Monthly Archives: December 2018

New daily devotional and online Bible course launches

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FAITH NEWSWIRE – A revolutionary new daily devotional and online course, aimed at helping Christians get closer to God, has just launched.

Tech entrepreneur Andy Schick has taken content developed by his grandfather over 40 years and 3 generations to develop Knowing God, a daily devotional and fully integrated online course.

Knowing God is a daily devotional that takes members on a four year journey through the Bible, chronologically. Delivered through a daily online bible study program, members of the group start and journey through the program at the same time, getting to know one another, discussing, encouraging and sharing their learning journey together.
Knowing God also consists of 19 paperback and Kindle editions.

As a former Hillsong College student, as well as having been involved two churches in New Zealand, Andy not only saw the opportunity to publish the printed guides, but also had the technical ability to develop the online component.

“This project is very close to my heart,” Andy stated. “A daily devotional that my grandfather spent 20 years of his life writing, it is exciting to see it hit the marketplace. Knowing God takes the reader on a four year journey through the Bible. It is a really unique mix of expositional and personal devotion teaching for the Christian who wants to go deeper in their bible.

“Whilst we live in and have adapted to a hyper-connected environment, we still have traditional expectations of what the Bible should look like, which can put us on a path of dis-engagement and guilt. In my opinion, quiet times aren’t always meant to be hidden or alone, and devotions aren’t meant to just be personal. Exploring the Bible can also be done in community, with people who can encourage us, support us, share their revelations and learnings with us, get curious with us and keep us accountable. That’s why I created Knowing God.

Instead of watering down the deep content that my Grandfather created to make it more ‘accessible’ to today’s audience, I decided to make it easier to go deep into God’s word by creating an encouraging and collaborative community where there is a sense of belonging. I believe there is a genuine hunger to know God in a deeper and more intimate way, but many people need to be taken on a journey, and a community to journey with.

“The other unique element is that we have set it up so online classes go through the material together, so they can learn together in community, ask questions of each other, and encourage each other when the journey gets tough.”

Each day, those doing the online course are sent their study for the day, either by email address or Facebook Messenger. They receive a Bible passage to read, as well as related teaching. Members don’t need a physical bible or need to switch to a different app; they can read the bible passage directly from the study page, including switching between a range of translations.

Course members can study each page, as well as highlight anything they like, saving it to their journal for review and reflection at a later date. They can also comment and discuss particular passages with the community.

Each day after the reading, members are asked to contribute to the group what they thought, learned, wondered or questioned. They are then asked to find at least two other contributions from others, replying to them with useful thoughts or words of encouragement.

Members also receive days of reflection and review, whilst being encouraged to put their thoughts into the community. Outside of the daily bible study comments and encouraging replies, members can join a private Knowing God Facebook Group, deepening their connection and sense of community along the way.

For more information, or to join, visit www.knowing-god.co .

Family suicide leads author to express her journey from anguish to healing

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FAITH NEWSWIRE – On a dark Tuesday night in June 2006, Debby Curreen’s youngest brother took his own life. Driving to his favourite beach, he parked his car and left this earth. Such was the anguish of this event in her life, Debby Curreen, the author of The Long Cold Nights of June, healed her pain through writing.

“I was notified by the police the following day and I had to go with them to make the formal identification of my little brother, whose body was now laying cold and silent at the local undertaker,” says Debby.

“That day, in an instant, my life cracked and I fell into a pit full of never-before imagined pain, and a frightening darkness of anguish and confusion. The grief overwhelmed me, and my journey back to a life that was now forever altered, seemed unending.

In talking to God, her brother, her dogs and herself, and struggling to make sense of suicide and a life that no longer had her beautiful brother in it, she would go home exhausted and sleep, then write her thoughts out.

The Long Cold Nights of June is the result of her heart being poured out in a remarkable poetry book.

“At times I feared I would never again see the light of another happy day,” she said, “but my hopes in God, and of course the fierce love I held for my family, became my sole purpose for living.
 It was at this time that I began to write again as I daily walked my brother’s two beautiful boxer dogs, who were now mine, along the roadside by our home.

“Gradually life began to settle down and time slowly healed my shattered heart and broken mind. Many dear friends pulled and pushed me through the darkest times of my life with their love and unceasing belief in me. I will be eternally grateful for them all.”

Debby agrees that grief is messy and unpredictable to manage. There is no right way to grieve and no magical timeframe where you suddenly emerge from a dark tunnel into bright and happy day.

“When a loved one dies through suicide,” she says, “it is unlike any other grief and is in fact, trauma. You have nightmares, you cry continually; sleep is elusive and your substance/s abuse becomes infinitely harder to control. I remember going from being a non-smoker to a chain-smoker overnight.

“My memory of those first six months is a time of continual chain-smoking and drinking coffee to stave off unpredictable bouts of crying and near screaming. At night I would drink enough wine or beer to fall asleep, only to wake in the middle of the night crying or gasping from the frightening nightmares that would wake me up.”

Debby’s hope in sharing her poems of grief, pain, denial, bargaining and hope is that people who have lost loved ones to suicide may be able to relate to her words and that they will help in some way to heal.

“Eventually, thank God, we do find acceptance and we do move on, but we never forget and we never stop missing our loved ones,” she continues. “All of these stages of grief fade with time and life slowly returns to a different ‘normal’, but a peaceful one where you can accept your darling’s fated decision to say goodbye on their terms.”

To order The Long Cold Nights of June, email the author on tlcnj2018@gmail.com, or connect with her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/milliepariri.writes.

Abortion is a Crime Against Humanity, Not a Fundamental Human Right

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FAITH NEWSWIRE – On December 10, various liberal Democrats introduced a bill, the Reproductive Human Rights Act which would require the U.S. State Department to include abortion on demand and other reproductive rights in its annual Human Rights Report.

110,000 Americans believe that abortion is a crime against humanity, not a fundamental human right. See www.themoraloutcry.com. These Americans have signed a petition to the U.S. Supreme Court asking them to reverse its abortion cases. Allan Parker, Attorney for The Moral Outcry Petition, stated: “If you believe abortion is a crime against humanity, you can sign the Petition at www.themoraloutcry.com.”

These signers are calling upon the Supreme Court to reverse its abortion decisions because abortion is a crime against humanity just like the Dred Scott decision that African Americans could not be citizens under the Constitution was a crime against humanity. A crime against humanity occurs when the government withdraws legal protection from a class of human beings.

The petition drive is a part of a national campaign which has already filed two Amicus Curiae (Friend of the Court) Briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court and which ultimately provides a legal justification for reversing Roe v. Wade. The legal reasons in the Petition are based on the Law of Judicial Precedent, a book which was co-authored by Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch before they were placed on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Section 47(d) says that one of the reasons for overturning a Supreme Court decision is if it has been met with “severe criticism”. Obviously, Roe is one of the most severely criticized and controversial decisions in American history.

The five reasons in the Petition for reversing Roe are:

1. New Argument that Abortion is a Crime Against Humanity

2. New scientific evidence shows Life Begins at Conception

3. New scientific evidence and testimonies show Abortion Hurts Women

4. New, better alternative to abortion –Safe Haven Laws (www.nationalsafehavenalliance.org)

5. New – a million people are waiting to Adopt Healthy Newborn Infants

Contact: Allan E. Parker, Jr., J.D.
Tel. (210) 614-7157
info@txjf.org