search

While you might be kicking your heels waiting for your fortnight in the sun, most students are already two months into their summer break. The encouraging news is that many Christian students are giving weeks or months this summer to be part of what God is doing worldwide.

What will make your next-door neighbours consider the claims of Christ?

Traditionally, one style of evangelism has been popular. This is a style used by Paul: reason (dialogue), telling the story of Jesus and his bringing salvation for us. For a number of reasons, particularly related to the impressions that the bad lifestyles of some Christians are making on non-Christians, I believe it's important that we now investigate using another style of evangelism as well.

'God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord' (1 Corinthians 1.9, ESV).

2004 sees the celebration of the Oxford Inter-Collegiate Christian Union's 125th anniversary. On May 8, DV, we shall be welcoming J.I. Packer and Andrew Goddard to encourage and challenge us from God's Word in a celebration to be held in St. Aldate's main building. It is our hope that former members of the OICCU will be keen to join us.

The church in Cambodia went through cruel persecution 50 years after it was founded. Don Cormack's unique account of this period is in his book 'Killing Fields, Living Fields'. It has become one of the most 'talked about' books around.

We in the West have much to learn from the lives of Christians in that south east Asian land. Here Julia Cameron talks with Don Cormack.

Serb and Croat, Israeli and Palestinian students were among the 2,000 who spent Easter morning sharing in communion, praising God, and celebrating salvation through Jesus Christ.

It felt like a small taster of heaven. There may not have been palm branches, but we were each given a daffodil, which we waved as we sang together 'Up from the grave he arose'. The sea of bright yellow, intermingled with national flags from Sweden to Spain, Germany to Georgia, demonstrated our unity in Jesus. Political, economic and social divides were put aside as our Lord was praised.

A disturbing centrifugal force, seen in the enduring propensity for division among evangelical churches, has been powerfully at work among us for many generations, with devastating effects for the gospel of Christ.

Post-Reformation church history, particularly in the UK and the USA, is littered with evidence of disagreements, splits and rupture among congregations and church groupings, and it is quite staggering how often this has been over truly minor and secondary matters.

Chris Sinkinson

Date posted: 1 May 2004

THE WORD BECAME FLESH
Evangelicals and the Incarnation
Edited by David Peterson. Paternoster. 208 pages. ?14.99
ISBN 1 84227 209 8

The background to the book lies over a century ago in an 1889 conference called Lux Mundi. This was a watershed in the Church of England that crystallised what we now call liberal Anglicanism.

The evenings begin to draw out and, for many, thoughts turn to the warm and sunny days of summer and holidays.

Such thoughts help to speed the grey winter days, helped by the TV travel programmes which offer us tempting vistas of what next summer could have in store if we book early for that bargain villa holiday in Spain, that self-catering gem in Greece or that idyllic week flotilla-sailing in the Caribbean! Add the weekend supplements and those visits to the travel agent resulting in a pile of brochures that help whet our appetites for that perfect week away next summer.

Evangelism was obviously top of the agenda of Christian Unions last term: over 50 mission weeks took place across the country, tens of thousands of copies of John's Gospel were given out, many students put their trust in Christ, and enquirer courses were well attended.

A month or so later, has evangelism slowed down? Have students done their bit, storing up their evangelistic zeal for next year's drive?

'Presence: Images of Christ for the Third Millennium'

Linked exhibitions in six cathedrals to celebrate 150 years of BibleLand's ministry. Remaining exhibitions: Lincoln, April 27 to June 4; Durham, July 31 to September 5. There is no separate entrance charge for the exhibitions. Further details from: www.biblelands.org.uk

Last month I began by introducing the problem of intergenerational tension in the church.

A young student was in despair. Her life was in turmoil and she felt a deep emptiness within.

Somehow she knew she needed God, but she had no idea where to find him. One Sunday, on the way to the supermarket, she saw crowds of young people going into a church and she began to wonder if she might find what she was looking for inside. But she did not go in. It was a frightening, unfamiliar place - she wouldn't know where to sit, when to stand or what to say; so she walked away.

Much progress is being made in inter-church and interdenominational co-operation and unity.

However, the trend is often not mirrored within individual fellowships. Sadly, much of this disunity is split along generational lines and many churches are finding it difficult to 'keep everyone happy'.

This year is the centenary of the 1904/05 Welsh Revival. Here we read of its beginnings . . .

On Sunday evening 18 December 1903, Evan Roberts preached his first sermon at his home church of Moriah, Loughor. He preached on Luke 9.23: 'Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me."'

The British Evangelical Council (BEC) has a new name - 'Affinity', with a subtitle, 'Church-centred Partnership for Bible-centred Christianity'.

The British Evangelical Council (BEC) has re-invented itself. Its re-launch took place on March 25 at a smart London hotel, with a swish DVD presentation and reporters from national daily newspapers present.

Paul, a student a Reading University, stood up at the CU house party to deliver a simple message: 'Talk to your friends about Jesus like Sam and Rosie did for me, and support this mission week. If it wasn't for last year's mission I wouldn't be a Christian.'

At UCCF we are so thankful to readers of EN for your prayers during the CU mission weeks last year. Paul and numerous others around the country put their trust in Christ last spring and we praise God for that. We thank God too for the students who have been converted throughout the year.

Students are not lacking in imagination. Take a recent CU house party. What would you do with the leftover food from your church weekend away? Distribute it throughout the church? Donate it to a local hostel? Freeze it for the next weekend away? Not these students. Following the example of Aberdeen CU, Durham decided to auction off everything that was unused, with proceeds going to their forthcoming 'life' mission.

Ranging from bread to pasta, a signed copy of The Blurb (signed by the CU's vendor) to A Call to Spiritual Reformation by Don Carson, the items were put up for auction. With the treasurer looking on eagerly, the bidding got underway.

During a recent trip to the UK, Phillip Jensen, Dean of Sydney, was involved in various student evangelistic outreaches.

Prior to speaking on 'Atheists are fools and agnostics are cowards' at Durham University Christian Union, Jonathan Carswell caught up with him in a Durham coffee shop.