As we enter into a new year, some approach the year with a sense of foreboding and fear, others with a sense of opportunity and excitement. Still others look at the days to come with a certain coolness of spirit — a disinterest and detachment — that is neither excited nor anxious, because we cannot tell what tomorrow will bring. Truly as James 4 reminds us, we are merely a mist, and we should neither say with certitude that we know what tomorrow will bring, for only He that is eternal, unchanging and enduring can speak of tomorrow with certainty.
Google “deconversion” and a whole bunch of people’s accounts of leaving Christianity will appear. One high profile former Christian leader, now “deconverted”, reads “I don’t view this moment negatively. I feel very much alive, and awake, and surprisingly hopeful.” These testimonies of faith, doubt, decision and clarity invert what we know to be the traditional testimony of conversion where someone publicly bears witness to faith in Jesus Christ: sin and doubt, decision (repentance and faith), faith and clarity. A string of high-profile examples can be found coinciding with the Trump era as a strong erosion of confidence in the Gospel’s power and the straightforwardness of the Christian life has taken hold. As one article observes, the power of this new wave of stories is not “the actual arguments themselves…[that are] so persuasive. It’s the people behind the arguments.”
Is a change of heart really impossible? Are we powerless before the patterns, routines and rut of sinful living and thinking?
An article recently appeared in the New York Times, titled “Why do people believe in hell?”. Here, we reflect on this article, as well as on the Bible’s teachings on hell.
This is a hymn that is still sung in a number of churches today and the lyrics speak of the richness of our salvation in Christ.
Every Wednesday, we begin our time of study with a time of worship. New songs are taught occasionally. This blog series hopes to explain some of the new songs that have been taught. We hope that it'll encourage you to use good Christian songs as part of your daily meditation and prayer too, not to replace the value of Scripture, but to complement it.
What comes to your mind when you think of "ambition"? Some might point to specific parts of our Bible to suggest that the ‘Christian-thing-to-do’ is to deny yourself, take up your cross to follow Jesus (Mark 8:34). In other words, some might think that Christians should have no ambition. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul? (Mark 8:36).
“Hallelujah!” means praise — and for most Christians raised in the Western tradition, is associated with George Frideric Handel’s “Halleuljah Chorus” in his composition, “Messiah”, a common Christmas-time favourite.
But why exactly do we sing “Hallelujah” about Christ?
Who are the people that God uses? In Acts 4, we realise that the early disciples were fishermen! Yet they spoke with a surprising clarity. What can we learn from this?
What happens when Christmas around and you don't feel Christmassy? In this blog post, Darius Leow, who attends our weekly Fellowship studies shares with us how Christmas took on a slightly different meaning for him this year.
