Sundays@645 Sept/Oct/Dec Rosters

Please email or call Troy for any questions/comments

troymunns@hotmail.com

200 words on … the pornification of culture

I don’t think we realize how desensitized we have become to the sexualisation of the media in our culture. On my way to work I see an ad with Kate Cebrano in leopard print underwear. I see huge billboards displaying women (from the neck down) wearing only lacy undies. As a Christian I have always thought that these are very unhelpful, especially for our brothers who seem to be more visually wired than women.

What I hadn’t stopped to think about was the message that this sends to us women. Our world tells us that womanhood is all about our bodies and our sexuality and nothing else. It seems that the porn industry has lead the way here and images that were once deemed inappropriate are out for the world to see.  It seems that now more and more the images are of younger people and that children are being affected by this trend.

This is completely outrageous. But it’s not surprising given our culture’s attitude to sex. Surely this media trend is a big red flag telling us that something is horribly wrong with our culture. Maybe we can use these issues as conversation starters to affirm once again the way God designed sex and marriage and family.

To hear more about this come along to Toxic Culture next Thursday (if you’re a girl)! 

Here’s a clip of Melinda on a morning show to whet your appetite…

RevWrites- September 20

Jesus All About Life is here!

You may already have noticed the banners going up around churches

Look out now for the outdoor adverts

Jesus All About Life has launched! Look out for the outdoor advertising in bus shelters around NSW. They will be seen all over Sydney. Look out for them in our own area, in Northmead, Winston Hills, Parramatta and North Rocks.

Please continue to pray that people will be open to finding out more about Jesus and that Christians will share their faith.

Praise God for the discussion and debate that has happened so far.

Here’s a conversation starter tip … ask the question

"What do you think about the ads?"

The TV advertising will begin in a week’s time, so please keep praying for the effectiveness of this part of the campaign as well.

Most importantly, keep praying for our friends and neighbours, keep connecting and talking with people, have your copies of The Essential Jesus ready to give away. Offer to read it with the people you give it to. Offer to discuss it with them.

Pray that as we make connections with our neighbours, they will begin making connections with God.

God is giving you a wonderful opportunity to let people know that you are a follower of Jesus and that life is all about having Jesus at the centre.

Jesus calls anyone who would come after him to take up his cross daily and to follow him. Jesus calls his followers to give their lives in his service, just as he gave his life in service of his Father (Luke 9:23-24). And it is the Father who commands the disciples of Jesus to listen to his Son (Luke 9:35).

Praise the Lord for all that he is doing amongst us!

George

200 words on… guys and dolls

I was sent this video a while ago. It is really really sad. In essence it’s about men who have ‘real’ relationships with dolls. You watch it in disbelief as the guy explains what he thinks is a real relationship with this doll who isn’t alive – who can’t move, think, breath, talk…

I think it tells us a few things...

1.     People are made for relationship – so much so that they’ll go to any length to get it.

The guy himself says that he doesn’t mind being alone but can’t stand the idea of being lonely…

2.     Our world will exploit anything for a quick buck.

Marketing and media will go to any length to sell a product.

I think these guys have some kind of psychological problem – which is really sad and a result of sin– but the companies that make these dolls make them specifically for this purpose!  Anything for a quick dollar (the dolls cost around $1500 US).

How desperately does this man and others like him need Jesus. He has a void in his life that he’s trying to fill with a doll. But isn’t that something that all people do – only with other things slightly less weird eg. romantic relationships, money, food, sport, clothes... But what we all need is relationship with Jesus and community with people in him… We need to tell this to our world!

Sundays@645 Sept/Oct Rotsers

Please email or call Troy for any questions/comments

troymunns@hotmail.com

RevWrites- September 13

Jesus All About Life is about to hit our screens!

