The Preacher this Sunday is Dr John Scott who is the minister of Chelmsford Presbyterian Church. Me and him are doing a swap.
There are 2 Presbyterian churches in England the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of England and Wales (EPCEW) and the IPC. The Free Church of Scotland also has two congregations in London. I am hopeful if we can build relationships with each other there could be a merger somewhere down the line. The differences between us are small and if we were all willing to compromise a little we could be together, whether this will ever happen I'm not sure.
Thursday 22 February 2007
Tuesday 20 February 2007
Please Pray
Please pray for Jennifer Courtney, she is heading to the US tomorrow for 2 missions conferences. The first one is in Trinity Presbyterian Church, Charlottesville (see the Wade Bradshaw post below), also there will be Bill Nikides, Nick Farrelly and Alan Waldecker they will be speaking on behalf of the IPC. Jennifer will be talking about her work with us and her time in Ethipia. She'll then go on to Independant Presbyterian Church in Savannah, Georgia.
Monday 19 February 2007
Church W/end at Home - March 9-11
March 9-11 - Guest speaker - Alasdair I Macleod from St Andrews, Scotland. You can hear audio sermons of him here.
Please do book in ASAP as we are ordering food in. Please give your booking form to Jill Peistrup.
All are welcome!
Please do book in ASAP as we are ordering food in. Please give your booking form to Jill Peistrup.
All are welcome!
Reading Retreat
Next week at the Pines, Pulborough, West Sussex
Monday afternoon - Thursday morning
There are still spaces
New Members
It's been great in the last month to welcome lots of new members here's a list of the people who've joined us:-
Ashley Cicocki
Jennifer Courtney
Martin Fox
Adrian Little
Rachel Little
Marianne Macleod
Hazel Mangaser
Jonathan Mckirgan
Jill Peistrup
Christopher Roberts
Gillian Thompson
Emma Vane
Jonathan Willcox
Thursday 15 February 2007
Bradshaw's Departing remarks
I thought it would be good occasionally to post something on Presbytery, last summer Wade Bradshaw left IPC Liss to return to the US. He now works for Trinty Presbyterian Church in Charlottesville. At the Presbytery last June he gave the following remarks. I've found them really helpful so thought you might want to read them.
Wade Bradshaw’s Departing Remarks:
Given before the English Presbytery of the IPC 6 June 2006
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us …”
As I leave to return to America, these are the weights and entanglements I see for the International Presbyterian Church. I have three to mention this afternoon.
The first is the weight of our pasts. I say it this way, because we in the IPC have several pasts, but I want to mention two prominent ones. First, there is the heritage of L’Abri Fellowship, and secondly, there are the Presbyterian churches that we come from – and the PCA in particular.
Both of these are very strong histories, and both flow from the Protestant Reformation. Each has a great deal to offer us today in our situation, and the two can co-exist together well.
But I have often noticed that dangers we face seem to come in pairs. There is one danger in front of us – this is the danger we are most aware of and most afraid of stumbling over. Very frequently, however, this danger in front of us is not something we are going to stumble into: we are too aware of it, too afraid of it to do that. Instead, as we back away from the danger in front of us, we are likely to fall into a different problem, a danger that was always there and lurking behind us.
We in the IPC are afraid of losing our histories: the heritage of L’Abri and the PCA, and perhaps even of the Reformation. In the past, we may have wrestled with things; but in our current situation, the loss of our heritage is the danger in front of us. Our real danger and the one that we could back into unintentionally, the danger that we should actually fear is our not looking to the new thing God is calling us to be: a seriously connected, international, reformed, missional church in post-Christian Europe. As we back away from the danger of forgetting L’Abri, or the danger to our PCA background and the danger of losing the Reformation, we may actually fall into our real danger of just replaying previous history rather than trusting and obeying God with the opportunities of today.
The second weight that I think I can see among us is what I call the secret story we tell ourselves. This is related to the weight of our pasts.
Presbyterianism is ‘life in committee’ and church-planters can find life in committee maddening. We tell ourselves that “I am the only person who understands … something.” This something with which we finish the sentence can be many things. It might be the heritage of L’Abri, or Presbyterian polity, or what the future of our church-planting denomination ought to be.
Once I identify myself as the only voice for some cause, all kind of bad things begin to happen. Among these, we stop listening to each other carefully. We group each other in our minds into parties, rather than listening to the Holy Spirit. We trust only ourselves in this one issue, but soon we can begin to trust only ourselves on many issues. We begin to try to win in committee rather than to be wise and learning how to lose. This cascade of bad things is of the Flesh, not the Spirit.
