September Review

It's the final blog post of September, the 34th, so it's review time again. I've never written as many as 34 blog posts in a September before, so 2009 again makes a new record. On the running total, we're up to 355 of the year, so if October yields ten posts, then we'll have one for every day of the year. What has September held on the McFlurry blog?

In the world of blogging, there was the excitement of the Christian Blog Awards, as finalists were announced, and winners revealed. No prizes here, but then it's not what I'm after in the first place.

Musically, we had a little update, lords, lots of love, and a mad man. (Sounds like a soap opera in the Houses of Parliament, doesn't it?) There was also the video of Select Blendz.

New York, New York was our destination for a week of holiday, and there were some reflections on dangerous diversity, and the 'real' Jews.

Three books were read this month, so there were reviews on Out of the Storm (Job), The Year of Living Biblically, and The Lost Symbol.

This month's preaching was from Job 1 (audio) and Psalm 148 (audio).

As a demonstration of the breadth of material we cover on the blog, there were random pieces on conversions, clairvoyancy, television, history, CK fragrances and some helpful quotations on fellowship and preaching, and our flexible friend.

My favourite posting of the month was probably without many words, just the image of goggles!

Book Review: The Lost Symbol

To quite a bit of hype, the new Dan Brown novel was recently released in the UK. The author of The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons has done it again. As one of my Facebook friends commented a while back, the latest Dan Brown book will contain some secret codes, some puzzles, a high speed chase through a city, and some secrets being revealed. A fair enough summary of the plot!

Having previously tackled Opus Dei and the Catholic Church, the Illuminati and the Catholic Church, both set in Europe, this time the hero of the stories, Robert Langdon, a symbologist, finds himself dealing with the Masonic Order. Unlike the previous organisations, the Masons (the Freemasons of the Scottish Rite in America) get off lightly, and are well respected. Is Dan Brown a mason himself?

Set in the capital of the United States of America, Washington DC we're quickly introduced to a series of characters, who are interacting at various locations, with increasing tensions and ultra-short chapters (some of less than half a page!) jumping from location to location and danger to danger.

It's typical Dan Brown material, with the expected twists in the tale and even more secrets being unravelled as the symbols and codes are discussed and solved. The action (apart from the numerous back-stories and remembrances by characters) all takes place in the course of one evening, so as you can imagine, it's high paced. However, it took me longer to read than the first readthrough of either Da Vinci or Angels. Each of those was completed in a day or two, but this one took me maybe a week and a half.

I don't want to ruin the story for anyone who will read it later, so I'll not comment on the plotline in detail or depth. What I do want to raise, though, is the assumption running throughout the story, that all religions are basically the same, and together protect and preserve the Ancient Mysteries, the secret wisdom of the ancients which allowed them to do miracles and wonders, to become deities or god-like beings.

According to the thesis proclaimed in the book, the Masons are interested in apotheosis - man becoming God, precisely because the power and potential lies inside man, hidden and untapped. All that is required is enlightenment, along with a butchering of the Scripture text that 'God created man in his own image' means that 'mankind was not created inferior to God.' The idea is then attempted to be justified by pointing to a bunch of enlightened teachers, 'the Adepts - Buddha, Jesus, Muhammad, Zoroaster, and countless others.' He then goes on to write that their ideas are passed on through books: 'Every culture on earth had its own sacred book - its own Word - each one different and yet each one the same.'

To which I say, nonsense! Jesus cannot be lumped in with other 'wise teachers'. His identity simply will not allow it. Either he is who he says he is - the Son of God, the only one who is the way to the Father - or else is simply mad and must be ignored. It's not worldly wisdom from one specially wise. Similarly the Bible is not the same as the Koran or the Bhagavad Gita or any other so-called holy book.