Last week, Neil asked us to do three things:
• Pray for wisdom and praise God for what he is doing
• Ask the people we know, have they seen the ads on TV and what do they think of them
• Be prepared with copies of The Essential Jesus to give to people, and be prepared to read this with them or to have a conversation about Jesus with them

Here is what Daniel Willis, the CEO of the Bible Society had to say this week:

The last 2 weeks have been a whirlwind of media opportunities to discuss the JAAL Campaign.
If the interest that has been shown by journalists and radio announcers is anything to go by we will all be flooded by many opportunities to say something in our local community throughout the campaign.
Of course there were many detractors who have wanted to have their say. This is precisely what we’re about – providing the opportunity to graciously talk about the relevance of Jesus to our every day lives.

The campaign starts next Monday and I want to encourage you to be in constant prayer as the day approaches. We’re involved in a major attack on the very heartland of “the ruler of the kingdom of the air” (Eph 2:2) but “the One who is in us is greater than the one who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).

This has been an amazing journey as we’ve prepared for these next 8 weeks.
Thank you for all you have done.
Thank you for your encouragement, your prayers, your preparation, your financial commitment and your trust as we’ve travelled this road together.

This morning the team at Bible Society spent time praying together for these next weeks. We are expecting God to work mightily across our country and we’re expecting to continue seeing results for many years to come.
What a joy to see the name of Jesus proclaimed so boldly and widely and what an amazing opportunity to start talking to people everywhere about our Lord.
May He be glorified and may Australia see and know that Jesus is King of Kings and Lord of lords.

Grace & Peace

Let’s keep praying for the people we know, let’s keep connecting with people and let’s take copies of The Essential Jesus, prepared to give them away and to talk with our friends about Jesus.

I have my copies ready to give to my neighbours, family members and the people I go running with on Monday nights, who are not followers of Jesus

George

200 words on... the idol of self

At Senior High this term we’ve been thinking about the 7 deadly sins. Often, we talk about sin as idolatry… For example in the bible greed is spoken of as idolatry (Col 3:5). So when we love our money more than God, we make money a god and worship it. I was reflecting this week on why? Is it really that we’re worshipping the money and have made it an idol or is the underlying problem that we’ve made ourselves the idols? Really, we love money when it serves our needs and our desires, when we can use it to get more stuff for me to make me feel good and feed my desires.

Watching compass on Sunday night has further confirmed this idea for me that the real problem of idolatry is not that we love stuff but that we love ourselves. There was a guy on who had a bit of an alternative religion where it was all about meditation and having faith. But the faith he was talking about was faith in yourself!!

When we look at the world and see idolatry on steroids I think it’s because we all ultimately worship the idol of self. Come to 645 in 2 weeks to see what Jesus says about this…

RevWrites- September 6

The Bible Society’s Jesus All About Life campaign is about to get under way. Here are some key dates:

September 7 – Viral Campaign (that means, it starts on the internet through Digital media).

September 14 – Outdoor Advertising (you’ll start to see the ads popping up at bus stops around NSW)

September 27 – TV Advertising (our ads will be featured on prime time TV and run for 4 weeks)

We hope NACers and WACers will be involved in three ways. First, pray. Praise God for all the good works he has done leading up to the campaign. Pray for Church Leaders and spokespeople, to give them wisdom and the right words to say when responding to the press regarding the campaign

Second, our banner will be going up on 14^th along with hundreds of others. Point it out to people you know. Ask them if they’ve seen the ads when they come on. Ask them what they think. In the next couple of weeks we’ll give you some ideas about how to get from the ads into conversation about the gospel.

Third, give a copy of The Essential Jesus to your friends. It’s Luke’s Gospel with other helpful stuff added. We have ample copies and can get more. I gave away two copies to strangers on Wednesday afternoon without even being there. I asked some shop-keepers we’ve been building relationships with for nearly 20 years to put some freebies on the counters. Two went within an hour.

You might offer to read it with your friend/neighbour you’ve been praying for all year. You might suggest that some neighbours get together to study it, a sort of reading group. You’ll think up lots of ways to use it if you’ve been connecting with your neighbours all year.

If you haven’t been praying and connecting, then start now. You can always give someone a copy of The Essential Jesus at some later date.

In fact, we can all keep making connections with neighbours so they might connect with God right up until we die. Connect09 is just the beginning. Please don’t wait until you die to make a beginning at connecting. Then it will be too late!

Neil