Yearly Archives: 2002

DO GYPSIES SPEAK IN TONGUES AND PERFORM MIRACLES? If we doubted what we saw or seemed to question authority, we were seen as rebels, unsaved, or just plain unspiritual by Gary Nixon As a Christian brought up in a Pentecostal church, recognised as an evangelist, combining work in Romania and planting my own church in […]

WORSHIP AND THE PRESENCE OF GOD Think what is involved – personal communication and communion with the living God. by Graham Harrison   Worship has been hijacked and debased by many today. It is often reduced to a set of preliminaries lasting anything from a half to one hour, usually consisting of repetitive chorus singing, […]

SHOULD CHRISTIANS DRINK ALCOHOL? Anyone considering the problem alcohol brings to our society today is challenged to become a total abstainer. That is a choice many Christians make. They don’t flaunt this fact before others, but are happy to live alcohol-free lives. Other Christians do reserve the right on occasions to drink alcohol. Here are […]

We will not be strong because of our own sense of righteousness, morality and good behaviour. by Geoff Thomas What a constant theme is Christian weakness in Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians. How alien a message it is to the prevailing Christian ethos of the 21st century. For example, those churches which claim to […]

SPORTS AND GAMES FOR CHILDREN “As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him who sent Me. Night is coming, when no one can work.” John 9:4 Some men are spending their time in making money. That is the main object of their lives. They would be as usefully employed probably […]

HOW OPEN THEISM HELPS US CONCEAL OUR HIDDEN IDOLATRIES Open Theism implies, therefore, that we should not think about the wisdom of God’s purpose in causing or permitting our calamities by John Piper Open theism may help conceal deep idolatry in the soul. One of the great needs of our souls is to know if […]

JOHN BUNYAN AT THE FUNERAL OF HER MAJESTY QUEEN ELIZABETH THE QUEEN MOTHER There could be no greater contrast then the funeral services of the Queen Mother and that of her grand-daughter-in-law, Lady Diana the Princess of Wales. The Order of Service for Tuesday 9 April 2002 at 11.30 in Westminster Abbey has just been […]

WINDOWS ON SIBERIA Nizhnivartovsk Vladimir Radzihovski (31) and his wife Oksana (30) came to this oil rich city of NIZHNIVARTOVSK in 1993 at the invitation of Joseph Bondarenko, the leader of the original mission to western Siberia in 1991. The city now has 300,000 inhabitants and was founded in 1972 following the discovery of huge […]

PAY FULL ATTENTION! ‘If no sin was unpunished in the Old Testament, how can any be in the New?’ Every good preacher should be able to state things as succinctly as the writer to the Hebrews has done; but no preacher worth his salt is content with doing only that. He knows that things have […]

WHY DO WE DO CONTINUE IN OUR MINISTRIES? “The ministerial work must be carried on purely for God and the salvation of souls, not for any private ends of our own. A wrong end makes all the work bad as from us, how good whatsoever it may be in its own nature. It is not […]

KEEPING THE SABBATH DAY Doing the Day “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work…” What do you do with the day the fourth commandment (Exodus 20:8-11) calls us to keep holy? It would seem that many Christians would prefer not to think about it, […]

THE ORIGIN OF THE CLERICAL COLLAR When did Anglican ministers start to wear “dog collars” on a regular basis? In 1976 the Church of England’s Enquiry Centre produced an A4 sheet concerning the use of the “dog collar” among the clergy. Apparently, it had been invented, they said, quoting the Glasgow Herald of December 6,1894, […]

MEDIEVAL MISTAKES We could well do with a Luther redivivus today Sinclair Ferguson Althought provoked by the indulgences peddled by Johannes Tetzel, the very first proposition which Luther offered for public debate in his Ninety Five Theses put the axe to the root of the tree of medieval theology: “When our Lord and Master, Jesus […]

A WARNING AND A CHALLENGE Never, never he afraid to hold decided doctrinal opinions We cannot withhold our conviction that the professing Church is as much damaged by laxity and indistinctness about matters of doctrine within, as it is by sceptics and unbelievers without. Myriads of professing Christians nowadays seem utterly unable to distinguish things […]

ON READING BOOKS I thought it might be advantageous to delineate how I myself read books. I don’t presume to be a reader or bibliophile superior to all of our readers (I am certain that a number are quite superior to me!), but I believe it will be helpful to some who are perhaps looking […]