April 2008

Dear [firstname,fallback=friend],

(If you are having difficulty viewing this e-news, you can view the content online.)

Welcome to the April edition of enews.

By the way, if you are going to be at the Together for the Gospel conference (15-17 April) in Louisvile, Kentucky, please drop by the Matthias Media display and say hello to our team (both American and Australian accents available!). We'll have a very special offer for you at the conference, so don't miss out!

The following new resources are in stock at Matthias Media now. Click on the links to find more information, pricing for larger quantities, or to place an order in either our Australian or US online store.

So Many Questions For some years now, the So Many Questions multimedia course has been helping thousands of Christians to know how to respond to some of the most-asked questions from their non-Christian friends, and how to do it wisely, graciously and compellingly. Now the So Many Questions course has been made even better and more useful in this new edition. (Workbook and DVD required.) Workbook: AUS $7.95 | USA $5.99 DVD: AUS $28.50 | USA $19.99

The Daily Reading Bible (Volume 13) This popular devotional series is becoming a staple diet for many Christians. The Daily Reading Bible is an all-in-one resource, and a good way to get started or keep going in your daily reading of the Bible. This 13th volume contains 60 undated readings looking at Luke 1-6, Amos and 2 Corinthians. AUS $7.50 | USA $4.99 Take a test drive: download the first 12 readings now for free (PDF).

There are a number of new ministry resources in the pipeline due in from the printer next month (May). Stay tuned to enews for more details.

There are few more pressing and strategic avenues of Christian work than one-to-one ministry. Yet many Christians sit in churches week by week thinking, “There's nothing for me to do in this church. I just can't get involved. All the jobs are taken.” This is akin to sitting on a battlefield with a gun in your hand and the enemy on all sides and saying, “There's nothing for me to do. All the sergeant's and captain's jobs are taken. Until someone specifically invites me to get involved, I guess I'll just have to remain a passive onlooker.”

All around us in church are individuals floundering or stagnating in their Christian lives. With an open Bible, a prayerful heart and a willingness to share our lives with others, we have all the weapons we need to have an enormous impact on other's lives.

In this month's online ‘Thinking About Ministry’ article, Tony Payne urges us to discover that there is more to ministry than running a good church meeting and getting lots of people into small groups. One-to-one ministry is an oft-forgotten dimension of ministry that can be extremely powerful and effective. (Read more)

In this month's Briefing:

The slow death of congregational singing by Mike Raiter

Song leaders: Who needs them? by Cathy Sampson

Fight the good fight (Part 2) by Tony Payne

Plus our other regular sections: Couldn't Help Noticing, Pastor's Brief, Resource Talk, Bookshelf and Bible Brief (daily readings on Titus).

12 month subscription: from AUS $35.00 | USA $29.99 or buy this issue as a PDF AUS $5.00.

Download the latest episode of our podcast The Briefing Lounge. (14.87MB. Subscribe to the feed.)

Matthias Media develops ministry resources designed to promote and fuel what we call the ‘gospel growth process’. You can learn more about this at our website: AUS | USA. In this section of enews, we highlight one category and refer you to some of our resources available to help in this area. This month, it's ‘growth’.

This time we are highlighting some of the resources designed to help with one-to-one ministry (see the article above under the Thinking about Ministry section):

	Short Steps for Long Gains This ingenious and helpful little booklet by Simon Manchester is a tool to help Christians get together in pairs to look at the Bible, pray and share their lives. It consists of 26 short Bible studies (starting with A for ‘assurance’ and finishing with Z for ‘zeal’), each one based on a Bible verse, with half a dozen questions to stimulate encouraging conversation and prayer. AUS $4.80 | USA $2.99
	Short Steps for Long Gains: Family Edition This booklet is similar to Short Steps for Long Gains, but it's been written for parents to go through with their children. It provides a great way to open up discussion on a variety of important topics. AUS $4.80 | USA $2.99
	One 2 One This resource is designed to help people form Bible reading partnerships where they meet together perhaps once a week to read, discuss and pray through a passage of Scripture. The book contains 24 studies on John 13-17, Philippians and selected Psalms. Suitable for men, women or couples. AUS $7.80

One of our most innovative multimedia resources is Genuine Imitation. This CD-ROM is both Windows and Macintosh compatible, and will help you discover the message of 1 Thessalonians. Find out more at http://www.matthiasmedia.com.au/gi/welcome.html.

This is a great product, and for the next month, it available at an unbeatable price.

Normally AUS $19.95 | USA $15.99 each, for this month only, this resource is half price: AUS $9.95 | USA $8.00.