Daily Prayer

The C of E website is very helpful for those wanting to use an authorised form of Morning or Evening Prayer. It includes both Common Worship and The Book of Common Prayer and the appropriate seasonal material, Collects etc. and the lectionary readigs are automatically included. Instead of Daily Prayer, The Lectionary and Bible and a good deal of flicking about and bookmarks and so on, all you need is this one website. Fantastic. Now all we need is free wireless access in our churches! :)

Assemblies

A note to self.

Friends have reccomended the following sites as worth a look for ideas for school assemblies:

http://www.shambles.net/pages/staff/Assembly/

http://www.brf.org.uk/pages/483s.htm#Assemblies

http://assemblyideas.wordpress.com/

http://www.barnabasinschools.org.uk/pages/2626.htm

http://www.reep.org/cw/index.php

 http://www.assemblies.org.uk/

http://cowo.culham.ac.uk/
 
http://www.bdeducation.org.uk/collective-worship.html

http://spinnaker.org.uk 

http://www.kidsofintegrity.com/

Apparently they may need adjusting for heresy / gospel! 

The book of the last 400 years

Coming soon to a website, churches and village hall near some of you

Marriage Preparation 1

I find myself with the opportunity to prepare several couples for marriage this year. In preparation for this I'm listening to The Marriage Preparation Course by the Lees, the Alpha / Holy Trinity, Brompton people. One of the couples I am marrying has just done the course and speaks very highly of it.

Here are my jottings from the first session:

Strong marriages don’t necessarily develop automatically.

Good commitment, understanding, skills, habits, patterns are necessary to a strong life-long marriage.

Invest in your marriage, make it a priority. Be dedicated to it. Take a positive long-term view.

See every argument as smaller than the marriage.

What are your expectations of marriage?

How are we influenced by our own backgrounds and upbringing?

E.g. What would you expect to spend on a family birthday present?

E.g. when would we fill up the car, who would do it

E.g. Cling film and kitchen roll or a plastic box and a cloth?

Our assumptions might not be shared!

The average wedding takes 250 hours to organise.

40% of 1^st time marriages in the UK end in divorce.

Communication

2 parts: Talking effectively & listening effectively.

We all communicate differently.

We’ll be influenced by our personality, background and circumstances.

Extroverts tend to think our loud, talk through ideas.

Introverts may have decided before they suggest something!

How logical (think things through) or intuitive (work on hunches) are you?

How quickly do we think, react, speak?

How much conviction or passion would you speak with? How passionate / committed would you really be?

How easily / quickly do you change your mind?

Do you want to think things through on your own or discuss together?

Do you like to just talk or do things together?

How spontaneous are you or how much do you like to plan things (how far in advance)?

How much would you air your differences?

How acceptable is it to interrupt? Is an interruption rude or is it a sign of interest? Is it polite or boring not to interrupt?

How load or quiet are you?

How gentle, placid, relaxed or passionate, excitable / agitated and fired-up would you be?

E.g. what would your family be like over a meal? What sort of talk would there be?

What are your patterns of work (e.g. shifts, overtime, travel) etc.?

Do stressful things dominate? How much do you talk about them or try to put them to one side from time to time?

Stresses: E.g. moving house, changing jobs, tiredness, busyness, unemployment, miscarriage, infertility, illness, bereavement, financial worries.

Do you know what your partner is really thinking?

Do you tend to hide or go on the attack? Would you be heated or withdrawn?

What are the barriers to effective communication?

(1) Insufficient time.

Time that works and is good for both of you probably needs to be planned.

(2) Failing to talk about our feelings i.e. only discussing practical or superficial matters.

Understand and express feelings, emotional openness, reveal yourself / all parts of your lif.e

Can you ask each other helpful questions?

Fear of rejection, vulnerability.

Dare to reveal yourself.

Trust, acceptance – don’t judge or criticise / justify yourself.

When is a good time to talk and when is a good time to avoid?

E.g. ? bad times: bedtime, as going to sleep – raising a big issue; when driving / navigating.

Nice to focus on one another when getting home from work or over a meal.

Don’t carry over grudges to the next day – start and end each day in love and without ill-feeling.

(3) Holding on to hurt and resentment.

Shouting and (secret) sulking – moods.

Why is the other person upset? (What would make it better?!)

(4) failing to listen to one another.

Intimacy.

Communicate support not just advice.

What does it feel like to be listened to / not to be listened to?

Listen not only with your ears but with your eyes and your heart.

Do you go off at a tangent?

Advice instead of empathy? Do you try to solve problems too quickly?

Do you put aside your agenda and try to understand, see the world through their eyes?

You could ask the other person if you could sit down and talk / listen!

Techniques for listening:

Try to reflect back what the person has said / feel?

What do they really feel most about it? What is at the heart of the issue?

Is there anything you / I / we can do about it?

Is there anything else they want to say?

Lost

It would appear that my friend Jonty Allcock has written a book on the parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15) aimed at teenagers. Dan Green says its a good read. Better order a copy.

