The Churches of Greymouth enjoy the benefit of a number of long-term clergy and pastors who have formed good friendships and relationships with one another combined with newer clergy and pastors who are keen to connect ecumenically. The result is a strong sense of ecumenical unity that plays out in joint activities, responses to issues and good fellowship and prayer at our Minister’s Association meetings.
One example of how that sense of unity has worked out long-term has been the annual Combined Churches carol service in the local Regent Theatre which has been running for close to thirty years and is a feature for many in the community’s Christmas celebrations, Christian or otherwise. It’s always a good night of singing, dance, drama, humour and a poignant message towards the end with three to four hundred in attendance.
A more recent example of our unity was our coming together this year (2017) for the new Alpha Film Series where many of the churches were involved from hosting the starting dinner to providing venues for courses. We share leadership across the churches and joined forces for the Holy Spirit Day. We were blessed to see quite a number of people growing in their faith, experiencing healings and more.
The town has struggled economically over the last few years but the consistency and unity of the town’s churches have I believe been a point of stability for our community.
Rev Tim & Nicky Mora
In 1999 the Anglican Church of Greymouth and Kumara appointed a new youth worker by the name of Nicky Mora. Her husband Tim had just arrived in the Parish as a trainee priest and both had had experience in youth work.
Very quickly under their joint leadership, the youth group grew and expanded into a community-based youth project for the young people of the Grey District with administration and oversight support provided by the church.
The church’s support also includes the provision of “The Shed,” a multi-purpose youth activities centre with an amazing range of facilities. The project has been very successful with around 20% of the High School aged young people in the Grey District currently on the total roll.
The project was put in place because it was recognized that on the Coast young people can miss out on opportunities and don’t always have the support they need to get through the teenage years and the struggles that brings easily. It was in recognition of this that the Greymouth Churches Community Youth Project was established and gathered together an amazingly dedicated team of volunteers.
The aims of the project are to provide weekly and other programmes and activities that meet the needs of the young people in the Grey District in a safe and controlled environment.
These programmes include social, recreational and skills learning activities. Camps and outdoor wilderness activities (often subsidized). We involve ourselves in community initiatives and run social justice projects. We are members of the West Coast Youth Workers Collective, network with DCYFS, the High Schools, the police and District Council and have twice been awarded the supreme Trustpower Award for overall best community project in the Grey District.
Speak for those who cannot speak; seek justice for all those on the verge of destruction. Speak up, judge righteously, and defend the rights of the afflicted and oppressed. Proverbs 31:8-9 (ISV)
Discrimination, restrictions on the right to Freedom of Religion or Belief, and religiously motivated violence are on the rise. These have become, and have always been, the norm in the life and witness of the Church in most parts of the world today.
Being a voice for over 600 million evangelicals, how is the WEA responding to the ever-increasing threats to religious liberty?
Inspired by Proverbs 31:8-9, the WEA Geneva Liaison Office began to actively engage the United Nations (UN) Human Rights mechanisms in 2012 in defence of human rights, and predominately, the right to Freedom of Religion or Belief. The office’s aim is to foster structural changes in countries where our national Evangelical Alliances work, to strengthen the rule of law, to advance the right to Freedom of Religion or Belief, and ultimately, to enable an environment for a more vibrant Christian witness.
Why is a UN presence important?
As surprising as it may seem, the WEA Geneva Liaison Office is the only evangelical representative body advocating for religious freedom on behalf of the more than 600 million evangelicals at the UN in Geneva! And regularly, States that persecute or discriminate against religious minorities have to defend their human rights record at the UN’s Human Rights Council. By relaying the voices of national Evangelical Alliances, the WEA has a unique contribution to bring to the conversation.
In a recent article, Wissam al-Saliby reflected on what evangelical engagement with the UN means when it comes to advocacy for religious freedom, and explained more in detail how WEA’s voice can be of influence in this unique context:
The main tool available is to submit reports to various Geneva-based UN Human Rights mechanisms including the regular Human Rights Council sessions, the Universal Periodic Review, the Human Rights Committee and the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief. These reports would relay the information provided by WEA member Alliances.
