Aber Conference 2023 Wednesday Parry and Ash

Good day yesterday. More from Ian Parry and Christopher Ash. Ian took us to Revelation 5 and spoke about the Glory of the Son and Christopher Ash spoke on Psalm 149. His suggestion that the sword swinging is a metaphor for praise might well be right.

Wednesday morning here.

Wednesday evening here.

Aber Conference 2023 Tuesday Evening Christopher Ash 1

Good stuff tonight from Christopher Ash on Psalm 11. See here for the service.

Aber Conference 2023 Tuesday Morning Ian Parry 1

 

A wonderful sermon this morning from our main speaker, from Ruth on getting the big vision. See here.

Westminster Conference 2023

The brochure for the Westminster Conference in December is now out.

Double Click

Aber Conference 2023 Monday Evening Phil Swann

Phil Swann from Llanelli kicked us off with an encouraging sermon from Jude 26 and 25. You can watch the sermon on the EMW Youtube site. See here

Lord's Day August 13 2023

I was preaching last Lord's Day in Penuel Baptist Chapel, Roch. I have never preached there before but two long serving members have moved to Pembrokeshire and become members there and so I was given the opportunity. The chapel is compact and holds less than 80 I would guess. It was pretty full last Sunday as lots of holidaymakers had come in, in the morning, including a family I know from North Wales, the new minister at West Kilburn and his family, a family from Childs Hill, a couple who know my sister and several others. I preached on three groans from Romans 8 in the morning. The later 4 o'clock service was smaller and more informal with no hymns. I preached on Zechariah 3:2 and then we had a useful discussion. One feature of the day was that on a campsite near the chapel which we passed a car had speeded into a tent the night before and caused injuries, an item covered on natonal news.

Holidays

We are having a nice time in Wales. We travelled up to Aber last Monday and are enjoying staying with family. Good to get some reading done and a bit of research in the National Library. Good to be at the Alfred Place prayer meeting. Last Friday we drove down to Solva to spend time with good friends from Childs Hill who have now retured to Pembrokeshire. They treated us very nicely, including ice creams, etc, etc. I preached in Roch and we then returned to Aber on Sunday night for the conference week. That began this morning with a book launch at AP for Keith Underhill's book.

Traditional Welsh Breakfast

We are away in Wales on holiday. We had a few days in Aberystwyth and then headed down to Solva to stay with good friends, formerly members of the Childs Hill church. We had a brilliant time including a traditional Welsh breakfast in St David's, in The Mill Cafe, paid for by our hosts. You could argue over the ingredients of such a thing but in this part of the world the above seems about right. (We also had toast with ours). The sausage, bacon and egg are obvious ingredients. Then black pudding would get a vote across a wide range of territory (we always had it at home). The really distinctive ones are the cockles and the laverbread in oats. Cockles are small clams found on sandy beaches. The Magna Carta grants every citizen the right to collect up to eight pounds of cockles from the foreshore. Larger quantities will require a picking permit. Laverbread or bara lawr is a fine seaweed. It has nothing to do with bread but is a puree mixed with oats or put on toast. Scrumptious.

Planted by the Providence of God

I have spent the last few days reading Keith Underhill's new autobiography cum handbook for church planting and mission. It is a well produced hardback with large print and sturdy pages. The book is enhamced by many colour photographs, two indices and some maps. Too many typos but there we are. I am familiar with the story to some extent in that when I came to Aberystwyth as a student I attended Keith's sending church. He was just getting started then. In 2011 I travelled to Kenya to speak at a conference (enjoyed seeing my name on page 452!) and so saw the work close up. I also spoke on my return to GBM on Keith's behalf convinced he had been treated harshly by them and others. I know many of the men who have walk on parts in the book.

Keith has divided the book into four phases (preparation up to 1977, church planting 1977-1989, consolidation 1989-2006, church maturing 2006-2015). Interspersed with these chapters are 22 biblical foundations for mission that go from the great commission to the centrality of preaching. As Tom Richwine has written 

This book is a compellingly detailed account of some of God's work in Kenya over the last 40 years skillfully interwoven with biblical principles of missions and church planting. A must read for those considering serving Christ by planting churches in a cross-cultural environment. These pages highlight the challenges, opposition and many rewards of dedicating your life to taking the gospel to a foreign nation.

Some may find the book (at 510 pages) long and no doubt some editing could have been done. As a prolific prayer letter writer Keith is not short of material. The book is well written, however, and the large amount of material serves to leave you with a very full picture of what has been going on down the years. It is stunning to see what God can do with one (in some ways) ordinary man.

Having recently re-read Michael Toogood's much briefer but similarly compelling story of what God can do with one man I am beginning to see that there have been giants among us. If anyone has any influence in these matters I am eager to see something from Brian Ellis and Andrew Swanson soon.

PS On the 14th of August, at 11am, Keith Underhill will be speaking at a special-meeting at Alfred Place in Aberystwyth, to launch his book Planted By The Providence Of God (Broken Wharfe, 2023). All welcome.

David and Susan

I was walking along my street the other day and I saw my neighbours David and Susan. A thousand thoughts can pass through your mind at once and so I thought first of the fact that all three of us are Welsh. David is more of Scot really but I remember he told me he was born in Wales. Susan grew up in the same county as I did. Then all three of us have published books (Susan's on gardening and David's a novel). The thing that was uppermost in my mind, however, was Teddy Bear Comic which I was a reader of back in the day and its strip Nurse Susan and Dr David. Shows my age.

Lord's Day August 6 2023

We began yesterday with communion. We were supposed to welcome in new membrs but they were late so we held it over to the main meeting, which is better in some ways as non-members are much more likely to be present. I preached from Luke 7:7-10 fearing I might have taken too small a section but I made an application using Gavin Ortlund's list of practical helps to humility. Good to have our student and his wife along again. In the evening we weren't a very small number. I preahed a text - Romans 15:13.

Midweek Meeting August 2 2023

On Wednesday night we met on zoom once again. Numbers were down as one mght expect at this time of the year but lots prayed once we got going. We looked at Psalm 11, whuch I caan't say I have ever really noticed before.

Day Off Week 30 2023

The main thing on my day off this week was going down to the aquarium in central London, Sea Life. We went by tube, getting off at Waterloo. It's a while since I've been to the aquarium and there were new things to see. It's expensive but Tesco vouchers help. We went with my third son and his family. Their youngest is too young to enjoy it properly but their two year old thought it was great, as did the rest of us. We briefly met a boy working there from Carmarthen, a Welsh speaker. We wandered north then to Leiceser Square. I came home for the dog. The rest of the day was spent mostly reading. I've been catching up on my Banner mags. The penguins are Gentoos.

Carey Conference 2024

 

Brochures for the Carey Conference next January are out. Speakers - David Campbell, Paul Mallard, Conrad Pomeroy, Paul Brunning, Gail Currie.

Westminster Conference Papers 2022 Print Version Out

The printed version of the six papers given last September on Oxford Street are now available in print form. The death of Michael Toogood earlier this year means that for the first time in along time we did not have his help o this volume.