Two new online resources for Reformed Baptists and others

The archive for the now defunct Grace Magazine (which I edited c December 1995-March 2001) is now available online in digital form (January 1981-December 2014) on the sbhs website. The search facility does not seem to be available for finding issues but once into an edition it can be searched throughly. The website is here.

Meanwhile, over at the Reformation Today website all the editions from 1970-1987 are available in digital format (issues 1-100). There appears to be no search facility. The websire is here.

Christmas Convictions Article

(This article has appeared on the blog before and was written for the sadly missed Grace Magazine)

Christmas Convictions

Gary Brady

No not the results of the government's latest drink driving offensive but a look at one man's personal convictions about celebrating Christmas

I am sometimes involved in interviews at a theological college. We ask most of the questions but at the end they can ask what they want. I remember an occasion when one student asked about celebrating Christmas and Easter. He had come to the conviction this is something he did not want to be involved in and knowing that not all Christians take the same view he wanted to flag up his viewpoint. We assured him it would be no problem.

He is not alone in his convictions. I know of a minister with similar convictions who regularly goes on holiday at this time of year knowing that most of the church take a different approach to the season. The late Professor John Murray of Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, apparently used to really enjoy having the place to himself each December 25, which was for him an ordinary working day.

At the other extreme are Christians who keep Christmas as enthusiastically as anyone. Some will have a crib in their front room, pipe endless Christmas carols through the house and send cards with nativity scenes and texts. Some even talk of celebrating Christ's birthday and the idea of not being in church on Christmas day of all days make them rather nervous.

What about you? Did you tut a little when you saw that the magazine theme was a Christmas one? Or were you pleased that the subject has been raised again? Whatever your reaction you need to hold firm convictions on this vexed subject but you need to hold them with grace recognising that not all will hold the same convictions as you.

What I want to do here is to set out my own convictions so that if you are undecided on the issue it may help you to come to firm convictions, which we all need, and if you are decided you will have a good opportunity to test your convictions and consider whether there might be need for change.

Conviction 1 The New Testament does not require believers to keep any particular festival

Talking about Jewish customs in Colossians 2:16 Paul says do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. In Romans 14 he says (6, 7a) One man considers one day more sacred than another; another man considers every day alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. He who regards one day as special, does so to the Lord.

Obviously the Lord's Day is to be kept special as it is part of the moral law but with everything else it is up to the individual. If you wish to celebrate Passover or Israeli independence or your birthday or Christmas or (to a limited extent) Ramadan for that matter, you are free to do so.

Conviction 2 Christmas or the midwinter festival as some want us to call it is a pagan festival

It is certainly possible that Jesus was born on December 25 or thereabouts but the truth is that we do not know, we cannot know and we do not need to know if that is so. It is true that large numbers of people celebrate his birthday at this time of the year but that is undeniably tied into the pre-Christian traditions that existed in communities in the northern hemisphere long before they heard the gospel.

Wherever Christians have gone they have attempted to transform pagan customs into something more Christian. There is some evidence, for example, that Boniface the sixth century missionary to the Germans tried to stop pagan tree worship but still encouraged the custom of cutting down a fir tree and bringing it into the house in winter.

We may feel that pagan customs are better abandoned rather than adapted but the fact is that year by year we are confronted by pagan traditions, often with but increasingly without a Christian veneer, and we need to decide how to react. To do so we must try not to confuse what is allowable for a Christian to do with what it is necessary for him to do. It is allowable for a Christian to put a tree in his house and decorate it or eat plum pudding or wear a paper hat and blow a party puffer. It is allowable for him to celebrate Christ's birth with songs and readings and sermons any day of the year. None of these things are necessary for him to do.

Conviction 3 Christmas or the midwinter festival is a good idea for many

If you live in the northern hemisphere winter is long and dreary. Splitting it up with a celebration in the middle makes good sense psychologically. If at the same time lots of people want to say it is a time to celebrate Christ's birth then rather than complaining about it take advantage of the opportunity to talk about his birth, his life and his death too and how to come to him.

Having said that it is a pagan festival, if we are going to celebrate it then we must nevertheless be careful to celebrate it in a Christian way. Can we justify the amount we are spending albeit on other members of the family? Is slumping in front of the TV for more than a few hours a good idea? What about all that food and drink – is it right to so indulge? Are we just being swept along with it all and not thinking about how to glorify God? These are the sorts of questions to ask.