The following are examples of reports submitted over the course of this year:
Bhutan: Freedom of Religion or Belief, addresses ongoing criminalization of religious “coercion or inducement,” the registration of religious organizations and discrimination against Christians
Algeria: Freedom of Religion or Belief (also available in French), submitted jointly with the Protestant Church of Algeria and other partners, and addressing namely Churches and Protestant institutions shut down by the government and the trials and arrests of Christian leaders since November 2017
A new audio Bible read and recorded in a Kiwi voice has been released by Bible Society New Zealand in partnership with Rhema.
Read by Rhema long-time announcer Andrew Urquhart, The Kiwi Audio Bible, took a marathon five years to produce with Andrew recording in weekly slots of four hours at a time. The playing time for the Bible from start to finish is nearly 80 hours. Preserving Andrew’s vocal cords was vital both to the Bible recording and his broadcasting commitments. But the biggest challenge for Andrew was reading 2 Kings with the endless lists of unpronounceable Hebrew names. He said some of his personal favourites were Sepharvaim, Meshullemeth and especially Seraiah son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite.
“I was sometimes relieved when they were killed off, only to have them referred to again as the father of such and such in the next genealogy!,” he quipped.
Another challenge was ensuring voice consistency. If a name was pronounced a certain way in one chapter it had to be the same when it appeared next. Project Producer Rev. Ross Browne, who is experienced in speech and drama tuition and radio play production, ensured Andrew found the keyword and accurate emphasis for each verse. For Andrew, this helped him engage with the meaning of the text.
Overall, Andrew said reading the entire Bible out loud was an amazing privilege he would recommend to anyone. The book he enjoyed reading the most was Isaiah, which he described as an epic poem.
“It was fantastic to read out loud, whole chunks at a time. It was great to hear some of those treasured verses in Isaiah back into the context of what was being said in the book overall.”“I think this is such a wonderful resource, especially for people who want to be able to spend more time in God’s Word but find it difficult to find space in their busy schedule. By having the Bible on a USB stick they can redeem the time spent commuting or exercising, bringing the Bible into their everyday routine,” commented Andrew.
The Kiwi Audio Bible (New Living Translation) comes on a USB stick and is available at Bible Society New Zealand and Manna for the special introductory price of $14.99. For more details or to order phone Bible Society on 0800 424 253 or buy online at Manna manna.co.nz
This month has marked the 29th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall (November 9) and of the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia (November 17), two events which catalysed the collapse of the communist system.
In 1989, headlines everywhere announced the unbelievable news that the Wall had fallen. Euphoric crowds celebrated in the streets. The pluralistic free society of the West had won! Marxist regimes in other central and eastern European satellite states toppled like dominoes, and eventually the Soviet Union itself fell apart.
Yet today, less than three decades later, headlines now tell us that it is truth that has fallen.
“In today’s world, truth is losing”, announced The Washington Post. The Oxford Dictionary chose ‘post-truth’ as the word for the year in 2016. Since that year, we have watched political leaders rise to power in both North and South America, and across Europe to Russia and Turkey, who brush aside truth as a petty inconvenience.
The words of the prophet Isaiah ring ominously true today:
Justice is turned back, and righteousness stands afar off; for truth is fallen in the street, and honesty cannot enter. So truth fails, and he who departs from evil (stands for truth) makes himself a prey.
– Isaiah 59:14-15 NKJV
What happened?
What has happened to turn this apparent triumph of secular liberalism into a climate of fear, uncertainty, polarisation, fake news and mistrust?
