phillipjensen.com

Video | Evangelical Worship

2012-01-30T07:15:12+00:00

The Chat Room | 30th January 2012

Watch video

Video | Church Discipline And Pastoral Care

2012-01-25T01:32:29+00:00

The Chat Room | 25th January 2012

Watch video

Video | Aren’t All Good People Christians?

2012-01-18T01:04:53+00:00

The Chat Room | 18th January 2012

Watch video

Audio | Two Christmas Puzzles and One Christmas Answer

2011-12-24T12:42:19+00:00

St. Andrew’s Cathedral | 24th December 2011

Series: Christmas (00)

Download mp3

Articles | Britain is changing. Will Australia?

2011-12-24T12:29:50+00:00

Britain is changing. Will Australia?

From the Dean | 24th December 2011

In 2003 the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair’s atheist press secretary famously said “We don’t do God”, even though Mr Blair was known as a believer. Apparently, in 2011 the current Prime Minister, David Cameron, is not under the same media constraint. For celebrating the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible, Mr Cameron has spoken quite openly about religion in Britain. And he has gone on the attack on behalf of the Bible and Christian Britain. (http://www.number10.gov.uk/news/king-james-bible/)

He argues that tolerance is not to be confused with secularism and that genuine liberalism has more values than individual liberty. “Moral neutralityor passive tolerance just isn’t going to cut it anymore.” “Put simply, for too long we have been unwilling to distinguish right from wrong. ‘Live and let live’ has too often become ‘do what you please’. Bad choices have too often been defended as just different lifestyles.”

These social comments flow from his address commending the Bible because as he says: “The Bible is a book that has not just shaped our country, but shaped the world. And with three Bibles sold or given away every second… a book that is not just important in understanding our past, but which will continue to have a profound impact in shaping our collective future.” Pointing to the way the Bible permeates “every aspect” British culture, language, literature, music, art, politics, rights, constitutional monarchy, parliamentary democracy and welfare provisions, he states quite boldly “we are a Christian country. And we should not be afraid to say so.”

But what of Australia? Are we a Christian country? Do we want to be? If not – then what kind of nation are we and what do we want to be? We do not have a state Church like Britain. But just like Britain, so much of our culture is inherited from the Bible. As Mr Cameron rightly observed: “The values we treasure… are Christian values. And we should not be afraid to acknowledge that.”

While Britain is formally Christian, its pursuit of “moral neutrality and passive tolerance” has been every bit as strong as Australia. It is the only nation where I have been reported to the police and chased by journalists for reading the Bible at a public meeting! Mr Cameron is quite clear that the move to make Britain a ‘value free’, liberal, secularist, multi-cultural state just hasn’t worked. As he says “Those who say being a Christian country is doing down other faiths…simply don’t understand that it is easier for people to believe and practise other faiths when Britain has confidence in its Christian identity.”

But we in Australia still labour under the intellectual bullies and secularists who deny our Christian heritage, imposing strict disapproval on anybody who wants to stand for morality and censorship on those who wish to speak for Christianity. Our media and leaders still ‘do not do God.’

Nobody can speak on a moral issue without commencing “I’m no prude, but…” or “I like a little flutter myself, but…” or “everybody overindulges in alcohol at some time, but…” as if being immoral is the necessary precondition for the right to express a moral view.

And ironically it is especially at Christmas that Christianity is being censored.

In this week’s opinion pages an associate-professor, spelt out his scrooge like disdain for Christmas: “There is plenty to loathe about Christmas; from the tedious rounds of workplace parties, to the obscene garbage we buy as gifts, to the cynical attempts by Christians to hijack the whole fiesta for their own religious ends.” It is reminiscent of the Canberra shopping centre manager objecting to a pastor’s request for his church to sing some carols because “[expletive] Christians want to take over Christmas”. The pastor said, “I’d always assumed that the ‘Christ’ bit in both words might serve as a clue”.

Even my favourite Herald journalist, Ross Gittins, wrote this week: “One (principle) that's particularly apposite at this time when we celebrate the birth of Santa is: help others instead of yourself. Somebody who had nothing to do with Santa once said it was more blessed to give than to receive. Turns out he was right.” Why not mention Jesus by name and source the quote (Acts 20:35)? And if Jesus’ teaching turns out to be right, isn’t it worth exploring more rather than dismissing him with a joke?

Why is our society so embarrassed about the Christian foundations of our culture? From the inanity of “Seasons Greetings” and “Santafest” to the stupidities of academics insisting on the nonsense called BCE (Before Common Era) instead of BC (Before Christ) – we are disowning, discrediting, and denying our culture. And how can a prodigal society regain the social capital of an inheritance they have wasted?

Mr. Cameron’s speech made clear this is not a matter of party politics but of the truth of who we are and of what we need to do. For as he says “the Bible has helped to give Britain a set of values and morals which make Britain what it is today. Values and morals we should actively stand up and defend. The alternative of moral neutrality should not be an option. You can’t fight something with nothing. Because if we don’t stand for something, we can’t stand against anything.”