It's interesting to notice that at one point, a character reflects that 'the name Jesus has been hijacked as an ally in all kinds of power struggles... They defended their worldly desires by citing Scripture they did not understand.' In my considered opinion, this is exactly what Dan Brown does in his pursuit of this story (as well as his previous two novels!). There is widespread cherry-picking of random isolated verses which fit in with his theme of secret / mystery / wisdom / gods and these are repeated time and again, completely out of context. Also, atonement - the word coined by John Wycliffe to describe the propitiatory sacrifice of Jesus for our sins as being our 'at-one ment' to God is reinterpreted to mean being at one with the universe in a general sense, not mentioning or referencing sin or sacrifice at all.

So where do I finish this short review? Like the others, The Lost Symbol is a decent read if you like mystery and thriller with some action and suspense. I enjoy trying to solve the puzzles and codes before the characters. But it's certainly not a book to base any doctrine on - it's fiction, after all, and in appealing to the Masons as the guardians of all that is good and right, I think it fails, and unfairly tries to insist that all 'religions' and none are all basically the same. Forget the secrets that have been deliberately hidden, and concentrate on the plain word of the open Bible, wherein God speaks authoritatively.

Mind, Heart, Will

One of the kind gifts I received at the time of my ordination as a Presbyter was a book from the parish: Preach The Word. It's a collection of essays on expository preaching, and I hadn't got round to reading it after my ordination. I picked it up earlier and have started to read the first essay, and already I'm struck and convicted. David Jackman writes the following:

Everything depends upon our detailed, careful, and disciplined reading of the text... The text needs to be seen not as an object to be analyzed, dissected, or even "mastered" so that we can then begin to "do something with the Bible." Rather, we need to hear it as the urgent, present-tense message of the present-tense God (I AM) through our minds to our hearts to energize our wills in faith and obedience. Then the Bible is doing something with, in, and to us. If the preacher's life is being changed through his encounter with God in the "living and enduring Word" (1 Peter 1:23), he realy does have a message to proclaim, not simply from the written page but from the heart.

The Bible is not just a textbook to learn off by heart, or as a ready supply of quiz answers, or random facts. It's not for head knowledge only. Rather, it needs to move from the head to the heart, and from there to our wills, moving us to action. If this is true of the preacher, how much more of his preaching?

If my last few sermons were to be analyzed, what part of the person was I targetting? The head or the heart? Jackman is certainly not saying that we only aim for the heart to the neglect of the head - we must definitely think about the Bible and learn it more thoroughly, but is that where our preaching sometimes stops? Do we merely inform without enthusing? Engaging the mind but not the affections?

Perhaps better focused content, and greater application is the answer, but there's a lot of learning still to be done!

Book Review: The Year of Living Biblically

I've been thinking carefully about how I should blog about this book. There were humorous moments, times when I quite liked the author, but there were more times when I got out my pen and wrote yet another note about how he had misquoted, stretched or made a nonsense of the Scriptures.

A J Jacobs is a career author, regularly churning out book after book based on strange challenges he sets himself. An American Dave Gorman, if you will. A previous effort saw him read through the Encyclopedia Britannica and use the facts he found there in his everyday life, as well as an appearance on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? The challenge he has set himself this time is, as the title suggests, to live biblically.

He's upfront and honest about his quest. He wants to 'explore religion.' And on that very point, he immediately stumbles into a great problem. He does indeed explore religion - rules to obey and seek some reward for obedience; but Christianity isn't about religion - it's about relationship. After a mammoth session of reading the Bible from cover to cover, he finds there are over 700 'rules' in the Bible, commands that he feels me has to fulfill and obey over the course of his year.

As he starts, he's only too honest that he doesn't believe in God, but seeks to practice 'cognitive dissonance', so that by behaving as if he believed in God, then eventually he will. Where practice leads the mind will follow. The logical conclusion of this is that the Bible is seen as a manmade book, a self-help manual, filled with rules and handy hints to make him a better person.

Yet as Hebrews warns, 'Without faith is it impossible to please [God], for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.' (Heb 11:6).

So how does he do as he seeks to keep the whole law? Within half an hour, he stumbles. Half an hour is quite impressive, yet he knows failure fairly quickly. And that's the point. The law wasn't meant to be kept, because we cannot do it. Yet Jesus perfectly kept the Law so that he does for us what we cannot do by ourselves.

