'Niddrie Pastor' Tagged Posts (Page 32)
Don’t work in schemes if you can’t use your brain!
By Andy Constable Biblical thinking can very often be in short supply among many young Christians who want to work in ‘poorer’ areas. They can be guilty of explicitly reasoning that ‘thinking’ is somehow unspiritual or implicitly believing that the people they are working with only need…
Why My Perfect Family Is Better Than Yours!
Here in the UK there is a (not so) great tradition of sending yearly family newsletters around about Christmas time. I am unsure if it is just a Christian phenomenon or a class thing because I never came across them in my life when I was growing up. However, many of them are unintentionally hilarious. Being a pastor we used to get more than our fair share of these things.…
Youth Groups That Do What They Say On The Tin!
In the UK, there’s a product called Ronseal. It’s a popular varnish/wood stain product available in most hardware stores. Their advertising strap line is really well known: it’s supposed to be simple, straight-forward, and down-to-earth. “Ronseal: It does exactly what it says on the tin.” In…
When Helping Hurts
This is an extremely provocative book and I absolutely loved it. Although written for a North American cultural mindset, it is certainly applicable across much of Europe. The byline is, ‘How to alleviate poverty without hurting the poor..and yourself’. We live in a culture where the concept of a ‘missions trip’ is now almost the ‘done…
Sing it like we mean it!
A bit of Christmas fun to brighten up your day. We have our Christmas carol service today at NCC and I hope we sing wiht half the gusto on display here 🙂 [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihQuiyV-lXU] Also, I found this one quite cool and modern. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=sghwe4TYY18#!]
The Death of Christopher Hitchens
This is a blog about inner city church planters and so it may be a surprise to find something on the death of the so-called intellectual secularist. Despite his views I did admire his way of talking and his unflinching belief in his own unbelief. You can read a biography of his life from a Christian perspective here. I hope he didn’t go to meet the Lord the way he…
Evangelism ‘On the Way!’
Isn’t it fascinating how the Lord Jesus used so many informal settings as teaching opportunities. Reading through Luke’s gospel offers us some revealing insights as to how Jesus used this style of teaching as he travelled from Galilee to Jerusalem. Luke contains all sorts of stories and questions and metaphors for how Jesus interacted outside of the pulpit, if…
‘Off the shelf’ Christmas assemblies for schools
Being the new chaplain on the scene, it falls to me to deliver this year’s Christmas assembly in the local high school next week. The expectation is for me to deliver a short seasonal message to a large group of teenagers (who don’t really want to be there) to help them think more about Christmas.…
Why the Atonement Matters for Church Planters (8)
Atonement’ edited by Gabriel Fluhrer (P&R Publishing 2010) This is a series of lectures about ‘blood’ according to the book’s sleeve and is a compilation of 8 essays on the topic by 7 evangelical theologians and pastors. Such is the importance of this subject for every Christian, whoever they…
How far should we go in living for Jesus?
What do we do with the words of the Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 10:39: Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it. The context is sending out the 12 to proclaim the ‘kingdom of heaven’ (v7). They were sent out as ‘sheep amongst wolves’ (v16) but were encouraged to stay firm in Jesus and to…