Later this month Jim Packer will be in the UK, speaking at various places on his experiences with the Church of Canada and the future of Global Anglicanism. If you’re down near Sussex then why not come along to Holy Trinity Eastbourne at 7.45pm on the 24th June. The title of his address is ‘Lessons to be learned from the Canadian Church Experience’.

If you’re in London, then he’ll be speaking on the 1st July at All Souls, you need to get in touch with All Souls to book in for that event. I’m sure he’ll be doing some other talks round the country, leave a comment if you know where and when.

There’s only 150 tickets left for the Dwell Conference happening on Saturday 12th July in Central London. It’s for anyone interested in church planting in whatever form that takes. Speakers are Mark Driscoll, Scott Thomas and Steve Timmis, and it will cost you the bargain price of £21. To hear what kind of things go on you can listen to talks from Dwell New York conference from the Acts29 Network. Sign up for your tickets now from the Good Book Company!

You may well be in the middle of exams, you may have finished, either way I need to let you know about a great little resource from the Good Book Company called ‘Don’t Panic!‘. DP is written by Martin Cole and Andrew Roycroft and is essentially a 4-week Bible study guide to help you through exams.

The main ‘feature’ of the booklet is 4 weeks of very short Bible study / devotional times, with the aim of helping us to focus and trust in Christ at difficult times. The studies are simple and help to get our priorities sorted. We start in Nehemiah, go to the Gospels, Psalms, 1 Peter, Colossians and a few other passages here and there. They’re not deep studies going through whole books or chapters, but simple thoughts to get us to put God at the centre when there’s plenty of stressful things competing for our attention.

Each week also includes both a revision timetable and prayer diary to fill in. The booklet is very easy to keep with you during your revision and easy to turn to at any time. There’s also 3 Su Doku, and some word puzzles, the latter were too difficult for me, but it makes for a better revision break than Facebook! There’s also some short articles about how to revise and how to cope with the stress that exams bring, and an interview with a real student, particularly helpful because it’s so honest and down to earth!

Criticisms - I think the cover looks silly, and it would be nice to have the Bible passages printed in the booklet so you can be out revising and not have to carry a big Bible as well. But these are minor things, basically this is a great idea, not one that’s been done before to my knowledge, and it’s been done really well - clear, simple, biblical and God-focused. If you’re a student get it! If you’re a parent, get it for your kids! If you’re a teacher buy it for Christian students you know! If you’re a youth leader, get copies for everyone in your youth group! If you’re involved in running a CU, why not invest in a few copies for your members?

It’s a real bargain at £2.50, and the usual discounts are available if you’re buying in bulk for a group or if you have a UCCF Student Card. I’m hoping there’ll be a new edition out for next year, with new studies perhaps, new puzzles, new articles? News coming soon about some new Bible reading notes from the Good Book Company…

Here’s a few bits and bobs that have been happening in the life of Hugh…

1. Exams are finished! Results on 20th June.
2. I bought a car! A 2005 Citroen C2, in Navy Blue. I spent £5000 on it which seemed reasonable, but then I had to pay £700 to insure it, £120 to tax it, and £40 to fill the petrol tank!
3. Did an apologetics talk at the Medical Christian Union - “Isn’t the Bible full of errors?”
4. My university cricket team has made it to the quarter finals of the national BUSA competion, playing Luton tomorrow, unfortunately I can’t play in this match (see below).
5. I’m currently suffering with tonsillitis, so I’m sitting around, not doing much, gargling paracetamol and sucking on Soleros.

So here’s the latest news on New Word Alive 2009…

A new website has been launched with all the info on.

First, a correction on what I said a few weeks ago, New Word Alive 2009 will be in Pwhelli, NOT Prestatyn, as far as I know the Pwhelli site wanted us back and made a better offer than Prestatyn, which is annoying because Pwhelli is sooo far away!

There are still two weeks:

30th March - 4th April… mainly for students and adults without children (there is a crèche I believe)

4th April - 9th April… mainly for adults, families, young people

In week 1, the main speaker will be Vaughan Roberts. In week 2 it will be Liam Golligher.

Also, because they obviously loved it so much Don Carson and Terry Virgo will be back, proving the rumour that Richard Cunningham has a crush on Terry Virgo… or not.

Booking lines open on the 16th June for week 1, and on the 23rd June for week 2.

See you there!!

A few conferences have been happening recently, check out the audio…

Dwell New York -   Driscoll, Keller, Mahaney, Stetzer

New Attitude 2008 - Harris, Piper, Dever, Mohler, Mahaney

Basics 2008 -   Begg, Bridges, Getty, Bauchman, Challies

Together 4 the Gospel -   Piper, Duncan, MacArthur, Dever, Mohler, Anyabwile, Sproul, Mahaney

…and next week is Resolved 2008 with Piper, MacArthur, Mahaney and others!

Here’s a little video produced by UCCF for the final night at NWA. If you want to understand the Bible from beginning to end and only have 3 minutes, this is a good place to go!

Currently going up online are a series of video interviews between Adrian Warnock, and Don Carson, John Piper and presumably Terry Virgo. You can see them on the Youtube UCCFMedia page. Here’s my favourite little bit, last part of Piper, there’s a question in here that I submitted to Adrian, all about longevity in ministry…

Exciting news about Mark Driscoll’s visit to England in July…

Originally I thought he was just going to be at the New Frontiers conference in Brighton, ‘Together on a Mission’ - this is happening 8-11th July… anyway I’m booked in for that, good times.

But there’s some more stuff happening too…

On the 11th July, at 8pm there’s going to be an evening session with Mark Driscoll at St. James’ Clerkenwell, entitled “Driscoll Unleashed in the UK” a nice title!

The next day, Saturday 12th July, he’ll be speaking at the ‘Dwell London - Grace for the City‘… this is a day conference on church planting, and he’ll be speaking alongside Steve Timmis from Crowded House and Scott Thomas from Acts 29 Network. It’s 9.30am - 4.45pm at St. Pauls, Robert Adam street, near to All Souls Langham Place. Tickets are £20 and are available from the Good Book Company. Here’s the programme for the day event:

• Session 1: Gospel of grace vs Religion of works - Driscoll
• Session 2: Preaching Jesus - Timmis
• Session 3: The church planter as a minister of grace - Thomas
• Session 4: Planting communities of grace - Timmis
• Session 5: Am I a church planter? - Driscoll

On the Sunday, 13th July, Driscoll will be preaching at Jubilee Church, Enfield in the morning and at Church of Christ the King, Brighton in the evening.

I don’t know if he’s got any more bookings, but that seems a fair amount to me!

Also… the Good Book Company are now selling copies of Vintage Jesus, £13 - that’s £9.75 if you’ve got a UCCF card!

My mum passed into glory 8 days ago. Here are some words she was reading recently and wanted to be read at her funeral.

You are taking down my earthly tent with much tenderness and love. You have prepared a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. May you never leave me nor forsake me, ’till I be with you, where you are, and be like Christ and enjoy him for ever and ever! Yet a very, very little while - hold on, faith and patience - and I shall see Jesus in his glory, which is the heaven of heavens. - William Romaine

She was also able to choose some songs; ‘See what a morning’ and ‘The Lord’s my Shepherd’…

And we are raised with Him,
Death is dead, love has won,
Christ has conquered;
And we shall reign with Him,
For He lives, Christ is risen from the dead!