He's a writer, out for laughs, and for maximum sales, and so majors in on the weirdest rules in the Bible. Wearing mixed fibres, impurity laws surrounding a woman's period and men's emmisions, stoning adulterers, not capturing a mother bird along with her egg, the red heifer. His overall opinion is that he admires the 'ethically advanced rules' but wonders how they sit beside 'these bizarre decrees.'

Part of his problem is that he takes random verses out of context. So, for example, the command to bind money in your hand (Deut 14:25), but one of our Sunday School class could probably spot his taking it out of context - this is in relation to the tithes to be brought up to Jerusalem for a party as a thanksgiving of all God's good gifts. It doesn't mean that when you're going out for a walk you bind up some money and carry it in your hand or attached to your clothing! In other occasions, he seems to think that the rules he has compiled are things to be checked off, and so he goes to particular people, places and events to tick off another rule from his list. Again, not really the right attitude!

Using his author's instinct for the ridiculous, he even admits that 'one of the reasons I embarked on this experiment was to take legalism to its logical extreme and show that it leads to righteous idiocy.' He has a problem with legalists? Christians too! We're not legalists at all, far from it, we abound in the grace and mercy of God, not in the letter of the law, which cannot save us and instead condemns us.

To help us through the year, he assembled a team of spiritual advisors - Christian pastors, Jewish rabbis, and anyone else he could call on. At times, he is helped, and at least does put across the reason why Christians do not observe the Old Testament sacrifices and ceremonial law (in several places) because Christ is our sacrifice for sin, and the Old Testament prepares the way and points forward to him.

An interesting read, to see how an unbeliever reacts to the Bible, but entirely predictable. In his reading, he completely misses the point, and focuses on rules rather than relationship, on 'I must' rather than 'Jesus has.'

For another reaction to the book, check out Phil's blog on Rules, Rules, Rules.

Hebrews 1: God Has Spoken

Tonight we’re thinking particularly about the church’s mission, as we welcome one of our mission partners and hear of her work in Africa. But what is the motivation for mission? Why should we seek to spread the gospel, whether overseas or to our neighbour?

Our reading tonight gives us the motivation - God has spoken, through his Son, and we have a gospel to proclaim. First of all, God has spoken. This morning Tim was saying that it’s not about our search for God - we can never reach up to find him. Yet God in his grace has revealed himself. The God who spoke creation into being has spoken, first through the prophets in choosing a people for his own possession, but latterly through his Son.

As the writer to the Hebrews talks of Jesus, the Son, he lists seven facts about him. So who is Jesus, the one through whom God has spoken his final and great revelation of himself?

The Son is the heir of all things, the one through whom and for whom all was created. Indeed, he also sustains the universe by the word of his power. We do not have an absentee God, who kicked off creation and left us to ourselves. Rather, our God is intimately involved in his creation, giving us every breath by his command.

The Son is also the one who can perfectly reveal what God is like - because he is the radiance of his glory, and the exact imprint of his nature. For us to know what God is like, we look at Jesus. For us to hear what God is saying, we listen to Jesus in his word.

And what is it God is saying to us in these last days? What is the message that we hear through the Son? As a hymn reminds us: We have a gospel to proclaim - good news for all throughout the earth. As Hebrews tells us, Jesus has made purification for sins, dealing with our sin, and opening the way of access to the Father. Having completed his work, Jesus has sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, the place of honour and power, where he lives to intercede for us.

Jesus is the heir of all things. His blood offers peace to all people, as they trust in him. God has spoken to all, through his Son - and so we must go; we must tell everyone of the good news of Jesus.

This wee word introduced our mission update night in St Elizabeth's Dundonald on Sunday 27th September 2009.

The Cube

Earlier this evening we were sitting watching TV, when Phillip Schofield's programme came on UTV / ITV1. The Cube is a big glass cube, as the name suggests, and inside, challengers take on The Cube to perform certain tasks for monetary reward. There are memory tasks, balance tasks, ability tasks, and many others. It seems that things which appear very easy in every day life suddenly become very difficult inside The Cube.

