Missionaries living in parts of the world where missions are not welcome are rightly concerned about their internet traffic being intercepted, but what about you, do you care if someone else can read your email or the content of every web page you visit?
It has recently come to light that some of the UK's biggest internet service providers including BT, Virgin Media and Talk Talk are sending details of all web traffic to a company called Phorm. That includes everything you bring onto your web page such as web mail etc. The only thing safe from Phorm's eyes is data transferred using a secure protocol e.g. bank websites, payment pages etc. Of course Phorm make all kinds of promises that they do not store any personal information etc. but the disturbing thing is that ISP's seem to be able to do this without your explicit permission.
More info here.
Update 12 April Following significant pressure from consumers, it seems that the Information Commissioner is going to require ISPs to ask their customers to opt-in to allow their browsing information to be sent off to sites like Phorm
ER has a new chaplain, but sadly she seems to be short on answers:
HT: David Couchman
{mosimage}I was preaching on the Spirit of Truth this morning from Luke 16:5-15. I drew attention to the new BBC mini series The Passion which begins on BBC 1 (or as it now seems to be called BBC one) tonight at 8pm. I was questioning what weight the BBC would give to the historical truth as recorded by the eyewitness accounts of the gospel writers versus the concerns of political correctness and entertainment value. At this point I had the wonderful experience of someone actually speaking up and contributing from the congregation – oh that it would happen more – pointing out that today the Sunday Telegraph are giving away free copies of Luke's gospel with every paper. Wow – whatever next! Let's pray that the Spirit of Truth will speak to many as they read the Word of God and lead them into the light of the truth!
Wayne Leman at the Better Bibles blog has written a helpful article showing how familiar wordings in the Bible may actually be unnatural and why this is a problem. Here's a short extract to encourage you to read the whole article:
Overuse of unnatural wordings for rhetorical effect desensitizes us and
a desired effect is lost. If English Bibles are filled with unnatural
wordings, readers get from those Bibles the wrong sense about the
messages they are reading. Instead of being intellectually or
emotionally or volitionally challenged by the unnatural, the unusual,
the unique turn of phrase, we become too familiar with them if they are
overused. And familiarity can not only breed the proverbial contempt,
but it can also create within readers a sense that God is distant, he
doesn't talk our language, he isn't really interested in incarnation.
And that is exactly the wrong message we want to have connoted by Bible
translations. God not only incarnated himself to bring salvation to
mankind, but he also incarnated messages he wanted communicated to
mankind through normal human languages.
{mosimage} Hannah Grace was born today at 7.50am only 50 minutes after we arrived at the hospital. She weighed 6lb 11.5oz (just over 3Kg). Margo and Hannah were both able to come home this afternoon. Both are doing very well. As you can imagine our other children are all very excited at having a new baby sister. It was great for me to come from the hospital and lead the service in church this morning.
Apologies for not letting you know before that our move went well – it took weeks to get our phone and internet reconnected! Our new address is 124 Oaktree Crescent, Bradley Stoke, Bristol BS32 9AB and our phone number is 01454 610840. We have also found a new seven seater car which we should be getting later in the week – its a Kia Sedona.
Thanks for all who have been faithfully praying about all our changes. The Lord has truly granted us grace upon grace!
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