While searching on Google tonight, I noticed this ad:

Curious (it’s not often that you read that God’s protection from America has been removed), I clicked on the link to see what this was all about.  The website is promoting a book – 2008 – God’s Final Witness. Here’s the blurb:

The year 2008 has witnessed many prophecies being fulfilled, especially the Seven Thunders of the Book of Revelation, which the apostle John saw but was restricted from recording. Those thunders, which will continue to increase in strength and frequency, are revealed in this book, as well as detailed accounts of the final three and one-half years of man’s self-rule on earth, which are recorded in the account of the Seventh Seal of Revelation.

Some of these prophecies concern the demise of the United States over the coming year, which will be followed by man’s final world war. This last war will be the result of clashing religions and the governments they sway. Billions will die! This time will far exceed even the very worst times in all human history.

As these events unfold, the world will increasingly become aware of the authenticity of the words in this book and realize that Ronald Weinland has been sent by God as His end-time prophet.

I’m concerned about what he’s saying, not least of all his assertion that “billions will die!”, but his concern isn’t their salvation,  but that “the world will increasingly become aware of the authenticity of the words in this book and realize that Ronald Weinland has been sent by God as His end-time prophet”.

Even more concerning is what the author, Ronald Weiland, says about himself on his personal website:

Ronald Weinland, who is the pastor of God’s Church on earth, has also been appointed by the God of Abraham to be His end-time prophet and one of the two end-time witnesses (and spokesman of both), preceding the return of Jesus Christ.

The book has been made available as a free e-book, and can be downloaded from the website.

Why am I writing about this website on Communicate Jesus? Three reasons:

1. There have always been people with crazy, even dangerous ideas. The internet now gives these ideas greater legs. Just as the internet can be used for ministry to promote Jesus, it can also be used for false purposes. We need to be aware that there are others who are using the  internet to do their own ‘ministry’. We don’t operate in a vacuum, and we shouldn’t be ignorant of others who are operating in our ‘space’. Especially when they are using technology to draw people away from Jesus.
2. The websites I visited (including Weiland’s personal website) are good. Sure, they won’t win any design awards, but the designs are clean, pleasant and the sites are easy to use. This stands in contrast to many of the Christian websites I was exploring this afternoon that may well have been updated 20 years ago, and not visited again since. I’m not suggesting that our websites are the be all and end all in bringing people into a relationship with Jesus, when they’re done poorly they can certainly provide some decent obstacles to keep people away. On the flip-side, a decent website that is easy on the eye and easy to read and access, provides interested visitors with an easy first step into our churches and ministries.
   
3. Weiland has released his book as a free e-book. There’s one way to make it easy for others to read what you’ve got to say, and that’s to make it free. I’ve written elsewhere on why I believe free is the way to go, and I’ll write here soon on the potential e-books provide. If falsehood is being distributed for free, shouldn’t the truth be made equally available and accessible? It would be great to see more Christian resources, especially books, made available online for free.

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Once every 4 weeks or so I lead either the 9.30am or 6.30pm service. The songs are determined in advance, but the rest of the service structure – what happens and when, is up to the service leader.

When I led a youth group I was always encouraged to connect the prayers, the games, the activities – everything that happened on the night – to the Bible talk. These ‘elements’ had the capacity to either take away from, or reinforce the Bible passage that was being studied that night. I’ve tried to take that approach with me into leading the services at church, and found it’s a (perhaps not surprisingly) time-consuming task. It’s also a wonderful privilege.

Last Sunday night I led the the service and the theme for the sermon was ‘confession’ (the current sermon series is based on the ACTS prayer acronym – Adoration – Confession – Thanksgiving – Supplication). I thought I’d share with you two resources I discovered and used on Sunday.

1. The Valley of Vision is a book of Puritan prayers. Tim Challies (a Canadian blogger) has made a number of the prayers from this book available on his blog. I used the Prayer of Praise and Thanksgiving (changing references from ‘I’ to ‘We’ and so on) as an opening prayer at the start of the service, and Regeneration: A Prayer following a time of worship in song. I was going to use The Dark Guest but thought it was a bit heavy to follow-on from the corporate confession.
2. Following the sermon I led the congregation in a time of corporate confession of sin. The Prayer Book provides some well-known corporate confessions, but we have used these many times as church and I feared that our familiarity with them might dull their effect. I’ve found that the more familiar they are to me, the easier they are to say without thinking about what I’m actually saying. I discovered the Reformation Theology website that provides a large number of confesssions that can be used privately or corporately.

There’s lots of good reasons to make use of these prayers and confessions, but one of the things I love is the carefully crafted, well thought out use of language. For me to express the same truths in the same way would take days of reflection, prayer and re-wording. I encourage you to explore these resources.

To close this post, I thought I’d share with you Regeneration: A Prayer.

O God of the highest heaven,
occupy the throne of my heart,
take full possession and reign supreme,
lay low every rebel lust,
let no vile passion resist thy holy war;
manifest thy mighty power,
and make me thine forever.
Thou art worthy to be
praised with my every breath,
loved with my every faculty of soul,
served with my every act of life.
Thou hast loved me, espoused me, received me,
purchased, washed, favored, clothed,
adorned me,
when I was a worthless, vile soiled, polluted.
I was dead in iniquities,
having no eyes to see thee,
no ears to hear thee,
no taste to relish thy joys,
no intelligence to know thee;
But thy Spirit has quickened me,
has brought me into a new world as a
new creature,
has given me spiritual perception,
has opened to me thy Word as light, guide, solace, joy.
Thy presence is to me a treasure of unending peace;
No provocation can part me from thy sympathy,
for thou hast drawn me with cords of love,
and dost forgive me daily, hourly.
O help me then to walk worthy of thy love,
of my hopes, and my vocation.
Keep me, for I cannot keep myself;
Protect me that no evil befall me;
Let me lay aside every sin admired of many;
Help me to walk by thy side, lean on thy arm,
hold converse with thee,
That I may be salt of the earth
and a blessing to all.

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It looks like this is the week of top lists. On Tuesday I mentioned the (somewhat curious) list of sites that had become finalists in the Best Religious Blogs category.

Today I want to let you know about the Webware top 100 web apps of 2008. Here you will discover a list of the latest applications that can help you:

• listen to music
• browse the internet
• do business
• sell things
• communicate
• be productive
• publish photos and other content
• search for information
• connect with others
• store and share files, and
• watch and edit videos

Let me encourage you to explore the list and see use your imagination to consider how these might be used for ministry. Here’s an example from my own church.

Last.fm is a website where you can type in the type of music you like, and it will create an ongoing “stream” of music based on what you type in. It’s like a personalised radio station, that only plays the music that you like. Not bad, eh? Before a church service I will open up Last.fm and type in “Third Day” or “Chris Tomlin” or “Casting Crows” and Last.fm will play music that is similar to Third Day, Chris Tomlin or Casting Crowns. I don’t need to find a CD, or rely on finding the right music in iTunes – I let Last.fm do the hard work for me.

That’s just one example. Check out the list of top applications, and share with the rest of us some creative ideas for how these could be used for ministry.