The rewards are very profitable - £1000, then £2000, then £10,000, then £20,000, then £50,000, then £100,000, then £250,000. Challengers have nine lives to use in the pursuit of the big money. Compelling viewing as the contestants try to win against the cube's tricks.

When the nine lives run out, the contestant loses all money won so far, although before they begin a particular challenge they can decide if they keep what they have or risk it for the next prize. They enter the cube, and either emerge with a prize, or with nothing.

Reminds me of the cubes in the Bible. The inner sanctuary of the Temple was a cube, as 1 Kings 6:20 tells us: 'The inner sanctuary was twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and twenty cubits high, and he overlaid it with pure gold.' This is the Most Holy Place, the Holy of Holies, where the High Priest entered once a year, on the Day of Atonement, to make sacrifice for the sins of the people. Entering without the blood of sacrifice would have meant certain death for the High Priest. As it was, he achieved the purification of his people for the year.

However, as the letter to the Hebrews reminds us, this was but an earthly shadow of the reality of the heavenly temple, where the Lord Jesus entered to achieve eternal salvation and satisfaction for sin (Hebrews 9:12). The thing is, though, that in contrast to the television competitors, Jesus never leaves the cube, and has won his eternal prize - the inheritance of all things and the salvation of his people. How do we know he never leaves the cube?

Fast forward to John's vision of eternity in Revelation 21. John is shown the holy city, the new Jerusalem. Revelation 21:16 shows us that 'The city lies foursquare, its length the same as its width. And he measured the city with his rod, 12,000 stadia. Its length and width and height are equal.' Another cube, the eternal dwelling place of the Lord God, where God dwells with his people forever.

Isn't it great how even television programmes can be reminders of the gospel? Phillip Schofield asks if you'll enter the cube. Will you be part of that greater reward in the greater cube of the New Jerusalem?

Prodigal Sermons

Recently I blogged about Tim Keller's book The Prodigal God. Currently on the Redeemer Church website they're offering the series of sermons the book is based on for free. Not sure how long the offer lasts, so hurry over and download some Keller now!

Mad Man

We've reached M as we trail the alphabet asking 'what's on your iPod?' So here are some from mad to man:

Mad - Ne-Yo
Magic Love - Bent
Magnificent - Hillsong
Main Theme (Beetlejuice) - Danny Elfman
Main Title (Braveheart) - James Horner
Majesty - Heart of Worship
Make You Mine - The Corrs
Makeover - Christina Aguilera
Makes Me Wonder - Maroon 5
Making Melody - Matt Redman
Making Plans / Gathering the Clans - Braveheart Soundtrack
Mama - Spice Girls
Mambo Number 5 - Bob The Builder
The Man Comes Around - Johnny Cash
Man in the Mirror - Michael Jackson
A Man of Sorrows - Summer Madness
Maneater - Nelly Furtado

Favourite song without a doubt is The Man Comes Around by Johnny Cash:

Sermon Audio: Psalm 148

Here's the sermon mp3 file from Sunday morning's Family Service preach on Psalm 148, Praise the LORD.

The Real Jews?

While we were in New York, we came across a group of street preachers, so we stopped for a moment or two to hear what they were saying. However, it was unlike anything I've heard before, and certainly not witnessed even on the streets of Belfast.



The group involved was, I believe, the Israelite Church of God in Christ Jesus. They're an interesting group, who claim that those who we naturally think of as ethnic Jews are not actually real Jews. Rather, the twelve tribes were descended through the African-American slaves, who are the real Jews, the chosen people of God. They even had a poster set up with the places where each of the tribes is reportedly from - but I didn't get close enough to study it.

Their core message seemed to be that one day God would vindicate his people, the negroes, the real Jews, and in their version of Armageddon, the white peoples and Chinese peoples and Arab peoples would serve the negro. A reversal of those years of slavery, if you will. They also claim that Jesus was a negro, not an ethnic Jew.

