New Life Narrabri: 2006

Sunday, December 31, 2006

In this chapter, entitled "Exiles At The Table", Michael Frost talks about hospitality in the community of exiles. ...

Mass Insanity on Australian Roads

Paulette Reed: "NO MORE DOUBLE TROUBLE!--GOD IS OPENING DOORS TO PROVIDE A WAY OUT"

Paulette Reed: "NO MORE DOUBLE TROUBLE!--GOD IS OPENING DOORS TO PROVIDE A WAY OUT"

Walk Out of the Past

It seems many in the church are going through a sifting. But, Alleluia! Their trials have made them 100% God-dependent, which of course was the intent. What satan meant for harm, Jesus will use for His glory. He has "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future" (Jeremiah 29:11).

Each person is given a measure of faith and God promises we will never be tempted beyond what we can bear. God also promises to show His people a way out. Most frequently we think of open doors from the Lord as walking into something, but often He opens them so we can walk out of something.

We are now moving into a season where God will say, "Here's your way out, here's the open door--walk through it." Beloved, we must walk out of the past to walk into the future. ...

British bomb Iraqi Police

Apparently the Iraqis forgot to tell their police that the Serious Crime Unit was supposed to prevent Serious Crimes, not commit them. ...

A Brief History of Climate Change

Geek Shirts Big Hit

Global Warming Brings White Christmas to Australia

Sermon for Christmas Day 2006

Christmas Eve Service

Sermon for Sunday December 24th 2006

Christmas- Grace or Religion

Prophetic Acts In Christmas Traditions- Terry Sommerville

Terry Sommerville writes:

Amazing as it seems, our celebrations of Christmas may actually be keeping the nation from slipping into total darkness. In his book The Twilight Labrynth , George Otis Jr. says that cultures throughout the world reinforce their spiritual darkness, through seasonal festivals. Covenants are maintained with the powers and principalities by annual observances. Can it be possible that our celebration of Christmas reinforces the spiritual light in our nation? Charismatic Christians frequently ignore church traditions in favor of spontaneus actions. But recently prophets have recovered the whole idea of "prophetic action" to establish things in the heavenly places. Could Christmas observances be "prophetic actions"? Can it happen even when most of the "actors" don't know why they are doing it? Here are some of my thoughts on prophetic actions in the traditions of Christmas. ...

Demographics and the Church Growth Movement

Alan Hirch has posted a very compelling article on church growth and the modern (as in not post-modern) church ...

Advent Reflection

God giggled

Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture (Chapter 6)

In this chapter, Michael Frost looks at how we develop a missional community ...

New ecological threat to Christmas

If Jesus was born today, the three wise men might have had to substitute frankincense for another gift, according to new research suggesting that production of the fragrant substance is in trouble.

Frankincense, an aromatic hardened wood resin obtained by tapping Boswellia trees, has been an ingredient in perfumes and incense for thousands of years.

The Bible says that at Christmas, the magi brought gifts to Jesus of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

Now ecologists from the Netherlands and Eritrea warn that current rates of tapping frankincense from Boswellia trees are endangering sustained production of the aromatic resin. ...

Random Thought

Time magazine names 'you' as person of the year

Another win for individualistic self-centredness in western society today-- and another sign that we are headed towards self-destruction. ...

Sermon for Sunday December 17th 2006

Phil & Sus's (and others) My Space links

Bizarre Twist on Death Penalty

Bubblegum for your soul

Media PersecutionHits Another Low

Al Thomas: "I AM ABOUT TO REMOVE THE STONE OF UNBELIEF AND POUR OUT MY GIFT OF FAITH ON MULTITUDES"

Al Thomas: "I AM ABOUT TO REMOVE THE STONE OF UNBELIEF AND POUR OUT MY GIFT OF FAITH ON MULTITUDES"

I SAW A VISION OF PEOPLE TRYING TO MOVE A HUGE STONE

In a vision, I saw people trying to move a huge stone. Behind the stone were the answers to prayer requests that have piled up for years.

The stone was over one hundred feet high and weighed many tons. In spite of its massive size, I could see crowds of people pushing with all of their might to move the stone. It was a fruitless effort. Many grew weary, became discouraged, and walked away. ...

Clash of Civlisations?

Exiles- Living missionally in a Post-Christian Culture (Chapter 5)

In this chapter Michael Frost looks at the development of true community or communitas. ...

Excitement at the Bates household

Voting Must End Tomorrow

Christmas Eve Children's Service

Sermon for Sunday December 10th 2006

Post-modern worship on the theme of "Getting Ready for the King."

There was no sermon as such, but we entered a series of stages of experiential worship. ...

Recovering From Church Trauma

The Queen's English Threatened By Global Warming

Apparently the Queen is less posh these days and more suburban.

Crikey!

From abc.net.au ...

On-line Meditation

Christmas Meditation

Christmas at Bellata

A Day Off!

Science and Religion

The hypocrisy of scientists is sometimes unbelievable.

There is always a huge uproar when christians try to introduce Bible-based scientific theories such as creation science. "Religion should stay out of science", they say.

But apparently it's OK for science to interfere in religion. ...