Reccomended Reading

As I think about moving on to become a "senior" pastor / incumbent / proper "Vicar" in a rural setting a friend reccomended the following reading:

George Herbert, The Country Parson, naturally, though some people want to kill him!

And the Letters of Samuel Ruthford for the sake of pastoral conselling / conversations / preaching that is full of Christ and moves affections and will etc.

Dates for the diary

Bible By The Beach, Eastbourne, 29th April - 2nd May 2011. Archbishop Greg Venables, John Lennox, R. Kent Hughes, Rico Tice and more! Resurrection people. Children's & youth programme, creche etc. Group discount for 12 places booked before 30th Nov.

REAL

Classically the Church of England is Reformed and Evangelical. The historical formularies of the C of E unmistakably take such a position. But there is great (and not so great!) variety within Anglicanism today and much confusion about what it means to be an Anglican - not to mention what it means to be Reformed or Evangelical!

For these and other reasons, The Church Society's new Reformed Evangelical Anglican Library, edited by Rev'd Lee Gatiss is to be welcomed. They've kicked off with some Whitefield and I look forward to seeing what the subsequent publications will be.

Resources on Mark's Gospel

God-willing we'll be having Bible studies and talks from Mark's Gospel this year on our camp for 11-14 year olds (Danehill 1). Here are some resources I'm thinking of recommending to our leaders. Are any of these rubbish? Is there anything else you'd recommend?

Paul Barnett, The Servant King: Reading Mark Today (Aquila)

Peter Bolt and Tony Payne, Mark: News of the Hour Ten Interactive Studies for small groups and individuals (Matthias Media)

Tim Chester, Mark 1-8: The Coming King The Good Book Guide to Mark 1-8 Ten Studies for individuals or groups (Good Book Company)

Tim Chester, Mark 9-16: The Servant King The Good Book Guide to Mark 1-8 Ten Studies for individuals or groups (Good Book Company)

R. Alan Cole, Mark Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (IVP)

Phil Crowter, Preaching Mark: Talk Outlines For The Gospel of Mark (Good Book Company)

Dick France, Mark: The People’s Bible Commentary (Bible Reading Fellowship) – he also wrote the big fat New International Greek Testament Commentary on Mark as R. T. France (Eerdmans / Paternoster)

William L. Lane, The Gospel of Mark: The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Eerdmans) – fat

Tom Wright, Mark For Everyone (SPCK)

Christianity Explored and CY (youth version) material are also (largely) based on Mark’s Gospel (Good Book Company)

See also: http://www.bestcommentaries.com/category/mark/

The Family Under Siege Audio

When Mrs Lloyd and I get a moment we are looking forward to listening to the recordings from the The Family under Siege? – the 2010 Emmanuel Evangelical Church Family Conference – which are now available on their church website in the audio archive.

1. Foundations for the Family (David Field)

2. The Battleground of Education (Ian Fry)

3. Vision for the Family (David Field)

Piper on Lewis

I know he's a bit kinda trendy in some Christian circles, and a bit of a charismatic, and American, and baptistic!, and wrong on the Millenium and... but I must say I very much like John Piper. I've been enjoying half listening to and 1/3 watching his talk from The Desiring God Conference on Lessons from an Inconsolable Soul - Joy, Absolute Truth and what Lewis did for Piper.

The manuscript and audio of John Piper's "Lessons from an Inconsolable Soul: Learning from the Mind and Heart of C. S. Lewis" are now up.

Towards the end of his message, Piper lists 8 lessons—apart from the major lesson on joy—that Lewis has taught him. They are, as titled,

1. Liberation from False Dichotomies
2. Liberation from Chronological Snobbery
3. The Wakening of Wonder at What Is Really There
4. The Perils of Introspection
5. The Incompleteness of Duty Without Delight
6. The Painful Value of Self-Knowledge
7. Story Is Great—But Not Everything
8. The Glory of Simply Being Human

10 Commandments Resources

One day I might get around to posting a list of some useful things on the 10 Commandments, which I'm preaching through. For now, I wanted to remember the existence of this:

http://thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/justintaylor/2009/09/23/mohler-on-the-10-commandments/

Thanks, Dan Green.

Sung Worship / Music Resources

D.v. on Saturday morning I'm leading a meeting at church about our music. Here are a few resources (not all of which I've looked at in any detail). Anything else to recommend?