Their method of preaching, indeed, the very way they presented their message was to misinterpret the scriptures and prophets' message of the Messiah, applying it to their own ethnic group. So a random verse or two from Isaiah, with one guy reading a few words, then the other shouting out his own interpretation. White people need not apply, and the street preacher and his colleagues were specifically targetting people they perceived to be the real Jews to sign up to their movement.

I've since been able to find out a bit more about the group, with reports on the Washington City Paper website. They preach a racial gospel, which is good news just for those they perceive to be part of the ancient people of God, not open to all. Reminds me of a quote: If it's not good news for all, it's not good news at all.

Fellowship

Tonight we had the first night of the new term at Inform, our young adults' group. We launched into a journey through Paul's letter to the Philippians, and we concentrated on the slippery topic of fellowship.

When you hear the word fellowship, what do you think of? Is it a fuzzy, warm feeling as we have a cup of tea with Christian friends after the service? Just a wee chat at the end of the service, standing in the car park?

For Paul, fellowship is the deeper, harder, challenging idea of partnership. Fellowship is gospel partnership, standing together with other Christians, supporting them and working together to spread the good news of Jesus.

As Don Carson puts it, fellowship is "self-sacrificing conformity to a shared vision." In Philippians, we see the partnership expressed in the financial support Paul received, as well as the visit and help of Epaphroditus. They were standing beside him in his imprisonment as well as in the defence and confirmation of the gospel. Paul, in turn was praying for them, and teaching them to be bold and confident in God.

So how do we build authentic fellowship in our churches? How do we grow together to really encourage and support each other as we spread the gospel? It all comes back to the source of true fellowship: God's grace working in us as individuals and in the community of the church. Standing and serving together. Who's up for some fellowship in the gospel?

For Entertainment Purposes Only?

Among the news feeds I subscribe to, one keeps me up to date with forthcoming events in Belfast - appropriately named the Belfast Events RSS Feed. It's maybe just nosiness, as I've never actually attended anything they advertise, but it's good to know what I could be attending or avoiding.

This morning an interesting event popped into my Google Reader. Not interesting in the sense that I want to go, nor even that I am recommending anyone else goes. More interesting in the way the event is being advertised:

An Evening of Clairvoyance with Joe Power

Joe Power is the new exciting Liverpool medium taking the psychic world by storm. The accuracy of his private readings, public demonstrations and celebrity predictions are creating a sensation on both sides of the Atlantic.

Joe`s evening of clairvoyance will be a demonstration of communication where he delivers messages from people that have passed over.

While I do believe that there are angels and spirits, I'm certainly not in favour of any form of communication with them. The spiritual world is very real, and also very dangerous, with demonic powers ready to speak where they should not speak. The Bible repeatedly warns against mediums, clairvoyants, necromancy and such like, condemning King Saul for using the Witch of Endor to communicate with the departed prophet Samuel (1 Samuel 28); and showing the salvation for the slave-girl caught up with a spirit of divination and fortune telling who was exorcised by the Apostle Paul (Acts 16:16-18).

However, against all this background, both the guy's claim to be able to deliver messages from people that have passed over (where?), and the Bible's condemnation of such activities, the final line of the event listing is the most interesting:

An Evening of Clairvoyance is for entertainment purposes only.

So he claims to communicate messages from beyond the grave, but it's only entertainment? He claims to wield some power, which may psychologically and spiritually harm those attending, but it's only entertainment? He's getting mixed up in the dangerous daydreams and deceits of demons, but it's only entertainment?

Who was it put the disclaimer in? Is it his own line? Or is it a demand of the Waterfront Hall or Belfast City Council?

If genuine, and there is something demonic going on here, then it's really not entertainment. It's so much more serious.

Book Review: Out Of The Storm

Christopher Ash is steadily becoming a leading evangelical author on the British Christian book market. Alongside several books on marriage, the Director of the Cornhill Training Course in London has written an outstanding introduction to the Book of Job: Out of the Storm.

