Thanks for stopping my my blog since August – I’ve enjoyed starting it up. The top three posts for the year were: Go away, said the welcome team What prayer and ministry of the Word can never do It’s not a sin Actually that’s a lie – the top post was the free e-book version
A friend just described two churches to me, and I didn’t expect what he told me. One is a church planted about nine years ago, established and growing solidly – around 100 people on a Sunday. The other is enormous, one of London’s largest, with an international congregation and reputation, and a leader you’ve probably
Just read proofs for ‘Encountering God Together’ by David Peterson – new book from IVP due out in Jan/Feb. It’s very, very good – so save up those Christmas tokens!
I’m writing this eating my breakfast on the train. Which means a cup of rather weak black coffee, and a carton of microwaved stodge. Which brings me to preaching. Because I reckon we’re serving up a lot of microwaved stodge from our pulpits, and letting ourselves off the hook by quoting a bible verse or
So, you preached your heart out last Sunday, and you’re revving your engine for the next one. Prayer and the Ministry of the Word are setting your agenda, and your next sermon is an essential part of equipping the saints for their work of service. The Greek New Testament is sitting there waiting to be
A wise pastor friend pointed out to me, “You get what you teach.” Which means that if we preach that evangelism is important, but don’t do anything about it, then what we actually teach is that Christians are people who talk a lot about evangelism but don’t do anything about it. Which makes a lot
Ever since the church growth movement highlighted that we need Celebrations, Congregations and Cells, and the historians pointed out that revivals in the church frequently accompany the rediscovery of small groups, churches have become used to having small group bible studies as part of their life. Here’s a secret: put pastors on a platform, and
A young conference speaker was once asked how he found time to do all his studying. The clear, loud voice of John Stott replied from the other side of the room, ‘He doesn’t find time; he makes it!’ The first time the apostles would have realised that their decision to delegate in Acts 6 had
What is the heartbeat of our ministry? And what does that look like in daily life and planning? In a short series, we’re going to consider the central element, and what that means. Acts 6:1-7 was a clarifying moment for the early church. Burdened by the demands of spiritual growth and physical need, their structures
‘Pastor’ – it is an odd word that needs first translating as ‘shepherd’, and then explaining and clarifying every time we use it. But it has stood the test of time as one of the fundamental metaphors of Christian ministry. No other word seems to capture the idea of gentle leadership, modelled on Jesus. But
At the time of the Reformation the church had to learn that it had twisted some biblical vocabulary out of its biblical shape. The word ‘priest’, which is biblically a word ensuring free and open access of all of God’s people, who are all priests, had become limited to a few, who stood as
What, then, are we to make of the place of singing in our meetings? It was a major feature of the Old Testament Tabernacle and Temple, and even though there are fewer mentions in the New Testament, there are enough to indicate it was a normal feature of Christian life, individually and corporately, spontaneous and
Titus 2:1-15 We sing, we pray, and then we listen to a sermon and go to sleep. Of course there are reasons why we go to sleep – and as someone with a busy job and two young children I find the silence and lack of distraction as tempting as the next parent. But
