Each year, generally three times a year, in Cardiff, Newcastle a number of people gather to practice some of the Psalm tunes that we sing regularly in our churches, as well as learn new ones. This year we hope to gather again on Saturday 9th May at 11am in the Cardiff church hall to sing Psalms and enjoy fellowship together in Christ Jesus. You are welcome to come along and listen to the singing, or even join in.  

Our Annual Synod is coming around again in the first week of May (5th to 7th May). It will be a time for delegates from all the congregations to get together to discuss and deliberate on matters concerning the life of the church and the organisation and running of the denomination. This year's Synod will be held in our Mt Druitt (Sydney West) church building. Anyone is welcome to come and sit in on the open sessions of the Synod. You are particularly welcome to come along and hear speakers on our Mission night, Wednesday, 7:00pm. We look forward to hearing news from visitors from India on the work there.

Andrew Bajema has complied a great video of Family Camp this year, including interviews with those who were there. If this doesn't make you want to be at the next Family Camp, God-willing, then what will? 

Photos courtesy of Andrew and Sjirk Bajema

Some photos from this year's Family Camp. The talks were challenging and the fellowship was encouraging. A great start to the year! The report on the camp by Anna Ward is now available in this month's Banner.

Yesterday was our denomination's birthday (PCEA born 10th October,1846). It would be good to pray for renewal of the vision of our founders - men like William McIntyre (pictured here) and James Forbes.  Perhaps we should think in terms of an Annual Missions-giving Day to pull us together in reaching out.

Here are some other points for prayer:

• Please also remember Trevor Leggott and AIM in your prayers as Trevor has to deal with distressing and delicate issues with AIM that transpired many years before our involvement.
   
• Please pray for Denver Boehret who does not have a regular church engagement for next year, but plans to continue developing ministry gifts under Knox Session in 2015, and is looking for suitable employment.
   
• The Sudanese work under Rev Tut is now in its 10th year. We long to see greater commitment spiritually and financially, although we are very mindful of the demands on the people from their loved ones in desperate situations in South Sudan.
   
• At the Narre Warren church on Saturday morning, 25 October, Sjirk Bajema will lead a workshop on the conduct of worship and the preparation and delivery of sermons. Folk from other churches are invited, and the hope is that the workshop, which will include contributions from other PCEA ministers, will benefit men who may be called on to preach occasionally or who are interested in ministry, and of course to help men and women to appreciate what is involved.
   
• Geelong and Northern Rivers charges are vacant. Geelong is getting supply from various men on a roster but is not in a position to call a minister yet. I understand Northern Rivers has residential supply at present from a retired FCS minister.
   

• The potential church site at 8 William Road, Carrum Downs (Victoria) is due to be settled, funded by Knox. Several donations have been received but provision of a modest building depends on further gifts. Here is an opportunity to provide a Gospel witness and outreach is a growing area with little in the way of any Christian witness. Gifts can be made direct to the PCEA Bank account. Please contact Interim Moderator, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. for details.

Above all, we and our nation need an outpouring of God's Spirit to change our present situation and bring new life.

Application forms are now available to download for the PCEA Family Camp, 30 December, 2014 to 2nd January, 2015. Follow the link, download the form, fill it in and return it to the Camp organisers. You can check out the campsite on a video from a previous post - Elanora Conference Centre.  Please note that the picture on the home page (shown above) is not intended to be an indication of what is going to happen at the camp, rather a pictorial representation of the events and imagery found in the book of Isaiah. 

It's not exactly mortification of the flesh, but the ladies in the Ulverstone Church apparently enjoyed a great time of fellowship and pampering at a recent special event. (It is good to enjoy the blessings that we have from the Lord, by the way). Find out about the Ladies' Pampering Day in the latest edtion of The Presbyterian Banner .

With the rise of secularism in Australia, and the increasingly rapid decay of standards based on a Christian ethic, is the Reformed faith best suited to weather the storms of the coming "exile"? Here is an encouraging article by Carl Trueman (Professor of Church History at Westminster Theological Seminary) about the strength of a Reformed outlook to withstand the prevailing attitude in the US, which is certainly mirrored here in Australia. It is well worth reading. 