In just over 100 pages, Ash gets to the heart of Job's suffering and dialogue, tracing the main features of the book and priming the student for further study and reading. The insights are excellent, although perhaps unusually in a book review, I'm not going to provide quotations or much more detailed discussion at the present time. Why? Regular readers will have noticed that we're doing a series in Job on Sunday evenings, and I want to leave particular insights and helpful elements until we've finished each sermon!

Suffice to say that the book was very helpful in planning a series and is the book I've been recommending to the other guys who will be preaching through Job with me. Particularly helpful was his discussion of Behemoth and Leviathan as found in chapters 40-41. Rather than these creatures being the hippopotamus and the crocodile, they are actually probably the description of Satan, the best from the earth and the sea. Highly recommended!

Sermon: Psalm 148 Praise the LORD

This morning we’re looking at one of the Psalms, one of the songs in the Bible, and as we look at it together, you might find it useful to have it open in front of you. Have a look at it now - what is the Psalm all about? How does it open and close?

Our Psalm today is a call to praise - we’re told at the start and at the end ‘Praise the LORD’. But what does that mean? How do we praise the LORD? Some people think that when the Bible talks about praising the Lord, that it means those times when we are singing in church. So if we sing four or five songs on a Sunday, does that mean that the rest of the time we’re in church, and the rest of the week we’re not praising God?

I don’t think so! As we sing to God we are praising him, but praising God is so much more. Indeed, as we’ll see, the Psalm is a command for all of creation to praise the LORD, angels and people, stars and mountains. Everything that God has made is called to join in praising God. But I’ve never heard the mountains or the fruit trees singing!

The Psalm is divided into two main sections, and in each section there is a call to praise from somewhere, and then the reason why we are to praise. So let’s look at the first section. Can anyone see where the praise is from?

‘Praise the LORD from the heavens.’ When the Bible talks about the heavens, sometimes it means the place where God dwells, and sometimes it means the sky above us. Here in the Psalm, we see it refers to both - verse 2 the angels and heavenly hosts; and verse 3 the sun and moon, and shining stars. Do you notice what is being told to the sun? What should the sun and the stars do?

‘Praise him.’ From our place on earth, the sun and moon and stars seem so bright, so great, that we’re tempted to worship them. Some people even go so far as to think that the stars have an influence over how their day is going to turn out, if they’ll be lucky or not. But the Psalm reminds us that the sun and stars have no power of their own - they were created by God, just like us, and they also praise the Lord.

Over in Psalm 19, David tells us how the heavens above us praise God: ‘The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.’ (Psalm 19:1-2) Praising God is about declare God’s glory - even though the sun and stars never speak, yet they shout out God’s glory.

It’s the same with the angels. They exist to praise the Lord. Remember when Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the angels were there to declare God’s glory, to praise the Lord as they told the shepherds about Jesus’ birth.

So why should the heavens and all that are in them praise the name of the LORD? Look at verse 5. ‘Let them praise the name of the LORD, for he commanded and they were created. He set them in place for ever and ever; he gave a decree that will never pass away.’

God is to be praised because he spoke, and everything was created. His word is powerful. God should be praised because he has made everything that exists.

In the second section, we see a similar pattern. First, there’s the command: Praise the LORD from the ...? Earth. So what on earth should be praising God? Is it just us humans? No, not just us, but also sea creatures, lightning, hail, snow, clouds, winds, mountains, hills, trees, animals, cows, insects and birds. It’s a catalogue of creation, isn’t it? Everything biological, everything geological, everything meteorological, everything on and in the earth, and even the earth itself is called to praise the LORD.

Verses 11 and 12 also show us that every person is called to praise - not just the young, or the old, or the middle-aged. Not just kings, not just princes, not just important people or celebrities. Everyone!

Earlier we thought about how some of us can praise created things like the stars, or angels. Maybe we’re more tempted to praise other people. Here in the Psalm, we might be tempted to praise the kings of the earth. Well, we say, they’re really important and powerful, so we should praise them.

