Topic Archives: Church & Ministry

‘And He gave some as evangelists.’ , Ephesians 4:11  There is a plethora of good Bible teachers and preachers in the Reformed denominations of our day, and for this we ought to be thankful. We tend to attract men who love the Bible and theology and who, consequently, are gifted in communicating both. However it […]

At the 2017 Shepherd’s Conference, in Sun Valley, California, the Banner of Truth hosted a student event for Master’s Seminary Students. We sat down with Iain Murray and John MacArthur to discuss reading in the ministry, asking them if they could share their accumulated wisdom after reading and writing for decades. Here are some of […]

Malta is a Mediterranean island situated 60 miles south of Sicily. Its population is 420,000, almost half of whom live in the capital, Valletta, and the numbers have been swollen in recent years by a stream of refugees from North Africa. Its official language is Maltese but many of the people speak English. It became independent […]

Steve Lawson describes some of the early struggles of his ministry, and how God used The Forgotten Spurgeon by Iain H. Murray to encourage and help him. For one week only, get The Forgotten Spurgeon for just £6. The Forgotten Spurgeon

One sometimes meets Christians who use scriptural words and thoughts with no more feeling than if they were licking stamps. They seem to belong to a religious world whose citizens live always north of the Arctic circle of emotion. Their spiritual affections are buried beneath yards of ice and snow. When they venture to talk about […]

The members of First Church (not the real name of the church) consistently made false accusations against one another. They would regularly throw verbal mud at one another. At times, they would even form alliances and fight against one another. Some of their claims were silly. One elder accused a teenager of rebelliously going to […]

Some of us who are advanced in years can lay claim to  remembering life in a God-centred church and, to a certain extent, in a God-centred nation. The influence of  three centuries of the Shorter Catechism being memorized in the home, the church and the school had left its mark. The opening question: ‘What is […]

‘. . . I am under compulsion; for woe is me if I do not preach the gospel.’ , 1 Corinthians 9:16 Even a cursory reading of the Acts of the Apostles clearly shows the zeal the Apostle Paul had for preaching the gospel. The man was relentless. He went far, fast, and furious with the […]

Our dear friends and supporters of our ministry in this Northern Siberian city of Nizhnivartovsk, After six years of slow and painstaking labour, because we had to do most of the work ourselves, we completed our wooden church in 2014. We came here in 1991 on the first evangelistic mission to Siberia within living memory, […]

‘. . .teaching you publicly and from house to house’ , Acts 20.20 I know what many church pundits are saying, ‘Intentional, “drive by” evangelism does not work any more. People are too secular for this kind of thing. What we need to do is to develop relationships with people by joining a local workout […]

Let me introduce a contemporary church situation in England, and go back a time (a few hundred years in fact) to give it its origin, a contrast, and a perspective. I must take you back to William Bridge who is about as anonymous a Puritan preacher as you can find. Bare facts are the following, that […]

“Should it be according to thy mind?” (Job 34. 33) This is the second half of a sermon preached by John E. Hazelton at Streatley Hall, London, on August 1st. 1909. The occasion of this wonderful discourse was the death of his only son. The first section may be found here. Secondly, the proper reply […]

“Should it be according to thy mind?” (Job 34. 33) This is the first half of a sermon preached by John E. Hazelton at Streatley Hall, London, on August 1st. 1909. The occasion of this wonderful discourse was the death of his only son. The whole verse reads: “Should it be according to thy mind? […]

‘Why do you go to church twice on a Sunday? Isn’t once enough?’ In many churches the Sunday evening service is disappearing. There are two main reasons for this. First, demands from employers have increased enormously over the last 30 years. Weekends have become precious. Two Sunday services are seen as taking up too much […]

I’m not too keen on the title of this book, though I understand the context in which it was chosen, but I do love the author unequivocally. Elly Achok Olare and his brother Barnabas are two wonderful men, former students of mine whom I taught in the Pastors’ Theological Course in Nairobi, Kenya. I think of […]