More positively, many will want to go further and not simply seek to shun the commercialised and pagan Christmas that is so common but really celebrate the fact of our Saviour's birth. When he saw Christmas trees Luther would famously speak about how Jesus the Light of the World has come into this dark world. That fact beats anything the world has to offer.

Conviction 4 No celebration should be allowed to unduly interfere with the Lord's Day

I do not know how you celebrate Christmas Day. For many people it includes a number of things that they would not normally do on the Lord's Day. It is important not to let anything interfere with keeping the Lord's Day as far as possible and so when Christmas Day falls on a Sunday, as it will this year, it is wise for those who mark it to think ahead and consider how best they can handle possible conflicts. For many of us it will be wisest if, this year at least, we do many of the things that we normally do on December 25 the day before or the day after.

Meetings, TV Shows, etc

I've been meaning to a sort of general update for a while now. Various things have been taking up my time as well as the regular Sunday and midweek meetings and reading, etc. About 12 days ago I had an ultra-sound scan. I'm still waiting for the results from that.

The day after that I had an officers meeting (which went on a little long) followed a week later by a church members meeting where people were reporting back on no less than four potential new members - two by profession and two coming from other churches. I welcomed in the latter two the following Sunday but the other two will need to be baptised first so we will be arranging that soon.

Then there was a Grace Magazine Trustees meeting at the chapel as we discuss whether and online attempt is feasible. I also have an LTS Board meeting tomorrow.

On Saturday we were giving out tracts in Golders Green. It was rather wet for that sort of activity. I met an old man who claimed to be an atheist. He was quite convinced this was because he knew so much but when I told him he was sadly deluded and asked him if he knew everything he got quite irate. Atheism seems quite fashionable at present. it is difficult for an atheist to show humility, which makes them immediately suspect to anyone who has thought much about these things.

As for TV shows, we have been watching Wolf Hall, of course. I thought the first one was stunning, the second less so but the series looks set to be a classic. I have also been enjoying some BBC4 documentaries - the one on Mike Oldfield and Tubular Bells, the three on recording popular music by Neil Brand (Sound of Song), one on early rock 'n' roll, and the anniversary re-recording of Please Please Me. We also enjoyed the documentary on The secret world of Lewis Carroll fronted by Martha Kearney on BBC 2.
In the midst of all this it was nice to have Dylan around for his birthday. He was in town for an interview.

Last Issue of Grace Magazine

I received the last issue of Grace yesterday. It is sad to think that the magazine is coming to an end. I am glad to have been part of the story (as editor c 1999-2004). The cover reflects the original design of the first (smaller sized non-glossy) issue under the leadership of John Doggett. 

Secret Sins 2

Why should I want to be forgiven for secret sins?

We do not know what sins David may have been guilty of but he wanted to be forgiven them all. We should also want to be forgiven our secret sins. Sedgwick suggests why.

1. They may become public sins otherwise

When you weed the garden you know the rule that you need to pull them up by their roots. Sometimes a serious fire starts with only a small spark. Unless the spark is extinguished there will be a great fire. James 1:15 describes how after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death. The instinct of a baby in the womb is to be born; sin too wants to break out and act. If you indulge sin in your heart, do not be surprised if the next thing that happens is that it breaks out in your life. If you have thought about a sin, when an opportunity to commit it arises you are more ready to act. Spurgeon makes the same observation. One sin easily leads to another. When we sin a sin the first time it may be hard but the second time is easier and so on until we are used to it. Secret sin is especially dangerous in that way. We need to be done with secret sin before it becomes open sin. Sincerely seek forgiveness for that and you will not fall into the other.

2. They are the most likely to deceive us

All sin deceives us to some extent but secret sin the most! They are most likely to prevail because

• We do not judge secret sins as strictly and spiritually as open sins. We are often tempted to think of them as not being sins at all or small sins at most. We tend to think something like this. To stab someone dead or cause a wound is a great sin. It is not so bad but still a sin to speak in a nasty and unpleasant way so that someone is upset. As for thinking horrible thoughts about someone and raging against them in our minds, that is not really sin – or is it? Adultery is obviously sin as is looking at pornography. It is also a sin to fantasise in your mind about someone. Sin is always trying to excuse itself. Secret sin is the most likely to succeed. It should not.
• Many people are at least outwardly reputable. The truth is that most people learn by a certain age not to commit too many outward sins. We commit few in public, and perhaps not many in private. However, on our own and in our hearts we may commit many sins. Now we need in one sense to be most careful over the sins that deceive us most easily. We ought to be very concerned therefore not just to be forgiven our known sins but our secret ones too. Are we?