So I hope you will join with us not only in celebrating our Lord Jesus Christ’s birth this Christmas but also in proclaiming Him to our nation in the coming year – the year of our Lord 2012.

Audio | The Word Became Flesh Christmas 2011

2011-12-24T00:15:37+00:00

St. Andrew’s Cathedral | 24th December 2011

Passage: John 1
Series: Christmas (00)

Download mp3

Audio | Spoken By His Son Christmas 2011

2011-12-24T00:09:35+00:00

St. Andrew’s Cathedral | 24th December 2011

Passage: Hebrews 1
Series: Christmas (00)

Download mp3

Articles | Wasting Good Intentions

2011-12-19T21:57:51+00:00

Wasting Good Intentions

From the Dean | 19th December 2011

Christmas and New Year resolutions have a great problem in Australia – summer holidays.

Each year we hear again the great news of Jesus’ birth for our salvation and enjoy singing his praise, being with his people, hearing his message and laying our burdens before him in prayer – and then the summer holidays hit. And with the summer holidays comes a disturbance in routine and a forgetfulness of all our resolutions.

It is the same with New Year resolutions – they are not made in the regular routine of life but in the height of holiday festivities. It is the time of year when we travel and catch up with family and friends. The office runs on a skeleton staff and the children are being entertained at home.

In one sense this is the best time to make life-changing decisions. For we are free from the normal busyness to think out again ‘where are we going?’ and ‘why are we doing what we do?’ In another sense this is the worst time to effect change because our holidays have already changed everything and we are so removed from what we will need to change in the regular routine of life. By the time we return to work we have usually lost the resolve to bring about change and so our old habits kick in and we return to our old trusted mould of getting things done.

The festivities of the end of the year and the holidays that follow are a wonderful release from the drudgery of life. They relax and re-energise us for the coming year. Even the frantic busyness of getting everything done for Christmas and organising the New Year’s Eve party focuses our attention creatively away from the usual and mundane. But it is the resolutions to change that suffer at this time.

Yet it is at Christmas and New Year that we make resolutions. It is more than deciding to diet whilst in the midst of over-eating. The season forces us to stop and think about the year past, catch up with the extended family and old friends, and give more time to the children as they finish one stage of their education and look forward to the next.

Christmas is more than the bonhomie of wishing everybody happiness. It confronts us once more with the place of God in our life and plans and, our place in God’s life and plan. So many of us return to remember he who gave his life for us. And in the memory decide we really should do this more often. We really should find out more about the Bible. We really should get the kids to church and Sunday school. But then summer holidays, then preparation for ‘back to school’ and the routine of busyness takes over again.

It is somewhat akin to the lepers that Jesus healed (Luke 17:11f). There were ten of them, isolated from the rest of the community by their dreadful affliction. Each one required to call out that they were “unclean” before they came into contact with other people. Lost to their family and friends and facing a fearful future. They seemed to be under the judgement of God. They begged for mercy from Jesus and were told to show themselves to the priest; the regulatory requirement for being declared cured and accepted back into society. In obedience to his word, they headed off and as they went they were healed. But only one of them returned to say thank you. Only one of them remembered the man who had mercy upon them. Only one of them turned to praise God. And he was an outsider to Israel for he was a Samaritan; the enemy of the Jews.

As the carol says

“We hear the Christmas angels

the great glad tidings tell -”

And we pray

“O come to us, abide with us,

our Lord Emmanuel”

But then we forget. We do not mean to forget. It is not our intention to forget. It is just that life gets busy and we are overwhelmed with the things we have to do, and then there is January and the summer holiday season. And life’s demands squeeze out our good intentions.

It is not hard to imagine the joy and excited busyness of the nine lepers. They had to get to the temple. It was some distance away. And then there were the family members to tell and rejoin, and the business or farm to contact to get back their job. It wasn’t necessarily that they were ungrateful but most likely too busy to express their gratitude or to praise God. Too busy to find out who this man was who could cleanse leprosy with a simple command. Too busy to meet the man who was God. Too busy to hear of even greater news that Jesus gave to the Samaritan “Your faith has saved you”.

How typical it is of us at summer time. We think for a moment of the God who made us and came to earth to save us. We ponder again our life in the light of his mercy as we sing the wonderful words of the carols. We decide that this year we are going to do something about him. And then the reality of summer holidays takes over – and as Jesus says in his parable of the sower: “And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them” (Mark 4:15).

Better to be an outsider who turns back to praise God than one of his people who goes on ignoring or forgetting him.

(You may wish to reproduce this piece in your church bulletin or use as a handout this Christmas. Please simply acknowledge the source as phillipjensen.com)

2011-11-02T04:21:15+00:00

St. Andrew’s Cathedral | 2nd November 2011

Passage: 3 John
Series: 3 John: Loving Confidently In A Dangerous World (01 of 1)

Download mp3

Audio | The Great Evangelist

2011-11-02T03:55:22+00:00

City Night Church | 30th October 2011

Passage: 1 Peter 1:1--12
Series: The Mission (03 of 3)

Download mp3