Listening to Jethro

We are coming up towards Christmas. I wonder if you’ve started planning for Christmas yet? Maybe the mere thought of it fills you with dread! All those things to do; All the family coming to stay; All the visits to other family to get in; All the presents to buy, and wrap, and hide, and […]

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Kingdom Builders

Are you a ‘kingdom builder’ or a ‘church builder’ or even an ’empire builder’?   Or maybe you’re not a builder at all? As we embark upon a new series this autumn entitled Kingdom Builders it is helpful to look at exactly what the Bible means by ‘kingdom’ and in what sense we, as believers […]

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Liberation-Shaped Mission

As part of our new summer series Little People, Big God, we are embarking upon a journey through the book of Exodus, taking 12 sermons to cover the first 20 chapters. Exodus is perhaps a more contentious book in Christian theology than we may realise.  To see why, let’s remind ourselves of the process of […]

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Growing & Changing Together

Growth in a church – both spiritual and numerical – always involves change. In any church, excepting the tiny minority who simply do not want to grow, there may still be something in all of us that says ‘I want the church to grow … but not to change’.  Yet, growth is change. There are […]

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Church Governance Matters !

As the US election approaches, I am reminded of a single week in November 2012 when 126 million Americans voted for their President, 1.3 billion Chinese were informed about their new politburo leaders and 60 million Coptic Orthodox believers had the identity of their new Pope revealed when a blindfolded boy picked his name from […]

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Growing Numbers, Growing Disciples

We often hear statistics about declining numbers in the UK church, yet many local churches are bucking the trend.  Why do some churches grow and others don’t? Is this a question of theology and God’s sovereign choice, or of geography and population changes, or are there tangible things a church can do to grow numerically? […]

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Ever Changing Times!

“Don‘t long for the good old days. This is not wise.”  Ecclesiastes 7:10, NLT “Do not say, ‘Why is it that the earlier days were better than these?‘  For it is not from wisdom that you ask this.” Ecclesiastes 7:10, Baker OT Commentary The way we see the past, the present and the future determines our […]

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Angelology

Angels are everywhere!  Or at least, everywhere in pop songs, children’s literature, films and Valentines cards.  They’ve even been in a string of recent Cambray sermons. Yet they hardly seem to fit with our term’s theme, Grow Up, Grow Deep in Christ, despite the Bible’s 196 references across 34 books.  Or do they? Angels, a […]

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Who You Should Vote For – Revealed !

With the general election just days away, you may be feeling excited about the chance to engage in the democratic process.  Alternatively, you may be feeling numbed by the wall-to-wall media coverage, as parties attempt to win your support.  Perhaps you’re feeling both. The Evangelical Alliance recently polled more than 2000 evangelical Christians in the […]

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We wish you a Chinese Christmas

Each year, more and more of China’s 1.37 billion people are saying to each other ‘sheng dan kuai le’ – Merry Christmas! Much like the UK, Christmas in China represents a major commercial opportunity, first for exporting plastic Christmas decorations to Europe and the US, but also for Chinese shoppers in the country’s vast malls, […]

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Milk or Meat?

Are you a milky Christian or a meaty one?   The infant formula kind or a steak-on-the-plate believer? Recently I felt more than a little chastised by the tone of the writer to the Hebrews, who gets frustrated with his readers in Hebrews 5:11 – 6:4 for still living on spiritual milk – the foundational […]

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