3. Sin's strength is inward

You are familiar with the fact that when you are ill the problem is often within ad so you need to get a drug into your system to be well again. In many cases simply rubbing on ointment will solve nothing. In a similar way, we need forgiveness for secret sins first and foremost.

4. God looks mainly on what is within

Psalm 66:18, 19s If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened; but God has surely listened and has heard my prayer.

Psalm 51:6 Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.

In other religions you will find outward conformity is all that is required. The concept of hypocrisy is particularly Christian. This is because God looks at the heart. We sing a song about this with the children at our church. It begins

Girl so pretty, boy so smart, Man looks on the outside but God looks on the heart

Charming manners, friendly grin. Man looks on the outside but God can see within

Sedgwick: “The man is to God what his inside is. If you work wickedness in your heart, God will destroy you. Plaster your visible part with all sorts of pious expressions: if yet you can set up a form of sinning within, you are notable hypocrites. The Lord sees you to be false and rotten, and He will discharge Himself of you …”

Three horrible sins wrapped up in one

• The sin itself. Often the worst sins are committed in secret. Murderers usually murder when they think no-one will see. Adultery is usually secret. Some say the only sin that matters is getting found out. That is heresy. Spurgeon says “A sin is a sin, whether done in private or before the wide world … Do not measure sin by what other people say of it. Measure sin by what God says of it and [by] what your own conscience says of it …”
• Hypocrisy. The hypocrite can get little pleasure from secret sins. Spurgeon says “Hypocrisy is a hard game to play at: it is one deceiver against many observers; [certainly] it is a miserable trade that will earn at last, as its certain climax, a tremendous bankruptcy. Ah! Ye who have sinned without discovery, Be sure your sin will find you out (Numbers 32:23); and bethink you, it may find you out ere long.”
• Atheism. We seldom think of it like this but secret sin is a form of atheism. It is pretending God cannot see or that he is not there. Psalm 94:7-9 They say, The LORD does not see; the God of Jacob takes no notice. Take notice, you senseless ones among the people; you fools, when will you become wise? Does he who fashioned the ear not hear? Does he who formed the eye not see? Spurgeon warns “There is no hiding it from God! Thy sin is photographed in high heaven. The deed, when it was done, was photographed upon the sky; and there it shall remain. … thy vices are all known, written in God’s book. He keepeth a diary of all thine acts.”

(We closed with words from Puritan Jeremiah Burroughs

“Take heed of secret sins. They will undo thee if loved and maintained: one moth may spoil the garment; one leak drown the ship; a penknife stab can kill a man as well as a sword. So one sin may damn the soul”.)

Secret Sins 1

The current Grace Magazine has an article of mine on secret sins. No original content here but readable and challenging I trust.

If you lift a stone in the garden you find all sorts of creepy crawlies underneath. Sin is a little like that.

What are secret sins?

Psalm 19:12 Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults. It is not entirely clear what these hidden faults or secret sins are. Secret sins are the subject of the first part of a book by Obadiah Sedgwick (c 1600-1658), an exposition of verses in Psalm 19, first published in 1660. He says that such sins are

1. Not hidden from God

There is no such thing as a sin hidden from God. It is impossible to hide anything from him. Remember Adam and Eve vainly trying to hide from God and Cain failing to realise that the blood of Abel was crying from the ground. Many verses show this

Isaiah 29:15 Woe to those who go to great depths to hide their plans from the LORD, who do their work in darkness and think, Who sees us? Who will know?

Proverbs 5:21 … your ways are in full view of the LORD, and he examines all your paths.

Hebrews 4:13 Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

A children's catechism asks: Can you see God? Answer: I cannot see God but he always sees me.

2. But may be hidden from you

David may have in mind sins in his life he is not even aware of. It is possible to sin and not realise. In some situations you hear people use God's name thoughtlessly. You point it out but they often do not realise they have spoken God's name. An extreme example was Saul of Tarsus persecuting Christians thinking it pleased God. There are professing Christians who think they are serving God by pursuing a certain policy or lifestyle yet there is reason to think it is the opposite of what God wants. We need to recognise in all humility that we may sin at some point and not even realise. These sins also need to be forgiven.

