I returned from six weeks leave today and found a copy of our weekly newsletter on my desk. Supposedly!!! It was a mock up of the newsletter that Nigel and other members of our staff had contributed to with the purpose of scaring me that all that has been done in the last five and bit years at northern had disapeared. No longer did we have seven congregations but we were all back to one Sunday morning worship experience.

To give you an idea of it - this is the article that Penelope had written on the front page:

“The bible is the only true word of God.
In the gospel of Mathew 6:22 it is stated that “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single.”
The bible teaches us all that we need to see the world as it has been written by the great creator.
If we need comfort we can look to the bible. If we need joy we can look to the bible. If we need truth we can look to the bible.
Some say through translations we have lost some of the meaning in these words. God looks down upon those that do his work through these translations.
He can give them the strength to do these correctly and so human error does can not taint the holy scriptures. Those that divert from these reading are on a path of sin and destruction.
Today there are people that have tried to accomplish god’s work by writing his teachings. Some of these are Allen Hursh, Kevin Ford and Bishop Spong.
Although if these feebles contradict a single word of god, they must be condemned for their blasphemy.
Parents today have turned to new radical texts to reach the hearts of minds of our youth. These will not make them pure. These will not make them strong.
The only text they need to know is the bible and children do not know these miraculous stories. They are being brought up in sin.
Timothy 3:15 says “that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation.”
Northern Community for a long time has sought to segregate the masses through alternative words.
As adults we must set the example for our children by reading the bible.
In our seven disciplines, one is entering the biblical story.
Now I propose that this discipline be embarrassed by raising it as the main one. This is so that we can teach by reading the scriptures every day and become more holy as disciples of Jesus.
Mark says in 14:49 “I was daily with you in the temple teaching, and ye took me not: but the scriptures must be fulfilled.”
It is not that these should just be read but acted upon.
My proposal in summery is that we unite together not just in teachings but as one congregation.
We then can show our children our power as one united church.
As we formed from 4 churches into one, now we can progress into one congregation on the true holy day.
Psalms 133 teaches as that “how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity!”
In unity Northern will be on Sunday mornings. We can not grow from discussion that leads us away from our faith and the true biblical teachings.
The church is not there to please but unite with hymns of prays, and the word of god. The only word, the one word and only true word of God.”

Mmmm, I can see my task is not finished at Northern

And can you see that they had plenty of time on their hands while I was away!!!

This entry was posted on Monday, September 26th, 2005 at 2:35 pm by phil and is filed under notes from northern, us. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.