Category: Archive

Let your light shine

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith

“You are the light of the world. A town built on a hill cannot be hidden. In the same way, let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven.”

Matthew 5:14,16
This passage from the Sermon on the mount is rather famous. It is part of a number of instructions to how his disciples should behave. Here, he is calling his disciples to be examples to the rest of the world, that their good deeds may encourage others to glorify God. In the Tyndale commentary, he writes,

But the disciples of Christ must not, through fear of being an unworthy influence, remain silent about their religion. They can, and they must, bear witness to the faith that is in them through personal example. This is the truth underlying the metaphor used by Jesus when He tells them they are the light of the world.

…

So the disciples must not hide themselves, but live and work in places where their influence may be felt, and the light that is in them be most fully manifested to others – not for their own glorification, but that others may see that the light of real Christian goodness, finding expression in practical acts of loving-kindness and service, is a light not of this world but coming from God, and may in consequence be led to give honour and praise to its Giver

The Gospel According to St Matthew, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (General Editor Prof. R.V.G. Tasker), 1979 printing page 64.

I’ve heard this manifested in many different ways. People, like Major Brendan Nottle who runs the Melbourne 614 corps, working with the homeless, the poor and needy. I’ve heard it in suggestions to Christians that they should start each day with a bible in one hand and a newspaper in the other, meaning that they need to not only be in touch with God, but also in touch with the world. I’ve heard of it being manifested in people who are known as “the Christian” at work, who anyone can turn to when they’re going through a rough time.

What sort of things do you do to let your light shine?

Website Review: St George’s Cathedral

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

One of the best way to find ways to improve your own website is to look at the competition to see what they do, and what you can learn from them. Today, I’m looking at the website for St George’s Cathedral, Perth.

Home Page

The home page has a rotating flash banner with well-chosen images, with a message over the top of each image. Below that is a three column layout where there is an image based navigation on the left, a short welcome note, including a link to sign up for the e-mail newsletter, and Latest news in the centre column, then a virtual tour and upcoming events in the right column. Continue reading “Website Review: St George’s Cathedral” →

The right to become children of God

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith
Incipit Page of the Gospel of John.
The incipit page from the Gospel of John (Image by peterjr1961 via Flickr)

“Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.”

John 1:12-13
This is a beautiful passage from the beginning of John’s gospel, that says that all who believe in Jesus, all who accept him and trust in him, have the right to become a child of God, and accept all the inheritance that comes with that, to receive God’s care and protection.

This NIV translation has some interesting changes in verse 13. The NRSV translation of verse 13 reads “who were born, not of blood, or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.” They both use the plural, “who were” or “children” as opposed to the singular “who was” which some old translations have. The singular implies that it is only Jesus that this passage is talking about, where as the plural implies that it is talking about everyone that accepts and believes in Jesus. But the next part, skipping the “not of blood” with the NIV translating that as being “not of natural descent” is a nicer translation, if not entirely correct, but it does reduce the chance of confusion. E.C. Hoskyns in his book The Fourth Gospel writes “The Evangelist cannot write that the Christians were not born of blood (singular), because their birth does in fact depend upon a death which later he describes as involving the outpouring of blood.” This depends on whether you believe that salvation comes through the death of Christ, or as this verse seems to imply only through belief in his name. Note that one does not discredit the other, it is all in which way your beliefs take you.

There are many who would say that belief that doesn’t include salvation through the cross makes you not a “real” Christian. To them, I would give this verse, “to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.” Personally, I believe that Christ died to forgive our sins as an amazing act of grace. He did this for all the children of God, all those who believe in his name.

Disciples of the Cross

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life
Official crest of The Salvation Army.
Image via Wikipedia

It is with great pleasure that I can announce the Liesl and I have been accepted for training at the Salvation Army Training College as part of the Disciples of the Cross session.

For those outside of the Salvation Army, this means that Liesl and I have been accepted for training to become Salvation Army Officers (Ministers), and will see us move to Melbourne at the start of next year for two years of study at the Salvation Army Training College.

