Godfirst :: Blog http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog.php 2012-01-13T19:13:33+00:00 FeedCreator 1.7.2 2012-01-13T18:55:00+00:00 2012-01-13T18:55:00+00:00 2012-01-13T18:55:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=40 Godfirst

A Community of Grace or Community of Performance? The network of churches to which Godfirst belongs is noted for the coherence of its message of grace.

2011-12-09T16:30:00+00:00 2011-12-09T16:30:00+00:00 2011-12-09T16:30:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=39 Godfirst

If you asked Newfrontiers church planters , or those whose gift is helping to establish the foundation of local churches , what is one of the vital truths that a church plant must grasp if it is to be a Jesus centred, healthy gospel community ? Then right up they would answer "The Gospel of Grace". I know this because in starting new churches you find people at all stages on their spiritual journey, who want to join you but have been led to believe that they will be acceptable to Jesus and the church based on their performance.

2011-11-30T14:44:00+00:00 2011-11-30T14:44:00+00:00 2011-11-30T14:44:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=38 Godfirst

  When people read my blog thoughts the top post they mention is one of three that I didn't write... the post was, Top 10 Reasons Not to Join a Church Plant, which received a lot of traffic.

2011-10-31T09:08:00+00:00 2011-10-31T09:08:00+00:00 2011-10-31T09:08:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=37 Godfirst

As a church planter having started with a blank piece of paper with regards your ethos, strategy and structure, it's really encouraging when you find that somebody with a growing international reputation is endorsing what you feel God has called you to do.

2011-09-29T10:58:00+00:00 2011-09-29T10:58:00+00:00 2011-09-29T10:58:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=36 Godfirst

The more I reflected on sin as "Incurvatus in se" "the Blackhole Life" "the life curved in on oneself" the more it seemed to occur to me that this idea not only effectively describes an individual life of Sin, but it could also be something that happens to churches. Is it sin for a church to be curved in on itself? We live in a consumer society and it's very hard not to approach church with a "what's in for me attitude?" Now I would love thousands of non Christians to connect with churches across Cheltenham and ask that question.

2011-09-19T08:41:00+00:00 2011-09-19T08:41:00+00:00 2011-09-19T08:41:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=35 Godfirst

"Incurvatus in se" I don't remember hearing the term before but, even as Mike Reeves (UCCF) unpacked it's meaning during a Porterbrook Institute residential, the concept resonated with me. "Incurvatus in se" Latin: "turned/curved inward on oneself" is a theological phrase describing a life "turned inwards" on oneself rather than "outward" for God and others. It is suggested that Augustine coined the phrase, but Martin Luther who expounded on this in his Lectures on Romans and described this state as: "Our nature, by the corruption of the first sin, [being] so deeply curved in on itself that it not only bends the best gifts of God towards itself ...

2011-06-30T16:05:00+00:00 2011-06-30T16:05:00+00:00 2011-06-30T16:05:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=34 Godfirst

Mission Communities (Part 3 - The Launch) One of the things I love about Church Planting is that you can make decisions quickly.

2011-05-17T13:02:00+00:00 2011-05-17T13:02:00+00:00 2011-05-17T13:02:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=33 Godfirst

  Chatting to a young church planter today I suggested he visit Resurgence.com and read Justin Buzzard's posting "The Top 10 Reasons Why People Should Not Join our church plant".

2011-04-11T07:55:00+00:00 2011-04-11T07:55:00+00:00 2011-04-11T07:55:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=32 Godfirst

"What's in a name? That which we call a roseBy any other name would smell as sweet."Shakespeare : Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 1-2) How important is a name in our modern day British culture? Is a name there just to sound nice or does it have to carry a meaning? I know that when most people in our society are trying to decide on a name for their new-born, they will often opt for what sounds nice.

2011-03-22T16:20:00+00:00 2011-03-22T16:20:00+00:00 2011-03-22T16:20:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=31 Godfirst

How do you to build an authentic disciple-making, mission-shaped community? I would hope that Sunday gatherings at Godfirst will have those values, but how will we build those values into the other 110 waking hours?The traditional solution is to create a midweek meeting, call it a home, small or cell group, appoint a leader and expect him (they were always men back then) to run a mini church meeting and teach the bible without the time or possibly the gifting to make it compelling.

2011-03-10T10:19:00+00:00 2011-03-10T10:19:00+00:00 2011-03-10T10:19:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=30 Godfirst

"Church is much more than Sunday meetings". Undoubtedly whatever your style of church most Christians would agree with that statement.

2011-02-08T10:11:00+00:00 2011-02-08T10:11:00+00:00 2011-02-08T10:11:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=29 Godfirst

Growing up. We all know it's the nature of living things to grow. To be alive, by God's design, is to expect to change, develop and grow. I have three children who are growing and changing fast.

2011-01-25T17:38:00+00:00 2011-01-25T17:38:00+00:00 2011-01-25T17:38:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=28 Godfirst

Friedrich Nietzsche wrote, "The essential thing in heaven and earth is. . . that there should be a long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living." Now you have to be careful when you quote from Nietzsche; firstly it's very pretentious and two he also said "God is dead" so almost always best to stay clear of his thoughts on God, humanity, good and evil or anything else for that matter.

2010-12-24T10:45:00+00:00 2010-12-24T10:45:00+00:00 2010-12-24T10:45:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=27 Godfirst

Joan Osborne wrote a song - What if God was one of us? The awesome mysterious truth is God became one us (Ok not a sinful slob like one of us) God took on our humanity.

