One of New Zealand’s most successful music exports returned over the last few months, with multiple singles ushering in her sophomore album. Eleanor has a listen (or 5) and gives us some thoughts on each track.
Track 1: Green Light Continue reading
Check out part 1 here.
Speaker and author Rob Bell has a weekly podcast which includes discussion on all facets of like, often with some very high caliber guests. Continue reading
Where to from here? That’s what many of us might be thinking after our event last week on Common Prayer. So we at the Grace Collective thought it would be helpful to share some tools with you to begin with as you delve deeper into different ways of enriching your prayer life. It’s by no means comprehensive. In fact it’s rather a small list. But our prayer is that it would be the beginning of a journey for you into different ways of praying alone or together which will enliven and strengthen your relationship with God. We hope you find them helpful. Continue reading
Prayer is a beautiful thing. When we pray we are participating in Jesus’ relationship with the Father through the Holy Spirit. We enter the Triune dance between Father, Son, and Spirit of God through Jesus who is our Great High Priest, sitting at the right hand of the Father and making a way for humanity to come back to a relationship with God. There is so much going on in a conversation with God that we don’t always have the capacity to acknowledge all at once, but in this short piece I want to remind us of two elements in this transcendent and yet very grounded practice at the heart of our faith. Spirituality and mission are intrinsically connected, and for today’s cold, anxious, groaning world, the slowness, silence, and solitude of the contemplative spiritual practices of the monastics is good news. Continue reading
One small thing,
At the same time,
Every day,
With gratitude in your hearts.
A dear friend of mine once shared with me this mantra. A friend who carries with her sixty years of discovering what it means to engage with a God who cares deeply for his people. She often spoke to me about the franticness of life and how the “glorification of busy” robs us of the deep fulfilment God longs to soak us in. For her, praying is constant, simple, and sincere. But I think she’d say it’s much more about listening, than telling God what she wants. This friend lives in a closeness to Jesus that is infectious. Not that she is never worried, or tired, or annoyed, but that she somehow walks through these human experiences evidently close to God. It intrigued me. So I asked her once, What’s the trick? How do you spend time with God? I kind of expected her to give some vague answer which was really just a question back at me, in that mysterious way that intriguing people like to answer curious questions. But this time she didn’t. Continue reading
Following the last year’s Lent Calendar, the Auckland Diocese have launched a Resurrection Calendar, beginning on Palm Sunday and continuing the resurrection story through to Pentecost. The calendar includes video, audio, practical tasks and reflections to help you go deeper into the story after Easter.
Two weeks ago we gathered together in our new venue (!!!) for the first time in 2017. The topic was ‘Post-Truth’, what it looks like to follow a God of truth when the truth seems to be so blurry these day (see: alternative facts and fake news), or when truth seems to matter less in light of people’s emotions. Continue reading
Eleanor has a listen through Ed Sheeran’s new album ‘divide’ and reviews each track: Continue reading
For a number of years now I’ve loved the Karl Barth quote about how we as Christians are called to hold the “Bible in one hand, and the newspaper in the other.” I think it holds a number of ideas pertinent to living as the people of God in 2017.
We believe that the scriptures reveal truths about who God is, but also about how he calls us to live as his peculiar and redeemed people. Continue reading
The Grace Collective 