quinta Christian conference centre in North Shropshire for the 100th Forum conference.
Over the last century, 40,000 students have been equipped for witness in their universities through Forum, and it was a privilege to stand alongside students this year.
Margaret Weston 1929–2019
Julia Cameron
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
Generations of Christian Union members
will remember Margaret Weston with affec-tion and gratitude. Her husband, Canon
Keith Weston, was a widely-loved speaker
in CUs and Margaret often travelled with
him, making herself available to talk with
students.
From 1964 to 1985, Keith was Rector of St
Ebbe’s Church, Oxford. Margaret exercised a
pastoral ministry among
its
students, as
among members of the parish. The rectory
was then amid some of the most deprived
housing in the county.
Somalia: wife divorced after husband finds Bible
Morning Star News
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
A woman was divorced by her Muslim hus-band after he discovered she owned a Bible, it was reported in August.
The husband of the 32-year-old mother of two children discovered that his wife was a Christian and owned a Bible. He demanded that she reveal who had given it to her.
Modern Foxe
Chris Sugden
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
Book Review
HATED WITHOUT A REASON:
The remarkable story of Christian persecution
over the centuries
Read review
Crossing the Culture
Reaching the Sikh
community with the gospel
Jon Taylor
Date posted: 1 Oct 2019
Although Sikhism is a major world reli-gion and the fourth largest UK religion,
it is surprising that even in well-stocked
Christian bookstores
there
is very
little
material in the way of reaching out to the
Sikh community. Typically in the apolo-getic section there are many books regard-ing Islam, some on Hinduism and a few
on Judaism and Buddhism, though little if
anything on Sikhism.
In 1992 Josh McDowell and Don Stewart
wrote ‘Sikhism is a religion all but unknown
to Western civilization’1. Strangely, we are left
with the same conclusion today.
