Midweek Meeting June 11 2025

Just a handful of us on Wednesday night to look brefly at Romans 8:31, 32 but a very good time of prayer, each one taking a turn to lead us.

Some gleanings from Catalyst

Alfred North Whitehead saw philosophy as a series of footnotes to Plato. In a similar way we can see Scripture as a series of footnotes to Genesis 3:15. (SF)

Be a Baranabas not a Sabanarab! (SF)

For the only duty of the philosopher is to 'open' the truth. And I do not care much how it should be opened, whether you should use a wooden key or a golden key. It is far better to open it with a wooden key than to shut it with a golden key. (Augustine)

When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude. (G K Chesterton)

A heart of thankfulness is an entry point . We're to enter God's gates with thanksgiving. (Sam Crabtree)

I. Resolved, that I will endeavor hereafter, by God's help, to remember more deeply and solemnly than I have ever yet done, that I am not my own, but Christ's servant; and of course, bound to seek, not my own things, but the things which are Jesus Christ's.

II. Resolved, that I will endeavor, by the grace of God, to set such an example before the candidates for the ministry committed to my care, as shall convince them, that, though I esteem theological knowledge and all its auxiliary branches of science very highly, I esteem genuine and deep piety as a still more vital and important qualification.

III. Resolved, that I will endeavor, by the grace of God, so to conduct myself toward my colleague in the seminary [Archibald Alexander], as never to give to give the least reasonable ground of offence. It shall be my aim, by divine help, ever to treat him with the most scrupulous respect and delicacy, and never to wound his feelings, if I know how to avoid it.

IV. And whereas, during my residence in New York, a very painful part of my trouble arose from disagreement and collision with a colleague, I desire to set a double guard on myself in regard to this point. Resolved, therefore, that, by the grace of God, while I will carefully avoid giving offence to my colleague, I will, in no case, take offence at his treatment of me. I have come hither resolving, that whatever may be the sacrifice of my personal feelings - whatever may be the consequnce - I will not take offence, unless I am called upon to relinquish truth or duty. I not only will never, the Lord helping me, indulge a jealous, envious, or suspicious temper toward him; but I will, in no case, allow myself to be wounded by any slight, or appearance of disrespect. I will give up all my own claims, rather than let the cause of Christ suffer by animosity or contest. What am I, that I should prefer my own honor or exaltation to the cause of my blessed Master? (1813 Resolutions of Samuel Miller - see more here)

The only singular immediate act of the person of the Son on the human nature was the assumption of it into subsistence with himself. (John Owen)

The Sabbath is an ascent to the summit (Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel)

... the horror of Sunday used to cast its prescient gloom as far back in the week as Friday ... (John Ruskin  on his evangelical childhood)

The eschatological is an older strand in revelation than the soteric. (Geerhardus Vos)

But one day, as I was passing in the field, and that too with some dashes on my conscience, fearing lest yet all was not right, suddenly this sentence fell upon my soul, Thy righteousness is in heaven; and methought withal, I saw, with the eyes of my soul, Jesus Christ at God's right hand; there, I say, as my righteousness; so that wherever I was, or whatever I was adoing, mGod could not say of me, He wants my righteousness, for that was just before him. I also saw, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor yet my bad frame that made my righteousness worse; for my righteousness was Jesus Christ himself, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. (Bunyan in Grace Abounding)

O death, we defy thee! A stronger than thou

hath entered thy palace; we fear thee not now!

Oh, sing hallelujah, oh, sing hallelujah,

oh, sing hallelujah! Be joyful and sing,

death cannot affright us - Christ Jesus is King! (William Plunket)

Therefore I say, we get no other thing in the Sacrament than we get in the Word. Content yourself with this. But if this is so, the Sacrament is not superfluous.

Would you understand then, what new thing you get, what other things you get? I will tell you. Even if you get the same thing which you get in the Word, yet you get that same thing better. What is this “better”? You get a better grip of the same thing in the Sacrament than you got by the hearing of the Word. That same thing which you possess by the hearing of the Word, you now possess more fully. God has more room in your soul, through your receiving of the Sacrament, than he could otherwise have by your hearing of the Word only. What then, you ask, is the new thing we get? We get Christ better than we did before. We get the thing which we had more fully, that is, with a surer apprehension than we had before. We get a better grip of Christ now, for by the Sacrament my faith is nourished, the bounds of my soul are enlarged, and so where I had but a little grip of Christ before, as it were, between my finger and my thumb, now I get him in my whole hand, and indeed the more my faith grows, the better grip I get of Christ Jesus. Thus the Sacrament is very necessary, if only for the reason that we get Christ better, and get a firmer grasp of him by the Sacrament than we could have before.

