calvins-urbanreform

When I recently heard, through Matthias Media, of a conference soon to take place with Mark Dever, Philip Jensen and Tony Payne my ears pricked up. I was soon disappointed to hear that it was only in America and would not be in Australia anytime soon. The conference is called 'Gospel Growth vs Church Growth'. With the 'conversations' (emerging lingo) of church health, growth, leadership, and structure going on in my neck of the woods I was beginning to get fustrated. Much of the conferences/discussions centered on human vision and techniques to grow your church or converse with post-moderns. After hearing about the conference and seeing the 9marks website I decided to pick up 9 Marks of a Healthy Church by Mark Dever. It is refreshing to read a book that clearly believes church health must be informed by the whole Bible. Yet Dever's book "is not a complete ecclesiology," he writes, "It is merely trying to focus on certain crucial aspects of healthy church life that have grown rare among churches today" (2004:338-9). So what are the 9 Marks? I shall list one for now.

Mark #1: Expository Preaching "...This will help you understand what pastors are to give themselves to, and what congregations are to demand of them. My main role, and the main role of any pastor, is expositional preaching. ...if you get priority of the Word established, then you have in place the single most important aspect of the church's life, and growing health is virtually assured, because God has decided to act by His Spirit through His Word" (2004:39).

"A healthy church is a church that hears the Word of God and continues to hear the Word of God. And such a church is composed of individual Christians who hear the Word of God and continue to hear the Word of God, always being refashioned and reshaped by it, constantly being washed in the Word and sanctified by God's truth" (2004:51).

"So long as we do not look beyond the earth, we are quite pleased with our own righteousness, wisdom, and virtue; we address ourselves in the most flattering terms, and seem only less than demigods. But should we once begin to raise our thoughts to God, and reflect what kind of Being he is, and how absolute the perfection of the righteousness, and wisdom, and virtue, to which, as a standard, we are bound to be conformed, what formerly delighted us by its false show of righteousness, will become polluted with the greatest iniquity; what strangely imposed upon us under the name of wisdom, will disgust by its extreme folly; and what presented the appearance of virtuous energy, will be condemned as the most miserble impotence. So far are those qualities in us, which seem most perfect, from corresponding to the divine purity" (Calvin's Institutes, 1.2).

It may seem an odd inclusion in a blog, but I figured I'd give it a go. I have a Vmoto Milan JX50 scooter for sale. It is a late 2005 model, as new condition, with 2000kms on the clock. It is registered till June and comes with a cool helmet. I am asking $1600 but all reasonable offers will be considered. If you are interested or know of someone that would like a scooter, simply reply in the comments section. It is a great scooter and has served me well!