seeing in a mirror dimly

Well, over Friday evening and through Saturday, a group of about 50 of us had the privilege of hearing Carl Trueman speak on the topic of Creeds and Confessions.  It was excellent – lots of stuff to think about, and lots of great encouragement too! Carl took three sessions (with Mark Thompson taking a great session on the 39 Articles in between) which were:

1. Christians who know what they believe in a world which believes nothing
2. Confessing Christ in context
3. Confessing Christ in the future

These are some of the key points I thought Carl made during his lectures (it’s a little random, but worth putting down!):

- Contra today’s emphasis on progress, and the future, Christians know that 1) Truth is verbally formulated, 2) There are bodies which do the formulation, and 3) Truth can, to some extent, cross time and space.
- God does Church, we don’t! And Church is a doctrinal entity (not purely experiential), which presupposes knowledge and experience, which in turn presupposes office (Heb 14:7-9, 1 Tim 5:17,  Romans 10:9, Titus 1:5, James 3).  Thus, training and age are important.
- The order of Calvin’s institutes cannot be read up into his theology. Crucial.
- There are two types of Christian: One who writes their creeds down in order to be open with what they believe, and the other who prefers to keep them in the background
- The fact that Calvin and Luther didn’t reject the perpetual virginity of Mary shows how they valued tradition.
- The proof-texts of the Westminster Confession of Faith point you to traditions in the commentaries – they aren’t crude and brute proofs in and of themselves.  They urge you to pick up the 30 or 40 commentaries on that verse to see why the point was made.
- Confessions are necessary for corporate unity.  Eg: the Emerging Church is correct to point out the individualism of current evangelicalism, but hasn’t solved the problem since they haven’t produced any confession of belief.  Thus, they have a rubbery, non-existent corporate unity.
- Confessions demonstrate our integrity.  Eg, Luther and Zwingli and their disagreement on the Lord’s Supper: [it] “was a tragedy, but would have been an even greater tragedy if they had agreed.”
- Confessions require catechisms.  They are vital to the communication of the faith.  Carl agrees with Jaroslav Pelikan: “any movement that is based around personal salvation in Jesus but is divorced from creeds and confessions is doomed.”
- Confessions relativise the present.  Since they stand the test of time, but they be used to measure how significant current issues are.
- Carl made an interesting suggestion of preaching through confessions.  Morning worship with expository sermons, then a church family lunch, then afternoon worship with a sermon based around the week’s confessional point.
- Confessions must not simply be used as a test of orthodoxy, but they should ultimately bring us back to doxology – since of course, that was in the mind of the framers!

Personally, I’ve been challenged to think about my doctrine of baptism, and the importance of this for my future ministry in the Anglican Church. I think I’ve been taking this doctrine quite lightly, but actually should reconsider this, in light of upholding the 39 artictles.  And also, I’d be keen to think about preaching through the 39 articles at some point also (bar the one on the Queen!).

So, all in all – a great conference and a great guy.  I’m looking forward to Wednesday night’s lecture back at the PTC.  It’s on BB Warfield’s theology.  Info here.

Number 8 of the Pilgrim’s Podcast, and we get into some really great things with Geoff Chambers.

Geoff is a really great guy from college who blogs over here.  He’s a humble, keen, thoughtful and easy-going bloke.  He’s also involved with St. Saviour’s Anglican church in Redfern and shares about his involvement and time there.   Geoff’s got a big heart for the Aboriginal community and wants to head up to the Armidale region of Australia to share the Gospel there in the future.  Listen in to see if there’s any way to get behind his future ministry!

Along with the normal rambling, there lots of shout-outs on this show: they go out to Stan Lie, Jacko, Nigel Fortescue, Phil Markham and Shane Rogerson!

