This week at Monday Mad Skills we put out the Top 10 Christian Books you should consider reading… here they are (without the funny/cool/interesting dialogue between Richard and I).

10. John Chapman, Know and Tell the Gospel

9. James W. Sire, The Universe Next door

8. Bruce Milne, Know the Truth

7. Don Carson, A Call to Spiritual Reformation

6. Phillip Jensen & Tony Payne, Guidance and the Voice of God

5.  J.I. Packer, Evangelism & Sovereignty of God

4. Graeme Goldsworthy, According to Plan

3. John Stott, The Cross of Christ

2. J.I Paker, Knowing God

1. Don Carson et al., New Bible Commentary & I.H. Marshal et al., New Bible Dictionary

I can’t say whether the links will provide you with the best price, but I noticed that the New Bible Dictionary and Commentary are on sale right now! Apart from that, please try and buy Australian books direct from the publisher (e.g. www.matthiasmedia.com.au)

So the “Time with God” material has been great! Going through Joshua just bit by bit, just enough to dwell on and consider the God who saves and brings about his plans and promises.

But, we’ve decided it really needs its own location - so we’ve setup this site: daily.hunterbiblechurch.org

Ok, so they don’t come up daily, but the idea is that you develop the habit of reading the bible as often as you can - daily even! All the HBC “Time with God” material has been moved there, and all the new posts will appear there too - one every two days.

If you ever forget where it is, you can get there through the website menu above… “Pastor’s blog > Devotionals”

What do all these people have in common?

Apart from all being at the church office and helping getting things ready to proclaim Jesus at carols and other events, they all have the brand new 2011 Hunter Bible Church Calendar!

Its got all the preaching details for the year, all the conferences and dates for Life and NextStep (that we’re aware of). It will tell you when Youth group is going away, and when there are special events on special weekends. Great if you’re working out things like 21st parties or wedding dates! And on top of all that, each month (Jan ‘11 - Jan ‘12) has got a beautiful picture from Wave Kids Club 2010.

To cover costs of printing, they cost $5 each. Any extra money received will go to WAVE summer sites.

On last Wednesday night, the Finance Committee and the Elders presented the Gospel Proclamation Investment target for our church in 2011. It was a great night of dreaming about what God has in store for HBC in 2011 and beyond, and praying for great things.

We’d love you to hear the talk, and the special announcements from Greg.

We’d also love you to read the summary document here: HBC 2011 Budget summary booklet

On Sunday, we’ll be having a panel discussion to help us all think Christianly (is that a word?) about our political system and voting.

Here are some sites that we hope are helpful as you prayerfully go to the voting booth. We’re not suggesting that everything below is trustworthy or even correct. But they might help you think through some issues:

• Electorate details from the Australian Electoral Commission - maps, polling places, candidates …
  • Charlton
  • Newcastle
  • Paterson
  • Shortland
• Senate Group Voting Tickets for NSW
  • If you vote ‘above the line’ in the Senate, this document will show you how the party you vote for will distribute preferences on your behalf.
• AEC’s guide to How your votes are counted
  • All the gory details of how the preferential voting system works and the intricate details of how Senate votes are counted.
• ABC’s election analyst Antony Green’s guide to the Federal election
  • Lots of background information for each electorate, including a bit more info on the candidates
• Australian Christian Lobby: “Know what the parties think before you vote” paper
  http://australianchristianlobby.org.au/wp-content/uploads/AVBrochureDownloadable.pdf
• John Dickson (Australian Christian author) article in the SMH
  http://tinyurl.com/JohnDickson-ChristianVote
• “Australian Christian Values” produced a political views checklist
  http://www.christianvalues.org.au/check_list.html
• Tim Keller sermon on Politics and arguments
  http://sermons2.redeemer.com/sites/sermons2.redeemer.com/files/sermons/RPC-Arguing_about_Politics.mp3
• Medicine with Morality - a group that helpfully raises ethical issues about medical policies
  http://www.medicinewithmorality.org.au/

Well here it is… Scripture vs Ethics #3.

If you are passionate about seeing Scripture in schools then come to my place TONIGHT!! 7.30pm let me know if you need my address. We will be hearing some encouraging Scripture stories, praying and being informed on the Ethics versus Scripture debate and praying some more.

I would love to see you there.

Here is a document which will help you write a letter to voice your opinions on the Scripture vs Ethics debate…

Crafting a letter

I have also included in the above document names and addresses of the relevant people involved so you know who to write your letters to!

I hope this is helpful. Please let me know if you do decide to write a letter - it would be enormously encouraging for me to hear.

See you tonight!

Ok, so I just found this resource on someone else’s blog, and I thought it was so good that I had to put it up here too… This is a recipe book made by a couple at Petersham Baptist Church (where a few of our staff used to go) that has meals you can make for the masses!

Need to cook for 60 to 100 people in a hurry, and don’t know where to start? Check out the PBC Recipe Book! It’s got 26 recipes, with answers to your PBC specific questions such as: How can I get all this rice cooked in this oven? Download the recipe book in PDF format (204 kb). Lovingly prepared by Ros Thomson and Sarah Whitington in 2004.

photo credit: tom.hensel

Enjoy!

As mentioned earlier in this blog, we’d be releasing a document that outlines some of the things we, the Building Feasibility Committee, thinks are critical for any building that HBC might consider buying or building in the near future.

Well, we have the document, but it comes with a catch… we’d like your input, comments and suggestions about what we, the BFC, should consider critical or important, or just nice to have in a church property.

So, please download the “Proposed Building Requirements” document, and after you’ve had a read through it, make a comment by either:

• emailing building.hbc@gmail.com
• leave a written comment in one of the red collection boxes at a HBC meeting
  (its important that you include your name with your comments.)

Check out the preaching plan for 2010… here.

Earlier this year, the elders formed a committee to do some thinking about whether HBC should ever buy a building.

That committee recently produced a document which recommended that the church should really aim to buy a building sometime soon. The Elders have had a good look at it, and agree with the reasons in the report.

We haven’t formally decided when we should do this, or where it should be, or how much it’ll cost. But this is something we should all start talking about some more.

To help kick that off, it would be good to read the committee’s report (along with the Elder’s thoughts) on the member’s area of the website. Please take a look! (We’ve also got some copies printed, and will have them up the back of our Sunday congregations).