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Oxygen is rad. Here’s a video from day 1 of Oxygen (I haven’t watched it yet).
Below are are my tweets from Piper, Lennox, Reaching the Next Generation and Piper. Read from the bottom up.
Continue reading “Oxygen Christian Leaders’ Conference Day 1”
KCC are hosting John Piper and John Lennox for ONE Night Only on Wednesday 31st May 2011. ONE will be held at the Sydney Entertainment. Check out the website. Promo vid:
I think the above clip is from this sermon on Boasting Only in the Cross. It’s worth a listen.
I’m about half way through watching this fascinating interview that John Piper recently did with Rick Warren. Warren is the Senior Pastor of Saddleback Church in Southern California. Piper and Warren have very different methodological approaches to their ministry. I’ve read some fairly harsh criticism of the author of the massively best-selling book The Purpose-Driven Life. Some of those haters might want to repent of their critique that Warren lacks any doctrinal depth. Piper has a thorough break-down and overview of the interview here.
(Click here if you can’t see the video)
Let me know what you think.
Warren is one of my favourite Tweeters. Earlier today he began an encouraging trend on twitter: #GospelHaiku. Go have a read. Here’s mine.
In Vanuatu I gave a list of my top 10 books for a Christian to read in their first year out of school. The list actually had 11. And then it kinda grew to almost 20. Here is the final list. Shout out to Dan Godden, bro-in-law and co-host extraordinaire, who helped me to decide what made the cut. Have you just finished school? I believe that if you read each of these books it will give you a good foundation for the rest of your life. 10 books works out to be a book per month with 2 months off throughout the year. As you work out your reading plan, make sure your first priority is to have programmed into your daily schedule time with God to hide his word in your heart.
Each of the authors in books 1 through 7 are great. If you like the book I’ve suggested, read anything else by the same author you can get your hands on.
Most of the links above are to the publisher’s website. In some cases you might want to buy them direct from the publisher. Looking for a bargain? Check out booko.com.au – they find the best online prices for purchasing from Australia.
If you’re having a crack – let me know how you go!!
I’ve just got back from a Schoolies trip to Vanuatu with Scripture Union. It was an incredible time. Stay tuned for a bunch of blog posts with some reflections. The topic was “Don’t Waste Your Life”, I spoke from Ephesians about God’s purposes for his people. While reading Don’t Waste Your Life, by John Piper (available for free), I was challenged to think about the time I waste on the Internet. We don’t have a television, but it’s very easy to waste precious hours on the internet that then nullifies the decision to not have a TV. It was liberating to not go online while in Vanuatu!
Here’s a snippet from Piper (p. 120-121 DWYL):
Television is one of the greatest life-wasters of the modern age. And, of course, the Internet is running to catch up, and may have caught up. You can be more selective on the Internet, but you can also select worse things with only the Judge of the universe watching. TV still reigns as the great life-waster. The main problem with TV is not how much smut is available, though that is a problem. Just the ads are enough to sow fertile seeds of greed and lust, no matter what program you’re watching. The greater problem is banality. A mind fed daily on TV diminishes. Your mind was made to know and love God. Its facility for this great calling is ruined by excessive TV. The content is so trivial and so shallow that the capacity of the mind to think worthy thoughts withers, and the capacity of the heart to feel deep emotions shrivels. Neil Postman shows why.
What is happening in America is that television is transforming all serious public business into junk. . . . Television disdains exposition, which is serious, sequential, rational, and complex. It offers instead a mode of discourse in which everything is accessible, simplistic, concrete, and above all, entertaining. As a result, America is the world’s first culture in jeopardy of amusing itself to death.
Postman’s cultural critique, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, is brilliant. Go here to download Piper’s book.
Stay tuned for more Vanuatu posts!!
John Piper doesn’t have a TV and doesn’t go to the movies very often. I’m all for godly engagement with culture in preaching Jesus, but this article from Piper is helpful in keeping the main thing the main thing. Here’s a snippet:
“If you want to be relevant, say, for prostitutes, don’t watch a movie with a lot of tumbles in a brothel. Immerse yourself in the gospel, which is tailor-made for prostitutes; then watch Jesus deal with them in the Bible; then go find a prostitute and talk to her. Listen to her, not the movie. Being entertained by sin does not increase compassion for sinners.”
Go read the whole article.
The 268 Generation crew are doing a world tour this year with their Passion Conferences. Sydney date: Tuesday October 21 @ the Sydney Entertainment Centre. Regular speakers include Louie Giglio and John Piper. Regular musicians includes: David Crowder Band, Matt Redman, Chris Tomlin and Charlie Hall. I’m not sure who will be coming on tour – but should be a great night!
It’s a movement aimed at university speakers. It will be interesting to see how Sydney Anglicans and Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students respond to the event. If John Piper were to speak – they probably wouldn’t have a problem supporting the event, but the last time that Giglio and Tomlin were in the country was for Hillsong Conference 07.
Bring it.