Issue 5 of my newsletter

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Latest happenings...

I have a week and a half of work left until the new year begins. This year has gone by very quickly.

In reflecting on the past year I am thankful to God for this opportunity he has given me to do MTS. As with a lot of things, I've found that there has been no better way to learn about full-time ministry than by being engaged in it full-time. I have learned a lot over this year, have made a few mistakes along the way, but have also feel I have grown immensely, only by God's grace.

Thank you for all your support and prayers for me this year. Here are some things that you can pray for as the year wraps up:

• Pray that God would bring many people to our Christmas celebration meetings and grant them the gifts of faith and repentance
• Pray that God would give me wisdom as I start planning for next year
• Pray that God would give Rob and I wisdom as we plan for the future

WKC 11 review

It has almost been two weeks since WKC so I definitely thought I should do a review post now rather than later.

Overall, Women's Convention was a great weekend away. It was the first time I had gone with a group from St Andy's and we had a great time together. It was truly a very womanly weekend - we started by driving up together and having dinner in a pizza place. Then after that we went to Coles to pick up dessert - Yogo! On arrival to the KCC center, we ate our Yogo and got settled into our rooms. It was freezing! So we ended up driving back to Kmart to buy slippers and boots. Over the course of the whole weekend I think we went to Kmart 3 times to do various shopping. We also went out for deluxe hot chocolates, scoured the antique stores, knitted and crocheted.  Fun times!!!

The topic of the weekend was "A life worth living - eyes on the prize, feet on the ground." Cathie Heard and Jane Tooher gave talks from Philippians. Philippians is such a jam packed book and full of great encouragement and challenges. Cathie and Jane gave 4 great talks - but I felt like I wanted more! I guess it is a bit of a big ask to do a whole series on Philippians in 4 sessions. I was challenged to live for Christ above everything and to be willing to die for Christ now, before children and houses and security come. I was encouraged by the fact that God counts us righteous and his righteousness is the most valuable thing we can have.

Here are some quotes that I found helpful from the talks:
- Humility is thinking of yourself less, not thinking less of yourself.
-"To live is Christ and too die is gain" - dying is gain only if you are living for Christ.

There were a number of differences in the conference from previous years. The one that I thought was best was the use of dramatic readers to read the passages. Four women memorised a chapter of Philippians each and recited it to us. Not only did they remember everything word for word, they also put a lot of effort into reading the text with the right emphasis. The way they read also felt like they were reading a letter to friends.

They also had bite-sized segments and video interviews. There was a video of John Piper talking about what a life worth living is like for him. There was also an interview with 3 women on how they lived godly lives in the face of suffering and hardships. There was also a video testimony of the late Deb Lean which was very encouraging. WKC have said that they would upload the videos to their website so once they have I'll post up the link.

Once again I'll say that I really enjoyed WKC 11. To me, WKC is probably one of the best KCC conferences I've been to as they are always faithful to the word and always put a strong emphasis on preaching the Bible. Next years WKC is called "Fuelled by Desire." I'm interested to know what part of the Bible they will look at. Am looking forward to it and hope you (if you are a woman) can join me.

Should a single woman pray for a husband?

Found this quote from an article on the Center for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood:

Should we even pray for husbands? Is that acceptable? What if we pray and we remain single-what then??

My first answer is that of course God is still good if we pray and remain single. Marriage is a gift for this life alone. If we have received forgiveness for our sins and life eternal, we have already received the biggest and best gift and one that is for all eternity. We didn't miss out on God's very best.

http://www.cbmw.org/Blog/Posts/Why-pray-for-a-husband

What an encouragement: we have not missed out on God's very best!

Questioning our Evangelism Practises

I just finished reading Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God by J. I. Packer. It's a fairly short book made up of one tiny introductory chapter followed by 3 jam packed chapters. It should only take you less than a week to read it.

At the end of chapter 3, Packer poses 5 questions that he encourages us to ask of our own evangelism practises. Here they are:

1) Is this way of presenting Christ calculated to impress on people that the gospel is a word from God?

2) Is this way of presenting Christ calculated to promote, or impede, the work of the word in men’s minds?

3) Is this way of presenting Christ calculated to convey to people the doctrine of the gospel, and not just part of it, but the whole of it?

4) Is this way of presenting Christ calculated to convey to people the application of the gospel, and not just part of it, but the whole of it?

5) Is this way of presenting Christ calculated to convey gospel truth in a manner that is appropriately serious?

If you read the chapter yourself he goes into detail on why asking those questions are important. What do you think of these questions? Are there other questions we should be asking? Are some of these questions not important?

And how do our evangelism practises stand up against these questions? Do they make the cut?

Examples of evangelism practises/courses:

• Two ways to live
• Simply Christianity
• Just Start Talking
• Introducing God
• one-to-one/Bible reading
• doorknocking
• events/talks

Decline in church growth?

Been reading this article and found the following paragraph quite interesting:

In other words, although the outspoken atheists and cultured despisers of Christianity may seem very prominent to us, this may well be because they are over-represented among the media gatekeepers and opinionisers. The population as a whole is not nearly as hostile to Christianity or to churchgoing as we think.

 Thinking about my own experience I can see this to be true. I have been attending a pottery class and one girl in particular is not a Christian but is very happy to ask me about what I do during my week and about church and Christianity.

Have a go. Talk to some people. They may not be as hostile towards Christianity as you might think.

God is Faithful!

Hello All,

Two days ago I gave a talk at Abbotsleigh chapel to the whole school! My talk was on how God is faithful to his promises and he is concerned for his people. I spoke from Exodus 2:23-3:4. I enjoyed preparing the talk as I was being constantly reminded to trust in God's strength and not my own, and also the reminder that God is faithful!

In giving the talk I could also see that God was working through me to present something that was clear and faithful to the word. I have also been sick for the past couple of days and was sick on the day of giving the talk... but by God's grace, I was still able to give the talk and the students were very attentive.

Praise God for his power and strength, love and faithfulness!

Issue 4

Here is the link to my latest newsletter.

Hello Everyone!

I only ever seem to blog here when I'm sick so I thought I should let you know... I'm better now! We can definitely thank God for that.

I thought I should also let my internet savvy followers out there know that I have been doing some work on the St Andrew's website. I've uploaded all the most recent sermons including our 6 week series on worship. Check it out at www.standys.org.au

I am writing my next newsletter now so be on the lookout for that.

Prayer points

Hello Everyone!

At the moment I'm home sick with a bad flu. Could you please pray that God would give me a speedy recovery and good health for the rest of winter as this is already the second flu I've had this cold season.

Caroline