chongs · worship – Page 71 – [ mites from our momentary marriage and ministry ]

Web curations (12 Mar)

#music

Whose songs are played more than Katy Perry’s each week? Chris Tomlin, king of the sing along. Eric Marrapodi and Tom Foreman share a bit more about the worship songwriter, whose latest album topped the US Billboard 200 charts in January. In CCLI’s last two reporting periods, Tomlin had the No. 1 most-sung song and five of the top 25 (I wrote more about this and other thoughts here). Tomlin: “I strive for trying to write something that people can sing, that people want to sing, and that people need to sing.”

#churchpolitics

CJ Mahaney steps down as President of Sovereign Grace Ministries – From Christianity Today: “C. J. Mahaney, founder of Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), will step down as its president effective April 12 in order to focus on being a local pastor. The news comes shortly after the beleaguered network of churches asked a Maryland court to dismiss a lawsuit alleging its leaders covered up the sexual abuse of children.”

#science

The ever-evolving appendix story – I grew up being taught in science class that the appendix is an evolutionary left-over with no real function. Dr Jay Wile shows how scientists have changed their views and now believe that the appendix is so important it evolved over 30 times.

#satire

Vatican shocker: Cardinals choose Siri as next Pope – In a groundbreaking decision, “Siri becomes the first arguably female pope, the first battery-powered pope and, most important, the first truly infallible pope.”

Sadly, this is not the Onion – A website that collates stories that could feature in news satire website “The Onion”… except they’re all 100% true.

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â€œWe talk of the Second Coming; half the world has never heard of the first.â€
~ Oswald J. Smith ~

— GFA World – NZ (@NZGospelforAsia) March 6, 2013

A fictional shadow and type

(William: I finally started on John Stott’s “The Cross of Christ”. Considered to be his magnum opus, and until last week sat proudly on my bookshelf as a paperweight. Well 30 pages in and I am already transfixed and ready to discover why the universal symbol of the Christian faith is a cross, and why Christ had to die.)

The Bible is full of historical events that act as a type of, or foreshadow, Jesus’s work of redemption. John Stott opens his book by describing an 1873 artwork of Jesus Christ (viewable here):

“Do you know the painting by Holman Hunt, the leader of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, entitled ‘The Shadow of Death’? It depicts the inside of the carpenter’s shop in Nazareth. Stripped to the waist, Jesus stands by a wooden trestle on which he has put down his saw. He lifts his eyes towards heaven, and the look on his face is one of either pain or ecstasy or both. He also stretches, raising both arms above his head. As he does so, the evening sunlight streaming through the open door casts a dark shadow in the form of a cross on the wall behind him, where his tool-rack looks like a horizontal bar on which his hands have been crucified. The tools themselves remind us of the fateful hammer and nails.

In the left foreground a woman kneels among the wood chippings, her hands resting on the chest in which the rich gifts of the Magi are kept. We cannot see her face because she has averted it. But we know that she is Mary. She looks startled (or so it seems) at her son’s crosslike shadow on the wall.

The Pre-Raphaelites have a reputation for sentimentality. Yet they were serious and sincere artists, and Holman Hunt himself was determined, as he put it, to ‘do battle with the frivolous art of the day’, its superficial treatment of trite themes. So he spent 1870-73 in the Holy Land, and painted ‘The Shadow of Death’ in Jerusalem, as he sat on the roof of his house. Though the idea is historically fictitious, it is also theologically true. From Jesus’ youth, indeed even from his birth, the cross cast its shadow ahead of him. His death was central to his mission. Moreover, the church has always recognized this.”

– John Stott, The Cross of Christ: 20th Anniversary Edition (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1989), 17.

I haven’t been this hooked by an opening three paragraphs in a long time!

“For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” – 1 Corinthians 1:18

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Round the Bays on four feet

Enjoyed a weekend of unhurried, intentional family time this weekend. The highlight was trudging from Quay St on the waterfront in town all the way to St Heliers for the Auckland Round the Bays fun run/walk.

Despite the overexcited More FM announcers, the Army cannon’s starting gun, Eden fell asleep about 15 minutes before the race started until about half an hour into the race.

