May 2008

Dear [firstname,fallback=friend],

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Welcome to another Matthias Media enews. As well as the regular resource information, we have some exciting (and some sad) staff news to share with you this month.

2008 looks like a year of staff changes here at Matthias Media.

	We'll start off with the not so good news (for us). Our Multimedia Editor, Simon Roberts, has accepted a full-time pastoral position with his church, and so will be finishing up at Matthias Media in June this year. Simon has been the driving force behind a number of very valuable resources over the last few years, including Six Steps to Encouragement, Six Steps to Talking About Jesus, So Many Questions, Where to Lord, and From Sinner to Saint, as well as the one who pulled together many of the sermon audio CDs. These have been very significant contributions to the progress of the gospel. So we will be very sorry to lose Simon, but know that he will continue to contribute to the Kingdom through his new role.
	On the plus side, we were very glad to welcome Liza Tan to our team in April to serve as our Operations Manager. We have eagerly been awaiting the contribution she is going to make, in particular to our whole stock management system. With her help, we hope to make it extremely rare for our customers to hear the dreaded words “I'm sorry, we're out of stock of that at the moment”.
	And finally, we are delighted to be able to announce that Paul Grimmond will be joining our editorial team later this year. Paul will be working as a full-time Briefing and Resources Editor. Many will know of Paul's very fruitful ministry as Chaplain at the University of New South Wales and as pastor of Unichurch—roles previously filled by our Founder, Phillip Jensen. When Paul decided it was time to move on from those roles, we were very glad to be able to persuade him to use his fine Bible teaching and communication skills in this different ministry context. So we are now very much looking forward to the contribution he will make to The Briefing and to the development of new ministry resources.

Okay, I admit, this is not a brand new resource, but it's still relatively new, and with World Youth Day being held in our home town of Sydney in just two and a half months, I want to remind you again about the importance of a resource which explains to both Christians and non-Christians what the significant differences are between Catholicism and Protestantism.

Nothing in My Hand I Bring The personal story of Ray Galea's journey from ‘belonging’ to Roman Catholicism to ‘believing’ in Protestantism is a powerful testimony and a helpful explanation of the differences between the two. This book is ideal for giving to Roman Catholic friends. AUS $16.95 | USA $9.99 If you are a pastor, you might like to consider some of the ideas in this helpful feedback we received recently:

Brilliant. It is such a good book. We are anticipating great gospel opportunities and some conversions (under the Lord's hand) from Ray's story. All our small groups will work through it and these will run in conjunction with a morning sermon series on ‘Here we stand: A call to modern reformation’. This series will look at where we currently stand as a society and even as a church, what we need to regain from our Reformation heritage (the ‘solas’ plus semper reformanda which is often forgotten), and conclude with why we must still protest and how to protest effectively. In our evening series (most of our people are in the habit of coming twice on Sunday), we will do a parallel series on some of the more detailed history of the Reformation with special focus on some key reformation personalities.

Anyway, I just thought I'd tell you the context in which we will be using the book as we gear up for a concentrated evangelistic opportunity that we anticipate will come with the World Youth Day.

Preaching is more than conveying information. Although it must involve the communication of ideas, it is not the same thing as a lecture. It is also more than pulpiteering. It can occur just as well in a letter or a conversation as from behind a lectern. In fact, we struggle to define exactly what it is that a preacher does.

Here is an attempt at a definition: “Preaching is declaring the mind of God, seeking a response”.

In this month's online ‘Thinking About Ministry’ article, Phillip Jensen explains why the second part of his definition makes preaching a dangerous thing to do, and he outlines the risks it presents. (Read more of ‘The Risks a Preacher Takes’.)

In this month's Briefing:

The greatest place on the planet by Chris Green

Talking about Total Church by Simon Flinders, Tony Payne and Steve Timmis

Sharing your life for a season: Hospitality and the modern pastor by Nicole Starling

Plus our other regular sections: Couldn't Help Noticing, Pastor's Brief, Bookshelf, Resource Talk, and Bible Brief (daily readings on Exodus 19-40).