The PCEA Camp will be hosted at Elanora Conference Centre. Have a peek at this short video to see what the place is like. You can also go to their website for more details on the venue, as well as maps and a photo gallery. It looks wonderfully comfortable. 

In this fresco [by Benozzo Gozzoli on the walls of Sant Agostino Church, San Gimignano, 15th Century] , St Augustine hears a voice in the seclusion of a garden commanding him to "take up the book and read". Following this command, [which he believes to be a word from God], he takes up the epistle of Paul to the Romans, and starts reading Romans 13:13 ff., which warns sinners to "put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof." On the right his intellectual friend Alypius is reaching out to him with his hand. Two old friends, on the left side, are keeping their distance from his on account of his change of faith. The phrase coined by St Augustine, "credo ut intelligam, intelligo ut credam" - "I believe that I might understand, and understand that I might believe" - appears to have been visually translated into this picture. From Web Gallery of Art

Reading is fundamental to the Christian life. Reading the Scriptures (or having them read to us, and expounded in preaching) is the way by which we come to a knowledge of the Truth. Without the word written we cannot know about God (except in the general sense of what is revealed to our eyes in Creation. Rom. 1:18-20). Neither can we know His works of Creation and Providence, or the way that He has revealed how we may be saved in Jesus Christ.

Augustine of Hippo tells us in his Confessions  that, when he began to be under conviction of sin, he was instructed by a voice he assumed to be divine to "take up and read" ("tolle, lege"), he took up the Scriptures and read words that convicted him of his sin. This act of reading led to his conversion. It is the same in Pilgrim's Progress, that great work of John Bunyan. The book opens with a vision of the main character, Christian, reading and tormented by what he reads, because he is under the conviction of sin that the book brought to his mind. The book is obviously the Word of God.

But more than anecdote or works of fiction, the Lord Jesus (the Word), witnesses to the power of the word by the Spirit to bring conviction of sin and new life. Upon his resurrection, Jesus not only appeared to the disciples to show that He had power over sin and had conquered death, He opened the word of God and read and expounded Scripture to them. By this, he brought them to a full understanding of the redemption worked out from eternity and recorded for all in the Bible (Luke 24:27). The regenerative power of the Holy Spirit works in the word read and preached to bring new life to us who believe (Acts 17:11; Rom. 15; 1 Cor. 15:1-4; 2 Tim. 3:14-17; et al.)

It follows then that we must be reading people. If we are to know of salvation we have to read, or have the word read and opened up to us by preachers. But we also need to grow in the Christian life. To grow we need to read again and again and again. We need to read and feed on that which nourishes us. Scripture first, to make us understand what God would have us do, and how we should live, but also those books that help us to understand Scripture. Read biographies - read about the lives of those changed by the Gospel, read about those who carry the Gospel forth, taking the word into all the world. Read about the heroes of the faith, the martyrs, the faithful preachers and teachers of the Word that we have read and are learning. Read theology - the study of God and His work in the world, read it in Systematic form, or from an Historical perspective, or follow the flow of theology through the word in Biblical Theology. Read works on Apologetics - books that do not apologise for the faith, but argue the Truth of the Word that we read against the worldviews of those who reject that Truth.

The PCEA Church-wide camp is on again. It is to take place at the Elanora Heights Conference Centre, Elanora Heights in Sydney, Tuesday 30th December, 2014 to Friday 2nd January, 2015. The latest issue of The Banner has some details. We hope that you will pencil this in - no, scribe it with a pen of iron - into your diaries. The Camps are wonderful times of fellowship and edification, growing in God's word. Application forms and more details will follow soon. Come and spend New Years Day with your brothers and sisters in Christ!

Welcome to the PCEA News page. This will, in time, DV (God Willing), become a place for News and views from Ministers and guest writers for everyone to read and reflect on. We look forward to your comments and hope you will find this useful and edifying.