Sermon for Sunday December 3rd 2006

Fires to Rain

Only in the USA

Scary Questions

Alan Hirsch writes this on his blog:

OK, I want to return to our discussion on the new book. To get to the heart of the material, I have to introduce you to the question that obsessed me for about 3 years non-stop–the question that started my personal quest and culminated in the wrting of The Forgotten Ways. This question will serve as both the starting point AND the constant reference point for all the material in the book as well as this series of blogs. And here’s why it is so central: I am now utterly convinced that in the answer to this question is found some direct clues to the nature of the church as God intended it as well as some answers for the missional malaise of the church in our time and place. So here goes… ...

The Agenda Of Islam A WAR BETWEEN CIVILIZATIONS by Professor Moshe Sharon, Israel

Bogged Down!

Exiles- Living Missionally In a Post-christian Culture (Chapter 4)

Chapter 4 of Michael Frost's Book is called "Exiled From a Hyper-Real World" ...

Sermon for Sunday November 26th 2006

CATHERINE BROWN: "A VISION OF JESUS--HE IS LOVE"

Catherine Brown: "A VISION OF JESUS--HE IS LOVE"

"The only way we can go beyond the confines of our humanity, is when we overflow in and with Jesus' love" ...

Exiles- Living Missionally In a Post-christian Culture (Chapter 3)

Chapter 3 of Michael Frost's Book is called "Following Jesus Into Exile." ...

Happy 25th, Religious Freedom

Happy 25th, Religious Freedom
But we'll skip the cake!

25 year ago this month, more precisely on November 25, 1981, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed a 'Declaration on Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief' - in more simple terms, a resolution for world-wide religious freedom and tolerance. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? But hardly anyone is celebrating. The stark reality today is that in many parts of the world, freedom of religion or belief does not exist for individuals or communities. ...

Little signs of grace

Being good for God's sake

Alan Hirsch has posted the following article about the revolutionary nature of Christianity. ...

Exiles- Living Missionally in a Post Christian Culture

In Chapter 2 of this book Michael Frost looks at "Jesus The Exile" ...

Hungry? Eat My Shorts!

Bart Simpson's irritating taunt may soon become reality as scientists have discovered a way to make cotton seed edible ...

Sermon for Sunday November 19th

Dance Theology

A Strange Encounter

What the Greens don't want you to know!

TEN THINGS ANYONE WHO JOINS IN A TWENTY FIRST CENTURY MISSIONAL CHURCH PLANT SHOULD NOT EXPECT

David Fitch wrote this great piece on missional churches on his blog at http://www.reclaimingthemission.com ...

Exiles- Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture

This is a book by Michael Frost who is Professor of Evangelism and Missions at Morling College in Sydney (a Baptist Theological College). He is the guiding force behind a church called smallboatbigsea at Manly.

Since this book has really grabbed my heart about where our church is heading, I thought it would be good to write some reflections about it. I hope that I am able to communicate some of the excitement I feel at reading in words the unnamed desires in my heart for our congregation, the Church and our nation. ...

New Life Birthday Celebrations

Sermon for Sunday November 12th

Cricket gets more religious

Why do they do it?

Sermon for Sunday November 5th

Another Pastor Falls

Leading Evangelical Christian pastor Ted Haggard of New Life Church, Colorado has denied having gay sex but has admitted to buying illegal drugs. Full story here
...

Covered or uncovered the cats will pounce

Holy Spirit and Technology-- Are WAREZ sinful?

URL: http://christdot.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=8539

For the last 20 years I have been hacking satellite systems, xboxs, playtstations, gameboys, and ipods. I have downloaded hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of movies, applications, console games, pc games, operating systems, educational software, and last but certainly not least - pornography! I didn't do any of this to make a profit. It was only for personal use. I was excited by the challenge at first. To reverse engineer hardware and obtain free software from the deepest darkest bowels of the internet is fun. I guess you kind of lose sight of what you are really doing.
I also read the Bible twice everyday (well-weekdays on the train). A little hypocritical you say? Me too. Well, I'm trying to change all that. ...

THE PAINFUL LESSONS OF MULTICULTURALISM

THE PAINFUL LESSONS OF MULTICULTURALISM
By Michael Nazir-Ali, Bishop of Rochester in England

http://nightwatchworldnews.blogspot.com/

(APN Editors comments: This article written by an English Anglican Bishop draws on the experience of Britain. We reproduce it as the lessons learnt, and points the writer makes, are pertinent to our current situation here in Australia. Let us pray we as a Nation, learn the lessons spoken of in this article before we suffer the same fate as Britain. The writer was born in Pakistan where he studied Islamic History.) ...

100 million web-sites

School Chaplains

Car Problems

Sermon for Sunday October 29th

It's the Heart!

Opera Still Beats Firefox!

Sheikh again demeans Australian women

From today's Sydney Morning Herald:

At least one Muslim leader has branded Sheik Taj el-Din al Hilaly "out of line" for his comments in blaming immodestly dressed women for sexual assault.

The former secretary of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, Shujat Mantoo, said the sheik was probably out of line, but he defended his right to stay in Australia.

"There would be many people like [the sheik] who uphold those views, and there would be among mainstream Christians, but we don't simply deport them. We educate them," Mr Mantoo said.

Sheik al Hilaly's comments were delivered in a Ramadan sermon to 500 worshippers in Sydney last month, a newspaper report said.

He blamed women who "sway suggestively" and who wore make-up and no hijab [Islamic scarf] for sexual attacks. ...