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

Introducing The Sola Panel

The Sola Panel is a new blog by a bunch of Reformed Evangelical friends who love the five ‘solas’ of the Reformation, and who want to work together to promote a Bible-driven passion for theology, holiness and gospel ministry. Panellists include: Tony Payne, Peter Bolt, Gordon Cheng, Sandy Grant, Gavin Perkins, Ben Pfahlert, Archie Poulos, Mark Thompson and Lionel Windsor.

Read Tony's introduction and subscribe to The Sola Panel RSS 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’.

The Daily Reading Bible

They just keep plugging away—perhaps in the way we should as Christians! That's our series of daily Bible reading resources called ... er ... The Daily Reading Bible ... which just keeps on growing—not just in the number of volumes we have available, but in the number of people they are helping.

The Daily Reading Bible is designed to help keep you plugging away at feeding on God's word each day and responding to him in prayer. Each volume is a self-contained, take-anywhere booklet containing 60 or so ESV Bible extracts, along with questions to get you thinking. Plus there are points to ponder and suggestions for prayer. Each reading is designed to take about 15-20 minutes, so you can do them on the train, or during your lunch break, in just about any location.

There are 13 volumes in the series, with a 14th on the way. So you can choose from a wide array of Bible books to get started.

So if your ‘quiet times’ are a bit haphazard and you're not sure what to try, give one of The Daily Reading Bibles a go. If you want to test them out, you can download the first 12 readings of Volume 13 now for free (PDF).

View all volumes: AUS | USA

Last month we offered you one of our staple evangelistic tools (A Fresh Start) at a special price. This month, we're going to offer you another evangelistic tool that just keeps on doing the job: Two Ways to Live: The choice we all face.

If you're not familiar with this tract, you can read the online version at twowaystolive.com.

We've got a major new shipment of the ‘pocket edition’ of this tract coming in from the printers in early May, so we'd love to clear out a nice big quantity to make a bit of room in our warehouse.

Normally the pocket edition sells for AUS $0.70 each, or AUS $0.55 for 100+. For this month only, we're selling bundles of 100 for just AUS $35.00. So now is the time to stock up.

Australia: RRP $0.70. For this month only bundle of 100 for AUS $35.00.

USA: RRP $0.50. For this month only bundle of 100 for USA $25.00.

The Queen's Birthday Convention

For our readers who are in or around Sydney, there is an upcoming opportunity for you to receive some great input from the Bible on the long weekend in June, right in the centre of the city. The details are as follows:

When: Monday 9 June, 2008 from 10am to 5pm

Where: St Andrew's Cathedral (cnr George St and Bathurst St, Sydney)

Cost: From $15 (including morning and afternoon tea and all day parking). See the website for full details of cost.
Speaker: Phillip Jensen

Phillip will be speaking on Mark 9-16 (the sequel to his talks at the Australia Day Convention where he spoke on Mark 1-8). (Listen to the last talk from the Australia Day Convention.)

For more information and to register, visit www.queensbirthdayconvention.com.

The Faithful Writer

The Faithful Writer is a one-day conference for Christians interested in exploring the ministry potential of writing, paid or otherwise. It's for Christians keen to use their words to serve and glorify the one who made words. It's for Christians who are passionate about communicating and communicating well.

Date: Saturday 2 August 2008, 8:30 am-5:30 pm.

Venue: New College, University of New South Wales, Kensington (330 Anzac Parade, just past the main uni walkway).

Special guest speaker: Mark Tredinnick, poet, essayist, writing teacher and author of, among other things, The Little Red Writing Book

Seminar presenters:

• Trevor Cairney, Director of the Centre for Apologetic Scholarship and Education (CASE) and master of New College, University of New South Wales
• Greg Clarke, Director of the Macquarie Christian Studies Institute and Director (with John Dickson) of the Centre for Public Christianity
• Tony Payne, Publishing Director of Matthias Media
• Karen Beilharz, editor of The Briefing and other Matthias Media products
• Rebecca Jee, editor of Salt magazine (published by the Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students).

Cost (includes lunch, morning and afternoon tea): Earlybird rate if you register before 20 June: $80 ($65 concession for full-time students and pensioners).

Registrations received after the 20 June will be charged $100 ($85 for concession).

Registrations close Friday 25 July 2008. Places are limited so make sure you get in early. No registrations will be accepted on the day of the conference. (Please note there are no part-day registration discounts.)

Join the conference mailing list for updates.