City Lights- Kowhai IntermediateMarch 15th, 2010
Lights around the city of Auckland.March 14th, 2010
We talk a lot about Community. It’s one of the Church’s favourite words! And we do it well, but it’s incomplete if it doesn’t include genuine relational involvement with those who live and work around our family home.
City Lights is one of those wonderful opportunities to engage with the community
around us, and do it together. It might involve a paint brush, a broom, spade and a lawnmower, but if it’s a job done that makes someone elses life easier, then it’s got to be a good thing.
Someone old and famous said, ‘Preach the Gospel, and if you have to, use words’.
Great gospel weekend Edge.
Check out the photos above…
Lent: halfway.March 14th, 2010
We are half way through this Lent Season. How are we doing?
Everyone brings something unique into this 40 days of prayer and fasting, so now is a good time to reflect, look back over the past 20 days, and then ahead as we begin the journey towards Easter – Passion Week, Good Friday and Resurrection Sunday.
We experience Lent individually and as a community, and will culminate this season together during our Easter
Festival weekend events…..watch this space for more.
Who? Why? What? How? Huh!?March 13th, 2010
Have you ever wondered who all these people are that are mentioned in the New Testament? Like the Pharisees…who were they? And the Sadducees…what made them different to the Pharisees? Why is Simon called ‘the Zealot’, and how did the Romans fit into the picture? And then there’s the disciples…the twelve…or were there more than twelve? And why do some of them suddenly start being called apostles and stop being called disciples? Who wrote all of the New Testament’s books – exactly who were Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John?
For answers to all of these questions and many more, as well as a look at the basic story of the New Testament and how the NT books fit into that story, head along to the School google group (click here) and download the latest session notes. And while you’re there why don’t you join the discussion.
Lost in translation?March 11th, 2010
Our next session of School is tonight starting at 7pm where we’ll cover:
- An overview of the New Testament – brought to you by Andy Dixon; and
- The authority and inspiration of the Bible – in what ways is the Bible God’s word and what does that mean for us? – presented by Greg and Strahan.
One topic we touched on briefly at School last week was why we have so many translations of the Bible.
I mean, why can’t there just be one standard-issue Bible that we can all read from and there be no contention? That way, when someone reads their Bible from up the front on Sunday, you could be sure that you could follow along with the same words in your own Bible – instead of sometimes feeling like you’ve just got lost in translation… [cue reference to film title to show that even though I am a Christian, I am still culturally relevant - and witty at that]
Well the answer is quite simple. The Bible is a collection of writings that were originally written in another language – either Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic. And when you try and translate those writings into English, you inevitably find that the translation does not quite marry up perfectly because of the differences in grammar or meaning.
For instance, the Greeks apparently had four different words for the one English word “love”. How can we capture these different senses of these Greek words in English then?
And what happens when the English language itself changes over time, as it is known to do?
Well, it means that translators do the best they can, either emphasising a word for word approach (such as the King James Version translation) or a thought for thought approach (such as the NIV translation) or even restate the message entirely in a paraphrase (such as the Message translation).
As no English translation is going to be perfect, it is useful to be aware of the approach taken by the translation that you’re reading currently, and it may even provoke you to get a range of different translations so that you can get the benefit of these different approaches.
For more on this, see the notes from the first session which you can download at http://groups.google.co.nz/group/school-at-edge-kingsland.
See you tonight at 7pm.
I’ve got a great idea for a new book we can add to the Bible…March 10th, 2010
What if someone was serious about adding their latest work to our Bibles? Would you let them?
I mean, they could do a nice job of it, print it off on some nice quality A4 and glue in into the back right after Revelation but before the concordance, making sure it didn’t mess with those pretty colour maps.
Would you treat it like it was worthy of being on the same level as Isaiah or Luke?
What if it was fairly theologically accurate – no major issues there – and read really well? Perhaps with a touch of suspense, like the latest John Grisham?
This is the question of whether the Canon is now closed. If it is, then sorry, we’re not adding anything more in. We have what we need.
