EFAC Australia
A cultural change to evangelism: the election of Ric Thorpe as Archbishop of Melbourne
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- Written by: Peter Adam
I read in a book on management that minor technical changes are easy to achieve, but cultural changes are hard to achieve! And if cultural changes take a long time to achieve in a church, they take much longer to achieve in a larger and looser structure such as a diocese. But cultural changes in a diocese have a great impact on local churches.
WHAT HAPPENED?
In this election, we saw a massive cultural change to focus on evangelism!
Who did we elect? 70% of the Melbourne Anglicans who were members of Synod voted for Ric Thorpe, an effective personal evangelist, experienced in planting churches with the gospel, and reinvigorating churches with the gospel, the gospel of God’s free gift of grace and love in the Lord Jesus Christ. We voted for an Archbishop to transform the culture of the diocese and our churches from maintenance to mission, and a cultural change to prioritise evangelism!
Read more: A cultural change to evangelism: the election of Ric Thorpe as Archbishop of Melbourne
Partnering Together to Reach a City: The Trinity Network Story
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- Written by: Paul Harrington
ADELAIDE IS A GREAT PLACE TO LIVE
When you think about Adelaide, what comes to mind? The City of Churches? The AFL Gather Round? Wineries? Pie floaters (an Adelaide cuisine involving a meat pie floating in pea soup and smothered in tomato sauce)? When I ask some of my friends this question, they say, ‘Not much!’. I’ve lived in Adelaide most of my life and love it.
But here is the thing you really need to know about Adelaide and South Australia – we are gospel poor. A tiny percentage of the population attends church regularly, and few of these are in evangelical churches. Like every other state in Australia over the last 60 years, mainline churches have experienced a huge drop in attendance and membership. Our city and state are full of people who are spiritually lost and in desperate need of the gospel.
Read more: Partnering Together to Reach a City: The Trinity Network Story
City-to-City
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- Written by: Andrew Katay
ANDREW KATAY INTERVIEWED BY STEPHEN HALE
Stephen Hale: City to City commenced in Australia around 2010; and you became the CEO around 2014, is that right?
Andrew Katay: Yes. City to City had made a connection here at the end of 2010, with the first event in 2011. Tim Keller was not inclined to lead a conference here in Australia unless it would lead to some tangible movement in the church, but by 2014 there was this nascent city expression that had already begun to emerge in the couple of years prior.
Stephen Hale: There was the Trinity Network in Adelaide, and City on a Hill had started in 2007.
Andrew Katay: Yes, so Tim had a level of confidence that if he did come out, it could achieve what he hoped: a movement. And that’s when City to City really became a public thing. We realised that with the conference, we needed proper governance, so we created a company limited by guarantee with a proper board and so on. That enabled us to employ some staff and function as a proper organisation from the end of 2013. The “Pastors and Planters” conference, which many remember, happened in 2014, with 800 or so people packed into the Wesley Theatre.
Church Planting Story
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- Written by: Leili Shirmast
I never imagined I would one day plant a new ministry in one of the most iconic places in Melbourne. But one afternoon, as my husband Pedram and I stood in St Paul’s Cathedral, we watched people stream in—tourists, students, and families, wandering the building, taking photos, admiring its beauty. Then we heard it: Farsi, Turkish, Arabic. Familiar languages that stirred something deep in us. When we later learned that over 1,500 people visit the Cathedral every day, it sparked something in our hearts. How, we wondered, could we share the Gospel with even a few of them?
We began praying, listening, and discerning with others. Some people encouraged us to start a new outreach. After seeking the Spirit’s guidance and receiving confirmation, we knew God was opening a door. That vision became reality on 16 March 2024, when we launched a new multicultural midday service at the Cathedral, beginning with a celebration of Nowruz (Persian New Year). I never expected to start this new ministry. But when I thought about the deep spiritual hunger among those who speak my own language, I realised God had been preparing me all along.
Book Review: Modern Genre Theory
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- Written by: David Mitchell
Modern Genre Theory: An Introduction for Biblical Studies
Andrew Judd
Zondervan Academic 2024
Reviewed By David Mitchell
Judges 19 is one of the most confronting stories in the Old Testament. How are we supposed to read it? Is it something of a cautionary tale about the likely outcome for those who commit adultery? Perhaps, like a modern horror film, its designed specifically to make us squirm and shrink away from it. Or, perhaps, it’s better understood as being a piece of wisdom literature with complex truths about life under the sun being conveyed through the narrative. Or, would we be better understanding it as simply another dot point in the decline of the Jewish nation during the period of the judges as they await a king? Or is it some mix of all of things?
How we read a given passage of scripture depends significantly on what genre we assign it. Hence the battle, say, between the literal six-day creationist and the theistic evolutionist, or between the reader who takes Jesus’ parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19–31) as speaking about the actual intermediate state and the person who thinks it does not. On all sides of such debates, people can agree on the authority of the Scriptures and yet be at odds as to what the scripture in question is authoritatively teaching.
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