Sober Words

"The English evangelicals who arranged for Richard Johnson to be chaplain to the first fleet had envisaged the distant new settlement as a place from which the Christian gospel would emanate. Such a thought was hardly likely to have occupied the attention of the first settlers with the exception, perhaps of Johnson himself. It was no doubt far from the mind of the Christians among the convicts, transported across the world against their will.

Yet, however unwittingly, however imperfectly, however inadequately, they did carry the knowledge of Christ to these shores. But the Christian settlers were few and their light was feeble. It is one of the great tragedies of the recent history if Australia that true Christianity was for so long so very difficult to discern in the life of this outpost of a distant nation which called itself Christan." - John Harris, One Blood.

HGP Relfections II

I recently completed a ministry traineeship at Sydney University with the EU Grads Fund and the Sydney University Evangelical Union. Over the next couple of days I'll be posting some of my reflections on the past two years.

Love the Church

"And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church..."

Over dinner at a conference I recently attended I heard a theological college graduand explain his decision to head into full time student ministry in 2012. He said he wanted to be involved in a ministry where he could pastor people, teach the bible and especially see people transformed by the Spirit of Christ and grow in their faith. And as far as he could see, there was no opportunity at all for this to happen in church-based ministry. Hence his move into student ministry.

It was a conversation that made me quite sad. If Ephesians one is right and the church really is the Jesus' body, than the church is something to be loved, and not despised. Jesus is the head, the church is his body, made up of his people, and so you love his church. And I don't just mean your local congregation you meet with on Sunday. I'm talking about the one true holy catholic and apostolic church, the church that God works through to make his wisdom known to the world (Ephesians 3.1-10), and the church that Jesus died for (Ephesians 5).

One of my peculiarities is that I've spent the past five years working parachurch organizations: three years with CMS and two years with the EU Grads Fund/Sydney University Evangelical Union. During my traineeship I've had time to reflect on both organizations and something that has impressed me about both organizations is that they know who they are. They understand that they are not churches, but as parachurch groups they exist to serve the church. Not every parachurch organization remembers this.

For a long time now I've been impressed by how the SUEU and the EUGF have sought to be a blessing to the church. The students in the EU are exhorted and encouraged to not only belong to, but to also thoughtfully serve their local church. The training they receive as students will hopefully equip them to serve not only during their time at uni, but also for the rest of their lives. And vision of the EUGF is to see hundreds and thousands of Sydney Uni graduates flood the church ready to serve wherever they find themselves. It's all about helping the church be the church.

Love the church, because it's Jesus church.

HGP Reflections

I recently completed a ministry traineeship at Sydney University with the EU Grads Fund and the Sydney University Evangelical Union. Over the next couple of days I'll be posting some of my reflections on the past two years.

Jesus is Building his Church

"...I will build my church, and the gates of hades shall not prevail against it."

Jesus promises to build his church. And he does - in two ways. Sometimes it is like the mustard seed in Mark 4. This tiny, most insignificant of seeds, grows into a tree that is so large that there is room for all the birds of the air to nest in its branches (a reference back to Jeremiah and Ezekiel for the Gentiles coming to nest in Israel). Jesus grows his church as more and more people are brought from death to life. And praise be to God, during my two years we saw over 40 university students put their faith in the risen and reigning Lord Jesus.

Jesus builds his church in both size and breadth. He also grows his church in depth. His church grows as people understand him more and more and live out the implications of knowing him. One of the joys of my two years at Sydney University was being apart if people's lives and helping them in submitting every aspect of their life under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. This may have been in helping students develop a "Biblical worldview" and be shaped by a Christian mind. This sometimes looked like helping students think through how the should think or feel about different things. And sometimes this looked like helping students repent of various deeds and take a different course of action. And though it all people were growing in their faith and conviction.

Jesus is building his church. He's on for church growth; and we should be too. Not even death will overcome his church. Jesus builds his church.