Maitland Evangelical Church website has been remade and looks good. Simple, but effective. They're also letting us know they are around on facebook and Twitter. Kevin Reid is the webservant. I like his personal website, too which is called Grace Transforms. He has quite a few thought-provoking articles on his site. It is enriching to be partners with people and churches like these folk.

What should church be like? Do you think that this video portrays church as it should be? Could our church be a church like this [with an Australian accent]?

Top Ten Myths About The Resurrection

Did the resurrection of Jesus really happen? This should be a question that everyone and especially every Christian, should ponder.

Is it true? If it isn't, Christianity is meaningless because this teaching is the lynchpin of the whole story.

Mike Licona has made ten little videos in which he dispells some of the myths that people believe about the resurrection.

If you are really sharp, you might notice that the link is to another site pointing to the site where these ten videos are stored. This is because the hosting site doesn't seem to have a handy index to the videos!

These are the topics that Dr Licona discusses in his series of ten videos:

Myth 1: Contradictions in the Gospels
Myth 2: Pagan Parallels in the Mystery Religions
Myth 3: The Fraud Theory
Myth 4: Hallucinations
Myth 5: It's a Matter of Faith
Myth 6: Apparent Death Theory
Myth 7: It Was Merely Legend
Myth 8: Science Proves that Resurrections Cannot Occur
Myth 9: Not Enough Evidence
Myth 10: Lost Gospels

You will notice that each video gives some information quickly and then focusses on a set of DVDs on the topic. I have not yet seen the longer program, but if it is as good as the tasters, it should be terrific.

I'm convinced that Jesus really did rise from the dead and is alive today. I'm also convinced that the resurrection is by far the most logical explanation of the data we have concerning Jesus Christ.

What about you?

Top blogs

Two of our Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches pastors are writing quality stuff. Others may be, too, but these two are well worth following.


Science and the Gospel is an intriguing series in which Chris Little, pastor of Albury Bible Fellowship, is considering how faith in Christ transforms our view of science, through the lens of Two Ways To Live. His blog has lots of other great articles, too, on quite a variety of subjects.

Dave McDonald is another FIEC pastor, who is writing about his experiences as he undergoes chemotherapy for “inoperable” lung cancer It is not gloomy, but can be both confronting and compelling. Dave is currently on leave from Canberra's Crossroads Christian Church.

Outstanding resource

Getting more deeply into your Bible is an outstanding series of articles by Geoffrey Grogan, a Bible scholar who died recently. His son John is progressively releasing these articles which really do live up to the claim of helping you to get more deeply into the Bible. Highly recommended.

Genuinely free book

So often free book offers turn out to be less than free. And, all-too-frequently, in fine print, near the end of the offer is a line which says

available to US residents only

which really cheeses off this Aussie!
But George Verwer's offer is genuine. I received my copy a few days ago. George wants to get as many people as possible to read Fred Heeren's Show Me God. (I have inserted the link to the Amazon product page, so that you can peruse the book, and also read the mainly positive reviews.)

The book's subtitle is What the Message from Space Is Telling Us About God. In the book, Heeren shares interviews with leading cosmologists and gives his own interpretation of how what they say and what the Bible says about creation can be harmonised.

I thought this short review from an Amazon reader was worth quoting:

I bought this book because I was having some serious doubts about God and Christianity. This amazing book cleared up all those doubts! When I finished reading the book I couldn't believe how clear everything was. There is no way anyone can read this book and be neutral about whethere or not there is a God. It is an amazing book and I highly recommend it for anyone. (Christen Humphries)

To order a copy, head to George's own webpage and follow the instructions.

Loving your "earthly dearest"

C S Lewis

When I have learnt to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now.

Insofar as I learn to love my earthly dearest at the expense of God and instead of God, I shall be moving towards the state in which I shall not love my earthly dearest at all.

When first things are put first, second things are not suppressed but increased.

Thanks to Justin Taylor for reminding me of this quote from C S Lewis, sums up what Christopher Ash says in Married For God.

Ash challenges us with the thought that the main purpose of marriage is not to meet our needs, nor to stop us from being lonely. But he also says that when we truly put God first, we may find these things as byproducts (or, we may not).

Ash's book has some interesting questions at the end of each chapter. Some of them make you think about the nuts and bolts of the chapter you've just read, while others are designed to stimulate more open-ended thought.

It is a well-chosen book for getting us thinking, in preparation for our Making Good Marriages Better conference with Jim and Lesley Ramsay.