The third weight is about personal holiness and devotion. Church-planters are a very independent bunch. We can try to look good to impress one another and to gain status. This is normal behaviour. In reality, however, we may be what Jesus referred to as white-washed tombs: all image for the eyes of people watching, while inwardly there is a loss of devotion to God and dependence upon His power. There can be a loss of a pure heart and mind and body.
I think that we are to grow in our connection to each other, to grow in intimacy, being honest with each other, looking out for each other. We should not fear that the others learn my weaknesses and problems, we should fear that my brothers not know my real struggles. Our connection is not to be only administrative but a common walk in the Holy Spirit.
So, our weights may be:
· Fearing the loss of our past, when we should fear not responding to God’s opportunities today.
· Telling ourselves that ‘only I’ understand something, and then trusting only my opinion.
· Not allowing each other to be sinners – so that we can help each other really grow in holiness.
I have a last fourth point. It is more of an entanglement than a weight.
We have the Scriptures, the Confession, and the Book of Church Order. Be very careful about adding more and more requirements to our unity. The IPC ‘underdid’ it in the past, but we must not forever ‘tinker with the machine’ in hopes of making it perfect. I would counsel you to beware of adding things we must be similar in, because we are to be flexible and highly diverse. Beware the urge to centralise everything . We are to be truly and spiritually connected – this is very difficult to accomplish. And because people tend to ‘manage what they can measure’, we prefer to control everything administratively rather than doing the hard work to bring about the true and spiritual connection. The IPC needs to spend its time reaching postChristian Europe and modelling the Kingdom, rather than perfecting our uniformity in everything. So, my fourth point is then – we are to be connected not controlled; united not uniform.
“… Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
Working with the IPC has been a real privilege for me. I have serious doubts that I shall ever again be associated with a better group undertaking a greater need.
Wade Bradshaw
Given before the English Presbytery of the IPC 6 June 2006
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us …”
As I leave to return to America, these are the weights and entanglements I see for the International Presbyterian Church. I have three to mention this afternoon.
The first is the weight of our pasts. I say it this way, because we in the IPC have several pasts, but I want to mention two prominent ones. First, there is the heritage of L’Abri Fellowship, and secondly, there are the Presbyterian churches that we come from – and the PCA in particular.
Both of these are very strong histories, and both flow from the Protestant Reformation. Each has a great deal to offer us today in our situation, and the two can co-exist together well.
But I have often noticed that dangers we face seem to come in pairs. There is one danger in front of us – this is the danger we are most aware of and most afraid of stumbling over. Very frequently, however, this danger in front of us is not something we are going to stumble into: we are too aware of it, too afraid of it to do that. Instead, as we back away from the danger in front of us, we are likely to fall into a different problem, a danger that was always there and lurking behind us.
We in the IPC are afraid of losing our histories: the heritage of L’Abri and the PCA, and perhaps even of the Reformation. In the past, we may have wrestled with things; but in our current situation, the loss of our heritage is the danger in front of us. Our real danger and the one that we could back into unintentionally, the danger that we should actually fear is our not looking to the new thing God is calling us to be: a seriously connected, international, reformed, missional church in post-Christian Europe. As we back away from the danger of forgetting L’Abri, or the danger to our PCA background and the danger of losing the Reformation, we may actually fall into our real danger of just replaying previous history rather than trusting and obeying God with the opportunities of today.
The second weight that I think I can see among us is what I call the secret story we tell ourselves. This is related to the weight of our pasts.
Presbyterianism is ‘life in committee’ and church-planters can find life in committee maddening. We tell ourselves that “I am the only person who understands … something.” This something with which we finish the sentence can be many things. It might be the heritage of L’Abri, or Presbyterian polity, or what the future of our church-planting denomination ought to be.
Once I identify myself as the only voice for some cause, all kind of bad things begin to happen. Among these, we stop listening to each other carefully. We group each other in our minds into parties, rather than listening to the Holy Spirit. We trust only ourselves in this one issue, but soon we can begin to trust only ourselves on many issues. We begin to try to win in committee rather than to be wise and learning how to lose. This cascade of bad things is of the Flesh, not the Spirit.
