Spring 2025 Update
Between Friends
Dear Friends,
At some point every generation probably thinks that the number of things competing for its attention is too great, or at least greater than what previous generations had to face. I doubt if that’s true, but it is a fact that many things are competing for our attention right now—some good, some bad and some unavoidable. There are issues that have to be attended to in our personal and family lives. We live in a world saturated with information, entertainment and events; our minds and bodies can be kept busy constantly. Changes in political temperature and national alliances seem to be brewing, with consequences we can’t yet foresee. Since most of these things arise in a disorderly way, the result is often that we are distracted from what matters most, and even pitched into anxiety over how it’s all going to turn out. Sometimes it becomes difficult to distinguish what matters and what we should be allowing to take up our time and our mental energy.
As Christ’s followers there is another challenge that comes to us, and that is to listen carefully to what he says is important. We hear him asking a probing question that brings clarity to what each of us is facing. It is profoundly simple: ‘What are you doing with your life?’ It’s a question he asked Peter and the other disciples in different ways throughout his years with them. In the following excerpt from a sermon, Dr Gooding points out how Christ shows us that the question of priorities ultimately comes down to a question of realities—to what’s real and lasting. It’s a question he is still asking us, and how we answer him will matter forever.
Looking back over the last year at Myrtlefield, we see a lot to be thankful for (you’ll see some of that as you keep reading), and a lot that has still to be done with whatever time the Lord gives us (more of that as well). As we go forward in the strength he is giving us to continue the work, we’re mindful of the many people who help us, including friends who let us keep in touch through these newsletters. So we ask that the Lord will also bless the work he has given you to do for him, and hope that the resources he’s entrusted to us will be a help to you. And we’re grateful for all your encouragement over the months and years, and especially for your prayers. It’s an honour to be able to serve together.
- Josh Fitzhugh, Executive Director
Excerpt from David Gooding’s sermon: ‘Christ Our King’
Which kingdom are we living for?
The gospel preachers, good men they are too, will ask you, ‘Have you got a soul? How is your soul getting on? Is your soul saved?’ Happy you are if you can say, ‘Yes, my soul is saved. I can tell you the very date and the time when the light dawned in and I trusted the Lord, and my soul was saved and never will perish.’ Thank God for that, but can I ask you a question? This soul of yours that is saved, where do you keep it? Have you got it in a nice box and put it in a vault in the bank so that when the Lord comes, you’ll say, ‘Lord, give me half a minute, I’m just going to the bank to get my soul’?
Well, you can’t do that with a soul, can you? What do you do with it? A soul, as you see, is a life, and not just your physical life but all things that go with it. Your time, for instance, and your love and your ambitions. You have to spend your life, don’t you? You have to spend your time. You have to spend your energies. You have to spend your love. You say your soul is saved, thank the Lord for that. You still have to spend it, and the question is, what will you spend it on? When Peter heard that our Lord was going to Jerusalem to be crucified, he objected most strongly: ‘Lord, you’ve got that wrong. You need more positive thinking,’ said he. ‘You’re going to be a success.’ Peter had invested a tremendous bit of his soul, so to speak, in Christ. He’d left his job, he’d gone away from home, he’d put his energies into preaching for Christ, gone round Palestine preaching for Christ, hours he’d spent, time, love, affection. If Christ was going to be crucified, the whole lot had gone down the drain. ‘No, Lord, you’re not going to die. No, you’ll not be crucified, you’re going to sit on a throne and I’m going to sit right beside you.’
And our Lord had to correct him, ‘Peter, you must be careful. He that loves his life, his soul, and tries to keep it, shall lose it. He that loses it for my sake, shall keep it’ (see Matt 16:24–25). How could you expound the conundrum? Because there are two ages: this present age and the coming age. There’s a coming age when he shall come in the glory of his Father and the holy angels, and we shall see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. And the question is, which age are you spending your soul on? Spend it for the age to come, and you keep it. Spend it on unworthy things, and you lose it, don’t you? ‘Don’t love the world,’ says John, ‘because the world passes away’ (see 1 John 2:15–17). And in the sense that John means the term ‘world’, anything we spend on the world is but temporary. The world passes away. Spend it on things that are going to last. Invest in that coming age.
