Topic Archives: Today

We have no idea what we take for granted in the United States. I emigrated from Syria to American when I was 19 years of age, and became an American citizen four years later, and then a Christian many years later. As a photojournalist for twenty-five years, I have experienced up close and personal this […]

Nine congregants were ready for baptism, all of whom but my second daughter, Shlomit, were immigrants from the former Soviet Union. God had worked wonders among us. Four were couples who had turned to the Lord together. We hired the CM&A Church building in Jerusalem, reserved three buses and made preparations. The Orthodox, who almost […]

I met Patience, a young black woman from Zambia, on my recent trip to Cape Town, South Africa. She is attending the Maranatha Family Church in Masephumalele, pastored by my friend Ronni Cronje. Patience, a year or so ago, was riding with her mother on a small taxi van from Zimbabwe to South Africa when […]

Imagine an ideal setting for spiritual revival. Odds are good that the razor wire and guard towers of Angola prison, Louisiana’s infamous maximum-security penitentiary, don’t fit the bill. Yet spiritual revival is precisely what is taking place among the prison’s inmate population, most of whom are incarcerated for life. ‘Dr. John Robson [who heads the […]

It is recorded of John Newton that he said: ‘I read the newspaper that I may see how my heavenly Father governs the world.’ Spurgeon said that he read the newspaper to find illustrations for his sermons. In our 21st century it is very revealing to read God’s Word side by side with the newspaper. […]

In 1993 Vladimir Radzihovski was living in southern Ukraine when he was invited to join the third of the river ‘Missions to Siberia’. Passenger ships were hired to visit cities, towns and small settlements along the banks of the rivers Ob and Irtish, to preach the gospel to those who had never heard it before. […]

David Cameron will almost certainly get his Syrian war. Who will fight it, let alone who will win it, remains unclear. But who will lose it is already known – the Christians. The relentless persecution of Christ’s followers is foretold in the Gospels. Suffering is portrayed as the pathway to triumph. The global position today […]

Having been vacant since June 2010 with the emeritization of Dr. L. W. Bilkes, the Free Reformed Church of Grand Rapids was privileged and blessed to install Dr. David Murray as a Free Reformed minister labouring in our congregation. Synod 2013 of the Free Reformed churches unanimously approved Dr. Murray to be called as Free […]

Lately many new church buildings have or are still being built by congregations of our denomination. Some of these are the congregations’ second buildings since their founding. What a contrast this is to the situation in Israel. During the entire history of Israel as a modern state, not a single building was erected and dedicated […]

We are all familiar with the feeling of accomplishing a big task. Often we can feel the pressure almost physically in our muscles and bodies. But then one day we can say it is done, we tick it off and feel the relief. That is how we felt at HaGefen when the fifth and final […]

The present state of the Church of Scotland should be a cause for Christians everywhere to cry to God for mercy. For a professing Christian church to pass legislation that permits a congregation to call a minister (man or woman!) who is in a same-sex relationship is a theological scandal and a moral monstrosity. No […]

On 26 June 2013 the U.S.A. Supreme Court issued rulings that boosted the cause of same sex marriage by a 5-4 decision, and ruled that the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was unconstitutional. This is a major decision that will have long term impact. The court accelerated the advance of gay marriage in the US, […]

A report given at the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland, May 2013. China is a vast country, and a country of vast contrasts. There are peasant farmers and billionaire IT entrepreneurs; sophisticated Shanghai and the wilds of the Gobi desert; there are Buddhists, Daoists, Christians, Muslims, and those who follow no formal […]

The original vision for African Bible Colleges began in the hearts and minds of Dr and Mrs John W Chinchen. After spending seven years training pastors in the interior of Liberia, the Chinchens realised that in order to raise up servant leaders for Christ in Africa they should develop university-level training with a distinctively biblical […]

Bill Wilson’s Salvation ‘What must I do to be saved?’ is the urgent question of anyone who knows he is a sinner. It is a question Bill Wilson, founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, faced after repeated attempts to get sober followed by devastating failures to maintain sobriety. He describes his long history of alcohol abuse in […]

There is a place you can go in the world to learn about evangelism. It is a place unlike any other I have found, where the beauty of God’s creation and the darkness of humanity’s sinfulness stand in such stark contrast to each other. It is a place where evangelism is the focus of the […]

Pakistan is an Islamic country with 97% of the population considered to be Muslims. Christians are a very small minority and Protestants a small proportion of this. To be a Protestant Christian in Pakistan is costly. Employment becomes difficult and reproach and persecution are the expected result for those who profess faith in the Lord […]

The fact that the staunchly Reformed publisher Banner of Truth has released a biography of dispensational pastor John MacArthur is testimony to the fact that MacArthur is one of the most influential evangelical ministers of our times. This book1 began in 2009 as a biographical portrait commissioned from Iain Murray by the elders of Grace […]

Not many people get the opportunity to attend seminary. In an amazing way I have attended two. The first was training for the Roman Catholic priesthood in Ireland and the second at a conservative Evangelical seminary in England. Raised a Catholic . . . but not knowing God Like most boys in the Republic of […]

Most Christians will have heard of John MacArthur. For more than 40 years he has been Pastor of the same large church in Los Angeles, USA. He is best known for his books, audio sermons and radio broadcasts. This biography by the co-founder of Banner of Truth brings to life John MacArthur. We find a […]

Victor Atallah, General Director of Middle East Reformed Fellowship (MERF), writes: The Republic of South Sudan just divided from the north to become the newest African nation. Hundreds of thousands there are recent Christian converts from tribal animism. Bibles are few. Pastors hike long distances to minister to many villages. Since 2003, Reformed pastors and […]

Iain H. Murray, born in Lancashire, England, in 1931 was educated in the Isle of Man and at the University of Durham. He entered the Christian ministry in 1955. He served as assistant to Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones at Westminster Chapel (1956-59) and subsequently at Grove Chapel, London (1961-69) and St. Giles Presbyterian Church, Sydney (1981-84). […]

Long-time readers of this magazine1 will have noticed that comment on church conditions in Scotland is almost non-existent in these columns. One reason for that has been the complexity of the situation. It is far easier to see the providence of God in events that happened many years ago than it is to understand our […]

Iain H. Murray, the co-founder of the Banner of Truth Trust, recently gave this interview which is to appear in a coming issue of the fine monthly American magazine Tabletalk that comes from Ligonier Ministries and R.C. Sproul. Tabletalk: What are the top three Puritan works that every Christian should read and why? Iain Murray: […]

In May 2001 a few people first met in a little flat in West London to pray and think about a ministry for Russian speakers in London. At that time I was in my first year at London Theological Seminary, seeking God’s will for the work that he would call me to do. It would […]