All Things Seen & Unseen

If you ask Jehovah's Witnesses (JWs) today do they wor ship Jesus Christ , they will say 'no'. Christians are amaze d at th e news of this missing dimension in the J ehovah's Witness (JW) pr acti ce . BUT, it is perfectly consistent with JW basic beliefs about Jesus Christ Himself. L et us then investigate their basic beliefs about Him . Firstly , they say, 'Jesus was/i s a creation of Jehovah God [Yahweh]', the first 'direct' and only creation of J ehovah . Hence, Jesus did not always exist but, f or JWs, came into existence as a 'spirit- being' exist ing as Michael, the Archangel before his Fath er sent him to earth !     Orthodox Christians find this type of notion strange to say the least. F or them the Son of God is co-eternal with the Father and was in the words of the Nicene Creed , ' begotten not made'. Historically considered, their teaching is known as Arianism. Secondly , JWs say, that Jesus while on earth...

Of all the sections in the fourth gospel account (FGA) Jesus' discourse with the Samaritan woman (Jn 4.7-26) fascinates me the most. I t's loaded with material that could keep any teacher at work in any interested group for a good while. The discourse has 3 stages: first, water (vv7-15); then, her ' husband ' (16-19); finally the worship place (20-26). The gospel's question is, Who is Jesus ? The writer focuses on her answers to this question as in each section her understanding becomes greater.

One of the popular, modern beliefs about Christian worship is that it primarily occurs when the congregation is led in singing by a band of musicians and singers. That view is unfortunate and takes us back to the days when the laity came to church not to sing but to listen to the beautiful cathedral choirs do the singing.  For sometimes, the use of 'worship teams' with bands' and sing ers' efforts amplified can inhibit congregational partic ipation . The 'worship te am' can become a unit set apart by its skills and volume from the congregation leading to congregants becoming passive in their invo lvement in the service.

I am an evangelical looking for an Anglican congregation which still values the Prayer Book (PB). Australian Anglicans have three major prayer books dated: 1662 ( Book of Common Prayer ), 1978 and 1995 but it's hard to find evangelical congregations which use the PB. Some will use tiny bits out of the PB but it's hard to describe their liturgy as dependent on the Anglican Tradition; what is presented could equally be found in any non-conformist denomination. Usually members of such churches will boast about this absence of Anglican liturgy as if this is a good thing. (I suppose it can be if the formal liturgy has become lifeless and routinised but this process can happen within non-conformity too.) Last Sunday I finally found an evangelical Anglican church where good expository preaching was given and the PB liturgy was used. My, it was good! I had almost given up hope. The church is the Church of St Edward the Confessor in Blackburn South, Melbourne, Australia. I...

When I hear some recent church songs I wonder whether Christianity has become a Jesus-only movement! Some songs talk about nothing else but Jesus. Of course we all love Jesus but the calling of the Son is to lead us to the Father. I appreciate that the Trinity is heavy-duty teaching in so many ways because heretics stand ready to demote the Son to a mere creature and the Moslems want to relegate him to an inferior prophet to Mohammed. And Judaism sees him in even lower terms. And Christians too claim not to understand it! Yet the teaching makes the Christian religion distinctive among all religions! But we are Christians, followers of Jesus because he is God's son who reveals the Father through the power of the Spirit. What we do in our songs/hymns we are likely to do in our prayers. So some will pray to the Son directly and never mention the Father. That's not the practice of the biblical writers who consistently pray to the Father through the Son in the power of t...

Yesterday I had what I can only describe as a feeling of Paradise. I was babysitting my 2 y.o. granddaughter and we had been up to our local park. She hadn't been as interested in that as she normally is but she did enjoy her regular swing. We left there to buy some bread and as we walked home with her pushing the pusher--or trying to--I was seized with a spirit of thanksgiving. I began to sing, Praise My Soul the King of Heaven . I didn't care who heard me. (In any case I didn't and can't sing very loud!) This was a grace-filled moment when the privilege of being when I was with my gorgeous little granddaughter on a beautiful, albeit hot, sunny day with her steering the pusher all over the place because she can't see over the top of it!!

Christian groups 'dress to impress' these days with their song words on walls. We usually don't stop to think about this development but go along with it as the latest thing. However, may I just point out some aspects of this development that should give us pause for thought? With every use of newer technologies our lives are being subtly and sometimes not so subtly changed leaving us forgetting that 'the medium is the message'.* First, the medium of data projection means that words cannot be meditated on or scanned before viewing by a congregation. Nor can an arresting phrase in any already sung verse be looked at again because the congregation is now onto the next verse. The simple use of hymn books allows those activities to be done. Second, the congregational worship is always controlled by the click of the controller of the data projector. One could say that congregational worship in song moves according to the rhythm of the person with the mouse! I wonder whe...