Hey, two posts in one day! Must be some kind of achievement (for me anyway).

I’ve recently installed this realy useful little Gnome panel applet called sshMenu. Once installed and set up it gives you direct access to all your ssh sessions from a menu on the Gnome panel. Here’s how to install it on Ubuntu 8.10 as that is my current distro:

sudo apt-get install sshmenu sshmenu-gnome

then just add the application to the Gnome panel by right-clicking the panel and choosing ‘Add to panel’ then select the sshMenu application from the list. I had to restart Gnome (CTRL-ALT-BACKSPACE) after the installation before it showed up in the add to panel list.

Sorry for the lack of updates recently, I’ve been working on some projects at church and work has been very busy with the new enrolment and changes throughout the University IT department, I should be in a new position before the end of the year and in a better position to keep up to date with this blog. As for Church, I’ve completed the first module of my Theology qualification, it’s been alot of hard work but most definatly worth it. Also there’s a new Church website which is almost finished, just a little bit of polishing to do there and I’m now the leader of the Friday night youth club for secondary school kids called Rock Club. (The younger group is called Pebbles and the older bible study group is called Bolder, kind of a play on words). Whew, thats all for now, new updates coming soon!

What is at the core of Christianity? There have been several books over the years trying to answer that question, most famously Mere Christianity by CS Lewis, he of Narnia fame. (A strongly recommended read). Here’s a breakdown of the four key areas of truth that a person needs to know to be saved. This is a brief summary of each of the key points. I’ll try to expand on each a little over each soon.

God

God is our creator; he fashioned the whole of creation out of nothing and created the human race through Adam and Eve who rebelled against Him. God is Holy and Just; this means that he is different to us, set apart and that he is the final authority on Justice, what is right and what is wrong. God is also Loving and Merciful; He loves and cares for his creation, even in our rebellious state. God has spoken in the past to men who faithfully recorded His words and actions in history. God’s spoken word comes to us in the form of the Bible

Sin

Sin is anything that is against God, words, actions and thoughts. Because God is Just he has laid out in His word what is right and what is wrong. Sin is a nature that is within us, it’s something we’re born with, inherited from our ancestors who rebelled against God. Sin is also a practice, that nature causes us to think and act in ways that are contrary to God. Because God is Just He has said that sin must be punished.

Jesus Christ

Jesus Christ is God, specifically God the Son, part of the trinity. At the same time He is also Man. Because He is God, Jesus is perfect, He never sinned, not even once. Jesus died for sinners. He took the punishment from God for our sin. Jesus was raised to life and He’s coming back to take his people to heaven.

The Way of Salvation

God makes the invitation to mankind for people to be saved from the punishment their sin will ultimately bring on them. Man’s response is to Repent, that is to turn away from sin and to Believe, to put your trust in Jesus Christ as God’s way of salvation.