In 1991, Lesslie Newbigin warned of the multiple problems of pluralism. While others contrasted free society pluralism with totalitarianism as light with darkness, he wrote: “Total pluralism, in which there are no criteria by which different lifestyles could be evaluated, in which any kind of discrimination between cultural norms as better or worse is forbidden, in which there is no truth but only ‘what seems meaningful for me’, leads inevitably to anomie, to lostness, to a meaningless life in a meaningless world” (Newbigin, L. (1991) Truth to tell,Geneva: WCC Publications, p55).
Marxism, claiming to be objectively scientifically true, therefore claimed the right to impose itself as public doctrine controlling all areas of life, he argued. We have seen the disastrous consequences of a false objectivity and applauded its collapse. Yet, even as the crowds were still celebrating victory in the Cold War, he cautioned of the ‘danger of collapsing into a false subjectivism in which there are no criteria but everything goes’.
Today, truth has fallen to subjectivism. Honesty is shut out. Those who stand for truth are mocked and dismissed. So how do we respond?
On the recent anniversary of the Velvet Revolution, I was in Prague with 170 participants of the Together for Europe movement from many nations of Europe east and west, and shared a meditation on lessons from Czech heroes about living in a ‘post-truth’ world.
Jan Hus, burnt at the stake as a heretic in 1415 during the Council of Constance, is honoured in Prague’s Old Town Square by an impressive monument paid for by publical donation during the First World War, to mark the 500th anniversary of his death. A century before Luther, Hus stood up for truth against abuses and doctrinal distortions in the Church of the day. Even as he faced his own death in Constance, he exhorted his disciples back in Prague to ‘seek the truth, hear the truth, learn the truth, love the truth, speak the truth, adhere to the truth, defend it to the death, for truth will free you’.
Truth prevails
On the base of the Hus memorial in Prague is the famous phrase attributed to the reformer, ‘Truth Prevails’. This motto was adopted by the first President of Czechoslovakia in 1918, Tomas Masaryk, and again by the first President of a democratic Czechoslovakia after the Velvet Revolution, Vaclav Havel.
Havel is another Czech hero from whom we can learn about living in a post-truth world. In what used to be a famous essay, The Power of the Powerless, the dissident playwright exhorted his fellow countrymen living under the false scientific objectivity of marxism: ‘don’t live the lie!’In language becoming freshly relevant this time in the West, Havel hammered again and again that truth and love had to prevail over lies and hatred.
Havel was a founding member of the Charter 77 movement whose motto was: Truth prevails for those who live in truth. Imprisoned multiple times for his stand on truth, Havel found himself in 1989 thrust into leadership of the Velvet Revolution and almost carried up the hill into the presidential palace to be the nation’s new leader.
In their words and life, Hus and Havel challenge us in our post-truth world and through our daily lives to stand for truth, to seek the truth, to speak the truth, to love the truth – for the truth will set us free.
Jeff Fountain’s Weekly Word – originally published here
One of our goals was to prayer walk all the streets in Tauranga. We came close to covering the whole city, whole suburbs that have been covered, with a few areas across the city left.
Unity and Prayer
For many years praying pastors have met on Thursday mornings with these scriptures in mind, John 17:20-23 “Father make us one……” and Isaiah 62:1-10 “…..for ‘Tauranga’s’ sake, we will not remain quiet, till her righteousness shines out like the dawn…..”
So when Stephen Hanson shared the vision of ONEVOICE, there was immediate agreement and support.
This initiative saw over four thousand believers from at least 22 churches come together from a number of denominations across our city.This included 5 well attended, Sunday night gatherings. There was a special theme for each night. The feedback through the course of the month, and since, was that a greater sense of unity was cultivated in our times together, and the desire expressed by many to continue to meet in 2018. One pastor said ‘we are growing up in love together’.
One Sunday night we had 11 invited guests representing the people of Tauranga in central government, local government, education, the police, and one of our local iwi. Pastors and leaders gathered around these men and women during the meeting and prayed for each of them. It was an incredible opportunity to bless and encourage these people. We received messages of thanks from a number of them the following week. The final Sunday evening saw dozens of spiritual fathers and mothers individually pray and bless many hundreds of people.
