Her name means 'white snow'

Today we had the pleasure of visiting the English for Life program at the church.

People come to learn English, which helps them for this life, and they also learn the Bible, which helps them for the next life.

The advanced English class put on a play today, based on the story of Jesus healing and forgiving a paralysed man (Mark 2:1-12).

They did a fantastic job!  Afterwords, Phil shared how Jesus can not only heal us on the outside, but on the inside too.

This fit really well with a conversation I had with one of the ladies.  She said, "My daughter's name means 'white snow'."  I said, "That's what Jesus' cleansing is like.  He makes us like white snow.

"it's like the United Nations here" - mission day 1

What do we need for mission?  People and food!  (am I forgetting something...?)

We certainly were blessed with good food and good company today on our first day at St Marks Pennant Hills.

I was particularly encouraged to meet brothers and sisters from various parts of the world.  One guy said, "It's like the United Nations here."

I was able to hear the testimonies of brothers and sisters who have come from the falsehood of Hinduism and Buddhism to the true and living faith in Jesus.

We are praying that God will grow His family in Pennant Hills as we go out with these brothers and sisters to tell people in the area about Jesus.  Will you join us in prayer?

textual criticism - useful?

Even though it seems annoying, textual criticism is important because the trustworthiness of the Bible is important.  We want to have a foundation for our faith.  We want to know that what we believe is true.  And in order to know the truth we need to have an authoritative source of truth.  But what if there is a question about the trustworthiness of the Bible?  Some people have concerns about the historicity of the Bible, others have concerns about its content, but textual criticism deals with issues concerning the text of the Bible.

There are “multiple copies” of the Bible so to speak.  It’s not as crazy as it first sounds, though.  In the case of the New Testament they made oodles and oodles of copies so that lots of people could read it.  But this was way before the printing press, so they made copies by hand, so you’d expect the odd ‘typo’ to get in.  Having said that, though, most of the variations in the manuscripts don’t make a difference to the overall meaning (for example, spelling errors).  So if someone says to you “you can’t trust the Bible because there are so many variations in the manuscripts”, don’t worry.  There’s not one single Christian belief which is in doubt because of a textual variant. Thank you textual critics who've gone through and checked out stuff like that!

We can trust the Bible.  God worked through people to write down the Bible.  He was in control of the writing process.  He has also continued to be sovereign as the Bible has been preserved, transmitted and translated.  And more amazingly, He teaches us the Bible from the inside.  His Spirit is inside us, helping us to understand the Bible, to remember it and to live it out. 

The creator of the universe speaks to us.  Wow.

hello neglected blog world

Hi again!

After a long absence while I was out of town, I'm now trying to get back into the swing of College and blogging.  It's a good reflective discipline for me. :-)

new places, new faces, new culture

I'm writing this from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.  I've only been here for a couple of days, but it's been good to see a new place, meet new friends, and catch up with other friends.

I enjoy seeing new things, meeting new people and eating new foods.  I find it tiring, but I really enjoy it.  As I've been to a number of countries now I feel less surprised by the different things I see.  I'm used to the grime and busyness and different languages and different people.  I think it's cool.

But not everyone feels like that.  My mum is an example of that.  I love mum, but she doesn't cope well in unfamiliar situations.

I plan to do gospel work overseas somewhere.  It will take a lot of courage and effort for my mum to come and visit me!!  But she's said she will.  What a champ!

And I think for me too it will take getting used to - living long term in a different place like that, rather than just for a visit.  But everyone needs to come to Jesus for salvation, so they need to hear about him.

Psalm 3 song - I look to You

I'm reading through Psalms in the mornings at the moment.

Last week I was struck by Psalm 3, and the idea to turn it into a song came to me (yes, I do know that it was already a song!).

In the deep val-ley

And in the dark-ness

I look to You

When foes surround me

And say you won’t help

I look to You

They call out to me

“Your G-od can’t help”

I look to You

Many march out just

To bring me down

I look to You

For You are my shield

My strong protector

I cling to You

When times are tough

You will never let me down

So I can sle-ep

In sweet comfort

You care for me

(I) can lie in my bed

Completely at peace

You care for me

It doesn't have any music to go with it at the moment.  I'm not very good at that.  