3. Hidden from others

• Some are hidden because of how they are described. One way people try to hide sins is by disguises. People are pro-choice if they favour abortion on demand. They speak not of abortion but termination of a pregnancy. It is adult entertainment not pornography, having an affair not committing adultery, sexual liberation not unfettered lust. The word fornication has almost disappeared exist being covered by myriad euphemisms. Even for your prayers can in fact be gossip.
• Some are secret in the sense of being private. They are kept to a small circle of friends. You read of some politicians after the event and gain quite a different impression of their character. Sometimes people are outed when their private life becomes public knowledge. Gordon Brown was famously caught out when he commented adversely on a woman without realising his microphone was still active. Are you one person in public and another in private?
• Others are kept from all other human knowledge. Some sins are pretty much hidden from human view. The person who sins knows in his conscience he is sinning but pretends at least for that moment that they are not sinning or are unseen. Some sins are outward but occur when no-one else is around, others occur only in the mind and remain undetected for that reason. All sin, of course, begins there. Left to itself it will erupt like a boil and become visible. A child can be conceived but not born. So many sins die in the womb, as it were. Some deny that a foetus under 14 days is not human but it is. Sins that remain only in the heart are still sins. Sins that I hide, as best I can, from every other person, sins that remain only in my heart, are still sins.

Grace Magazine

The annual Grace Magazine trustees meeting took place in the chapel today. The trust is well aware of the difficulties getting a good Reformed Baptist mag into people's hands these days but rightly has great confidence in the product and it was good to be with people so committed to the doctrines of grace once again. The magazine website is here. Chris Boyes, elder at Bradford on Avon, joined us for tea before heading west. It was good to share fellowship with him.

What's happening

Sunday was a good day. I preached from Mark 9 on cutting off hands and feet in the morning and from Hebrews 12 on the Lord's discipline in the evening. They were both very practical passages - one very challenging and one full of comfort. I think they were appreciated by the two congregations - the morning one around 50, the evening one more like 20. Easier to preach than to live I guess. We had tea together before the evening service and reviewed the year gone by (see previous post).

On Monday it was the meeting of the trustees of Grace Magazine. For various reasons we were rather thin on the ground but it was good to meet and seek to encourage the editor Stan Evers and those who assist him. it is an excellent magazine. I raised the issue of providing an online edition, which would be a great help, I believe. I hope something can be doe about that.

In the evening I was over at Cranford where the support group for the church planting work led by Robin Asgher were meeting. It was a good time. Some real progress is being made but there are still important decisions to be made in the near future.

Michael Praetorius

In the December Grace Magazine I notice that, among other good things, Mike Perrin has an article chiefly on the composer Michael Praetorius (1571-1621). Praetorius is well covered on the net. See here (wikipedia) and here (Cyberhymnal) and here and here, etc. I knew In dulci jubilo, of course and Ein Ros ist Entsprungen but not much more I confess. The above is just an audio track featuring two nice dances from his terpsichore.