Don Carson, Worship by the Book (Zondervan)

John M. Frame, ‘A Fresh Look at the Regulative Principle’

http://reformedperspectives.org/newfiles/joh_frame/Frame.Ethics2005.AFreshLookattheRegulativePrinciple.pdf

John Frame, ‘Some Questions about the Regulative Principle’

http://www.reformed.org/misc/index.html?mainframe=/misc/frame_regulative_principle.html

John Frame, Contemporary Worship Music (P&R, 1997)

John Frame, Worship in Spirit and Truth (P & R, 1996)

Christopher Idle, Sally Trethewey, and Rosalie Milne, Church Musicians’ Handbook (Matthias Media) available from Good Book Company

Paxson Jeancake, The Art of Worship (Wimpf and Stock, 2006)

Reggie Kidd, With One Voice (Baker, 2005)

David Peterson, Engaging With God

http://philippercival.com/blog/blog.html - Philip Percival’s blog – Director of Music at St Ebbe’s Church, Oxford

Vaughan Roberts, True Worship

Terry Virgo – Worship in Spirit and in Truth – (John 4:23-24) 31/1/2009 Worship School Conference, Brighton

http://www.cck.org.uk/Articles/158720/Church_of_Christ/Worship/Worship_School/Resources/MP3s/Terry_Virgo_Worship.aspx - charismatic

http://www.resoundworship.org/ - new songs

http://www.songsfortoday.com/ - biblical songs for today’s church

http://www.sovereigngracemusic.org/

https://store.emumusic.com.au/

http://www.gettymusic.com/

Good Commentaries

The folk at The Good Book Company have come up with a list of what they regard as the best non-technical commentary on each book of the Bible and they'll flog 'em to you.

For much more detailed reviews see www.BestCommentaries.com who also try to list the two best commentaries on each book.

Lord's Prayer Resources

Among the no doubt many excellent studies on The Lord's Prayer are:

Richard Coekin, Our Father: Enjoying God in Prayer (IVP)

Peter Lewis, The Lord’s Prayer: The Greatest Prayer in the World (Paternoster)

Gerald Bray, Yours is the Kingdom: A Systematic Theology of the Lord’s Prayer (IVP)

Derek Prime, The Lord’s Prayer for Today (Day One)

Tom Wright, The Lord and His Prayer (Triangle / SPCK)

Peter Masters, The Lord’s Pattern for Prayer (Wakeman Trust)

Thomas Watson, The Lord’s Prayer (Banner of Truth)

J John, God’s Priorities: Living the Lord’s Prayer in the 21st Century (Kingsway) Your Kingdom Come Study Guide

I haven't used them all, by the way!

Lots of people will have preached on it so you'll find lots of free sermons on the interweb. I had a go myself - 4 sermons (Aug - Nov 08) available on our church website sermons page.

And check out books on the Sermon on the Mount (e.g. Stott, BST) and Commentaries on Matthew and Luke, of course.

See also Calvin's exposition of the Lord's Prayer in Institutes of the Christian Religion Book 3 chapter 20 parts 34-49, Ford-Battles edition vol 2 pp897-917

Anything else you'd recommend?

Abortion & Euthanasia etc. resources

On Sunday I made some comments about abortion and euthanasia (amongst other things) from the 6th Commandment, "You Shall Not Murder". You may find some interesting stuff on these subjects on The Christian Institute website (link on the right). The Institute is a kind of public policy lobbying think tank resource type thing. I also linked to The Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child yesterday.

I would also highly recommend Rev'd Dr David Field's ethics notes which cover subjects such as abortion, euthanasia, just war and a whole lot more, as well as quite a bit of stuff on how to think (ethically), meta-ethics.

On our church website sermons page, you can find (evangelistic) talks by my predecessor as curate, Rev'd Jeremy Hobson (who is a medical doctor) on abortion, euthanasia, stem cell research and other topics besides.

As ever, John Frame's The Christian Life (P&R Lordship Series) would be a great place to go to think more about the Commandment and the issues it raises, though arising out of and more oriented towards a US context than a UK one. Get that book - its impressively fat but pretty readable!

www.clayton.tv

The good folk of Jesmond Parish Church seem to have made some useful and interesting videos available on www.clayton.tv, including edited versions of Sunday services.

Our Father

Recently I preached 4 sermons on The Lord's Prayer. I haven't opened it, but if I had had it at the time, I certainly would have read Rev'd Richard Coekin's new book, Our Father:Enjoying God in prayer (IVP, 2009), which is due out on 17th July and was handed out free to the lucky customers at EMA.

Williams on Ridley on Supper

The Theologian has done us an excellent service by making Dr Garry Williams' Protestant Truth Society Lecture on Nicholas Ridley's death and doctrine of the Lord's Supper available.

Learned, funny, careful, pointed, applied, interesting.

The talk warms the heart and educates.

Since Ridley's doctrine of the Supper is virtually indistinguishable from Calvin's the lecture serves as a good guide to Calvin's doctrine, which I would claim is Biblical.

When some evangelicals seem to have no idea what the Supper is for nor much desire for it, I think there is much to learn here.

No ping-pong on the Lord's Table, for Ridley or Williams.

Notes on the Apostles' Creed

Please feel free to comment or email me if you might be able to use some notes (introduction, Q&As, tips etc.) on the Apostles' Creed which I originally prepared for our homegroup leaders. I could send you a Word document with a couple of pages each of 10 studies.

I might one day get round to editing them and putting them up on line but it doesn't seem the most pressing or important thing to do right now.