Funeral for Gary Benfold

I made my way down to Bournemouth yesterday for the funeral of Gary Benfold. The actual burial was a family affair beforehand but a large number gathered in Lansdowne Evangelical Church for the memorial service. Refreshments were served afterwards. Gary's good friend Chris Kelly led the service and did so very well. Gary had planned most of the service - the hymns (mostly traditional) and the text Chris was to preach on (Job 19:25). Tributes were given (and done very well) by his two children. I did not know most of the people there but it was good to chat with my old friends from London Seminary days Bernard and Linda Lewis and Chris and Serena Durrant. Chris is a pastor in Bournemouth and was contemporary with my oldest son at the seminary. Also Peter Baker, pastor at Lansdowne, Chris and Jim Sayers who first knew Gary when both were in Aylesbury. I also spoke to Gary's son-in-law. Others I would like to have spoken to but did not get to do so.

I first met Gary when he was beginning his second year in London Seminary and I my first. He had already taken up the pastorate and had a young family. Much of the time he spent in Aylesbury but sometimes he was back to the single life in seminary and one fond memory is being driven in his car with others to MacDonalds in Golders Green (no longer there). That was my first experience of such delights. Although I did not keep up a proper friendsip with Gary (he was always ahead of me in everything at first - marriage, driving, pastorate, theological thinking, etc) I always appreciated speaking with him in person or by other means and admired his solidity, down to earth approach and friendliness. People would sometimes confuse us I understand merely because we're both Gary B.

Gary was not 70 and it is amazing to think that he has been taken from us so soon. Great for him but hard for Elaine and the family.

His son shared with us that the last sermon that he heard on the Sunday before he went to hospital the last time was Geoff Thomas on YouTube asking "Are you satisfied with what Jesus has done for you?" Apparently every time my father-in-law asked the question, Gary was enthusiastically saying 'Yes!'. It was apparently powerful stuff and it deeply moved Gary. Andy said "On that morning, let me tell you, dad was satisfied with what Jesus had done for him."

(There seem to be two versions of that sermon on YouTube. Not sure which one Gary heard but this is one of them.)

EMA 2021 Day 1 and 2

Stephen Boon

So I have been enjoying the online EMA Conference. Yesterday began with an excellent exposition of Luke 19:1-10 from Rico Tice. Phil Allcock, on Luke 19:11-27 was perhaps not so impressive but it is  a harder passage to work with. The exegesis and exposition sessions with Andrew Sach on Ezekiel and Stephen Boon on Ephesians were okay but a little laboured but useful on the whole. The conference persists in using its least able participants to read Scripture, which seems to me a mistake. I'm not sure that autocue helps either. I enjoyed seeing the cherry red Gretsch Catalina drumkit that the band use. Various other bits come in between sessions. Interesting to know what is going on. Proclamation Trust are to be thanked for putting this on despite the drawbacks.

Lord's Day July 5 2020

I had hoped we might be back in the chapel last Sunday but we were not and so it was the same routine as in past weeks  10 am Zoom singing, then a recorded service (see our website for a link to YouTube) at the optimal time of 11 am. I preached on 2 Corinthians 5:11-13 on preaching. On Sunday evening we zoomed and I preached on Joshua 6. We also had opportunity to hear from our friends in the South of France and about the work there. We have had two newcomers joining us quite regularly in recent weeks. They were there again. One of them has a similar background to our visiting speaker and it was good to hear them chat. (Sorry this is late).

Lord's Day June 28 2020

It was a good day last Sunday. Different yet again in some ways. We began again with the singing time but our pianists were unable to be at their piano and so we made use of the excellent collection provided by the EMW. My son Gwïon kindly organised that for us. It's been good having him mostly with us over the summer (he has now headed back to Aber where he will work in the newly reopened bookshop over the summer). I recorded a service for YouTube last Friday on 2 Corinthians 5:1-10. (I had the camera a little low. I notice it officially has no views but I'm pretty sure that is wrong). In the evening it was Zoom time once again and I preached on the final three verses of Joshua 5. We also had Jonathan Parkinson with us from Caring for Life. We started supporting them years ago but have not been very good at keeping up so it was good to hear some news.