Genuine blogging

We like to do various things on this blog but from time to time we actually like to blog (ie provide a web log). I especially like to do that when I've been busy with diverse things. I started writing this last Thursday afternoon in Membury Services on the M4. I was on my way back from my Uncle Frank’s funeral. Frank Hugh Evans was born in 1922, the youngest of 12 boys. A sister eventually followed (we should have kept going!). He grew up on Buck Farm near Risca and at 16 began working at the new colliery in Risca, moving on to other pits before early retirement in 1984. He met my mother’s older sister Joan when he was 21 and she was 14 and working in a café in Newport. They married in 1947 and had two daughters. Lorraine died while under a year and Marion was born in 1950. (Marion is my eldest surviving cousin on my mother’s side, followed by Gill and Alan, my Aunt Bette’s kids, then me, I think). I think Frank and Joan lived with her parents first then on the farm before moving to Cromwell Road, Risca, where we met before the funeral service. Frank smoked and drank beer all his life, took six sugars in his tea but was always very active and I don’t remember him having any fat on him. He was on the committee of the working men’s club – responsible for bingo calling (something he sometimes would do in his sleep we were told) and booking the turns (using the phone of the lady across the road). We travelled over the mountain to Risca. I’d arrived at my sister’s in Cwmbran late the night before after our midweek meeting in Childs Hill. It’s always strange coming back as I see places I don’t often see and forgotten memories return. I haven’t been to Risca in ages. Things flooded back though – the fire station at the back and being there when the alarm went off once; fishing for tadpoles in the canal further up; Uncle Frank giving me a safety helmet that I played with for years, etc. The family have had a long attachment to Moriah Baptist, Risca. Marion married David there in the seventies. Originally a Welsh speaking congregation it began to use English in order to reach more people coming in. The present large well kept chapel was built in 1893. It is a BU church. The present minister, John Hayward, has been there since 1976. He led the service well and in an evangelical way. We sang three verses of Bread of heaven and six of Abide with me. About 50 gathered – friends and family. I enjoyed talking to Frank’s brother-in-law (I think it was), a Pentecostal believer from Cwmcarn. I managed to get lost between the chapel and the crematorium trying to get through Newport (I have no sense of direction) but made my way back to the Top Club in Risca where we had a nice buffet lunch with plenty of black pudding and other delicacies available. It was nice to talk to the family – my dad and sister Gail, of course (I saw my nieces at home briefly before leaving); Joan and my Uncle Raymond (there are two brothers still living but neither copes very well with things); Marion and Gill; second cousins, Tracy, Julia and Joanna, Marion’s daughter. Joanna is married to Cai. They have two boys. Elliot is three and suffers from lissencephaly. He has had a gastrostomy tube fitted. He is a lovely little boy and the family love him. Seeing him when Parliament is about to debate abortion and related issues once again reminded me of the reality of all this.

*

I got back to London around seven. We had our church meeting in the evening, including the annual meeting. That went well. We inch along. For some reason Rhodri and I were in the mood to make a version of the Cat Stevens’ number ‘Father and son’. We’re a weird pair.

We’d had to have the officers meeting on the Tuesday so it was a busy week. I was also at my two meetings for the elderly during Wednesday and at the clubs on Friday night. Tuesday was taken up (before the officers meeting) with a prayer meeting down in Covent Garden, followed by two hospital visits – one to a psychiatric ward (never easy and not something I’ve done in years). Monday we had the annual meeting for the Grace Magazine trustees in the chapel. We keep our heads above water and serve God’s people as best we can. I was glad that Stan Evers was confirmed as permanent editor.

*

With all that whizzing about I felt quite out of it for much of Friday and didn’t get much done – not even this. No surprise! Anyway I felt better come Saturday. Eleri’s sister and family arrived from Bradford-on-Avon late on Friday for a wedding. It was nice to see them again especially little Osian. They brought a DVD that had been taken from a family video from 1993 and 1997. Viewing such material impresses on you how the years are flying by so quickly. Dylan spent most of the day in Brighton with friends. Eleri and Gwion popped up to see the wedding, which was in Finchley. I watched half of the FA Cup and was sad that Cardiff lost. Eleri, Rhodri, Sibyl and Dewi went to a twmpath (barn dance) organised by the school so weren’t in until late. Somewhere along the way I’ve been preparing for the Lord’s Day.

Sunday went well. We welcomed in a new member at communion and had a bumper crowd in the morning incuding three Romanians who turned up from nowhere. I preached from Mark 4 on the mustard seed in the morning and from Luke 1:46, 47 on magnifying the Lord with Mary in the evening.

Archive 8c Princess Diana

Evil and Madness

Then think of the evil and madness surrounding Diana in life and death.

Think of the divorces that marred her life; the adulteries; the way she was photographed and turned into an ‘icon’; the way her presence could totally transform the presentation of issues.

Think of the bizarre circumstances of her death - the jet-set romance that led up to that night, the paparazzi, the excessive speed, the apparently drunken driver, the furore that has followed.

Think of the massive TV and radio coverage - and scarcely a word of biblical truth and sense.

Think of the supposedly Christian funeral that centred on the one created not on the Creator, its high point not a hymn but a secular song from an avowed homosexual, no sermon from God’s Word but a powerful scathing speech that mentioned God but once. Great is Diana taken out of the pagan stadium and into the church itself.

Think of the banishing of the National Lottery from the TV screen, hiding in a corner as it were until the coast was clear!

Think of supermarkets and sportsmen respecting the Princess but not the Prince of Glory.

Think of the madness and evil of a nation spiritually empty with a religious hierarchy so bankrupt as not to have a word of genuine comfort for the spiritually starving.