A Look Back at 2024
Project 2.2 Billion Progress
Windows on Paradise in Spanish is now available on our website, and all six of the Quest books have now been published in Arabic by our partners in Lebanon, Dar Manhal al Hayat. We also now have a contract in place to translate four further books into Russian: True to the Faith, In the School of Christ, Key Bible Concepts and The Definition of Christianity, and we are currently in discussion with CV-Dillenburg to translate and publish our two latest books into German (The Letters of David W. Gooding and Changing us for Glory). Also, The Bible and Ethics in Arabic was released in September 2024.
Our partners in Jordan continue to see good engagement with the Arabic Quest introduction videos. The total current view count is currently 1,640,445 with an estimated total number of minutes watched on the full videos at 1,905,219.
Published in 2024
Books
Changing us for Glory: Daily Readings on God’s Transforming Power
The aim of these 366 one-page readings, drawn from the works of David Gooding, is to deepen our understanding of some of God’s characteristics. We see that he is the Triune God of relationships; the living and transcendent Creator; the sovereign Lord who guides our lives; the God of love and grace, loyalty and humility, wisdom and truth; the God of revival and restoration who welcomes us into his grand story; the God of revelation who wants to be known; and the God of joy who changes how we think and live. And as we see him, he transforms us to be like himself, from one degree of glory to another.
If you have ever struggled to comprehend all that the gospel gives you, this year-long devotional will unveil the fullness of it. I look forward to reading it day by day.
– Judy Douglass, Global Director – Cru’s Women’s Resources, Author, Speaker, Podcaster
The Letters of David W. Gooding: Answering Questions Related to the Christian Faith
This collection of more than two hundred letters from David Gooding’s many years of correspondence helps to convey something of the man that he was, but its greater value is in the lasting ability of these letters to communicate the wisdom, power and comfort of the Word of God, which shaped both the man and the lives of those with whom he shared himself.
I have absolutely no doubt that The Letters of David W Gooding will be found on the bookshelves of serious students of the Bible and widely read by Christians who wish to understand their faith more deeply. I owe Prof Gooding a huge debt. Even though he has entered into his eternal reward, David Gooding will continue to influence and instruct thousands of Christian leaders
– Philip McCormack, Vice-Chancellor and Principal, Spurgeon’s College, London
New Sermon Transcripts
Tracing the major movements of the book, David Gooding takes us on a journey to witness the power, majesty and wrath of God as he leads his people from the bondage of captivity and through the wilderness, dwelling with them in his tabernacle.
Podcasts
Understanding the Bible and what it is trying to teach us, can be difficult. This podcast series will present David Gooding’s insights into several books of Scripture, helping us to navigate their complexity and comprehend their significance.
In 2024, we published two series of this podcast:
Encounters Distribution
In 2024 we were approached by the Leadership Development Partnership, a group in England who supply theological books to a Bible college with branches in Rwanda and Uganda. We gave them a grant of two copies of twenty-one of our books, along with an additional one hundred copies of our Encounters series.
Encounters in India and Nigeria
Thanks to our partnership with Revival Movement Association (RMA), and help from other key contacts, the following titles from our Encounters series were sent to India:
We are thankful to the Lord that these books arrived safely and are being forwarded to individuals, distributors and missions. A brochure containing information about our free online resources was included with each book.
RMA have also sent over five hundred Encounters books to ACTS Nigeria, again enclosing the Myrtlefield House brochure.