Each week throughout the whole month, we held 3-weekday worship and prayer meetings.
These were followed up with fellowship and teaching sessions. Some of the intercessors from different churches have continued to meet weekly to pray for the city. Others have been sharing the gospel and praying for people in the streets.
One of our goals was to prayer walk all the streets in Tauranga. We came close to covering the whole city, whole suburbs that have been covered, with a few areas across the city left.
We’re greatly encouraged by what is taking place in our city among the Body of Christ, and consider it a tremendous blessing and privilege to serve our city in this way.
The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) expresses concerns over the current draft law put forward by Bulgaria’s parliament aiming at amending the Religious Denominations Act. If approved in its current form, it threatens to force evangelical churches and institutions to close or face unbearable and discriminatory administrative burdens.
The draft law which passed in first reading in parliament on October 11, 2018 has implications on the funding and financial management of religious communities as well as on the training and appointing of clergy. Should the law pass, existing theological seminaries are at risk of shutting down, evangelical church pastors may no longer be able to conduct worship services, and the acceptance and use of donations will be subject to government approval and limitations.
The WEA echoes the concerns of the Bulgarian Evangelical Alliance (BEA), its national member body, and those of other religious communities in Bulgaria that this draft legislation is discriminatory. It puts unjustified and disproportionate restrictions on the right to freedom of religion or belief and is in direct violations of the democratic principles enshrined in Bulgaria’s constitution and in the legislation of the European Union, of which Bulgaria is a member since 2007.
Bp Efraim Tendero, WEA Secretary General & CEO, stated: “The proposed law legalizes state interference in the affairs of religious communities, which invariably comes at the expense of religious freedom. At a time when governments worldwide face the challenge of strengthening freedoms while maintaining security, we call on Bulgaria and other democratic countries to lead by example and to strengthen the right to religious freedom rather than to weaken it.”
In a recent statement commenting on the draft law, the BEA quoted the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), saying: “Pluralism, tolerance and broadmindedness are hallmarks of a democratic society. Although individual interests must on occasion be subordinated to those of a group, democracy does not simply mean that the views of a majority must always prevail: a balance must be achieved which ensures the fair and proper treatment of people from minorities and avoids any abuse of a dominant position.”
The BEA questions the legality of the aims of the draft laws, as well as the proportionality of the suggested measures and their balance in light of the ECHR’s decision.
“Together with BEA, we call on the Bulgarian authorities to reconsider its draft legislation aimed at amending the Religious Denominations Act,” Bp Tendero said. “And we call on evangelicals worldwide to accompany our brothers and sisters in Bulgaria in prayer as they dialogue with their political leaders to identify the best path forward.”
This Christmas Bible Society New Zealand, through the generosity of its supporters, is giving away 85,000 copies of The Well Good News of Christmas, a fun and colourful booklet for parents and grandparents to help them pass on the Bible story of Christmas.
Last year, this little book was a run-away success with 3,000 copies flying out the door equipping families to pass on the Bible story of Christmas. Following on its heels was The Super Cool Story of Jesus, with 84,000 copies given away to children around the country with the help of churches and families.
In publishing another 85,000 copies of The Well Good News of Christmas, Bible Society is hoping to reach the 36%* of Kiwi kids who have never seen, read or heard the story of Jesus’ birth. The book is part of Bible Society’s Pass It On campaign designed to encourage and equip parents, grandparents and caregivers to pass on their passion for the Bible to the next generation.
With The Well Good News of Christmas, people have a fantastic opportunity to share the good news of Christmas with the children in their communities using a brilliantly fun book. It’s a story that is still impacting and changing lives today.
Stephen Opie, BSNZ Programme Director.
Written by Welsh author Dai Woolridge, the story is aimed at four to eight-year-olds using child-friendly rhyming language.
And while The Well Good News of Christmas focuses on the events around Jesus’ birth, it also includes a little about creation, and Jesus’ life and ministry.
