Yesterday my wife and I attended a funeral in a small community on the west coast of the Scottish Highlands. The usual practice there is to conduct family worship and then the minister gives a short address at the local cemetery after the burial. The hearty singing of the praises of God from the Scottish …
Category: Worship
Critique of the Church of England ‘at its best’
One may assume that the funeral of the Duke of Edinburgh was the Church of England putting on its best display. The splendour and pageantry of the day, organised by the Duke while alive, easily eclipsed the offerings from the official ecclesiastics. Since I have often said that the national churches are failing the UK …
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My YouTube channel
Today is the second anniversary of my brother Andrew's death. It is also the 49th anniversary of my reading the whole Bible for the first time on 22/8/1971. I have read the Bible daily ever since and now I spend several hours a day on my Bible commentary, making its teaching accessible to ordinary people, …
The biblical view about denominations
"I am the Vine. You are the branches," said the Lord Jesus Christ. John 15:5.So why are people trying to join different branches of Christ's church into one branch? Whoever thought that a vine or a tree should have only one branch? Yet this has been the unwieldy vision of the ecumenical movement, which floundered …
Ambiguity and exegesis: confusing English words
My last blogpost highlighted the mistake that early Christians made between 'soon' and 'suddenly'. It continues to the present hour, even among academia, with serious practical consequences both to the early Christian church 2Th 3:11 and to current Christianity. There are other examples of ambiguity in English words leading to confusion in exegesis. Such an …
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What do we do about confusion in congregational preaching?
Intelligent listeners will notice differences in teaching between preachers even in the same denomination, as well as between denominations. The right of private judgment is permitted to Christians, but the continuous and unchallenged preaching of different doctrines only leads to confusion in congregations - and God is not the author of confusion 1Cor 14:33. So …
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Hogmanay and a Happy New Year
We brought in the New Year with our growing family. Since the children have left home a few years ago, Elizabeth and I have become accustomed to watching their lives from a distance. However, there are happy reunions when they make their occasional and seasonal return to Ebenezer, and this Hogmanay was one of them. …
Mrs James Boyd
Yesterday, Debbie Fisher became Mrs James Boyd. It was a delightful occasion and Elizabeth and I are very pleased for James and Debbie. The first Mrs James Boyd, the first of many loves in my life, was married on 5/1/51 and passed away on 10/11/10. The last major function she attended was the marriage of …
Discerning the Lord’s body
"He that eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord's body."The apostle Paul's epistle to the Corinthians 1Cor 11:29 There are various interpretations of this text and its neighbouring context. Christian exegesis There is a difference between exegesis and Christian exegesis because there are specific biblical principles employed in …
Vain worship of God and a mark of effective Christianity
Jesus teaches about worshipping God in vain: 'in vain do they worship Me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men' Mk 7:7. Vain worship is empty worship, devoid of proper content, but this is not the emphasis of the Greek word used here, which points to the 'fruitless activity' of such worship. It points to …
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Donald's Thoughts 