a blog about a blog...

I thought you might like to know that I have started a new blog... This blog that you are reading was designed to keep people informed about the happenings on the Biblebase websites but the new blog is more general in its scope. I have been encouraged by some to begin a kind of morning by morning devotional blog but I have been reluctant to take that route; it seemed a bit presumptious to think that I would have something relevant to add each day. Nevertheless, I do often have thoughts that I feel I would like to share with others. They are not ordered in any way but simply where I have 'gleaned today'. I have called it the Biblebase Second Thoughts blog and you can visit it by simply clicking that phrase. I suppose I could have called it 'Ron's Rambles' which was the unofficial title of a radio programme that I used to have.

If you visit Biblebase Second Thoughts and like what you see please make sure to 'subscribe' to that blog. That doesn't mean you have to pay anything but simply that whenever I do write a blog you will get an automatic message inviting you to come and read it. That way you don't have to come looking for the blog the blog will come looking for you. You can subscribe by clicking the 'follow this blog' option at the upper right hand part of the page.

The Biblebase Second Thoughts blog will also have a place where you can comment AND if you want to think more about that topic a link to the New Covenant Discussion Forum where you can 'think through' in the company of others, hopefully of like mind. See you soon?

Meanwhile back at the Base...

This catch-up is long overdue and as there has been quite a bit of activity on the website I thought it was time to put you in the picture again.

In the fellowship in Reading I conducted a series of Bible studies in 1st Corinthians on the theme of expressing the life of Christ in the local church. Corinth had wonderful beginnings with apostles, prophets, pastors and teachers. The believers had received spiritual gifts and were equipped to be 'God's People' in that city but things had gone badly wrong.  These studies trace the nature and purpose of a local church and the obstacles that stand in the way of its achieving of God's purpose. Matt Steed videoed the series and it is now available online in various forms.  You can also use the 'dynamic notes' which will give links to other sites and information.  We called the series...

Church Life Revisited 

Bob Oakley, one of the brothers in the church here, and myself have long been burdened about the number and quality of Bible versions which now circulate.  We did a series of studies to examine the nature of the Scriptures and their translation.  We concluded by looking at a selection of different versions in comparison. I would recommend this as a really useful starting point for consideration of this vital issue.  Currently you will find downloadable mp3s for the series at...

Which Bible?

...the videos and notes will be online very shortly.

We have also added numbers of M-other Tongue mp3s in Polish, Russian, Spanish, German and Romanian.  Please pass these URLs on to anyone you know who might benefit from them.  You will find a mini-menu at...

M-other Tongues.

and lastly, for this blog, I have begun a series of compilations on different themes. These are based on Dot Twivey's boxed sets of messages.  So far I have done two compilations... tell me what you think.

1. Choose Fire
   
2. Prayer

Do take a look at the Discussion Forums and mp3 downloads.

His/yours

Ron

Normal Service Resumed

Hi Everyone
Gary has managed to pacify the 'kernal' and all is sweetness and light again. Thanks Gary!!

So if you have wondered what all this is about, why not join us on the Biblebase Forums?

Meanwhile, back on earth...

HI There,

I'm afraid my blog is a very occasional event. I tend to use it as a noticeboard rather than a regular update of Biblebase. This posting is a case in point. If you have tried to access the forum recently you will have got a message something like...

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_CLONE, expecting T_STRING in /home/biblebas/public_html/ncw/kernel/object.php on line 528

I am not quite sure what the 'kernal' is 'objecting' to but I gather he doesn't expect 'cloning' and his preferences are more for Bach's Air on a T_String. I am not sure why he has chosen my Biblebase Forum to share his disappointments but until we find out what is really bugging him the Forums will not be functioning.

I will get back to you as soon as we have located the 'kernal' and resolved his problems. Thanks for listening.

His/yours
Ron Bailey

Tranquility Base here; the Eagle has landed...

...but not without a few ruffled feathers!!

We are now settled with our new host and this really gives us oodles of space to work in. The new style website is up and running and most (hopefully all...) the kinks have been ironed out. The next exercise is to think through how we can make the site 'higher profile'. I am not into competitive things but I wouldn't have spent the labours (or other people's labours) on the site if I didn't think we had something that ought to be made available. My 'guru' tells me that one of the most efficient ways of making the site more conspicuous is if folk 'link' to it. So if you have a site of your own or some influence over a site please consider putting in a link to www.biblebase.com

I have oodles (please note this technical term for future reference) of tapes which need to be digitised and lots of ideas for new projects. A close friend tells me I am good a 'starting' projects! In particular I want to get some of the materials from the Church Life School online; this is really unique content and I think could be particularly useful for folks in other cultures as one of the themes of the CLS was to distinguish between culture and Christianity.

Another growth area is likely to be M-other Tongues. This is a section given over to providing materials in other languages which have been created in the course of visits to other places. If you have friends who are German, Spanish, Polish, Romanian, Russian, or Greek speaking please point them in this direction. In the UK at present we have oodles of Polish migrant workers and I would love to see some of these materials in theirs hands.

