Author: faithrootsdw

Don’t expect the Convention/Festival to compete with your local church

A certain prominent Christian leader used to finish the big festival every year with a speech to the gathered throngs of young people.  He’d acknowledge that they’d had a great week, that the music had been terrific, the teaching fantastic and that many of them had received a particularly powerful experience of the Holy Spirit. … Continue reading Don’t expect the Convention/Festival to compete with your local church

Reaping what you sow

This next section reinforces the point that we’ve seen developed through chapter 5-6, we cannot fix our lives and our relationship to God by making external adjustments to our behaviour through rule keeping and rituals.  Instead, our lives will bear fruit in accordance with the roots. A look at the text (Read Galatians 6:7-10) An… Continue reading Reaping what you sow

Church planting is not the enemy of the local church

I recently wrote in response to John Benton’s rather premature funeral service for the local church.  I just spotted that Jonathan Carswell, CEO of 10 of Those shared John’s original article with this comment.  Imagine reading Jonathan’s comments as a church planter labouring away perhaps on a council estate in the West Midlands or a… Continue reading Church planting is not the enemy of the local church

First and second things

At the weekend, the Keswick Convention put out a statement on social media as follows.  It seems that the convention has been subject to a bit of a protest about their stance on women speakers. It’s not the first time that Christians have decided to protest Christian events. In fact, back when we attended Keswick,… Continue reading First and second things

Reputations, assumptions and missing the important questions

“Oh we have x number of people coming to our church” boasted one of the group of people walking towards the convention tent.  Then they turned to me “oh Dave, how many people are at your church now”.  I wasn’t keen on the numbers feel to the conversation and I didn’t actually know the person… Continue reading Reputations, assumptions and missing the important questions

Should I take questions after preaching?

Someone raised the question the other day about what would happen if we opened up the floor to questions when we had finished preaching. Now, as it happens, I’ve been in a fair few preaching contexts where we’ve done that.  Sometimes, I’ve intentionally opened up to Q&A, at other times, it’s been the decision of… Continue reading Should I take questions after preaching?

Filled with the Spirit

Paul’s solution to the question of Christian obedience and holiness is not to impose laws and rituals (legalism), nor to say that grace means we can do what we please. Instead, he sees our true hope being the Holy Spirit. In Galatians 5:2-23, he says that the result or fruit of receiving the Holy Spirit… Continue reading Filled with the Spirit

Church on holiday

Tim Wilson writes here about attending church when away on holiday.  It provoked a few thoughts in my mind which I’m going to share below. So, as always it’s important to emphasise that I’m not disagreeing with Tim.  These were thoughts prompted, not disagreement prompted, although we may not agree on everything.  I would encourage… Continue reading Church on holiday

Tempted

#FaithrootsPodcast 1 Chronicles 21:1 -22:1 Tempted 1 Chronicles 21:1-22:1  The census (v1-5) An/The opponent, Satan (v1) 2 Samuel 24 makes God the source of the provocation for a census. “Satan … ‘Adversary,’ without the article, than than God is the instigator of David’s census. Such a figure does not appear elsewhere in Chronicles(or Ezra-Nehemiah): indeed… Continue reading Tempted