A very important principle of Christian ministry is that it is about persuasion not coercion. This is something which differentiates Christianity from many other religions. In many other religions what matters is external obedience, but Christianity is a religion of the heart; motives matter more than external actions (see Matthew 6: 1 – 18 for […]
Which of your rights will you give up today for someone else’s sake? Reading through 1 Corinthians 8-9 this morning, I was struck (again) but just how incredibly counter-cultural the Bible is when it comes to thinking about our personal ‘rights’. The language of ‘rights’ is everywhere in ethics and morality today. In large part, […]
In 2010, Howick Baptist Church (where I serve as Associate Pastor) held the first Stand for the Gospel Conference. This conference was started with a vision to serve the church in New Zealand, across denominations around the unity of the Gospel; its life transforming power and the call to proclaim it to all people, calling […]
You can read the first two instalments in this series here & here. Since the first post in this series, I have received emails, FaceBook messages, Twitter Direct Messages, etc. all from people who are facing a scenario very similar to the one I’ve described, or they expect to before the year is over. This […]
You can see Part #1 to this series here. (In this post I switch to first person pronouns throughout, not because this scenario actually relates to me or either of my sisters, but simply for ease of writing and a more personal form of communication.) As I try to think through this very real scenario, […]
