911 and New Lynn Mall
Good Morning and Welcome to this week’s Gospel and Culture update, by Alan Vink
9/11 and New Lynn Mall
Monday 13th September 2021
The purpose of this weekly ‘Gospel and Culture’ blog is to assist pastors and Christian leaders to quickly understand ‘key’ issues of the day and how they might intersect with the Gospel, Church and with Christianity generally. It is essentially a ‘curated’ blog that raises between one and three current issues and directs you the reader to a reliable article, podcast and/or a website for further reading. It is my contribution to help us ‘think Christianly’ and to develop a Christian world-view. Jesus prayed for us in John 17, “I’m not asking you, Father, to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one………make them holy by your truth”.
9/11
The images on TV over the weekend have been once again very confronting. Talk about a vivid memory. My son Brendan, who was in Boston working as a camp counsellor 20 years ago, called me at 2.00am in the night to tell me two aeroplanes had crashed into the Twin Towers in New York. “Dad, go and turn the TV on – I’m not having you on”. I did exactly that and that was the start of a day I will never forget……… a day, a week, a month, a year, the rest of my life.
It was a day that started me on a journey to better understand Islam, jihad and fundamentalism on the one hand and the peace loving Muslims living as my neighbours on the other.
Here is a 65 minute conversation with Dr Mark Durie about Islam and Afghanistan. If you want to understand more about what is happening in Afghanistan, how events there fit into the broader Muslim world, and what some implications for the rest of the world might be, this conversation is worth your time. Mark is a globally recognised scholar on Islam. Additionally Mark is an Anglican pastor in Melbourne and has had a very fruitful ministry amongst Iranians who are Muslims and seeing many coming to Christian faith.
And here is a very sobering article from Christianity Today titled, “Why 9/11 Brought Neither Unity Nor Revival”.
From everything I can deduce the exact same thing can be said about the Mosque attacks in Christchurch on March 15th 2019.
The Terrorist Attack at New Lynn Mall
Prof Andrew Geddis writes (5mins), in answer to the question, Why Not Just Send The Auckland Terrorist Back? “To simplify matters, the primary roadblock was that his status as an ISIS-inspired militant meant that if he were sent back to Sri Lanka (the only place that he could be deported to), there was a real danger of authorities there torturing him”. Talk about a legal conundrum!
Alan Vink is currently the Executive Director for LeadershipWorx. Prior to this role he has been the Executive Director of Willow Creek Association NZ (WillowNZ), a Baptist pastor (23 years), Bible College teacher, and church consultant.