If any of our Nepalese or Indian listeners can help Steve, please get in touch with him asap (and this’ll only make sense after 5:45)

Ok, listen here:
 

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Well, apologies for the delay in getting the Podcast up! Steve and I had to get around those pesky exams, and Justin is a busy guy!  But here it is (it’s our shortest ever Podcast!):

We had a great time.  We got together on the premises of St. Phillip’s York Street, Sydney and had a good old yarn.  Justin is a fantastic guy and a faithful servant of Jesus Christ.  We talked about his upbringing in Perth and Sydney, his ministry in Christ Church NYC, his ministry at St. Phillip’s York Street, and what sorts of exciting things he has planned for the North of the City CBD!

Especially interesting are his insights into younger evangelicals he learnt in Manhattan.  Also, he outlines some of the new ideas to reach people in the city, and of course we have a great time of banter and shnouncements!

Links:

St Phillip’s York Street
Christ Church NYC

Listen:

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Well we’ve hit #4 of the Pilgrim’s Podcast! Very grateful for all your listening, and thoughts and props!

This episode was a world first for Steve and me! We had the first ever woman join the Pilgrim’s Podcast (and many more to come!).  Ruth Lee came and shared all about the RICE movement: Revolution, Events, Regenerate, and upcoming conferences!  She’s awesome – and a great pilgrim who loves Jesus! We also heard all about the great work with the EQUIP women’s conferences – in fact, we signed up to get a Pilgrim’s Podcast team down there next year!

We also: had an awesome start to the podcast, launched our SMBC lovespot, gave shnouncements, talked about how to balance our work and play for Jesus, and Ruthy identified with an amazing movie! Get into it!

RICE: www.riceevent.org.au
RICE REGENERATE: www.riceregenerate.org
EQUIP: www.equip.org.au (next event: Saturday 8th May, 2010)

Can I put a serious plug in here for the RICE movement.  Sam Mak, Steve Chong, Ruthy and others are wonderful servants of our Lord and He is blessing this ministry in great ways.  If you haven’t (or your church hasn’t) yet gotten involved, do it! Hit up the site above and get in touch – great things are happening now, and there are great plans for the future too!

Listen here:
 

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Well folks, here’s episode #2 of the Pilgrim’s Podcast.

Basically, it’s what you’ve been waiting for: Steve and I interview the world famous Sam Russell about Coffee roasting and tasting, Church planting and ministry things!

As always, there’s rambling, laughs, good times and of course: shout-outs! If you want a shout-out on the Pilgrim’s Podcast, just reply and we’ll drop you a shout-out next week!

** Add the Pilgrim’s Podcast to your iTunes too: Click here.

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Well folks, here’s what you’ve all been waiting for.  Well some of you.  For the rest (majority?!) who haven’t – check it out! 

Steve Gardner and myself have started a weekly podcast where we talk to people about life, church, ministry and the joys of living the Christian life!

Every 2nd week we’ll be interviewing someone from college, and every alternate 2nd week we’ll reach out into the community to chat to Christian artists, psychologists, ministers, students and others to above-mentioned end.

This introductory episode of the Pilgrim’s covers: What this Podcast is? Who we are? The ministries we’re involved in, and a whole lot of rambling!  Prizes and Announcements at the end!

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Also, check out Steve Gardner’s blog – going live tomorrow!

And stay tuned for next week’s thrilling installment with Sam Rusty Russell!

Well I had quite an amazing evening last night.  A fundraising dinner with our Prime Minister Kevin Rudd at Bishopscourt!  Present also were Peter Jensen (Archbishop of Sydney), John Woodhouse (Principal of Moore College), Bruce Baird and 15 or so others who made fantastic company.  We were there to try and raise the funds to help Moore college through this challenging time in the economy, and Mr Rudd was our honoured guest.  

Kirst Sandell (2nd year Moore), Afred Olwa (PhD. student, Moore), and Tim (3rd year Moore) were simply there to share our experiences as students.  And it was a humbling and greatly encouraging night.