My journey starts a few years ago. When I was in year 11, I went on a “Priesthood Vocation Camp” that was being run by the Anglican Church in Perth. The Anglican Church identified a few young people who might be interested in ministry, and give them a weekend to explore the ministry. It didn’t really work out well for the Anglican Church. Of the five participants on the weekend, one is now in the Church of Christ, one’s moved to the Baptist church, one doesn’t really have a church, one floats between Baptist, Anglican and Salvos, and the one person who is entering the ministry is entering for the Salvos.

However, at the time, I wasn’t really interested in the priesthood, I wasn’t interested in Ministry. My Dad had been a priest (Both Church of Christ minister and currently an Anglican Priest), his dad had been a minister (Church of Christ), and my mum is an Anglican Deacon (having previously been a Church of Christ minister). I felt that God had our family, and didn’t need me. Well, he had other ideas.

When I started dating Liesl, I decided to check out the Salvos, because I had never really known what their service was like. Then one evening service, while I can’t really remember the message, I clearly remember my call. God said to me, “You’re going to college, and you’re going with her (Liesl)” and that was it. I talked to the officer that night, and started the journey to becoming a soldier, and eventually becoming accepted for college.

The application process for college is quite in-depth. It starts off with an A1 form, which is a general overview of you and your calling. Then if that gets accepted, then you get your pre-college assignments, and then your full set of papers.

The Pre-college assignments are some short assignments and readings that help you explore your calling, and leadership principles. There’s also some practical exercises, such as leading a service, and preaching.

The full set of papers give the Candidates Boards an in-depth view of you and your calling. There’s a family history, full set of medical and dental reports, a budget, and more. It really is quite in-depth.

Once your full set of papers is handed in, you will have your interview with the Divisional Candidates Board. Here they ask you some more questions, some which may have arisen from answers in your full set of papers. You also get asked to explain a bible passage, and to explain a doctrine.

From here, your application gets passed to the Territorial Candidates board, where they make the final decision on whether you are accepted for college or not.

From here, Liesl and I start making the final preparations. We need to finish our Pre-College assignments, we will need to do some fundraising, and then there will be the packing and moving. There will probably be a whole heap more as well as we prepare ourselves for lives as officers.

Once we have completed our training, we will be commissioned, and appointed to a Salvation Army Corps or Social placement somewhere within the Southern Territory in Australia. That’s basically anywhere in Australia, except the ACT, NSW and QLD (which are part of the Australian Eastern Territory). We will have no real idea of where we will be heading, but for me that’s part of the exciting part as we will be sent where the Army thinks we will best be able to serve that community.

Liesl and I are very excited about the future, particularly the next six months and the next 2 years of study, and can’t wait to be serving God wherever he needs us.

A Star Trek Devotional: Encounter at Farpoint

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith, Star Trek Devotional
John de Lancie as Q in WWIII/Post-Atomic Horro...
Q as an officer from the Mid-21st Century Wars, from Encounter at Farpoint. (Image via Flickr)

I wanted to try my hand at writing a devotional based on episodes of Star Trek. I am a Trekkie, and I feel there is a lot that we can learn from the various episodes. That I’ll have to watch more Star Trek in preparation for these devotionals is just a happy coincidence. My first devotional is based on the first episode (double episode) of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Encounter at Farpoint.

Continue reading “A Star Trek Devotional: Encounter at Farpoint” →

Knee Surgery recovery part 2

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life
A look at my knee one week post surgery

Well, I’m now a week past knee surgery, and things seem to be going well. I’m now walking around the house with the brace, and have ditched the crutches for the most part. The knee still feels weak (sometimes more than others), but most of the time it feels good.

I haven’t felt the need to have a lot of pain medication, and it’s only in the last couple of days that I’ve actually felt any discomfort, which has been taken care of with some paracetamol. On Sunday, I was at Church, and we had a long day, in having a corps lunch and then an afternoon meeting. By the time I got home, I was desperate to get the brace off, and my leg was incredibly tired.