(Robert Bruce in The Mystery of the Lord’s Supper)

Catalyst Day Three 2025

Simon Arscot

The first two days high standards were kept up on day three. Simon Arscot did well on the Lord's Supper, not straing too far in either direction on its importance. Christopher Ash was very good again on the psalms, this time on what Christ would have learned of evil and judgement. Jason Heliopoulos ended well with a reminder of the basics. It is not about you, minister, but about God and your people. Some nice illustration once again. The day began once again, however, with Sinclair Ferguson, who stands head and shoulders above us all with his vast knowledge and great spiritual acumen. His final subject was Christ Conqueror and High Priest. Just superb. Do check these messages out especially those by Dr Ferguson when they appear on YouTube soon on the IPC Catalyst channel. (If Simon looks rather youthful it's because I forgot to snap him this time and have used a pic from a previous year!).

Catalyst Day Two 2025

Ash

So more of the same on the Wednesday. Dr Ferguson was superb as he drew our attention to the founder of our faith (the archegos) and our worship leader. Well illustrated and theologically deep, it was a privilege to be there. The others were up to speed to - an excellent paper on the Sabbath from Simon Arscott, more good stuff on the Psalms from Christopher Ash (this time with a focus on the church) and then an encouraging last session from Jason Heliopoulos on the importnace of friendship, taking Paul and Calvin as exemplars. As ever, good to chat to people.Good to see the lollipops and cornettos available in the afternoon.

Catalyst Day One 2025

Heliopoulos

Ferguson

It is good to be at the Catalyst conference in Ealing with our Presbyterian friends once more. In this tenth yearthey have stuck with their tried and tested formula of four speakers across three days, beginning as ever with Sinclair Ferguson. He spoke on the person of Christ from Hebrews 2:5-9 making some excellent points about Hebrews and how the whole Bible undolds fom Genesis 3:15. We need to help our congregations see Jesus through "Emmaus Road preaching".

Simon Arscott was the second speaker of the morning, on Christ's presence in the sermon from Matthew 23:34 making goodd use of a book by Hugh Martin on the subject recently republished. (I couold have had a free copy if I had booked earlier). Scribes bind and loose from the text and that brings Christ near to the congregation.

In the afternoon it was good to hear Chritopher Ash on Christ in the psalms once again. Our final speaker, one new to me was Jason Heliopoulos on gratititude. Good day with over 300 present.

Lord's Day June 8 2025

I preached yesterday morning from Ephesians 5:15-21 and this was followed by a fellowship lunch where about 40 of us sat down to an array of international dishes. A new Iranian lady was at the morning meeting. Eddie preached in the evening. A good day but many missing as ever.

10 Beatles Songs That Include The Word Little

1. I Feel Fine [I'm so glad that she's my little girl]
2. Run For Your Life [little girl throughout the song]
3. Thank You Girl [I know little girl / Only a fool would doubt our love]
4. Twist and Shout [You know you twist, little girl]
5. Dear Prudence [Dear Prudence, let me see you smile? / Dear Prudence, like a little child]
6. Every little thing
7. Little Child
8. With a little help from my friends
9. All together now [One, two, three, four / Can I have a little more?]
10. I'm so tired [You know I'd give you everything I've got / For a little peace of mind]

Eryl Davies Autobiography

I have been aware of the retired Welsh pastor and academic Eryl Davies all my Christian life, although I have rarely heard him preach and only met him once (when I was a student in Aber and wanted to subscribe to Foundations which he edited from its inception and for the next 19 years - it ws produced in those days using a plastic binder adn no staples). The story is of growing up a nominal Christian and being non-academic but siuddenly feeling called to the ministry and starting to train.

During the nine years it took he was converted through Vernon Higham and others and went on to pastor a denominational church in Maesteg. Eventually he led the church out of the Welsh Presbyterian denominatio because of its compromised position. They lost the manse and the church building but God provided. After Maesteg he went on to pastor the newly formed and student dominated bilingual church in Bangor, in his native North Wales.

After around 15 years there he became the lead tutor and then principal of a new EMW college that merged wih Barry Bible College (he had completed a PhD in philosophy while a pastor - partly possible because he and his wife Magwen went 13 years without children until a son and daughter were born to them). He served a good long stint there developing the work and supervising some 27 PhDs. He also writes about several trips to Korea and the many books on various topics he has written. Dr Davies is clearly a very spiritual man of great integrity. He is quite mystical but no charismatic.

