Keller writes,

When we look at people who have brought trouble into their lives by their own foolishness, we say things like, ‘Serves them right’ or we mock them on social media: ‘What kind of imbecile says something like this?’ When we see people of the other political party defeated, we just gloat. This is all a way of detaching ourselves from them. We distance ourselves from them partly out of pride and partly because we don’t want their unhappiness to be ours. God doesn’t do that. (121)

Once the honeymoon period of missionary work wears off, the sinners we work among can be downright annoying. The triumph of knowing the local language well enough to communicate clearly is a dangerous gift. The ability to argue your rights or put someone in their place could grieve the Holy Spirit. As James admonishes, “from the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so” (James 3:10 ESV hereafter).

Practicing the compassion of God toward local people in the daily small annoyances is a training ground for missionaries to respond well on the day malicious people slander and persecute.

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The Cremation Society keeps very careful statistics of the number of times each of the crematoria in the UK are used, and publishes them on its website. The very first cremation in the UK was in Woking in March 1885, and between then and 1899 there were a total of 1,976, a tiny fraction of the over 8 million deaths in England and Wales in that period, just 0.024 per cent, or one in every 4,100 deaths.

Since then, however, the number of cremations has increased steadily, as has the number of crematoria, from four in 1900 to 13 by 1914. Over the next 15 years to 1914, the rate of cremations increased to 0.14 per cent, or one in every 700 deaths, and over the 15 years 1915 to 1929 to 0.46 per cent or one in every 200.

Today, in 2017, the latest year for data, four-fifths, 80 per cent of all deaths in England and Wales are cremated, spread across 291 crematoria.

The numbers began to increase very rapidly in the 20 years after the end of World War Two….

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A terrorism trial starting here on Thursday highlights the difficulties Europe’s courts and prisons face containing the spread of jihadist ideology behind bars.

Mehdi Nemmouche, a 33-year-old Frenchman of Algerian origin, faces life in prison for allegedly shooting and killing four people at the Brussels Jewish Museum in May 2014. But once in prison, law-enforcement officials warn, terror suspects and convicts breed even more plots and spread their ideology to other inmates.

European prisons are fertile recruiting ground for new terrorists despite efforts in France, Belgium and other European countries to isolate dangerous and radicalized suspects in dedicated wards to prevent them from proselytizing. The perpetrators in several recent attacks were radicalized in prison, including Mr. Nemmouche and an alleged accomplice also on trial, say prosecutors. In Belgium, which has the highest per capita rate of returnees from Syria and Iraq in Europe, one third of 125 returnees were in prison in early 2018, according to the Egmont Institute, a Brussels-based think tank….

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Words: Bishop Reginald Heber
Tune: ‘Epiphany’ – Joseph Thrupp

The letter to the bishops was sent before Christmas, and in turn the bishops have responded to the signatories with a statement of their own. Christian Today understands both letters are to be circulated to all clergy in the Oxford diocesan email news today, Wednesday. They are now also in the public domain on the website of the Oxford Diocesan Evangelical Fellowship.

Clergy signatories include conservative evangelical Canon Vaughan Roberts, Rector of St Ebbe’s Oxford, who has openly spoken of his celibacy despite same-sex attraction, and the leading charismatic churchman Canon Charlie Cleverly, Rector of St Aldate’s, Oxford. Their two congregations are among the largest in the diocese. There are also signatories who are lay people and retired clergy, including the distinguished author, evangelist and lecturer Dr Michael Green.

The letter says: ‘Our overriding concern is with the direction of travel which the Diocese is taking as revealed by this letter. In its desire for new expressions of “inclusion”, it could end up excluding those who hold to the traditional teaching of Scripture and doing a great disservice to those of us who experience same-sex attraction. We are not here simply stating an aversion to change; we are, however, convinced that failing to hold the Bible’s teaching out to everyone, including those who identify as LGBTI+, is to show a lack of that very love the letter urges us to exhibit.’

They continue: ‘As Bishop William Love of the Diocese of Albany in the Episcopal Church of the USA said last month in relation to the introduction of “blessings” for same-sex couples, it ‘does a great disservice and injustice to our gay and lesbian Brothers and Sisters in Christ, by leading them to believe that God gives his blessing to the sharing of sexual intimacy within a same-sex relationship, when in fact He has reserved the gift of sexual intimacy for men and women within the confines of marriage between a man and woman.’

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Meltdown in the Church of England’s Oxford diocese – https://t.co/mLFGi6PIak

— David Ayshford Baker (@Baker_David_A) January 9, 2019

In a move that can only further raise concerns with the Archbishop of Canterbury’s leadership, the Anglican Centre in Rome (essentially, the “embassy” of the Anglican Communion to the Roman Catholic Church) have announced their new Interim Director….

John Shepherd was previously Dean at Perth Cathedral for many years where he gained a reputation for regularly challenging Christian orthodoxy. Most famously, in his 2008 Easter message he denied the bodily resurrection of Jesus, stating….

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Keep us, O Lord, constant in faith and zealous in witness, that, like thy servant William Laud, we may live in thy fear, die in thy favor, and rest in thy peace; for the sake of Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

10 January 1645 Archbishop William Laud was beheaded for treason at the Tower of London.https://t.co/TwtMUCDgDb pic.twitter.com/yhvvtR5fDV

— George Costanza (@FeatOfStrength) January 10, 2019

O Blessed Jesus, who by the shining of a star didst manifest thyself to them that sought thee: Show thy heavenly light to us, and give us grace to follow until we find thee; finding, to rejoice in thee; and rejoicing, to present to thee ourselves, our souls and bodies, for thy service for evermore: for thine honour and glory.

And to the angel of the church in Sardis write: ‘The words of him who has the seven spirits of God and the seven stars. “‘I know your works; you have the name of being alive, and you are dead. Awake, and strengthen what remains and is on the point of death, for I have not found your works perfect in the sight of my God. Remember then what you received and heard; keep that, and repent. If you will not awake, I will come like a thief, and you will not know at what hour I will come upon you. Yet you have still a few names in Sardis, people who have not soiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy. He who conquers shall be clad thus in white garments, and I will not blot his name out of the book of life; I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels. 6 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.’

–Revelation 3:1-6