Advance peek at a fabulous article by J John that will be in the Church Times next week. Great to read as election fever(?) grips the nation! The awakening of the religious in politics? British politicians, Alistair Campbell famously informed us, ‘do not do God’. At this election time a related question ought to be asked: ‘Do the religious do politics?’ The answer, it seems, is that they do and increasingly so – something that ought to give the political parties pause for thought. Particular interest ought to be focused on that substantial sector that I belong to – the Evangelicals. In the UK Evangelicals tend to be the worst publicists for themselves (humility may be a great virtue but it’s a lousy basis for PR) and their growth here has been largely overlooked. Yet according to the Evangelical Alliance there may be around 2 million Evangelicals in the UK and they represent the only segment of the British church that is growing. Indeed, on current trends it will not be long before almost all of British Christianity outside Catholicism […]
Author: Anthony Delaney
I speak, I write, I lead.
SPONSOR ME RUNNING WILMSLOW HALF MARATHON
On Sunday 28th March I’m going to run the Wilmslow Half Marathon to raise money for two great causes, rebuilding a Haiti Hospital and the Message here in the UK.
J John on the future
My friend J. John was asked by Charisma Magazine in the USA to respond to the question:What will life be like for the church in 2020?
Lindz West of Lz7 on the skills of Evangelism
Lindz from Lz7 teaching on being an effective evangelist. Manchester is his adopted city, he is a missionary to Manchester! Sept 27th his ‘this little light’ song will be released. The government are right behind it: ‘Shine’ campaign = film young people doing something good. Put it on the website. Momentum is building! He has been doing evangelism full time for ten years. Employed by Luis Palau festival to preach to their youth, some massive crowds. But the tough stuff is When you go onto a classroom etc with his work through the Message – there are walls to be broken down Mk 1;17 “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will make you fishers of men. Ever been fishing!? Hard work! Chucking out the net is dirty work, and you need some skills, but ordinary people can do it. When he did a sports science degree – he learned a definition of SKILL. Skill is a learned ability to bring about a predetermined result with maximum certainty often with minimal outlay of time, energy or both. So: do your […]
More blessed to give than receive
They were sexually pure but promiscuous in generosity! They lived like that because they had their eyes on another destination.
Resident Evil
It’s a strong word isn’t it? Evil. Some will read this post and say, “Speak for yourself, I’m a good person.”
Not a matter of prayer- a matter of faith! Arnold Muwonge
Our dear friend Arnold Muwonge spoke yesterday at Ivy Manchester. His main text was Ruth 1.21 I went out full, I came back empty. The title was RHYTHMS OF CHANGE. Here are my notes on what he shared ; great stuff – and see the end for an important prophetic word from Arnold. A man he knew came from Africa, when he was at home he could smell gas, but he got used to it. It took another guy coming in to be able to alert him. When you are cooking, you may not smell how good it is: needs a stranger to come from outside to smell it. Arnold brings an outsider’s perspective! There are three main actors in Ruth. It’s a great story. BOAZ – A type of Christ. His character was integral. Dependable. He is faithful, rich (psalm 24), able to help, our provider. We must learn to trust him. He gives us everything. He will always turn up. We can be confident in him. He operates according to covenant. Our salvation is based on covenant. NAOMI […]
Pastors R Us! Debra Green evening talk
Debra Green : Equipped. Pastors r us? What is the pastor gift? Shepherding? Can mean someone with divine enabling of others, taking responsibility to model & establish trust, lead, protect those within our span of care. We can’t abdicate caring to pastors who are paid. We all should take responsibility to respond to need. Pastoral care; 4 things to remember- CARE C. Compassion. It starts here! Jesus looked at the crowd and had compassion. He saw they were hungry. Went to meet the need. Went to rescue the lost sheep. Moved to reach out. In your gut, you are moved toward a need. Splancnizomai. Not just a sense of duty, it’s more powerful. Break my heart for what breaks yours. We don’t all have the same concern about the same things & that’s OK. Sometimes we just have to get involved, being spontaneously compassionate. You don’t need permission or a word from God to do that. But bigger issues, like ‘should I go to Haiti?’ we need to check that and run through a bigger filter. A. Aid (or Action). […]
An Engineer’s View on the Haiti Earthquake
Haiti needs a rebuild program that erects buildings of reasonable quality design, materials and construction
From Trash to Treasure
I happened upon a link today from Fast Company’s twitter feed which is well worth a read, about three ways to make gold out of garbage. I was particularly grabbed by the third way. It’s all about someone seeing ‘worthless junk’ and reimagining it – better. Follow the link to Matt Brown’s own page and he tells us how he saw these old plastic horses in a junk store bargain bucket, repackaged and rebranded them as “Night Horses” – like, ‘Nugget the life liver,” and “Sotirius, the silent Duke.” I love it! It’s just like what God does with us! This designer says he gives the objects a story of significance again. It’s part of a project called Significant Objects. We might feel worthless, neglected, useless or left out. But the Bible says to Christ followers that we should “think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; […]