Banner Lite 2020

As the usual Banner Conference was not possible this year, Banner very kindly sent us all a box of books and organised a series of messages on All Things for Good. Ian Hamilton, a very familiar face, kicked us off in an obvious place, Romans 8:28. He was followed by someone unfamiliar to me, Hensworth Jonas, a Baptist in Antigua and Barbuda. he took us to Psalm 27:14 in a fresh Al Martin style that was helpful. We then had a book review of Thomas Watson's book on the conference subject. Ian was backed by a word map and I guess Hensworth was in his church - a slick production with camera angle changes and words appearing appropriately. Jeremy did the no, no, and had his library behind him. Not a problem for Banner types I guess but some may have been tempted to try and assess what he has (everything) and does not have.(nothing). The final session was good old Alistair Begg on lessons from the life of Joseph and Genesis 50:20, the Old Testament Romans 8:28. It was a relief to have a little bit of humour at certain points. The messages are all on the Banner site at YouTube. I enjoyed the music between sessions too, courtesy of YouTube I guess.

Lord's Day June 21 2020

We had a very good day last Sunday. We met to sing first (accordion accompaniment so it had a Beach Missions feel) and then listened to the recorded service on 2 Corinthians 4:13-18. We seem to have something different each week. This week I reintroduced consecutive readings (Jonah 1) and we used Abe Conference hymn recordings available from EMW. This took the pressure off our pianists, helped me to edit earlier and was probably nicer to sing with.  In the evening we zoomed, I preached on Joshua 5:1-12 and Andrew Murray, pastor of Hope West End reported. This is a project we have long supported so it was good to catch up. Also had that meeting something happened that we have longed for - we had a visitor. Someone local had tracked us down, emailed us and then joined us for the service. It's quite a little story how they became a ware of us but that will keep. So encouraged.

Lord's Day June 14 2020

Yesterday was different in that I "preached in two churches". That is to say, I prepared a recorded service last Friday, as usual, for the morning service here in Childs Hill (which I did get to see eventually). This was on 2 Corinthians 4:1-12, the next in the series. At 10 am I joined the singers (alright sinners who sing). The at 11 I preached on zoom to Gordon Road Evangelical Church, Hailsham. I only know one person in that congregation so it was a little strange, especially as I was still in my bedroom. Anyway it was okay. I spoke on James 1:4-6. We had four hymns (YouTube recordings of different congregations).

In the evening we had Reuben Saywell preach here on zoom, while I was upstairs preaching again to the Hailsham folk by zoom, this time on Acts 11:24 (Barnabas). We went into breakout rooms after so I at least got to chat with a few of the folk. It is mostly a more elderly congregation, not as diverse as in Childs Hill I guess. They don't have a pastor at present. (Hailsham is well off for Reformed ministry as there is also the Baptist Church and the Free church, if I have that right). When I came down, some of the Childs Hill folk were still chatting with Reuben so it was nice to catch up there.

So a lovely Lord's Day, despite the Lockdown.

Lord's Day June 7 2020

We began again with a singing (not sinning as I originally wrote!) session and then watched the recording I had made on Friday. I decided to preach from 1 Peter 1:18, 19 as it would have been a communion Sunday. (See here). This was the first time I had preached from home and I found it a little unsatisfactory and will probably return to the chapel next time. In the evening it was zoom again, this time from Joshua 4. We also had Robin Asgher and his family present and it was good to be reminded of the work in West London. Some people I know had trouble getting online and we are all pretty fed up with this while being thankful we can at least do something. Hopefully it will not be too long now before we can meet again in the old way.

Lord's Day May 24 2020

This week was slightly different in that I didn't preach in the morning. A student with us, Benjamin Saunders, preached on Psalm 45 in the morning. He preached well. I did the rest if the service apart from  the reading and sermon. So I still had to out in a few hours putting the thing together. In the evening it was zoom again and Joshua 2. It was nice to have a visiting friend. We began in the morning with singing. It's all on our website.

Lord's Day May 17 2020

Technology caught up with us a little but yesterday. We successfully zoomed for a quiz on Friday night and a Junior Church Saturday morning but like others, come Sunday morning there were major problems. Thankfully what we have at 10 am on Sundays is a hymn singing session so we didn't lose out as much as we might but it was very frustrating especially as we could see people but not here. We tried several machines and techniques. In the end I uninstalled and reinstalled the Zoom app on my laptop and that got us through but it was all over more or less by then. The recorded service from YouTube was okay except that for some reason one verse was missing from one of the hymns and all my sermon heads were out of sync. I've corrected it now so check that out if you wish. It was on 2 Corinthians 3. In the evening things were fine zooming on Joshua 2:10-18. We had a good chinwag after too.

Lord's Day May 10 2020

Yesterday followed a similar pattern to recent weeks. We gathered to sing hymns at 10 am and that was a good time. After that we listened to the recording I had made last Friday on 2 Corinthians 2. It's still difficult but we're getting a better idea. In the evening we zoomed again. Rather than chit chat at the beginning we decided that our host would moot us at first and then I would begin. I had the wrong setting so I made people wait a bit longer than I intended but we were fine once we got on with it. I started a new series on Joshua. The first sermon in a series is usually quite long as was this one, looking just at the opening nine verses. People seem to be bearing up generally.

