Working With Addiction (Page 3)

Working With Addiction (Page 3)

Where Will Our Future leaders Come From?

At Niddrie we will be launching a new church planting initiative within the next month. We are calling it “20Schemes” and further details will follow. We are launching this project in partnership with a church in Kentucky called Bardstown Christian Fellowship, itself planted by a Scotsman, Matthew Spandler-Davison. We are also benefitting hugely from the…

Faith Comes By Hearing

“Faith Comes By Hearing”  is a good resource site for those of us who work with people who find it difficult to read. One of the things we are currently considering at NCC is filming more Bible studies and building a contextualised, oral resource library for our ministry. If anybody knows of any similar resources or is interested in helping us develop material…

How Too Much Discipleship Was Hurting Our New Christians

Our current church membership stands at about 55, with another 15 or so waiting in the wings to be baptised. We have a Sunday attendance of anywhere between 70 and 100 (I suspect that’s roughly the same number of urinals found at any Mars Hill Church). By any description we are a small…

Leave Rap To The Experts Saddos!!

Just to prove that (c)rapness knows no cultural bounds! [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnT22QImDLY] OK…this has been a ‘stop doing rap if it’s not your gig’ week. Indeed, what is worse is when churches think they’re cool by doing it as some sort of marketing tool to reach non Christians. They just think you’re tragic and very,…

A Look Back In Time

I found this little clip of the social history of Niddrie and Craigmillar online. I have also discovered that the urban regeneration that has been going on here for the last 10 years is not the first time the government has tried to ‘clean up’ the area in the last 100 years. Indeed, Niddrie & Craigmillar have both received many facelifts over that time. It…

What Do A Group of Violent Thieves, Liars, Drug Addicts, Alcohol Abusers & Ex Convicts Have In Common?

The answer is ‘nothing‘ until you throw Jesus Christ into the mix! Let me introduce you to the four new housemates at James Ramsay House. JRH is a Victorian house owned by Niddrie Community Church and is situated…

What Causes Poverty & Do I Even Care?

Some people can debate until the cows come home about the causes of poverty (and they do!): socially unjust systems, political bias, economic inequality, laziness etc. In Niddrie, that is not the issue. I have a church to pastor and a community to serve. I have to work every single day with what is. I will leave the debating to others with far greater intellectual…

The Church & The Surprising Offence of God’s Love

I’ve been laid up in bed for a week after an accident and I pulled this book off my bookshelf, largely because I’m due to preach on the theme of God’s love in the coming week. Let me start by saying that this is quite a chunky book, considering the strap line: ‘Reintroducing…

How Small Churches Can Help Missions

There is a great article here published on The Gospel Coalition website here. Missions, training and church planting, particularly, do not have to be the domain of large churches. We are one of the smallest churches in the city (60 members) and I would hazard a guess that we offer one of the largest training places in Scotland for our type of ministry (9 full time…