It would also be a help to know which parts of the site you visit most frequently. Can you let us know which parts you think are helpful? More later... as always His/yours Ron.

Rare Vintage Recording discovered

In the mid 1960s I was able to meet and listen to W F P Burton, aka Willie Burton. He was already a legend in his own lifetime. Born in 1886 he went as an independent missionary to the Congo (now Zaire) in 1915 in the company of Jimmy Salter (who later married the daughter of Smith Wigglesworth). When he relinquished his responsibilities in the work 50 years later it had grown to hundreds of churches. His missionary work saw notable miracles and thousands of first time responses to the gospel.

The churches he founded were simple and indigenous. He refused to allow any titles other than 'elders' and 'deacons'. If you want an insight into apostolic missionary work get a copy of "God Working with Them"; the story of the first 18 years of pioneer mission in the Congo.

He was a man with a delightful sense of fun with children but with a steel backbone. My first experience was to hear him preaching in our Anglican church pulpit against the errors of infant sprinkling! He was a man of exceptional natural talents; an engineer, scientist, artist, linguist, musician, bible scholar. He was also a man of powerful spiritual gift. He conscioulsy dedicated it all to God and when he passed into glory, in 1971, he was travelling with all his wordly possessions in two suitcases; one for clothes and the other for his books.

I will see if I can 'dust down' this old recording and make it a little easier on the ear, but this is a must-hear opportunity to hear him telling his own story in 1968 in Staffordshire, UK. If you want to catch the flavour of those old time Pentecostals be sure to listen to Willie Burton's Testimony

We have a problem, Houston...

This famous laid-back communication of the Apollo 13 mission has been much in use over the last few days.

We have switched host-providers... twice... in that time and even now there a few kinks to be ironed out. Our current provider is based in 'Houston' hence our echo of the phrase.

Gary has been looking over their shoulder at every twist and turn of this saga but we are 'getting there'! The discussions forums are now up and running again. The Audio and pdf files should be there soon and the menues to follow. The front page isn't looking quite as swish as it should but the great news is that we have oodles of space and download capacity.

Please do remember us as you pray. We have stacks of materials that we want to make available and now we have the space to do it... now all we need is the time.

Did you know that we have all the time to do all that God wants us to do? We rest on thee and in thy name we go...

meanwhile back at the ranch...

We hit some insurmountable problems with our first host and have retreated a little the worse for wear. We are now in process of trying to get our stuff onto yet another host server. This seems to be going better but we have almost 15GB of files to transfer and this seems to be a slow process.

In the meantime please bear with us. The usual BibleBase URL will take you to our start up page with the new host so there is not much to look at there. I will do another blog when it is all up and running.

In the meantime you can be thinking about some of those topics... back soon, we trust.

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible...

Some will remember the early days of television with their many breaks in transmission and a static printed card which carried the title of this blog.

Normal service...
If you have been trying to take part in the discussions forum you will have found that it would not accept your posts. This is not a clever theological filtering system for rejecting rogue contributions but the consequence of having filled our quota on our server. The various parts of Biblebase have hit the ceiling for what we are allowed and so most things are quietly stalled at present. You should still be able to download audio and pdf files at the present time.

...as soon as possible?
I am in process of switching to another provider which will give us ample disk storage for the foreseeable future. Hopefully this will take place in the next day or two and I will do another blog then.

In the meantime my apologies for your frustrations... although frustration is always a call to prayer, so even this need not be wasted. ;-)

...and now with musical accompaniment

For the duration of the New Life Conference I am going to 'mirror' the morning meditations on Biblebase. If you would like to start your day with a bible meditation on 'the New Creation mirrored in the Old' you can visit Morning Meditations

This facility will only be available during the duration of the conference and will be taken off-line on 10th August.

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

Well, February 2005 at any rate and in a place called Reading in the UK... I launched a concept on the unsuspecting world... New Covenant Workshops.

The idea was to combine a day seminar with the power of a discussion group on the web. It was a modest beginning and it has taken some time to get a video of the event online, but its here at last. The two teaching seminars are now online and I will add the Q&A session and the evening meeting as soon as I can.

You will find a link at
Sin: its cause and cure.

You can then join any discussions on the discussion forums. The presentation and presenter are not likely to win any oscars but there is a beginning here of a vital topic and one that is fundamental, in my understanding, to the nature and glory of the New Covenant.

Joshua Series

Last year (2006) at the Rora House Conference Centre in Devon, UK I began a series of messages on the book of Joshua. It is good to remember that Jesus was never called Jesus by Mary but was called "Joshua". I can't help imagining what it was like for him as a child as he heard the stories of Joshua. Did he begin to sense his own destiny in the story of the man whose name meant "Jehovah-Saviour"?

As so often happens I got to the end of the 2006 Conference with more than I started with and had the thought at the back of my mind for a whole year that I would return to the book of Joshua.

This May (2007) I shared another Conference, this time with David Medlock, and returned to my subject of the the 'Book of Jesus' (ie Joshua). True to type I arrived at the end of this conference too with more than I began with, so we will have to see what happens next year... DV.

If you would like to listen to both series you can find them here, and if you want to ask any questions or discuss any of the sessions you can join us on the Biblebase Discussion Forums.

