Posts by A Jesus Follower
Pastors Ponderings
We are currently going through the book Acts for our sermon series. Already we have learned that the book was a record of how, what was to become the global Church, was founded. The book was supposed to be read following the book of Luke (who is the author of both books) with the gospel of Luke being an account of the coming and then death and resurrection of Jesus. Acts is an account of how everything changed after Jesus’…
pastors pondering
When people talk about what happened after Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, his ascension to the Father, and the start of ‘the early church’ they agree it all stared in Jerusalem. But defining the ‘it’ is more difficult. What began in Jerusalem? Some say Christianity but the word ‘Christian’ didn’t appear for decades so obviously those new believers didn’t think they were starting Christianity. So what did those first believers think was starting? In his book ‘Christianity in the Making’…
Pastors Ponderings
Pastors ponderings 21st july 2017 Acts is written by Luke and it is the continuing story from Luke’s Gospel. A notable thing about Luke’s storytelling is that he always uses the least likely characters. Luke chooses to focus on the people who you wouldn’t think were important, or who are normally excluded, to reveal the salvation of God; for example, poor widows, prostitutes, and tax collectors. It’s not surprising then that the first example of salvation seen in Acts…
Pastors Ponderings
As Christians, part of our calling is to herald the coming Kingdom of God to the world around and to start living our lives in a way that models that Kingdom. I have to say that often this is harder than we would like to admit. Screaming kids, a huge bill, an annoying co-worker, sickness – even walking on a piece of lego left on the floor can ruin our day making our lives sometimes a poor reflection of how…
Pastors Ponderings
I watched the film ‘National Treasure’, I suspect that most of us have and in it Nicolas Cage reads the map that leads to a hidden treasure using special glasses. Each time he pulled down the different lens, he saw a new clue, a new direction he could take. I thought afterwards that we should just watch ‘National Treasure’ instead of the sermon because it showed what is said about reading the Bible. We all come at the bible already…
What does it mean to be a Spiritual Church?
Exciting things are happening at CBBC. God is at work; lives are being changed. There is nothing more exciting than to see and to know the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our lives. Daniel mentioned that we all come from different Church backgrounds. Never were truer words spoken! I grew up in a generation where emotions were squashed, suppressed. It wasn’t right to show emotion or value experiences. It seemed ‘dead’. I’ve been thinking about that this…
Praying the Scriptures
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately…when it all began. It was a season of deep grief as it slowly dawned on me that our happy little “Christian” family wasn’t really as Christian or as happy as it looked. I came across Paul’s prayer in Colossians 1…I took hold of this prayer…it took hold of me. Oh Father God, that we would know you…live lives worthy of you…pleasing you…bearing fruit for you…knowing the redemption and forgiveness that is ours…
About Being Real
‘Be real,’ say Daniel and Julie (our Pastor’s). ‘Are we actually doing what we say we believe?’ they ask And so I ask myself the question, am I willing to be real? Sometimes it’s a bit like…will the real me please stand up because I don’t know if I know the real me yet!!! To be a real group of Jesus followers here at CBBC isn’t necessarily going to come in a neat package…it could be messy! In Aussie terms,…