Can you think of some people we might praise? Maybe we’re caught up instead with praising our favourite singer, or football player, or whoever is on Dancing on Ice or the X Factor this year. A few years back there was another reality TV show that hit the nail on the head: Pop Idol. The show was trying to make a new idol, a new someone to worship and praise.

But the energy and time that we devote to praising people is ultimately wasted. Our celebrities, heroes, politicians are just human - and make mistakes, and fail us. They’re not really worthy of our praise. Their failures make us more wary of who we praise. So why should we praise the name of the LORD?

Verse 13 gives us the reason: ‘Let them (that is, all of us) praise the name of the LORD, for his name alone is exalted; his splendour is above the earth and the heavens.’ If you go to a Northern Ireland game, you’ll spend the night cheering for David Healy or Steve Davis (not the snooker player!). But in the grand scheme of things, they’re just one person from little Northern Ireland. The name of the LORD - the Covenant making God, the promise-keeping God - his name is exalted or lifted up and praised everywhere. His is the only name that is praised.

Two Sundays ago, we were in Times Square in New York. There’s so much advertising that you can’t even see the buildings the ads are hanging on. All the big brands are there: Coke, McDonalds, Gap, and each one is fighting to be seen, to have the brightest and biggest and best advert. In the world, in the universe, there is just one name that is exalted and lifted high: The LORD (Jesus). It’s not just that his glory and splendour and wow-ness fill the earth - his splendour is above the earth and the heavens. God made the world to reflect his glory, like the moon reflects the sun’s light. We’re called to praise, to declare God’s name and glory and character. The sun and moon and stars are doing it, will you do it too?

Because, as verse 14 concludes, God’s people have an extra-special reason for praise. God has ‘raised up for his people a horn.’ Horns on animals are there for strength - so goats have horns and they try to overpower the other goats. Or the rhinoceros. The horn of strength that God has raised up for his people is his king, the Lord Jesus Christ. It was he who created the world (Col 1:16), he who upholds the universe by the word of his power (Heb 1:3), his the name that is above every name (Phil 2:9), whose glory fills the skies.

Psalm 148 is a call for all of creation to do what God made it to do - to praise the name of the LORD - to recognise the greatness of our God. The sun praises God - how much more we who are saved, adopted, and are members of God’s family? Praise the LORD.

This sermon was preached at the Family Service in St Elizabeth's Church, Dundonald on Sunday 20th September 2009.

McFlurry's McLinks (8)

It's been almost a month since the last McFlurry's McLinks, and it's looking like this could be a supersize version with a lot of great blogs and websites being read and ready to be recommended:

Irish Calvinist warns against selfishly using God, as well as wondering what he would do to the evangelical church is he were Satan.

Kevin De Young reflects on mission and not being able to do it all. He also critiques Karen Armstrong's defence of God techniques. (Al Mohler also comments on Armstrong).

The Ugley Vicar (whom I missed on his recent visit to Belfast and my own parish) reviews the latest Tarantino flick.

étrangère asks if Christ really is our cornerstone. She also ponders the WWJD message, which is really another gospel.

I've been linking to some material highlighted by David Keen recently, and he also shared the 'Doesn't Count List' from Stuff Christians Like (also check out letting online people know you're married and the multi-multi-point sermon.) Dave also discusses the world ending in 2012, and a modern-day acted parable.

Adrian Warnock hosted a guest post by Sam Allberry on Islamic Christianity.

Ben Yong (Dr) ponders his pager number.

For you Lord of the Rings fans, Josh Harris compares Gollum's obsession with his precious and our obsession with sin. Meanwhile Slacktivist offers a theology of vampires and crosses.

In the funnies, Ali shares a Father Ted moment... There's also the earth-bound pet plan in case of rapture, and in a newly linked blog, Ten Digit Lumber provides a groan-fest of puns (which I enjoyed).

And for the geek amongst you, there's Quaerentia's favourite iPhone apps.