The Online Bible School

If you have taken a look at the Biblebase Online Bible School you will have seen that one of my ideas was to introduce 'visiting lecturers'. It is a fiction, of course. It is just a way of bringing other men and gifts into the Online Bible School resource.

One of the sections in the Biblebase Online Bible School is Pastoral Theology. This is my favourite area of theology and has to do with the way that our beliefs affect the way in which we live our lives, in the world, in our families and in the church. In the area of Family Life one vital area is that of marriage; its foundation, purpose and provisions. Enter 'John Piper' as a 'visiting lecturer'. Clicking on Pastoral Theology will take you to a menu and then choosing "Marriage, Christ and Covenant" will take you to a series of that name from John Piper.

This series is an uncompromising statement of biblical truth and one which thrills me to hear. I strongly recommend this series and will be glad to hear your reactions in our Discussion Forum.

I want to 'invite' other 'visiting speakers' to our Online Bible School so if you have any recommendations please let me know.

their sound went out into all the earth...

...a bit of an overstatement at present but this represents another long cherished thought.

The saints are scattered in many places and in some there is little opportunity for fellowship or to be under the 'sound' of the Word of God. I want to add to this small beginning from other preachers and teachers and give the folks in other countries access to another precious resource.

Over many years friends and colleagues have traveled to many countries to preach and teach and this page is the beginning of a project to gather some good grain into accessible garners.

At present it is mostly from Poland but do watch this space... the sound went out...

The Legacy: Christie Costigan

This is something of a quite different nature to anything I have put on my sites previously.

In 2006 Christie Costigan 'went home'. She was the daughter of Sandy and Beth Robertson and had been diagnosed with terminal cancer. In the February of 2005 she had given a testimony to the exercises of heart she had passed through since her diagnosis. She left a husband and two young childred ...and an amazing legacy.

That was her own description. Faced with the prospect of an early death her prevailing thought was of her life's significance to others. She wanted to leave a legacy; and she has. This short testimony is a credit to the God she loved and served.

You will be moved and greatly blessed by The Legacy

Workman Workshops Launch

One of my original ideas for this website was to reproduce some work which had been done in what I called Workman Workshops. These were occasional weekend Bible Schools where we studied some Bible book or topic together. I prepared take-away notes and the sessions were recorded with a view to some kind of publication later.

I have now completed the first of these and if you would like to see and hear more please go to Workman Workshops and choose "Studies in Colossians". You will then be able to download, freely, both the notes and the recorded sessions. This is not swish professional stuff but I think it will be good enough to be servicable.

Please do let me know what you think. I will create another section on the Discussion Forum specifically for Workman Workshops so please feel free to ask questions or to comment.

Keeping a promise

It has been a long time since I added to the Biblebase blog but this is to keep a promise. One of the 'departments' of Biblebase is Workman Workshops, these are units of studies which were prepared for various groups at different times. I promised to let you know when I added more units to the list, so here we go...

In 1995 I did a residential Week-End Bible School at Rora House in Devon. The topic was Paul's letter to the Colossians. I want to add these kinds of resources to the site and I have created a 40 page pdf file of the notes which accompanied the studies. I want to get the audio files up as soon as possible but in the meantime if you would like to see what we have available so far...

please try Workman Workshops and then choose the "Studies in Colossians" option. More soon, hopefully.

and now... PODCASTS!

What are podcasts? Well, in effect, podcasts are like a radio programme that you can listen to at your own convenience of time and place. Secondly, you can subscribe, freely, to a podcast and automatically pick up the next 'programme' in the series when it becomes available.

So, if you use an iPod or iTunes, its a single decision and then you just sit back and the guy hidden in the boiler-room does all the work. Even if you don't use iTunes you can still listen to them on your computer or mp3 player.

I'm starting with a re-launch of the Abraham, my Friend series which first saw the light of day on www.sermonindex.net and where you can still find the original text versions. The place to start is Biblebase Podcasts, click the word 'Podcasts' on the topline menu and then just follow the intstructions.

Why not give it a try and let me know what you think?

Back from Bhutan

Back safe and sound and much blessed to have had a share in what God is doing in Bhutan. My health seems fine although I have one more test due in January. Thanks for your enquiries and prayers.

I have just added another blog. Biblebase and the Purpose Driven Life. I will add a subscription option when I can remember how to do it. If this interests you take a look and comment in the Biblebase Discussion Forum.

I'm still here...

It's been a while so I thought I would just break radio silence and take the opportunity to request your prayer.

Last Thursday while conducting a Bible Study at Epsom UK I had what was almost certainly a TIA or mini stroke. I spent a couple of hours in the Epsom A&E and then part of the next day with my GP. I am due tomorrow and Thursday to undergo a series of clinical tests to see exactly what happened and how to prevent another. I am pretty well back to normal now although a little tired.

My request for prayer is due to the special fact that on 8th November I am due to travel to a remote Himalayan kingdom until 23rd November. The tests undertaken this week will all be part of making final decisions.

I am well in myself and rejoicing in the love and care of the saints.