What’s a Cantata anyway?

I’ll be honest with you, when Andre Broodryk from Benoni Baptist said they were putting on a Cantata last Sunday night part of me thought, “I’ll give that one a skip.” I announced it at church that Sunday morning but it featured along side all the other midweek activities that keep us oh-so-busy.

When I arrived on Sunday evening (still with only a vague clue of what a Cantata was) I realized something was going down. The car park was unbuzz. I noticed folk as I drove in from Springs Baptist (I preached there a month ago), Eastvale and Northmead Baptist (we’ve been getting together for evening services) and Wychwood Baptist (their pastor, Lance Laughton, is a tall fellow and stands out in a crowd). When I entered the church it was full, sure there were seats open, but it was fuller than I had ever seen it before.

I sat and waited… now a little excited.

Just so you know, a Canata is a composition for one or more voices usually comprising solos, duets, recitatives, and choruses and sung to an instrumental accompaniment (more detail here).

And then it begun. A Piano, a drum, a guitar, a violin, eight voices in the front (four male, four female) and a congregation of a few hundred burst forth in rapturous praise. It was great.

There’re two things that I want to note right here. Firstly I love this traditional hymn revival that is going on in like minded churches at the moment. The REZ Band rocked The Resolution Conference a few years ago and again at the Baptist Union Assembly this year. I visited Free Grace Baptist Church earlier in the year and was completely blown away by the Brackenhurst Baptist Church choir. They really rocked! I’m loving the return to God glorifying praise and worthship.

Secondly I’m loving the unity I’m seeing in a number of like minded churches at the moment. I was chatting to Chris Woolley from Midrand Chapel (my sending church) on Monday and he noted that at no time in history has churches had to try and figure out how to exist within such a framework of splintered theological diversity than what we’re seeing in our day and age. Sunday night represented for me a coming together of those who have enough in common to sing together to God’s praise and glory; and there’s something cool about that.

I was encouraged. I will encourage my congregation to participate in the next event with much more vigor; and I’d encourage you to do the same *.

* There’s a post coming up soon regarding practical ways to put the unity we have in Christ on tangible display.

Churches in my city I would happily attend

Looking for a church in your area were the preaching is expository, the pastors are switched on and the doctrine is sound? These are the 9+ churches I’d attend. Click on any of the colored markers or hit the ‘View Larger Map’ tag.

View Larger Map

I’m really picky. If I know you and you’re not on the list it’s probably because I don’t know you well enough or because… well… you’re not a Calvinistic, Dispensationalistic, Lordship Salvationistic, Pre tribulational, Pre millennial, elder led, discipline practicing, believer baptising, fully dunking, expository teaching, Fundamentalistic, Cessationistic, Substitutionaryily Atonementistic… church. Towards the end I was just making stuff up;). The list is supposed to be polemic and I’ll be happy to hear about other churches I may have missed below.

The Great Big Blue Dot (Part 1)

Click here for Part 2 —>

Figure 1: The Great Big Blue Dot. Click image to enlarge.

Liezl, the kids and I attend a small church, Midrand Chapel, in the North of Johannesburg, South Africa.

Midrand Chapel isn’t exactly a descriptive label is it? Midrand covers a wide geographical area and comprises of many neighborhoods and the word Chapel conjures up images of some wishy-washy-anything-goes-pseudo-Christian wedding venue on the outskirts of town.

If you dug a bit deeper and took a squizz through our church constitution you’d discover we were formally called Midrand Baptist Church and we describe ourselves in the document as an “Independent Baptist church“.

What’s unique about Baptists anyway? Christo Beetge* from Brackenhurst Baptist Church sums it up quite nicely into 10 bite sized distinctives: The Direct Lordship of Christ, The Priesthood of All Believers, Congregational Accountability, The Authority and Sufficiency of the Bible, The Priority of Verbal Proclamation in Worship and Service, Regenerate Church Membership, Separation of Church and State, The Two Ordinances, The Autonomy of the Local Church and Freedom of Conscience.

Bottom-line, Baptists world over share a common set of identifiable doctrinal distinctives. Because of this most congregants attending Baptist‘ish [sic] churches think of themselves as belonging to The Great Big Blue Dot (see Figure 1). Metaphorically, anything inside the circle is Baptist, anything outside is not and the solid blue fill represents our unified doctrine. Simple.

The Great Big Shaded Dot. Click image to enlarge.

Actually it’s not so simple. Those identifying themselves as Baptists today, although agreeing on some central points of doctrine, differ widely from one another on many other matters of faith. Differences in Ecclesiology, Eschatology, Soteriology and Pneumatology for starters make us a fairly heterogenous bunch.

The image on top isn’t completely inaccurate but instead of one shade of blue Baptistdom in South Africa is more like The Great Big Shaded Dot (Figure 2) which acknowledges a broad’ish** range of Theological diversity which is how churches which cling to traditional Baptist tenants such as Rosebank Union, Honeyridge Baptist Church, Brackenhurst Baptist Church, Constantia Park Baptist Church, Antioch Bible Church, Grace Christian Church, New Covenant Baptist Church and even little old Midrand Chapel can co-exist in unified tension; held together but pushed apart; a mixed bag of fruit.