McFlurry's McLinks seems to always finish off with a funny video, so here's the Youth MiniStarz:

Blog Stars

As predicted earlier in the week, Dave's District Blog took the best blog at the Christian Bloggies last night. Well done to Dave, and also to BibleSEO which was placed second. A full list of winners and runnersup are available at the Christian Blog Awards site.

Love, Love, Love

We're coming to the Love section of my iPod, so here goes on a lovefest:

Love - Rosey
Love Can Build A Bridge - Cher, Chrissie Hynd and Neneh Cherry
Love Etc - Pet Shop Boys
Love Gives Love Takes - The Corrs
Love Guaranteed - Damage
Love Is All Around - Wet, Wet, Wet
Love Is The Law - Seahorses
Love Machine - Girls Aloud
Love Me And Leave Me - Seahorses
Love Me For A Reason - Boyzone
Love Me Tender - Elvis Presley
Love On A Real Train - Williams
Love Rendezvous - M People
Love Shy - Kristine Blond
Love So Amazing - Paul Oakley
Love Song - Hillsong
Love Song - Thirs Day
Love Story - Taylor Swift
Love To Love You - The Corrs
Love U 4 Life - Jodeci
Love's Embrace - Christina Aguilera
Love's Sweet Victory - Heart of Worship
Lovefool - The Cardigans
Lovely Ladies - Les Miserables Soundtrack
The Lover's Bits - Teannaich
Lovesong - The Cure
The Loving Kind - Girls Aloud
Loving Me 4 Me - Christina Aguilera

Lots of love songs there! My favourite in the batch is probably The Lover's Bits, from the Ceilidh band, Teannaich.

Conversions

I was inspired by a piece of marketing mail we got through the door the other day. Not the Consider Christ campaign, being run by the Free Presbyterian Church, but rather another sort of marketing. Not so much Mount Sinai or Mount of Olives, as Mount Oriel.

You might be saying to yourself, I haven't heard of that mountain in the Bible. Neither you would, but it was the strapline that caught my attention:

Thirty years experience - one thousand conversions.

They're a firm of builders, people you want to call if you want your attic converted into a spare bedroom, playroom, study or even a sauna bathroom. Yet wouldn't that be a great statement for preachers of the gospel? Far better than attics made liveable and the houses increased in value, but the eternal dwelling place of people assured in the new Jerusalem, through the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ.

Why should the builders claim all the best conversions?

The Flexible Jesus Who Deals With Sin

Both in the Fourth Gospel and in the Synoptics, the sheer flexibility of Jesus leaps from the pages as he deals with a wide array of different people and their varied needs. No less startling (though more often ignored) is the manner in which Jesus commonly drives to the individual's greatest sin, hopelessness, guilt, despair, need. This should not be surprising; if he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, inevitably he will deal with sin in those who express some interest in knowing and following him.

So says Don Carson commenting on John 4:16 as Jesus talks to the Samaritan woman at the well. Are we sometimes more comfortable discussing other topics or over-explaining that we fail to zone in on our greatest need, sin?

The woman at the well needed her sins dealt with more than the drink of water. Yet Jesus doesn't explain the water welling up to eternal life, he exposes her greatest thirst.

Blog Finalists

This Friday is the Christian Web and New Media Awards 2009 over in London. A while back I blogged about receiving an email saying that I had been nominated and was one of the finalists. Despite repeated checking on the site, nothing more appeared, with no list of finalists.

Church Mouse now has the exclusive list of the finalists for each category (H/T to DMK), so I'm able to see who else was selected in my category of best blog. You can check out the other four finalists, and try to see which of them will win - I haven't heard anything more, so I know I'm not the winner or runner-up, as the top two were being told and then invited to attend the awards ceremony on Friday night.

The five finalists are:

That I May Know Him
Bible SEO
Love Undefiled
Dave's District Blog
The Reverend Garibaldi McFlurry (who?)

Five very different blogs - I think mine is probably more general, whereas the others seem to be more focused on theology all the time. Which one will win? I'm thinking Dave's District. Good mix of photos and text, and a range of good subjects. What do you think?