Was quite amusing to watch Eden strapped on Cheryl’s back munching on a cheese stick as we walked eastwards. She’s still unable to walk so got the benefit of being carried all the way.

At times the size of the crowd (estimated at between 40-70,000 this year) made me wonder what it would have been like for an entire nation of 1-2 million Israelites to mass migrate from Egypt to Canaan.

Once we got to the end, we headed to Madills Farm Reserve. My company put on a pretty impressive lunch under a big marquee. We enjoyed eating together and also getting to know a few colleagues better.

Maybe we can do more walking as a family with this experience under our belts!

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“And this is love, that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning, so that you should walk in it.” – 2 John 1:6

Web curations – church stuff (8 Mar)

Clips on church life and ministry:

Infographics for the whole bible – This is pretty neat. Josh Byers combines biblical theology and great graphic design in his new project to create an infographic for every book of the Bible. Already the ones for Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and a Revelation end-times summary look fantastic.

Stop preaching on giving – Tim Thornborough on how to deal with “donor fatigue” in church giving – preach on generosity instead of giving.

Another moral effect of pornography – Al Mohler summarises new research showing that users of pornography tend to be more permissive and supportive of same-sex marriage.

Free music highlight:

Hymns Page CXVI

Page CXVI Hymns – These aren’t really for congregational use, but are thoughtful interpretations by a group of musicians from the coming generation. Over 70 tracks, free to download for the month of March as part of a Jubilee celebration. You have to submit your contact details but other than that it’s free.

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Atheists meet together to “worship”

Recently two London comedians decided to start a Sunday Assembly “anyone who wants to live better, help often and wonder more”. The idea of an atheist church has been wildly successful,with packed weekly services since the first gathering in January (they now run two services!). It’s been such a hit that the organisers are now offering help to spread the idea across the UK and beyond – a church-planting strategy, if you will.

So what exactly happens in one of these services?

Simon Jenkins went to find out one week and found it an interesting experience as a professed Christian. It was the BBC’s turn to report on it another week, where the order of service was:

Theme of “wonder”
Congregation sang Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now, Superstition by Stevie Wonder and Nina Simone’s Ain’t Got No
Screen on altar showed photo of TV scientist Dr Brian Cox
Reading by Dr Harry Cliff, a particle physicist, on the discovery of antimatter

Each Sunday Assembly so far can basically be boiled down to some common elements:

You meet on a Sunday in a church building
The service is structured around a theme
You sing songs
You take up an offering
There’s a reading (not from the Bible)
A speaker comes up to give a talk to inspire the congregation

Sound familiar? How ironic that in seeking to meet around atheism, they are using forms and structures that come from a Christian worship framework!

Christians meet on Sunday to celebrate the day Jesus rose to defeat sin and death.

Christians sing songs to recall how God has redeemed them as a people.

Christians give generously so that the good news of Jesus can spread and people can be cared for.

As a commenter in Simon Jenkin’s review points out:

“If people are so desperate to claw back some of the social aspects they lost or feel is missing by not being part of a church, then they’re just being honest about the real reason churches exist. There’s no need to copy their structural formalities to get that feeling back.”

Interestingly since the desire to spread the godless church, Sunday Assembly folks have even put together pseudo-guidelines for worship / statement of unfaith to help you run your own atheist church wherever you are.

Here are some of their “regulative principles”:

Your Sunday Assembly will be on one of the themes previously explored by Sunday Assembly London.
A Sunday Assembly will show the guest speaker’s talk and the address from the Sunday Assembly London they have chosen. (already dealing with the multisite issue I see…)
A Sunday Assembly will contain a moment of silent reflection. (read: silent prayer)
10% of donations will eventually go towards the Sunday Assembly Everywhere fund (read: missions fund)

It’s hard to know what to think in this case.

Is imitation the sincerest form of flattery?

If atheism is a conviction so strong you’d want to gather around it, isn’t it basically a faith system?

If you’re an atheist, would you head to a “Sunday Assembly” like this if one was available in town?

(HT: @vickibeeching)

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