Lord's Day May 3 2020

Bit behind with this. As we were missing another communion I thought it was good to get back directly to the cross, so we looked at Isaiah 53:5, 6 The suffering Saviour and the lost sheep. I should have made sure there was more juice in my camera. I made it but with very little to spare. There appears to have been a low uptake for the video here. In the evening we went to another psalm, Psalm 90. It is wonderful psalm.

Lord's Day April 26 2020

We began with some hymn singing via zoom as is our pattern these days. We then listened to what I prepared on the previous Friday carrying on with 2 Corinthians. I decided to put headings up for the sermon's various points but didn't put the reading on the screen apart from the reference. The Youtube recording is about an hour and can be accessed here. An audio version is available here. In the evening it was again live on zoom and we looked at another psalm, Psalm 103. Again just a  prayer a reading and the sermon, followed by a little chat. We seemed to be down in number. I'm losing track but I think this must be the sixth Sunday of doing this so it's a habit now. Who knows when it will be over.

Lord's Day April 19 2020

Preparations were a minor nightmare but the recorded service that went out for Sunday morning seems to have gone okay and can be accessed on Youtube via our website. I preached on 2 Corinthians 1:1-11 which may be the start of a series. A bit longer than of late (36 mins). I was a little too close to the camera at times. There seem to have been a good number of hearers. Before that we got together to sing. In the evening we zoomed and I tackled Psalm 4. I also listened to the recorded service from Aberystwyth at 5 pm.

Lord's Day April 12 2020

Thankfully I'm not a great one for the church calendar as on Good Friday I was busy preparing and preaching my Easter Sunday sermon on Luke 24:45-47 and the resurrection. For the first time I did it with a visual as well as audio. See here for link. I didn't feel it had gone too well but when I listened on the Lord's Day it wasn't so bad. So it was the usual pattern 10 am singing some resurrection hymns then from 11 listening to a recorded morning service with an evening zoom at 6.30 pm when about 20 of us tuned in for our evening meeting when I prayed and read and preached Psalm 121. We also had a Junior Church on Saturday morning. Still wondering who I'm missing.

Well done Gwïon

This is the submission that has won my fourth son an all expenses paid trip to the Tribeca film festival in New York. The great thing about this short film I find is thta you can watch it over and over and still not quite capture it. By the way the face you see above is my fifth son's.

A Phenomenon

For some reason one of the videos on my Youtube channel has just reached the million views mark.

Tasteless?

I'm not sure how these malgorithms work but if you know anything of the story of Marc Bolan (he died in a car crash) then you will recognise how tasteless this ad on Youtube is.

EMW Aberystwyth Conference 2014

The messages at Aber this year are not only being streamed but (the evening ones at least) can be accessed on youtube (eg here)

Lord's Days April 13 and 20 2014

I actually preached on the Sunday morning of the 13th. I got out of hospital on the 9th and then learned that I needed to report to the Heart Hospital on the afternoon of the 13th. We had booked a family holiday in Hampshire for the 12-19 with our boys and others. So I had a nice afternoon and evening down in Hampshire on the Saturday and then for various reasons we had our own service in the cottage (Eleri, me, the five boys, Sibyl (plus junior in utero), Eleri's sister, husband and son). At the last minute I thought of hymns and realised that we had enough devices between us to email or Facebook three hymns out for acapella use in the service. I preached on 1 Kings 3:1-15. After a quick lunch Eleri drove me back to London and to the hospital. No evening service for ne then (I think they  used stuff from Youtube to keep them in tune and listened to Mark Raines on Sermonaudio).

I believe my elder Robert Strivens and fellow minister Andrew Hill preached at Childs Hill. I am very grateful to them.

I had the operation on Monday 14, of which I remember very little thankfully and came home on Saturday 19. Both morning and evening I went to the Met Tab - virtually not literally, of course. Dr Masters has been unwell and so his assistant Ibrahim Ag Mohammed preached. He spoke on Matthew 28:6 in the morning on the resurrection and from Mark 5 and the raising of Jairus's daughter in the evening. The two services were identical in format, the evening on being evangelistic and shorter. Both services are solid, straightforward, heart warming and carefully though out. It was a joy to be "there".

I probably haven't looked properly but I could not see anyone else in the UK offering the same public facility - not even only in audio. There must be others I'm sure.

Robert preached again in Childs hill with Halbo Chou, assistant at Kensit Evangelical, preaching in the evening. Again I am very thankful to them and to those who have arranged this.