Perhaps you would like to write some music for it? :-)

pondering heaven and the nature of the Christian life

This was a story that I made up to tell the kids in Scripture today about what life is like as a Christian, both in this age and the age to come.  Especially since I'm teaching young kids I decided to do this via a story.  As I was thinking about this I realised that a good allegory about this has already been written; namely, Pilgrim's Progress.  But that is a little long to read out to the class.

It was done in a hurry, but hopefully it's not too heretical :-)

~~~~~

There was a girl named Katie.  When Katie was 8 she decided to ask Jesus to forgive her for her sins.   Katie told her friends about Jesus.  She said, “Jesus loves you.  He died to forgive your sins.”  Some her friends said to her, “why do you follow Jesus?  That’s just silly.  It’s a made up story.  You must be an idiot for believing it.  Katie wanted to get really mad at them, but then she remembered that Jesus said, “If you love me, other people are going to hate you and be mean to you.  Don’t worry, they just do that because they hate me.”  So Katie calmed down.  Then she prayed, “Jesus please make them love you and not hate you anymore.”

When Katie grew up she wanted to be a missionary tell people overseas about Jesus.  But one day Katie got sick.  She was so tired she could hardly get out of bed.  Her mum came into her room and said, “Come on Katie.  It’s time to get up.”  “Mum I don’t feel so good”, Katie said, “I’m so so tired.  Can I stay in bed today?”  “OK” her mum said, “you can stay in bed today”.  So Katie stayed in bed and rested.  Before she went to sleep she said, “Jesus I know you’re powerful and you love me, so can you please make me all better by tomorrow.”

So Katie went to sleep.  When she woke up in the morning she was still tired.  Her mum came into her room and said, “Come on Katie.  It’s time to get up.”  But Katie said, “I’m still really tired Mum.”  So her mum said, “I’m going to take you to the doctor.”  Katie had to go see lots of doctors.  Every day she prayed, “Jesus I know you’re powerful and you love me, so can you please make me all better by tomorrow.” 

Eventually one of the doctors said, “Katie you are very sick.  You have leukaemia.”  Every day she kept praying, “Jesus I know you’re powerful and you love me, so can you please make me all better by tomorrow.”  Then one day Katie died. 

The very next thing she knew, she was in a bright and shiny place.  It was very beautiful.  There was a big area of grass.  It looked so beautiful, so she took off her shoes, and went running down the hill.  The grass was so beautiful and soft; there weren’t any prickles in it at all.

When she got down to the bottom of the hill, she started to hear some noise.  So she went to investigate.  She went a bit further, and the noise got louder, then she came to a big high fence.  The noise was coming from the inside.  She said to herself, “It sounds like everyone was having a great time, there’s all this laughter.  Ooh I hope I can go in!” 

So she walked along the fence and found a gate.  On the gate there was a sign.  It had big writing on it “ONLY FRIENDS ALLOWED!”.  Standing next to the gate was a man.  He said to Katie, “Are you a friend of my master?”  “I don’t know”, Katie said, “Who is your master?”.  “My master’s name is Jesus”, he said, “are you friends with him?”  “Oh yes!” she said, “we’ve been friends for so long!”  So the man opened the gate and let Katie in. 

When Katie got inside she saw the biggest party ever.  There were lots and lots of people.  They were all laughing and chatting and eating.  There were all sorts of different people there.  There were old people and young people.  There were people from all different countries too, people with white skin, people with black skin, brown skin and yellow skin.  There were lots of people there.  They were sharing the food around with each other.  No-one was yelling or fighting or grumpy.  And Katie thought to herself, “No-one is fighting or being selfish. I’ve never been a place like this before.”

There was a band playing too.  They sang lots of great songs.  They were praising Jesus, saying, “You are amazing and holy.  You have made a whole new family of people.  You have got rid of all the bad things in the world.”  And Katie thought to herself, “These people love Jesus, just like me”.

As she was listening to the band someone came up to her and said, “Here are your new clothes.”  And they handed Katie the most beautiful dress she had ever seen.  She put it on, and it fitted her perfectly.

She twirled around in her new dress, and out of the corner of her eye she spotted someone who was so bright and shiny she could hardly look at him.  She stopped to get a closer look at him.  Then he looked up and saw her too.  Then he smiled and started walking towards her.  Immediately she knew who he was.  And Jesus said to her, “Welcome home Katie.”  Katie smiled and thought to herself, “This is the best place ever.”