The Well Good News of Christmas
is being offered free to churches, BSNZ partner organisations and anyone who wants to share the Bible story of Christmas
Click here to order your copies or call us on 0800 424 253
Individuals can order up to five copies, while churches and organisations can order up to 250 copies
Learn more about how Bible society New Zealand makes the Bible accessible to everyone and encourage interaction with it
Today the United Nations and the European Union are criticised from all sides by people of all faiths and none. When we ask why and how the UN and the EU came into existence, we discover that many of the key initiators were motivated by biblical values and ideals.
Could either of these entities ever have existed without biblical inspiration?
When war broke out, Sir Winston Churchill, never an active churchgoer, warned the British: ‘The Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilization.’
As war raged across Europe and beyond, the desire to build a free and peaceful post-war world order prompted President Franklin Roosevelt to articulate ‘the four essential human freedoms’: freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want and freedom from fear.
These ideas would germinate over the next eight years into the founding of the United Nations in 1945, and the formulation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), the first article of which read: ‘All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.’
Dr Charles Malik, a Lebanese Christian, was one of the drafters of the UDHR and later became the president of the UN General Assembly. US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles expressed that ‘Christian forces’ had been primarily responsible for giving the UN Charter a ‘soul’ in the commitments to human rights; among them pre-communist China (much influenced by Protestant-mission universities) and the governments of Catholic Latin America. Eleanor Roosevelt, a key player in shaping the UDHR, prayed each evening: ‘Save us from ourselves and show us a vision of a world made new’.
Winning the war was one thing; sustaining the peace was another. We easily forget how volatile the post-war years were with efforts by the Kremlin to overthrow the fledgeling democracies of France, Italy, Spain and West Germany.
While America cajoled western European leaders to formulate plans to bring West Germany back into the community of democratic nations, it offered the Marshall Plan as an economic package to kick-start the economy and initiated the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation as a protective umbrella against the Soviet threat. While essential for the recovery of western Europe, these initiatives were like scaffolding on the outside of a building project. The process of rebirth and reconstruction required an indigenous European initiative.
The defining moment for Europe’s future (including Central and Eastern Europe in the long run) took place on 9 May 1950 when the French foreign minister Robert Schuman surprised the world with his daring plan for a European Coal and Steel Community, the first step towards what has become the European Union. In a speech lasting three short minutes, Schuman laid the foundations for a European house in which today half a billion Europeans from 28 (soon to be 27) nations live together in peace, committed to democracy and human rights.
Schuman’s personal vision was that Europe should become a ‘community of peoples deeply rooted in basic Christian values’. ‘Democracy will either be Christian or it will not be,’ he wrote. ‘An anti-Christian democracy will be a parody which will sink into tyranny or into anarchy.’
Europeans today may squirm at references to Christianity and spiritual values. Churchill’s reference to ‘the survival of Christian civilisation’ may sound outdated in post-Christian society. And Schuman’s talk of ‘Christian democracy’ would be scoffed at in many circles today.
Yet Schuman and Churchill were not isolated voices. Numerous key figures engaged in drafting the UDHR and the ECHR consciously drew from their Judeo-Christian worldview, while attempting to find common ground with those of other persuasions.
Schuman’s German colleague Konrad Adenauer believed it to be ‘providential’ that those at the core of the new European project were ‘filled with the desire to build the new edifice of Europe on Christian foundations.’
The claim that Europe’s roots are primarily Christian is largely ignored today. Yet, even British atheist Richard Dawkins candidly admits we cannot understand European history without understanding Christianity and the Bible. Leading secular philosopher Jürgen Habermas concedes that there is no alternative to Judaeo-Christian ethics for grounding freedom, solidarity, emancipation, morality, human rights and democracy. These ideals are the direct legacy of the Jewish ethic of justice, he argues, and the Christian ethic of love.
In other words, without this biblical legacy, there would have been no Europe as we know it, no European Union and no United Nations.
