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Listed below are links to a range of resources that we hope you will find useful. Some of these resources may reflect a theological or doctrinal position a little different from our own. However, we believe that some diversity of opinion is healthy within any community, provided that it remains committed to the fundamentals of the Christian faith.

For members of the Gold Street community only, this link leads to our page of resources specifically for you. The password that you need to enter this page is printed in the Sunday news sheet, or is available on request from the website administrator.

Please contact us with any comments, or with your suggestions for additional material that we can list on this page.

Blogs

These blogs provide thought-provoking commentaries on current issues. Most of them also link to other blogs and material that they consider to be of value.

  • Pyromaniacs, taking their name from Jeremiah 23:29, speak from an American conservative evangelical perspective. This provides an interesting perspective on the Christian community across the Atlantic.
  • Terry Virgo speaks from within the Newfrontiers church movement,
  • as does Adrian Warnock.
  • Tim Challies is another American worth reading.
  • Sam Storms is an American minister who calls himself (a little provocatively!) a Christian hedonist.
  • Here is one for those with a particular concern for worship
  • Mark Lauterbach is senior pastor at a church in San Diego, California
  • Heat and light describes itself as "an online resource for Reformed Charismatics, Pentecostal Calvinists, & Empowered Evangelicals". How would you describe yourself?

Articles and on-line books

  • CCEL provides on-line access to a great many Christian classics from past centuries.
  • G. K. Chesterton wrote many books, including a number dealing with his Christian faith.
  • The Jubilee Centre, based locally in Cambridge, "seeks to connect the world of the Bible with the world of contemporary society". Some of the papers and articles are a challenging read, but there's a lot of worthwhile material here.
  • The "Desiring God" website (see below) has a section devoted to on-line books
  • Here is another website with a selection of on-line books
  • Yale University recently made available all the published works of Jonathan Edwards. He was a pastor in North America during the early 1700's and was much involved in the widespread revivals that took place during those years.

Audio (spoken word)

  • Sydney Anglicans (yes, in Australia!) maintain a site of interesting material.
  • Sermons from Holy Trinity Church in Raleigh, North Carolina (USA)
  • Saffron Planet is not based in Saffron Walden, but did win an award last year for the UK's "favourite Christian website"! It features podcasts of discussions covering a range of topics from a Christian point of view.
  • The White Horse Inn is an American radio talk show featuring regular round-table discussions on faith, culture and apologetics.
  • bethinking.org is a site run by the UCCF, a Christian student support organisation, containing many talks relating the Christian faith to contemporary culture
  • A list of talks given by John Piper (see below).
  • This one is for the men! The hazards of being a man looks at a range of temptations to which men in particular are vulnerable.
  • Talks from Grace Chapel, Lexington, MA (USA)
  • And talks from Park Street Church, this time in Boston, MA
  • Christian Audio both sells Christian audio books, and also provides links to podcasts and other free material.

Music

  • Buy Christian music from Fishtank creatives, featuring music by Phatfish and others.
  • Robin Mark lives in Belfast with his wife and children. He is Director of worship at his home church there, working during the week as a specialist in acoustics. Several in the Gold Street community have recommended his music as something out of the ordinary. It spans a range of musical styles, but much of it uses traditional Celtic instruments such as the penny whistle, uilleann pipes and bodhran drum. One of his albums, "Revival in Belfast", has become a worldwide best-seller during the last decade. A list of all his albums may be found here.
  • If you would just like to browse, you might enjoy a visit to Cross Rhythms, an online music store with a wide range of Christian music. The website contains samples of many tracks from listed CDs.

Websites

  • WordLive contains a range of resources from Scripture Union for personal and group Bible study.
  • Equipped for Living exists "to communicate the timeless truth of the Bible to equip Christians to live as wholehearted followers of Jesus Christ".
  • Christians in Science aim to show that it is possible to be both a committed Christian and a scientist. Their website contains many written and audio resources covering a range of scientific topics from a Christian perspective (and sometimes vice versa!)
  • TalkOrigins is a site that not only presents issues around the creation/evolution controversy from a mainstream scientific view, but also provides links to corresponding young earth / anti-evolution sites so that individuals can undertake a reasoned exploration of the facts and issues.
  • Desiring God contains a range of resources from the ministry of John Piper, the pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
  • Enjoying God comes from another American minister, emphasising the possibility that the Christian life is to be enjoyed!
  • bethinking.org does not just offer audio resources (see above) but also a great deal of textual material
  • theologynetwork.org is a companion site to the above, but with a more theological slant
  • Renovaré is an initiative dedicated to spiritual renewal, and was started by Richard Foster (see below). Its website contains a range of resources for developing the spiritual life.

Book reviews

  • Eat this book "Eat this Book: The Art of Spiritual Reading" by Eugene Peterson This author is probably best known for his paraphrase of the Bible, "The Message". For many years as a pastor, he has sought to make the Bible more meaningful to the members of his church. Now in this book, he encourages us to read our Bibles so as 'to bring us into the presence of God and to change our lives'.
    He explores an approach which he describes as 'participatory reading; receiving the words in such a way that they become interior to our lives; the rhythms and images becoming practices of prayer, acts of obedience, ways of love'. We are reminded that the original 'word of God' was spoken, not written, and communicated in the common everyday speech of the people.
    Peterson challenges us not to pass over even familiar passages, but like a dog with a bone to stay with them and explore them so that they become a part of us, forming a life within us that is 'congruent with the world that God has created, the salvation that he has enacted, and the community that he has gathered'.
    This book has encouraged me to take my reading of the Bible more seriously. While we often read simply in order to understand, it is more challenging but also much more rewarding to explore its meaning until it starts to change our attitudes and behaviour.