Ever since my early 20s, I’ve struggled on and off with anxiety and depression. In the last few years, the struggle has become particularly acute. I often wake at 4:30 am and pretend that it’s just the call of my bladder, but I know it isn’t. I know that as soon as I wake, I won’t go to sleep again. My body feels tired—like I’ve been running in my sleep—and my brain whirs away like the hard drive on my computer. I wake up with a thousand questions in my head—none of which seem solvable—and, at times, I’ve been so exhausted, I’ve just curled up in a ball on the floor and cried, wondering if the emptiness will go away soon. I have suffered mainly from anxiety, with periods of very low mood thrown in for good measure. (more…)
Tag Archives: Christian life
Ministry in the military
Everyday Ministry
Happy 21st, Briefing! (A birthday card)
To The Briefing on the occasion of your 21st birthday:
I think I was about 21 when I first met you. I was at a conference up at Merroo (the centre where the showers alternated between scalding hot and freezing cold, and the hall was large enough to house a small aeroplane). You were introduced to me and 500 other Christian university students by your founder, Phillip Jensen, who spoke highly of you as very good reading material—for when you’re on the toilet. (more…)
The first 21 years are the hardest
Resource Talk, Sola Panel
There’s no doubt about it: this 21st birthday Briefing has put me in a nostalgic frame of mind. I’m finding myself daydreaming about the late 80s when New Zealand wore beige and brown body shirts in one day cricket, when U2 was a young, emerging supergroup, and when the book to give away to a non-Christian friend was John Chapman’s bestselling A Fresh Start. (more…)
Review: “Living the Cross Centered Life”
Review
Living the Cross Centered Life: Keeping the gospel the main thing
CJ Mahaney
Multnomah, Sisters, 2006. 176pp.
Is there anything more important than the cross of Christ? Each of the Gospels centres on Jesus’ journey to the cross. Jesus’ wonderful mission statement in Mark 10:45 describes the goal of his ministry as the giving of his life as “a ransom for many”. The Apostle Paul resolved to know nothing except Jesus Christ and him crucified (1 Cor 2:2). The cross is the centre of God’s plan for humanity. (more…)
The obedience of faith
Thought
What does faith in Christ mean? What do people ‘do’ when they believe in Christ? Do they ‘do’ anything? If they ‘do’ something, how do we avoid faith becoming a ‘work’ smuggled in through the Protestant back door? Presumably if we have ‘done’ something (when we believe in Christ), we may justifiably be a little proud of what we have done and think that our belief is some kind of achievement or virtue. So how do we accurately describe the nature of faith in such a way that we exclude human pride? (more…)
The reluctant evangelist – Interview with Mark Dever
Pastoral Ministry
The gospel and the quiet time
Life
Many years ago now I heard a sermon on Matthew 6—the section where Jesus tells his disciples to pray behind locked doors to ensure that they pray to God and not to men. It was, in many ways, an unremarkable sermon. It was clear, faithful and challenging, like much of the preaching that, in God’s kindness, I get to hear. But, like most sermons, it was destined for the dustbin of my mind. Except for one thing: it was the first time I had ever heard a preacher ask, “Have your deeds of righteousness become so secret that not even God can see them?” The question stopped me in my tracks. (more…)
Virtues we dislike: dignity
Up front, Sola Panel
We shouldn’t be shocked when non-Christians find Christian virtues out of date, incomprehensible or just plain hateful. The natural person, Paul reminds us, “does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him” (1 Cor 2:14). (more…)
Virtues we dislike: mortification
Up front, Sola Panel
The story of the Bible can be summarized in two words: death and resurrection. Ultimately, the story of the Bible is about the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. This is the core of the story we call the ‘gospel’. But this basic story also finds its expression in many different and complementary ways throughout the Scriptures. To take just a few examples:
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The sum of the Christian life: The denial of ourselves
John Calvin lived from 1509 to 1564.
(The Christian philosophy of unworldliness and self-denial; we are not our own, we are God’s, 1-3)
Packer’s Lifelong Love
Review
Helpers and trainers
Life
When we first married, my husband kept telling his young single friends that a man was only half a man until he married. Shortly after tying the knot, we left for our duties as the only missionaries on an isolated Aboriginal mission settlement in the Northern Territory. The starry-eyed approach to marriage faded and we became the persons we really were in our relationships. Falling in love was not a sufficient resource to meet the demands of our new life together. Now we were to show that we were ‘one flesh’.