He now looks after his wife Magwen who is quite unwell. As he reflects on his life, he is very thankful to God and his providence but find the periods of poverty he has known a little hard to accept (though he does). He tells us that Dr Lloyd-Jones was disappointed when he decided to leave the pastorate but came to accept the move. For some reason he wants us to know how, although he did not agree with him on several things, he reached out to Dr R T Kendall when he was in London and the fact that he has seldom consulted Spurgeon's sermons. I suppose the point is that he has been his own man throughout.

Midweek Meeting June 4 2025

There were nine of us last Wednesday and uniquely though we were so few there were at least five of us present who could have taken the meeting. I say that because in addtion to myself and my assistant Eddie, who have both led the meeting many times and four church member regulars, we also had three visitors. A friend of mine, a German pastor called Stefan Beyer, is staying with us this week and could easily have told us about his work in Jena and/or led a Bible study. Further there was the dynamic duo J P and Fiona Earnest from Bangor who had both been at nearby London Seminary that day - Fiona doing the Flourish course for women and J P lecturing to the seminary students on evangelisitc work. J P, field operation manager for the Open Air Mission, would happily have told us about their work. They are in London next week adn will be at the derby in Epsom this weekend. Fiona is the UK Deputation and Communications Officer for the Albanian Evangelical Mission and would have happily told us all about the current work in Albania (which has been off our radar for 20 years I am afraid). Anyway what they got was a Bible study from me on Romans 8:29, 30 and then we all took turns to pray about the various things on our hearts.

Beard Theology

My sister gave me this for my birthday and I read it straight away. It is a very thorough study of an obscure subject and a great read that appears to be reliable. Beards are not such an important matter in the grand scheme of things but it is good to know this history and there are a number of interesting sidelights on various subjects. I had read the Spurgeon quotes before but had never noticed that whereas most of the Reformers had beards (Luther the obvious exception though he dabbled), the eighteenth century evangelicals did not at all. Is there something in this? Probably not. The author is an Anglican blogger.

The Art of Shepherding 2025

It has been good today at the St Giles Christian Mission in Islington for the Art of Shepherding Conference. Perhaps we were a litte less than last year (35?). The four speakers were Phil Heaps from Highbury, Dan Green from Banstead, Brad Franklin from SGM and Robert Strivens from Bradford on Avon. The messages were on Proverbs and pastoring, shepherding and the whole counsel of God, David Brainerd and pastors and retirement. All of them had very useful things to share. Audio will I guess appear here at some point.

Shapers of Christianity

These twelve biographies originally appeared in the Banner of Truth Magazine. Some of the material can also be found in Nick Needham's church history series. They have value, however, as a collection and I enjoyed reading them all in one session. They give a sweep through the length and breadth of Christian history and are wrtitten succinctly, knowledgeably and judiciousy. Each one is brief and to the point but guarded in what it commends. A great book for anyone with no church history and anyone with a vast knowledge too. Great book.

10 Welsh words beginning with c that end in "fa"

The Welsh man, fan or fa is one of their word for place (lle is the other). The fa ending is attached to many words. Eg

1. camfa stile (step place)
2. campfa gym (execise place)r
3. cerddorfa orchestra (music place)
4. cofrestrfa register (reminder place)
5. cronfa reservoir (collection place)
6. cuddfa hiding place or hoard
7. cyfnewidfa (stock) exhange or interchange (change place)
8. cyffesfa confessional (confession place)
9. cymanfa meeting place or assembly (together place)
10. cynulleidfa congrehation or audience (gathering full place)

John 'Rob Roy' MacGregor

We had a stupendous annual lecture at the Evangelical Library tonight when Norman Hopkins spoke on the forgotten Christian hero, the adventurer, writer, artist, evangelist and philanthropist John "Rob Roy"MacGregor. His whole story is full of amazing episodes from beginning to end and well told by our Library trustee. Perhaps the names and organisations mentioned will give you a flavour for how brilliant it all was - Hannah More, Thomas Chalmers, E H Bickersteth, Baptist Noel, Lord Shaftesbury, the Monod brothers, David Livingstone, C H Spurgeon, etc, and the YMCA, SASRA, the Ragged School Union, Open Air Mission, Lawyers Christian Felloswhip, The Protestant Alliance, etc. That is apart from the canoe expeditions, climbing Mont Blanc  and other travels and the various disasters he faced. Do look out for the lecture on YouTube in due time. The one disappointment was that so few were there to hear this illustrated talk.

Lord's Day June 1 2025

It was one of those days when you feel like you're edging forward last Lord's Day. In the morning we had a baptism - for the first time in a while not an Iranian. I preached from Acts 8 (struggling a bit as I've been unwell mostof the past week). Then in the evening we welcomed our newly baptised friend into membership at the Lord's Supper. Eddie then preached from Psalm 45. A good day.