The real highlight was the address by the Prime Minister.  As usual, his speech was prepared for him in advance – but during Archbishop Jensen’s address, John Woodhouse’s speech and the short interviews with us students, he was jotting down some notes.  Then, as he rose to speak it became apparent that he spoke not from the pre-prepared speech, but from the notes that he had jotted down.  What came next was an amazing display of intelligent and genuine public speech.  Engaging with those who had just spoken (so much so, I was referred to as “mate”!), Kevin Rudd rehearsed his deep knowledge of the theology and ethics of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  He then went on to explain his tension between being “true to thine self,” and how he handles making a public prosecution of his faith.  It was an incredibly honest and genuine moment of sharing.  His commendation of Moore College came next.  Followed lastly by his exhortation to acts of mercy in light of the economic challenges ahead.  Us students were particular urged to think through what claims these challenges might make on us in the parish we will minister in.  The night ended in prayer and thanks.

And then he left around 10:30pm (after an already hectic day – he’s been preparing the country’s budget!) and went off to another meeting.

I was blown away mainly by 1) his genuine faith and honest time of sharing, and 2) the physical and emotional strength he must have to meet and greet people all through the day, and yet engage with them with such friendliness.  Praise the Lord for the encouraging night we had!

Let’s hope it encourages many to give financially to the work of Moore college in service to Christ’s church.  And may we all take up our cross as we move into this next challenging period of our country’s life.  

As Bonhoeffer says in his Cost of Discipleship, “When Christ calls a man, He calls him: Come and die.”

Two interesting links, from two interesting guys!

Mark Thompson from Moore College discusses the location of the Trinity with respect to John Webster’s writings, on his blog here.

Tim Chester of Total Church fame discusses the “one-anothering” of New Testament ecclesiology which forms part of our church community on his blog here.

Here’s a taster of Mark Thompson’s post:

“… is it the doctrine of the Trinity which stands at the very centre? Is every other Christian doctrine ultimately an exposition of this doctrine? Or might we speak more accurately of the triune God at the centre? God is the ground of everything that exists. All truth is ultimately traceable to him. But do we put the doctrine under unreasonable strain by suggesting that it ‘comprehends within itself all further teaching about creatures, their nature and ends’?”

And a taster of Tim Chester’s post:

“All the New Testament writers refer often to what we are to do to or for ‘one another’ (or ‘each other’ – the Greek is the same). This concept of ‘one anothering’ is a central feature of New Testament ecclesiology, albeit one which receives little attention in contemporary academic discussions.”

They’re both good reads – check them out!

What do you reckon? Are you for large churches with multiple sites? Or do you prefer smaller local churches with a single site?  Are you passionately for or against them?

Not having attended one, I haven’t seen how things would work.  But my big question is that of NT prescribed community.  Weeping with those who weep.  Rejoicing with those who rejoice.  Can we do church over multiple  sites? Love to hear your thoughts!

More info at: Mars Hill Global and 9Marks Journal Special on Multi-Site Churches.

I was really struck by this beautiful hymn at church this morning, and was so blown away by it, that I thought it absolutely necessary to blog it!

The author – Samuel Stone – wrote it in response to the unorthodox teachings of Bishop of Natal, South Africa – Bishop Colenso.  Now, what really blew me away was that I had recently been reading the history of the Anglican Church in SA from a great book, A Candle Burns in Africa which mentioned exactly this story of Bp. Colenso!

These 3rd and 5th verses really got me longing for the day when the Lord would put everything aright.  I hope they leap out at you too!

Though with scornful wonder

the world sees her oppressed,

by schisms rent asunder,

by heresies distressed,

yet saints their watch are keeping,

their cry goes up, “How long?”

and soon the night of weeping

shall be the morn of song.

Yet she on earth has union

with God the Three in One,

and mystic sweet communion

with those whose rest is won.

O happy ones and holy!

Lord, give to us the grace

like them, the meek and lowly,

in heaven to seek your face.

Have a listen to the song and you think about the lyrics:

http://media.songsandhymns.org/mp3/TheChurchsOneFoundation.mp3 

 

“I will build my church and the gates of Hell will not overcome it” – Jesus.  Matthew 16:18

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