Meanwhile from ‘above the sun’ it has been made clear: After death, the judgment. Diana, Dodi Al-Fayed and the chauffeur are all either in heaven or hell. We are all headed to one or other too. In the madness and evil of this present time let’s look to the Lord and pray for mercy.

Archive 8b Princess Diana

(Regarding death)

Beauty exempts no-one
Diana was lovely and benefited from the best beauty treatments of the day. But beauty is fleeting. Beautiful or ugly, all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Fine clothes exempt no-one
It is tempting to think a person in fine clothes will never wear a shroud. Sharp dressers or slobs, all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Youth exempts no-one
She was only 36. One can die at any age. Babies die, children, teenagers .... The same destiny overtakes all.


Personality exempts no-one
Diana had personality, charisma. But it could not save her from death. Life and soul of the party or rather lacklustre, we all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Fame exempts no-one
She was the most famous woman in the world. Celebrities and nobodies die. The same destiny overtakes all.

Riches exempt no-one
Wealth could not save her either. Man, despite his riches, does not endure; he is like the beasts that perish. Rich or poor, all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Power exempts no-one
Politicians failed to get land mines on to the political agenda; Diana succeeded. Yet your power cannot deliver from death. The same destiny overtakes all.


Troubles exempt no-one
Her life was certainty not without its troubles. But no matter how many troubles we face we still have to face the last enemy. The same destiny overtakes all.


Overcoming troubles to find happiness exempts no-one
She seems to have overcome many of her troubles. It is easy to get a false sense of security when that happens but only Christ has conquered death. Winners and losers in life, all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Good works exempt no-one
A great deal has been said about Diana’s compassion and concern. There is no denying her good works but they have not preserved her from death. Good works or none, all die. The same destiny overtakes all.


Religion exempts no-one
Sadly, there is no evidence that Diana knew the Lord. One of her last reported brushes with anything remotely spiritual was to consult an astrologer. Was she told what would happen? Even the true religion of faith in Christ leads to the glory of heaven by way of death. Whatever your religion you will die. The same destiny overtakes all.

Archive 8a Princess Diana

This article appeared in Grace Magazine (which I then edited) just over 10 years ago under the heading here. This is the first of three parts.

Madness, evil and death
This is the evil in everything that happens under the sun. The same destiny overtakes all. The hearts of men, moreover, are full of evil and there is madness in their hearts while they live, and afterwards they join the dead. Ecclesiastes 9:3

I was only 4 years old on 22 November 1963, but I remember it. It was the day President Kennedy died in Dallas. I guess my young sons will remember equally well 31 August 1997. It was the day Diana, Princess of Wales, died in Paris. Certainly they will remember 6 September 1997, when we walked the two streets from our door to where thousands had gathered to see the hearse containing Diana’s coffin pass. The outpouring of grief that has followed this tragic death has been unparalleled. Not even the deaths of Eva Peron, Elvis Presley or other so-called ‘icons’ have caused such widespread grief. Even Mother Teresa’s death has not been met with the same world-wide attention.
We were all stunned by the news. Sometimes God shocks us. You do not know what a day may bring forth he says. At the same time no doubt, our hearts went with compassion to the families involved and especially to the young princes, William and Harry.
But such a death also makes us stop and think. We need to consider, when God does such shocking things. Consider what God has done ... When times are bad consider (Ecc 7:13,14). There is no point in seeking to pry into God’s inscrutable providence. We cannot say, for instance, ‘If they bad not divorced, she would not be dead’. There are too many Ifs between the two events. God has not built a law into this present world that evil always leads to pain.

Death
Rather, as with every death, we call to mind God’s sovereignty in life and in death. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away; may the name of the LORD be praised (Job 1:21). Similarly it is a reminder of our own mortality. As the Preacher says All share a common destiny (Ecclesiastes 9:2). Even from the under the sun point of view, without considering the eternal dimension of heaven and hell, it is clear that everyone dies. Nothing can exempt you. The death of the princess brings this home.

Grace Magazine May 07

The current edition of grace Magazine is now out and looks at the biographies of several women (mostly by women writers). How many of the nine women on the cover can you name? There is also an interesting title - Will there be computers in heaven?

I am a trustee of the magazine and will be meeting with the other trustees here in Childs Hill this month. It's a privilege to be involved.