we have moved

It's been a while actually, but just in case you've turned up here recently and wondered why this blog isn't active, it's because Pastor Steve and Keiyeng moved their blogging over to the new (Feb '09) night congregation's website, and Pastor Ben and Faith (SLE's new Pastor and his wife) prefer to communicate in ways other than blogging!

If you're keen to get faithful Bible teaching though, you're very welcome at either the morning or night congregations...

prayer points 240509

Pray for Australians affected by this week’s flooding; pray that people will turn to Jesus rather than away from him.

Pray for the thousands of Sri Lankan civilians who are now refugees and prisoners in their own country. Ask God to bring about true resolution to this unstable political situation and that the government will work persistently for the good of its people.

Give thanks for the security and stability we can take for granted in Australia. Pray that we’ll continue to be able to live freely for Christ and that we’ll make use of this freedom to make him known.

Keep praying for our sister Judy, on mission in East Asia. Pray for her and her team-members to have beautiful feet – bringing the gospel to many whom God has prepared.

prayer points 170509

Pray that we’d be willing to submit our thinking to the authority of God’s word, especially when its truth differs from popular opinion.

Pray for SLE’s many uni students – that they would see their courses in the big picture of a lifetime serving Jesus and his kingdom. Pray for eternal perspective to govern their decisions about their work both now and after graduation.

Give thanks for SLEers going on short-term missions this year. Pray for God’s direction and provision as they plan and prepare, for fruitful trips and for the ripple effect in SLE to be deep and wide.

prayer points 100509

Spend some time thanking God for each of the many life-changing blessings Paul lists in Romans 8. Praise God for His grace and kindness in extending His love towards us in Jesus, and consider how amazing it is to experience the truths of this chapter. Pray that we’d recognise these blessings in our day to day lives and not just in our heads on Sundays.

Pray that God will meet our church’s financial needs as we give thoughtfully and generously despite the economic downturn.

Pray again for people affected by swine flu, for quick detection and effective treatment – especially now that Australia has seen its first case. Pray for wisdom for international health authorities, and that this situation would again become an opportunity for people to seek and find Jesus’ salvation and Lordship.

punch to the collective nose (or "Making Singleness Better")

The point of this paragraph is self-evident, and I hope provokes you to read the entire article (and consider...).

But perhaps [Paul's] strongest response would be to the extreme loneliness many single people experience. I do not think that, in commending singleness, Paul was also commending a life without quality long-term relationships. The thought would have distressed him. A quick tour through his letters gives us every indication that he knew a lot of people, and that he knew them well; in some sense, Paul experienced our future — a multitude of great relationships with his brothers and sisters in Christ from every nation, people and tribe. Paul was not married, but neither was he lonely. I think he would see this epidemic of loneliness as a major moral failure of the church to be the church, and, perhaps, more particularly, a moral failure of families to treat those not in their family as family. The church is a family, and we are to treat those in the church as family — not by lowering the standard with which we treat our family, but by raising the standard with which we treat others.

from Making Singleness Better, by Tim Adeney, The Briefing

and once again on prayer...

I just got an email about how there's been a bit of a resurgence of prayer in our sister congregation (CPE) thanks to some passionate pray-ers motivating others to prayer meetings.  It was a bit of a kick in the pants for me, because while I love praying (but find it easiest to pray with at least one other person and find it hard otherwise), depend whole-heartedly on prayer, and dearly want and pray for many more people in SLE to gather together to pray at our monthly PrayStation, I tend to resign myself to the fact that prayer is so vital that it's typically the least supported ministry of churches.  

Yes, that's right - we pray in inverse proportion to how much we need to pray.  It's actually a logical outworking of the theological fact - in that the more important something is to God's kingdom, the more Satan attacks it and prevents it, and the less it happens.  This is terrible, but giving into this is even more so.  So - I'm going to seek again to be not only a passionate pray-er, but a mobiliser of pray-ers.

And so, I posit that prayer is more important than pretty much ANYTHING else you do on the first Wednesday night of each month.  It's not that you therefore must come to PrayStations, but don't you agree that this is a darn good reason to?!

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.  1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.  Acts 2:42

this week's prayer points

 Pray that it will be our joy to be slaves of righteousness, rather than abusing God’s grace through deliberate sin. Ask God to help us care deeply about our holiness, and to give us grace to submit to His Spirit’s work of sanctification. 

Ask for a faithful, God-glorifying and other-centred prayer life.

Pray for people around the world still affected by natural disaster, war, and terrorism, Pray especially for Victorians and North Queenslanders, those affected by the Mumbai bombing and corruption in Zimbabwe, and communities and families who will always bear the scars of genocide in Rwanda and former Yugoslavia.  Pray for Christians who work in each of these communities to bear witness to Jesus’ saving and healing power and presence.