In the most recent paper edition of our diocesan newspaper, Ross Cobb says, “We need to ask if our church music really is contemporary”. Ross is the music director at St Andrew’s Cathedral here in Sydney, and is across any genre you care to throw at him, whether it’s pipe organ or the credibility reducing Burt Bacharach. He says:
Author Archives: The Briefing
A visit to Hillsong
We’ve recently had some American friends staying with us. They sing Hillsong music in their church back home, and so they wanted to check out the church.
The danger of living the gospel without speaking the gospel
Assumption: Godly Christian living in response to the gospel is a clear and unequivocal command in Scripture. It also commends the gospel to a watching world. For instance, 1 Peter 2:12: “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honourable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation”. However, I want to suggest that godly Christian living in response to the gospel is a completely inadequate mission strategy doomed to failure.
The coming of the Son of Man: A response to Sandy’s second post
Sandy began his second post by noting the difficulty of verse 34 for the ‘second coming’ reading. The seriousness of this obstacle should not be overlooked, and a referent for the coming of the Son of Man ought to ‘fit’ with the time frame of this verse.
Housekeeping
Eagle-eyed Sola Panel readers may have noticed a couple of changes to our blog:
- Recent comments now appear just below the Briefing box on the right hand side of the page.
Podcast: Shifting to the personal
Audio
Tony Payne interviews Col Marshall, former Director of the Ministry Training Strategy, about people-focused ministry (MP3).
A scary, prayer-rie verse
For the last few months, I’ve been catching up weekly with my friend Alex. We meet to pray and read the Bible together, and, like a plague of two Egyptian locusts, to raid the contents of my fridge or the local takeaway (depending where we meet) for something resembling lunch.
Climbing the mountain (Zechariah Part III)
Elsewhere, I’ve described studying Zechariah as a bit like climbing a mountain: a great deal of effort, but well and truly worth it for the extraordinary view of God’s creation, through Jesus Christ. But whereas I thought I was just waxing poetical, Tim McMahon (and since then, other helpful friends) have helped me to see that there really is a mountain right there in the structure of Zechariah. It’s in Zechariah 1:7-6:8, and the best way to understand it is to climb over it!
Virtues we hate: chastity
Of all the ancient virtues, this one is not only out of step with contemporary culture but positively despised by it. At the beginning of the 21st century, many have accepted the idea that we are defined by sex—and I mean the activity, not simply our gender. Any attempt to introduce limits to sexual expression is then seen as an assault upon who I am, a violation of my fundamental human rights. Whatever else human beings are, they are sexual at the core. No wonder, then, that the decision to abstain from sexual activity—for whatever reason—is regarded as, well let’s face it, unnatural.
Zechariah—really struggling here! (Part II)
Sola panel readers will remember my first post on Zechariah where I expressed a certain degree of anxiety about understanding it, even with the wonderfully worthwhile help of Tim McMahon, whose studies on this book I’ve just been editing. Today, the story continues …
Has the Roman Catholic Church changed its mind?
The Council of Trent is a Roman Catholic Council that met in the middle of the 16th century specifically in order to condemn Protestant teaching on how we get right with God. In particular, they condemned the notion of ‘justification by faith alone’, an idea summarized and taught by Paul’s words in Romans 3:21-26:
Work and the kingdom of God
Why do we work? What value do we attach to our work? Does our choice of jobs matter?
There’s a lot of talk in Christian circles these days about work. Much of that talk seems to put a value on work that I simply don’t find in the Bible.
The coming of the Son of Man: A response to Sandy’s first post
Discussions about the Apocalyptic Discourse have to involve timing. Obviously I have a problem with this, given how slow I am to emerge from my underworld to respond to Sandy Grant’s invitation to discuss Matthew 24. Sorry about that! Even with Sandy’s pre-warning, I have been found sleeping like a disciple in Gethsemane.
The broken marriage of preaching and pastoring
It’s sometimes said of a minister of a congregation (and not necessarily with unkind intent) that, although they struggle somewhat as a preacher, they are brilliant pastors. Sometimes the comment runs in the other direction: “[Insert name] is a fine preacher, but he lacks pastoral ability”. It’s not hard to grasp what people mean by this. Some people are fine communicators in the pulpit, but are quite poor at interpersonal relationship. They’re like the minister who is regularly seen working at his desk, but who has trained his secretary so well that it is almost impossible to speak to him without an appointment (which could be anything up to two weeks away!). Other ministers have attractive personalities and good social skills, and are loved by all, but somehow they fail to speak to a congregation with clarity and conviction. (more…)
Doing good: The shape of the Christian life (Part 1): Why we don’t
Life
Stuart Heath argues that the Christian life is more than just having faith, it’s about doing good.
This is Part 1 of a three-part series. Read Part 2 and Part 3.
“Being Christian is not about doing good things”, quoth the preacher. “It’s about trusting in Jesus.” Here is the uniqueness of the Christian story: God in Christ has acted on our behalf. We could never be good enough to satisfy God’s requirements—we deserve to be condemned. But Jesus took our punishment for us, rescuing us from God’s right anger. God calls us not to earn our salvation, but to trust that he can save us. This is a beautiful, soul-satisfying truth. But when we talk about being Christian, if we only ever speak about ‘believing in Jesus’, we are dangerously out of step with the New Testament. (more…)