Prayer is clearly a very important theme in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. As the apostle sits in chains in a Roman prison, writing this letter, he keeps coming back to this topic of prayer. He prays for his readers, that they will be able to lift their eyes to see the greatness of God’s purposes and plans through his Son Jesus Christ.
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Prayer: the heart of evangelism (Ephesians 6:17–20)
Gerald Bray Essay Prize Winners
Paul Young, with his essay, “The Role of Works in Final Judgment Using Calvin’s Aristotelian Framework with Special Reference to Romans 6:19-23” of which Gerald says that, “Young tackles a little known subject with great erudition and thoroughness.”
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5 Reasons Why Women Can Love the Apostle Paul
Through his preaching and writing, Paul shows that the most important thing about a woman’s identity is not her physical appearance, nor her marital status, nor whether she’s had children, nor her education, health, wealth, or age. Rather the most important thing about a women’s identity is whether she is in Christ, or out of Christ. This impacts all of our eternity. Women and men therefore need to be saved, and so the gospel needs to be preached (Acts 20:20-24; Eph 1:1-3:13).
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Preaching on Australia Day?
Nations are a mixture of good God-given human potential, sinfulness, God’s common grace, and —where there are Christian believers—God’s saving grace…
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The importance of being a struggling Christian (Ephesians 6:14–16)
Do you ever feel like the Christian life is a struggle? Do you feel that it’s hard, day after day, to keep going? Do you find it hard to trust God, to live for Jesus, and to speak about Jesus with other people? Maybe you look at other Christians—at church, or online, or in sermon illustrations or books—who seem to have it all together and who seem to be able to live victorious Christian lives, happy and largely free from struggles. And then you look at yourself and ask: “What’s wrong with me? Why is it all such a struggle for me?”
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In tragedy, God is our refuge and strength
By: Rev Archie Poulos, Head of Department of Ministry
There will be no-one in Australia unaffected by the pain, loss, tragedy, despair and heroism that is this summer’s bushfires. I am unable to even imagine the intensity of emotion that so many closely afflicted from the fires must be going through. Yet when life is out of control as it has been in recent days, everyone looks for a higher power to call upon, or to blame, or to assist in propelling us to greater service. Some turn to prayer to ask the Lord for help, some to the politicians for either support or to accuse them of inaction, some to the extraordinary efforts of fire-fighters for examples of courage and selflessness, and some to the actions of people they don’t even know who have at personal cost opened their hearts, their homes and their wallets to support people in need.
Each of these helpers has a very important and wonderful place in our common distress this summer, but it is God who is our great defender and support – the one who will always do what is good and right and the one from whom our help finally comes.
Like our recent experience, many of the Psalms are set in a situation of opposition, despair; where the writer’s life is about to be extinguished, and in the awful extremity of the situation he turns to call on the Lord. It is right to call on the Lord as God watches over his own and they can shadow in his wings (Psalm 36, 57, 63, 91), and even though he inhabits eternity his ear is turned to hear the quiet pleas of his people (Psalm 18:6, 31:22), and so we can boldly ask God to make haste to help (Psalm 38:22, 70:1, 71:12). In all of life’s situations and circumstances it is such a comfort to know that God is our strength and refuge.
And yet, we called out to God through the bushfires and they still advanced. Knowing the revealed and proven character of God demands that we trust that God, like a mother hen caring for her chicks, has our best interests at heart. And knowing this, calls for trust from his people, as we continue in prayer for our nation; and for a heart like God’s where his people generously, moving beyond the boundaries of our comfortable relationships, seek the good of others.
God is our refuge and strength,
a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way,
though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble at its swelling
Psalm 46:1-3