** While there is a plethora of diversity within the Union and beyond it is worth mentioning that the differences are nothing like the swath of division faced by other mainline denominations such as the Anglicans.

* The ariticle referenced in this post was written by Christo Beetge, formerly pastor of Springs Baptist Church, handles much of the counselling at the church. Christo also oversees the Young Adults ministry of the church. He is married to Maureen and has two children: Anton and Gillian.

Click here for Part 2 —>

Sunday’s Point to Ponder

This week at Midrand Chapel we turned our attention to the book of Malachi; God’s final Words to Israel before 400 years of silence.

Chris covered Chapters 1:1 – 5, God’s Accusation, The Peoples Objection and God’s Evidence. God’s faithfulness despite Israel’s scorn. The key verse 2b – 3a, “…I have loved Jacob, but I have hated Esau…” stands as a testimony to God’s bountiful grace lavished on a people who had done nothing to deserve it but were still recipients of it because of His sovereign election.

The quotable quote for me was, “God’s love for us is unconditional been rooted in His sovereign choice of us; it therefore does not depend on our worthiness and should not be doubted because of our circumstances.”

Chris Woolley has been an elder employed at Midrand Chapel since 2005. He is married with six children, three of whom have been adopted. Chris studied mechanical Engineering at WITS University during which time he became a Christian and developed a desire be involved in missions and church planting. After initially working as a Maintenance Engineer he resigned to further his theological studies. He is a graduate of the Baptist Theological College in Randburg (DipTh) and the Masters Seminary in California (MDiv).

Sunday’s Point to Ponder

Today’s sermon at Midrand Chapel broadly outlined the Doctrines of Sovereign Grace as laid out by Paul in Romans. Chris didn’t spare a punch as he covered depravity (1:18 – 23; 3:9 – 22), election (8:28 – 30; 9:9 – 18), atonement (2:23 – 26; 4:24 – 25; 5:18 – 21), grace (19:25 – 32) and perseverance (8:1 – 11).

The quotable quote of the day had to be, “Man’s depravity is not a great obstacle to the Gospel, it’s an insurmountable one.”

Chris Woolley has been an elder employed at Midrand Chapel since 2005. He is married with six children, three of whom have been adopted. Chris studied mechanical Engineering at WITS University during which time he became a Christian and developed a desire be involved in missions and church planting. After initially working as a Maintenance Engineer he resigned to further his theological studies. He is a graduate of the Baptist Theological College in Randburg (DipTh) and the Masters Seminary in California (MDiv).

The Sovereignty of God

The work of the creator, owner, architect, sustainer and king is truely awesome to behold. This is my first try of image manipulation with GIMP. What do you think? Click image to link to source.

This week, at Midrand Chapel, we looked at the Sovereignty of God, and boy, was it a sermon or what! Chris preached that as we stood back and viewed God for who He really is part of us might want to shake our fists at Him but an appropriate reaction, a right response, would be to bow down and worship Him, and indeed by God’s grace (or at His judgment) we all will.

There were 5 pity statements Chris made in the introduction of his sermon that I thought I’d write down and share,

God is the creator. Everything that exists outside of Him is His creation!

God is the owner. Everything that exists outside of Him is owned by Him!

God is the architect. Everything that exists outside of Him is designed by Him!

God is the sustainer. Everything that exists outside of Him draws life from Him!

God is the king. Everything that exists outside of Him is ruled by Him!

For more context consider these wise words from The Book,

¹⁰ In whose hand is the life of every living thing,
And the breath of all mankind?

¹³ …”With Him are wisdom and might;
To Him belong counsel and understanding.

¹⁴ “Behold, He tears down, and it cannot be rebuilt;
He imprisons a man, and there can be no release.

¹⁵ “Behold, He restrains the waters, and they dry up;
And He sends them out, and they inundate the earth.

¹⁶ “With Him are strength and sound wisdom,
The misled and the misleader belong to Him.

¹⁷ “He makes counselors walk barefoot
And makes fools of judges.

¹⁸ “He loosens the bond of kings
And binds their loins with a girdle.

¹⁹ “He makes priests walk barefoot
And overthrows the secure ones.

²⁰ “He deprives the trusted ones of speech
And takes away the discernment of the elders.

²¹ “He pours contempt on nobles
And loosens the belt of the strong.

²² “He reveals mysteries from the darkness
And brings the deep darkness into light.

²³ “He makes the nations great, then destroys them;
He enlarges the nations, then leads them away.

²⁴ “He deprives of intelligence the chiefs of the earth’s people
And makes them wander in a pathless waste.

²⁵ “They grope in darkness with no light,
And He makes them stagger like a drunken man.

Want to hear the verse in context? Job 8 – 14 What is this about?

Chris Woolley has been an elder employed at Midrand Chapel since 2005. He is married with six children, three of whom have been adopted. Chris studied mechanical Engineering at WITS University during which time he became a Christian and developed a desire be involved in missions and church planting. After initially working as a Maintenance Engineer he resigned to further his theological studies. He is a graduate of the Baptist Theological College in Randburg (DipTh) and the Masters Seminary in California (MDiv).