Archive - Life RSS Feed

“Church Is” Survey Results Q1: What is Church?

The “Church Is” project was an interactive animation that was made as part of a Christian art exhibit in June 2011 (You can read more about the project here).

The project was based on a survey of 31 people. All the participants remained anonymous and gave permission for their answers to be used. The 31 people may or may not be Christian, but I would assume that most of them are as the majority of participants were people in my circle of friends or friends of friends. You can view a selection of the responses in the project itself, but for interests sake I thought I would publish all of the answers given.

What is Church?

These are the answers to the first question, What is Church?

  • The church is a word used to describe followers of Jesus Christ.
  • A place where Christians can worship God, be encouraged and equipped. A place where salvation comes to the lost
  • The redeemed elect united to Christ and gathered in heaven. We also meet on earth.
  • A way to connect with other christians, a house for your spiritual family.
  • Church is meeting with christians with aim for fellowship and worship
  • The kingdom of Jesus being perfected by the work of the Holy Spirit
  • The Church is the Pillar and Bulwark of the Truth.
  • Gods people gathering together
  • A Church is not a building. It is rather a community of people who accept Christ Jesus as their Saviour and are willing to show God’s Grace others. This community gathers together to profess that Jesus is Lord, through worship, prayer and biblical teachings.
Continue reading below the break for the rest of the responses.

Trusting God When Looking For Work

Recently I’ve been quite busy, not only with Uni work and Church commitments, but also with job applications for next year.

I’m in my final year of University and I’m hoping to be employed as a full time primary school teacher next year. However, in NSW, it is very rare to get a full time teaching job (unless you’re willing to move). Most grads don’t start their teaching careers in a full-time permanent position but rather start with casual work, which then turns into a block of casual work, which may then turn into a temporary or full-time position.

Chalkboard

This has been stressing me out a bit when it really should have been, that is until God spoke to me through a sermon at Church last Sunday.

Up until then, I had thought that I needed a full-time position, so that I could build relationships and serve God through those relationships, and if I didn’t get a full-time job that I wouldn’t be able to serve God as I wouldn’t be able to build relationships, I’d just be going in and out of schools all the time.

So last Sunday’s sermon was on Philippians chapter 1, specifically verses 12-30. One of the key arguments that Paul makes in those verses is summarised in verse 21.

For me, living is Christ and dying is gain.

Paul is currently in prison for serving God, and knows that he would rather be with God in heaven (who wouldn’t!?), but for now he knows that his life is about being fruitful for God.

Now if I live on in the flesh, this means fruitful work for me;

Philippians 1:22a

We as Christians exist in this world to serve God and be fruitful for him. Our purpose is not to serve God and live for him the way we want to, but to live for him and serve him how he wants us to.

This really hit me. Until Sunday I’d been thinking that there was only one way for God to use me, which is ridiculous as God will use me to serve him in whichever way he chooses. I don’t need to have a full-time teaching position to serve God, I just need to be willing to serve him.

I am really thankful for God showing this to me, I am really thankful that God will use me fruitfully, and I’m really thankful that I’m no longer burdened by stress.

To sum up, God is good!

5 Sites With Helpful Tips For Running Meetings

A MeetingI used to run quite a few meetings, and I always wanted to make the meetings I ran better.

I’ve had this post drafted for over a year now, so I think it’s just about time it got published.

These links below are 5 resources that I used to try and make my meetings better. Check them out to help you run your meetings.

Hope you find them useful.

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt in running meetings, it’s that an agenda is vital in making meetings purposeful.

What’s one thing you’ve learnt about running meetings?

Could You Spare a Minute?

I’m planning on making a piece of art for a Christian exhibition about Church which will be shown at Ancon 2011. I’d love it if you could spend 1 or 2 minutes filling out a survey that I have created.

There are 4 questions, and you can think about them as much or as little ask you would like.

Please follow the link below to complete the survey.

~ “What do you think about Church?” survey ~

Thanks!

My artwork will be made using Hype, and will be about Church. But if you want to see it, you’ll have to come to Ancon (or read this blog after).

UPDATE: See the complete animation here – “Church is”.

Ancon 2011 on Facebook

Ancon is the annual conference for the Sydney Uni Evangelical Union and it’s only 6 weeks away!

Each year some people choose to help advertise Ancon through Facebook, and just like last year, I thought I would try and help out by creating some stuff that you can use. If you want to use what you see, scroll to the bottom of the post to find the downloads.

Just like last year, I’ve made a square ancon image that will make the most of your thumbnail in the news feed.

I’ve also made a banner that you can use across the top of your Facebook profile.

I’m not the only one who has made these type of things, check out RyAncon’s profile below.

Continue Reading…

“Jesus Hates Religion”at Sydney Uni

In weeks 6, 7 and 8 at Sydney Uni, the Evangelical Union is running a three week series in Public Meetings called “Jesus Hates Religion”.

Over the three weeks, Dave Miers (Tuesdays), Andy Judd (Wednesdays) and Steve Chong (Thursdays) will be speaking. I’m excited.

To get others excited, I made this video and it was shown in Public Meetings last week.

If your at Sydney Uni, come along! More details here http://www.sueu.org.au/activities/public_meetings/.

If your not at Sydney Uni, please pray for us.

Homosexuality and Marriage

Recently there has been a large push from sections of our community in Australia to legalise homosexual marriage. To think about this issue more, our Bible study group had a night to think about this and other issues relating to homosexuality.

To clarify what I think about this, I have decided to write this blog post with ideas from the night, as well as ideas that I have heard from others.

Homosexuality and Marriage

I’ve broken this post up into three main sections. 1. What I believe. 2. Some thoughts about homosexuality. 3. Some thoughts about homosexuality and marriage. I’ve done this so that you know the basis of what I am writing, and hopefully by doing this I won’t wrongly offend people.

Firstly, before we start I think it’s helpful to lay down some ground work so that you all know what I believe. I believe that God created this world, and that we as humans stuffed up this world by not living the way that God made us to live (this is called sin), and we deserve to be punished for this sin. But because God loves us so much, he sent his son into the world to die as a sacrifice to take the punishment that we deserve. Jesus then rose to life as proof of this, and we’re now living in a time when we are waiting for Jesus to return and judge the world. Those who accept Jesus and follow him will be saved from punishment, and those who don’t will be punished for eternity as we all deserve to be. God is delaying Jesus’ return so that as many people as possible can follow Jesus and be saved.

So now that you know what I believe as a Christian, let’s get onto some thoughts about homosexuality.

Continue Reading…

Page 2 of 9«12345»...Last »