Till next week,
This article originally appeared on Jeff Fountain’s ‘Weekly Word‘
The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) expresses its sorrow over the tragic event in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where a gunman killed eleven worshippers in a Synagogue. Bp Efraim Tendero, Secretary General & CEO of WEA, issued the following statement:
We are deeply troubled by what has happened at the Tree of Life Synagogue this weekend and offer our heartfelt prayers of compassion and support for the families of those killed, for the local congregation and the Jewish community as a whole.
We call on believers around the world to specifically pray:
for the families, that those who lost loved ones will experience the peace from God;
for the leaders of Tree of Life and the Jewish community as they care for the suffering;
for the body of Christ to be united with all people of goodwill against hatred and violence;
that God may show mercy to all.
We are concerned about the increasingly polarized and hate-filled culture in many nations and regions of the world that not only marginalizes minorities but goes as far as encouraging violence against those they perceive to be different from themselves.
We believe that while we may at times disagree with people on matters of faith, opinion or tradition, every person is created by God and has inherent dignity that deserves respect.
Jesus called us to be peacemakers and in this spirit, we call on people of faith and any person of goodwill to not remain silent but speak out in opposition wherever and whenever hatred or violence is encouraged.
The Waka Whakamua is made up of 30 providers, businesses, churches and organisations focused on working together to deliver services supporting and strengthening youth, whanau and the wider community. Scott Clifford is the Pastor of Ascend Church and also the representative of the faith-based collective, he chatted with Andrew Urquhart on Rhema. Interview with Scott Clifford on Radio Rhema
We have seen a continuation of our traditional strengths: the Christmas Day Community Lunch (put on by the combined Churches, local businesses and the Mayor’s office) served over 500 of the most vulnerable in our city, and the Combined Good Friday Service saw about 700 Believers from dozens of different Churches worship together once again (not even a tropical storm could put us off!).
Two new opportunities presented themselves to the Rotorua Association of Christian Churches this year that were unique and timely. Waka Whakamua and Te Hāhi.
A community trust based on collective impact was officially launched (after 2+ years of dialogue and strategy). Waka Whakamua (meaning: Moving Forward, Together) is made up of 6 community collectives, including a Faith-Based/Church Collective. The vision of Waka Whakamua is “Transformed communities, full of hope and prosperity!” Having just received significant funding for this charitable trust at the end of 2017, the future is bright for the Church of our city to continue to impact those around us!
When former policewoman Tui Keenan moved to Rotorua last year our city was blessed! Tui had started a cooperative between local Churches and local Police to help curb incidents of ‘domestic harm’ (including domestic violence) in her hometown of Gisborne and wanted to help facilitate the same thing here in Rotorua.
Te Hāhi (meaning: The Faith) began over the holiday period 2017 and is seeing the same fruit in Rotorua as it has in Tairawhiti. Local pastors, current and former Area Commanders, parishioners, chaplains and many others are banding together to help shift the atmosphere of our city and region!
Exciting times!
The other significant event we participate in together is the Christmas Day Community Lunch. In partnership with churches (providing volunteers and organisation), government (the Mayor provides the Events Centre out of the Mayoral Fund and local MPs get involved), business (donating food and gifts) and the community (with volunteers and participants) it is truly a cooperative effort!
Last year over 400 folks who would have gone without on Christmas received a top-notch meal with all the trimmings and presents for the children. As I was leaving I noticed one of our MPs still vacuuming away as almost everyone had gone home. Everyone chipped in. We would love to model more events on this type of collaboration in the future!
There is a sign on the way into the city of Rotorua along the State Highway that reads, “Feel the spirit!”. The churches of our city are working together to make sure this happens!
Scott Clifford Chairman RACC, Pastor – Ascend Church Rotorua
Two new opportunities presented themselves to the Rotorua Association of Christian Churches this year that were unique and timely. Waka Whakamua and Te Hāhi.