The Church for the best part of the last 1800 years or so has been of this view – that the Old Testament scriptures and the writings of those who knew and followed Jesus during his time on earth comprise all that we need. There are no serious contenders for any further books to be added in.
But what if we found another one of Paul’s letters? What would you say then?
Perhaps this is a point worthy of further discussion at our online discussion group at http://groups.google.co.nz/group/school-at-edge-kingsland. Or you could come along to School tomorrow night.
Canon, what?March 8th, 2010
So in our first session at School last Thursday, we asked: “Why does the Canon matter?“
Now we’re not talking about medieval warfare here, or a brand of digital camera, because the word “Canon” in the sense we mean refers to the collection of books contained in our Bible today. And yes, the Bible is not just one book – its a collection of books or writings – 66 different ones, in fact.
So when we ask “Why does the Canon matter?“, we’re asking: “Why does it matter that someone, somewhere decided what books would be collected together to become the Bibles that we have today?“
Maybe its not a question that you’ve ever thought about much. But if someone asked you: “How do you know that you’ve got the right writings in your Bible there?“, what would you say?
And if you didn’t know what to say, how can you be sure that you can trust how the Bible is put together? How do you know its worth reading?
If that’s intrigued you, head over to our online discussion group at http://groups.google.co.nz/group/school-at-edge-kingsland where you can download the notes from the first session and join in the discussion.
‘At Home’ in the Bible – NamesMarch 7th, 2010
The great British Bible scholar N.T.Wright says that the more we want to read and understand the Bible, the more we need to become ‘at home’ in it. But sometimes, when we read certain parts of the Bible it feels like they are speaking a different language (and indeed they were!), so how do we become ‘at home’ in that? Sometimes, the Bible becomes a little less foreign to us with just a little insight into the languages and/or cultures of the Bible. It is my (AndyD) aim over this year to provide little thoughts that can help us all in becoming more at home in the Bible.
NAMES
In the Bible, the Psalmists (among many others) had a fascination with God’s name.
The following are just a few of the verses in Psalms about God’s name:
Psalm 8:1 – Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
Psalm 9:2 – I will sing the praises of your name, O Most High
Psalm 22:22 – I will declare your name to my people
Psalm 52:9 – And I will hope in your name, for your name is good
We ourselves often sing ‘beautiful is your name, beautiful is your name, Yahweh.’ So why this fascination with God’s name? It’s just a name…isn’t it?
In biblical times, someone’s name was not simply a label to help in differentiating them from someone else. The name was thought to reveal something of that person and so names were carefully chosen. Knowing someone’s name implied relationship with them. It is fair to say that someone’s name and their person were considered inseparable:
“The biblical concept of naming was rooted in the ancient world’s understanding that a name expressed essence. To know the name of a person was to know that person’s total character and nature.”
In the Psalms, then, the Psalmists are fascinated with God’s name because they are fascinated with God and who he is. For them, saying “I put my hope in your name” is a poetic way of saying “I put my hope in you”.
And when God told Moses his name was Yahweh in Exodus 3:14 (translated as “I am who I am” in most English versions…and then as LORD on many other occasions), he was doing more than telling Moses his name – the name Yahweh was God’s self-revelation to Moses, which, among other things, particularly stressed his faithfulness.
So indeed we should sing, ‘beautiful is your name, beautiful is your name, Yahweh.’
School – Join the discussionMarch 5th, 2010
Last night was the first night of School here at Edge, where we started our series “Eat this Book” – looking at the Bible, where it came from, its story and themes and how we can engage with and interpret it.
Over the next few days, we’ll post some thoughts here about some of the ideas that were raised in the first session.
And as we mentioned last night, you can join the discussion on the these ideas and ask any questions you might have by heading over to our online discussion group at http://groups.google.co.nz/group/school-at-edge-kingsland. Those teaching in this series will endeavour to answer any questions you might have that you post there. From that site, you can also download the notes from the first two sessions that we held last night in case you couldn’t make it.
We look forward to having you join the discussion!
Church Picnic- This SundayMarch 5th, 2010