The third weight is about personal holiness and devotion. Church-planters are a very independent bunch. We can try to look good to impress one another and to gain status. This is normal behaviour. In reality, however, we may be what Jesus referred to as white-washed tombs: all image for the eyes of people watching, while inwardly there is a loss of devotion to God and dependence upon His power. There can be a loss of a pure heart and mind and body.
I think that we are to grow in our connection to each other, to grow in intimacy, being honest with each other, looking out for each other. We should not fear that the others learn my weaknesses and problems, we should fear that my brothers not know my real struggles. Our connection is not to be only administrative but a common walk in the Holy Spirit.
So, our weights may be:
· Fearing the loss of our past, when we should fear not responding to God’s opportunities today.
· Telling ourselves that ‘only I’ understand something, and then trusting only my opinion.
· Not allowing each other to be sinners – so that we can help each other really grow in holiness.
I have a last fourth point. It is more of an entanglement than a weight.
We have the Scriptures, the Confession, and the Book of Church Order. Be very careful about adding more and more requirements to our unity. The IPC ‘underdid’ it in the past, but we must not forever ‘tinker with the machine’ in hopes of making it perfect. I would counsel you to beware of adding things we must be similar in, because we are to be flexible and highly diverse. Beware the urge to centralise everything . We are to be truly and spiritually connected – this is very difficult to accomplish. And because people tend to ‘manage what they can measure’, we prefer to control everything administratively rather than doing the hard work to bring about the true and spiritual connection. The IPC needs to spend its time reaching postChristian Europe and modelling the Kingdom, rather than perfecting our uniformity in everything. So, my fourth point is then – we are to be connected not controlled; united not uniform.
“… Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.”
Working with the IPC has been a real privilege for me. I have serious doubts that I shall ever again be associated with a better group undertaking a greater need.
Wade Bradshaw
More on Schaeffer
Reformation 21 which is a great online magazine published in November 2 articles on Francis Schaeffer, who founded our little denomination.
They are both legnthy but worth reading
'Francis Schaeffer - The man and his message' - Jerram Barrs
Monday 12 February 2007
Lunchtime lecture in Central London
The Evangelical Library is holding a lunchtime lecture on Monday 26th February 12.30pm. Mostyn Roberts will be speaking on 'Francis Schaeffer - The man and his message'.
The lecture will last 50 minutes.
The lecture will last 50 minutes.
Saturday 10 February 2007
Monthly Church Prayer Meeting
Church Prayer Meeting is this Tuesday at 8pm - Carlo Colloredo will be giving us an overview of what to pray for in Italy.
Thursday 8 February 2007
Book Review
The Church that Christ Built - John Legg - Only £7.50
Our esteemed Graham Weeks writes -
Simply the best book on church history I have read if one considers the needs of the ordinary Christian. From the early martyrs through to Spurgeon, John Legg writes biographies that inform the mind and move the heart. I cannot recommend this book too highly. It is full of great quotes from great men and women. Finally the truths taught from history are applied to today. I have heard the author preach many times. He is an excellent expositor. here he proves an excellent writer, biographer and historian.
You can buy this on the bookstall for £7.50
Tuesday 6 February 2007
Apologetics events in London
UCCF are running some apologetics events with William Lane Craig which are open to all and free.
Tuesday Feb 27th - Is God a Delusion? a debate with Prof Lewis Wolpert - chaired by John Humphrys - 7.30pm Westminster Central Hall
Wednesday 28th - Reasonable Faith - The evidence for Christianity lecture - 7.30pm All Souls Church
Monday 5 February 2007
Internationals Meeting
There is a meeting for the International team this Thursday night at the Rae's home at 8.45pm.
Evangelicals Now
Evangelicals Now is a non denominational monthly newspaper. It's edited by John Benton who is the minister of Chertsey Street Baptist Church. It's helpful in that it gives you news of what is going on, plus articles and news. As with all these types of things it can be a mixed bag. We'd love more people in IPC to read it so Hazel Mangaser is going to co-ordinate that for us.
To subscribe for 1 year costs £15 but if we get more than 3 people you can get it for £13 - please sign up outside the church lounge.
Saturday 3 February 2007
Presbytery website
The IPC Presbytery website is now online. There's only about 25% complete but the church consitution, bookof church order and 2 articles on IPC the Past and IPC the future are on there which may interest some.
Friday 2 February 2007
Pot Luck Lunch this Sunday
Do come and have lunch with us at IPC, bring enough for a few others as Marius Cradock is being baptised and I expect there'll be loads of visitors.
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