Queen's Road Cell

There is no pic of Ellie climbing up our grilled door until she was above head level!

Some of us had the opportunity to join many others from FFMC for this!

Grace was sharing about her experience in a church in London that seemed to over-emphasize the Bible as the only source of God speaking to us. The role of the Holy Spirit seemed to be primarily that of interpreting Scripture to believers. We spent some time discussing the idea of revelation: "general" revelation (Rom 1:18-20) is sufficient grounds for condemnation, but "special" revelation is necessary for salvation. The Bible is special revelation. God has revealed Himself most fully in His Son (Heb 1:1-2). I think we are to distinguish this foundational idea of how God reveals Himself to man from the idea that God communicates His will and desires to us in ways that are outside Scripture. He uses dreams, or a Christian brother's/sister's encouragement, the worship time in church, or circumstances to point us to Him. The key consideration is that all these means of communication must never go beyond what Scripture teaches - this is still the final authori

We started with Question 3 then moved to Question 2 before ending with personal sharing on Question 1. I asked the question: What is it (except for the last red/blue part characteristic) about the blue bar column that is distinctively Christian? Put another way, can a non-Christian be a 'blue-bar' person, or can only Christians be 'blue-bar' people? Our answer was that non-Christians can indeed have blue-bar characteristics, but never for the reasons and basis on spiritual truth that Christians have. For a disciple of Christ, every aspect of his or her life - both blue and red bars - is radically God-centered. All we do in both in our outer appearance to others and our inner lives is done before the face of God. We need both external accomplishments as well as inner substance. We did say that it was not helpful to be very spiritual but quite useless in a job! We also asked if this whole idea of red and blue bars was a Biblical idea at all? Certainly the Bible celebr

The 3 gifts of Christmas: The gift of frankincense – worship 19  The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20  Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21  Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22  You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23  But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24  God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:19-24) Introduction Frankincense is part of the holy, exclusive anointing oil (Ex 30:34), It is used in grain and food offerings (Lev 2:1-2, 15-16), but not in sin offerings (Lev 5:11) or offerings of remembrance to test a wife’s faithfulness (Nu

Selwyn shared about the Rapidly Advancing Discipleship (RAD) programme that Siew Leong is using in China and Bangladesh. This is a method of sharing the gospel, setting up small churches and helping members to be accountable to one another with specific Scripture passages following the principle of 1 Tim 3:16.. The programme seemed so simple that we felt that might work best  in particular cultures with a strong sense of community and where there were not many intellectual reservations regarding the gospel. The programme seems to have strengths in its speed of transmission, in the accountability structure and in the provision of Scripture to guide behaviour. Traditional structures can be simplified to achieve rapid expansion. The programme might be less effective in Singapore, though. We will need to learn more! We spoke about John Allen Chau, the young missionary who was recently killed by North Sentinelese tribesmen when he (illegally) chartered a boat to share the gospel with them

BAPTISM OF THE HOLY SPIRIT Gk.‘ baptizo’ = immersion In all baptisms, 4 parts: The baptizer The baptized The element (en) The purpose (eis = into) e.g. repentance Mt 3:11 Jesus is the Baptizer in the Spirit   Jesus is the one who “baptizes in/with [Greek en ] the Holy Spirit” 1 (Matthew 3:11; Mark 1:8; Luke 3:16; John 1:33) cf. Ac 1:5, 11:16 The purpose of the baptism/fullness of the Spirit In the OT Creative tasks (Ex 28:3, 31:3, 35:31 Bezalel, “the skilful”) Leadership (Dt 34:9 “Joshua the son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom”) Teaching/Proclamation (Mic 3:8 “But as for me, I am fill ed with power, with the Spirit of the Lord, and with justice and might, to declare to Jacob his transgression and to Israel his sin.”) In the NT Inspired witness ( Lk 1:41 “Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, 42  and she exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb!”; Ac 4:9 “Peter, fill

Our inaugural study of our post-Omega series. In this reflection Edmund Chan defines the layers that make up our lives: 1. The substructure is "who we are, what we do when no one sees". The Christian looks for "a life of worship lived before God in the fear of Him, held together by humility, wisdom and perseverance". This "is the work of a lifetime" 2. The structure , he defines as the areas we need to guard us in our pesronal life. This means the time we spend with family, spiritual friends and the community of God's people. 3. The superstructure is the outward accomplishments of our life and ministry, built by competence and skill... established by working excellently. It is noteworthy that this is not wrong in and of itself, but that our superstructure should be fully supported by the strength of the substructure and structure. I asked: is this categorization Biblical? These are not terms found in Scripture! Yet the Bible indeed makes referen

Eugene shared about a recent gathering where 2 OT passages (Jer 29:11-14 and 2 Ki 13:14-19) were used (?abused) and asked ourselves whether it was fair to apply the promises and principles in these passages to ourselves. After all, the first passage is for the Israelites in exile in Babylon, and the second is a somewhat bizzare action we are unlikely to perform (hit arrows on the ground). We said that, yes - If the passage has to do with the character of God, or the way in which God deals with His people , then the passages can be applied to us as the new Israel, the people of God. God does not change (Heb 13:8). The OT also looks forward to the NT and is quoted in the NT in ways which support this principle. For example, the blessings of the new covenant are alluded to in Jer 32:39--40. Rom 8:28 restates the same idea explicitly. On the other hand, we cannot fully apply passages where God speaks to his people as a nation-state.So promises of material prosperity, for instance in De

I felt that the lack of good questions in Book 5.2 for these 3 chapters meant that we should focus on the important material inside and do more in-depth studies of 2 passages instead: The important ideas brought up would be: The shift of the centre of global Christianity away from the West, with explosive growth in Latin America, Africa and China. This means a shift in the demographics of missionaries away from white Westerners. It means that, while the intellectual centres of Christianity remain (for good or evil) in the USA and UK, the momentum of worldwide church growth is now creating a disconnect between solid theology and lived out faith in some areas. It will also see a trend of third world countries doing missions in Western countries where the fire of the gospel has burned out. The idea of the 10-40 window as a strategic target for church missions. The concept of a 'world Christian' as a default for all disciples of Christ. I felt that the Joshua project webs