I went to the surgeon on Monday for my post-op check. He was very pleased with how the wounds were healing, and said that the wounds and the swelling were progressing above average. Good news! I mentioned that I expected to be in more pain than I had been in. He responded saying that most knee surgeries come out with the patient being pleasantly surprised, and most shoulder surgeries going the other way. I wonder why that is?

image

Anyway, I keep going on with my exercises. I’m slowly rebuilding my strength and flexibility. I have the exercises to take me up to 6 weeks without a physio, however I’ll probably go see one anyway just to keep me motivated and ensure I’m heading down the right track.

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Let the weak say, I am Strong

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

I went to Church yesterday, and halfway through, Liesl comes up to me and says “I think they’re doing your song for the songsters message.” Indeed they were, the Songsters message was my arrangement of “Let the weak say, I am strong” by Rueben Morgan. Thanks to not being able to sing (would be too tough for me to get up there with my knee) I instead headed up to the sound desk at the back to record it on my phone.

This wasn’t exactly a complete performance, as there is actually a violin part at the beginning. However, I did write it so that if a corps didn’t have a violin player (which, to be honest, there would be more corps without any musicians than corps who have a violin player), it could still be performed and have the same effect.

I’m really pleased with this arrangement. I think that within it all, every part has beautiful lines that are just a pleasure to sing. Of course, the sopranos have most of the melody. But the lines that I’ve written, particularly the Tenor and Basses are just beautiful. It’s a bit hard to hear in the recording, but the Basses have this great line in the chorus which provides a fantastic grounding to the chorus, while the Tenors get this lovely moving part. I’m also really impressed by the dynamic change in the final couple of lines, which I think provides a real lift to that final line, “Jesus died, and rose again.”

Hope you enjoyed it, and I’ll hope to get a few more out soon.

The joys of the internet

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

I love the internet. It has truly made a positive benefit to our lives.

For example, this weekend I was supposed to go to see James Morrison perform a tribute to Louis Armstrong with WASO. However, thanks to my knee surgery, there was no way I would be able to fit into my seat.

So my seat went to my sister, and then the next night I was able to watch the webcast thanks to iiNet. So I still got to listen to the concert (and have better vision than if I was there live).

The other thing I’ve really enjoyed doing on the internet has been streaming the live feed of the Formula 1 races. I enjoy watching these, while Liesl gets bored by them, so I can plug my earphones in and watch on my laptop, while liesl can watch whatever she wants.

TV on the internet has certainly come a long way, and there is now the possibility to watch anything from anywhere at a time that suits you.

Why does God allow evil in his world?

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, faith

This topic suggestion, Why is there evil in the world?, is from The Daily Post as part of the Post-a-day writing challenge.

Student: Sir, you are working on the Premise of Duality. You argue there is Life and then there is Death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, Science can’t even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one. To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life, just the absence of it.

That quote is part of a longer story about an atheist Philosophy lecturer and a student having an argument in class, where the student ends up declaring to his classmates that the lecturer has no brain, because no one in the class has seen, felt, tasted, smelt or heard it. You can read it in full here.

You see, there is evil in this world when people are far away from God. God allows it because he has given us free will. We can choose which way we go. I have this image of God, and all his angels, looking on from above, cheering each of us on to choose the right way, and consoling us when we make a mistake.

Postaday2011 links

It’s a Mainly Music Day

by Ben Clapton, posted in Archive, Life

This morning, I’m heading off to my church to help out with the first Mainly Music session that we’re running. This has been a long time coming, but since we set a date and made it a reality, the overwhelming sense of excitement at our church is hard to miss.

Mainly Music is a fun music group for parents or primary care givers to enjoy together with their young child. Throughout the morning, children develop gross and fine motor skills, language, imagination, mathematical and pre-reading skills as well as socialise with others.

Normally I won’t be able to help out, thanks to having to work at the time. But since I’m off work sick, I’m heading along to get out of the house, and to help out with the PowerPoint. I’m also helping out with putting the PowerPoint and music each week. I want to share some of the images that I’ve selected this week to help brighten up the slides.