Encouraging Statistics from 2024
Books & Other Resources
Number of books sold: 48,292
Number of free audio files played: 24.9K
The total length of time people spent while using our resources online:
Books: 30,733 minutes
Sermons: 140,342 minutes
David Gooding Answers: 71,456 minutes
YouTube Content: 17,500 hours watched
Podcasts: 12,800 total listens
Our Websites
Myrtlefieldhouse.com
Visitors: 45,000
Page Views: 208,000
MH316.com
Visitors: 8,000
Page Views: 21,000
Myrtlefieldespanol.com
Visitors: 758
Page Views: 1,200
A Look Forward
From Symbol to Reality: The Journeys of the Son of God in John’s Gospel
The editing of David Gooding’s teaching on the Gospel of John is now in chapters 7–10, the third of the four journeys that structure the Gospel. Right now the focus is on John 8 and Dr Gooding’s views on the woman caught in adultery. In some of his public lectures he dealt with the long debated matter of whether John 7:53–8:11 was originally part of John or whether it was added later. Just to give it away, this is the position he held, which placed him among the minority of biblical scholars:
I hold that, wherever John got this story from, he was guided by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to put it in his Gospel at this particular place, so that, even if he wasn’t the first one to write it, the story of the woman taken in adultery belongs to John, certainly in its present form, and that he placed it in its present position right from the start.
But more often than arguing the case for this position, he positively taught how this first story in John 8 fits together in a deeply meaningful way within the context of the rest of the chapter:
When he had written the second time he stood up and said to her: ‘Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?’ [that is, condemned you to death?]. She said, ‘No one, Lord’. And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more’ (vv. 10–11).
He is not saying that adultery is right. He is saying, ‘I don’t condemn you to suffer the penalty of death.’ How could he say it when he was the lawgiver incarnate? Well, how did he forgive Israel and write the tablets again? He could say it because in a year or two’s time, he was to be ‘lifted up’, as this very chapter says, and pay the penalty of that woman’s sin himself.
That is where we begin: when we begin to follow the light, and stand long enough to let the light expose us; and in repentance and faith we cast ourselves on the mercies of Christ. He is God incarnate, the lawgiver incarnate; a God of all mercy who died that we might be forgiven. Then we begin the journey, following the light of this world. He casts light on our journey. We are sure there is a heaven to go to because he tells us where he comes from and where he is going; and we find the transition from this life to the next because he is the I AM. Meanwhile, we are prepared to remain in his word that it might progressively set us free from the practice of sin. And we are assured that if we have come to believe in him and follow him thus, we shall not see death but shall abide in the Father’s house—freeborn children of God for all eternity.
The challenge is to bring together Dr Gooding’s necessary argumentation about the text, with his exposition of it, so that both mind and heart will be nourished, and, we hope, the spirit moved to bend the knee to the one who has made it possible to write his laws upon our hearts. But it’s an exciting challenge, so we’d appreciate your prayers as the work progresses.
A new podcast!
We are excited to announce a new podcast: Book by Book – Bible Intros with David Gooding.
In this podcast, David Gooding provides high level overviews that help us begin to understand what individual Bible books are saying, and why they matter now. He gives the big picture inside a little frame, and shows us that the challenge of understanding the books in God’s library is meant to be as exciting as it is challenging.
This podcast will be released later in the Spring. Subscribe to our channel on Youtube or follow us on Podbean to recieve notifications!
Because of your ongoing prayers and support for Myrtlefield, we are regularly hearing from people who are grateful for our resources and who give us specific examples of things that the Lord has taught them through what they've read or heard. Here are only a few examples:
‘I wish more people knew about David Gooding and his work. Every time I see him referenced my heart lightens up with a smile. His study on Judges was incredibly thought provoking to me.’
‘[Key Bible Concepts] is a great introduction to what the Bible has to say, well explained and useful for people who want to explore the Christian faith.’
‘Everything that I have read of Gooding has been brilliant, as are his spoken messages on-line. [In the School of Christ] is no exception. It is informative, spiritual and deep, without any academic garbage clinging to it. It opens up these chapters brilliantly. I’ve read it over and over.’