2010-11-02T11:32:00+00:00 2010-11-02T11:32:00+00:00 2010-11-02T11:32:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=26 Godfirst

The church is a place of hope, because we look forward with a certain hope, a confident future faith, to God's coming kingdom that will fill the whole earth, this hope pushes us on believing for more of God's rule to break in.

2010-10-22T18:05:00+00:00 2010-10-22T18:05:00+00:00 2010-10-22T18:05:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=25 Godfirst

ADDRESSING OBJECTIONS TO CHURCH PLANTING Grady D. Smith May 1, 2007 (Southern Baptist Theological Seminary) Link to full referenced paper.

2010-09-07T09:55:00+00:00 2010-09-07T09:55:00+00:00 2010-09-07T09:55:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=23 Godfirst

NB After decades of preaching I still type it out long hand, but be warned my copy is unproofed, and many of the sections were altered as I preached it. Epic - Newness beyond the Ordinary.

2010-08-07T14:44:00+00:00 2010-08-07T14:44:00+00:00 2010-08-07T14:44:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=22 Godfirst

Soft Launch I have an iphone 3G, so I watched with interest the "this changes everything again" launch of the new iphone 4. After a month of bad publicity about reception problems it seems to me that for Apple getting it wrong has "changed everything again" by taking a little gloss off their brand, by launching the iphone 4 before they had ironed out the glitches.

2010-05-27T12:03:00+00:00 2010-05-27T12:03:00+00:00 2010-05-27T12:03:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=21 Godfirst

  The emperor penguins secret is huddling as an extension of the "be big" method of reducing surface area to survive the extreme cold.

2010-03-16T16:25:00+00:00 2010-03-16T16:25:00+00:00 2010-03-16T16:25:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=19 Godfirst

 Getting out of the Bubble. I sat in a pub in South Bristol last week whilst staying with my friends Dave and Ali. It was about the third question, the one that follows after "what's your name?", when one of Dave's church friends asked me "what do you do?" Now normally I love that question because saying you start churches from scratch usually opens up a real flow of God talk, but this time my answer prompted the honest response "so you're not a real minister then!" I was tempted to answer "I'm not a vicar, as there is only one vicar (Latin: vicarious - someone who acts in the place of another) the man Christ Jesus" (see 1 Timothy 2:5), but I resisted and said "I'm not a full time minister".

2010-02-10T09:05:00+00:00 2010-02-10T09:05:00+00:00 2010-02-10T09:05:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=17 Godfirst

This article appeared in the Gloucestershire Echo today. It is a slightly modified version of my press release below. I don't like the headline but it is generally positive.

2010-01-07T15:48:00+00:00 2010-01-07T15:48:00+00:00 2010-01-07T15:48:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=16 Godfirst

My twelve year old son made a New Year resolution to clean his teeth at night as well as the morning! This is not a place to discuss our parenting skills, such as why has this taken us so long to get him to get to this point or the personal hygiene of boys.

2009-12-10T19:11:00+00:00 2009-12-10T19:11:00+00:00 2009-12-10T19:11:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=14 Godfirst

Gathered or Dispersed? I recently took a walk up Leckhampton Hill with a few friends. From the lookout point in the distance you can see the Malvern Hills but if you look down into what was the quarry, people gather the stones to write messages such as "don't look down" or "will you marry me?".

2009-11-20T10:15:00+00:00 2009-11-20T10:15:00+00:00 2009-11-20T10:15:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=13 Godfirst

Disabled Access? The first I knew of a Church Planting conference in Bath this week was when it started to appear on the Facebook status of some cyber friends.

2009-10-15T07:18:00+00:00 2009-10-15T07:18:00+00:00 2009-10-15T07:18:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=10 Godfirst

It was great to have a meal the other week with Mark Jones who leads City Church Gloucester. We sat in a pub which had been the site of the first ever Sunday School founded by Robert Raikes, and opposite St.

2009-10-05T16:53:00+00:00 2009-10-05T16:53:00+00:00 2009-10-05T16:53:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=9 Godfirst

Influence Part 1.  "The true measure of leadership is influence, nothing more, nothing less."Dr. John C. Maxwell. But is it the influence we think it is?  In politics it seems that increasingly our leaders lack the conviction to make the tough choices preferring to chase the influence that comes from pandering to focus groups or the fleeting popularism of the sound bite.

2009-09-18T10:45:00+00:00 2009-09-18T10:45:00+00:00 2009-09-18T10:45:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=8 Godfirst

  In a star filled Manchester night last Saturday 55 000 gathered at Old Trafford Cricket Ground for Coldplay. "Look at the stars, look how they shine for you, everything you do, and they were all yellow" as I joined the mass Karaoke (Naomi tells me I have a good voice - just as well as I was singing in her ears).

2009-09-02T23:38:00+00:00 2009-09-02T23:38:00+00:00 2009-09-02T23:38:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=3 Godfirst

When I was involved in training teachers we used to talk about the "hidden curriculum". This is not the on the page content of urban models or coastal erosion that you intend the students to be learning but the off message content that is learned as unintentional by products of the school experience. The hidden curriculum provides students with regular unplanned lessons on topics such as authority and power from teachers or inequalities in social networks from their peers.

2009-08-31T23:58:00+00:00 2009-08-31T23:58:00+00:00 2009-08-31T23:58:00+00:00 http://www.godfirst.org.uk/blog_article.php?id=4 Godfirst

Podcasting seemed logical maybe there was somebody out there who was interested in listening to my sermons. Even if there wasn't I was preaching Sunday by Sunday and it saved burning CD's for the Kids workers.