word | spirit | world | church
There is one truth in the glorious panoply that is the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3) that is particularly special to me. One that stands out as a shining beacon on the darkest of days, one that daily speaks to my heart and revives me in the truth.… Continue reading After death, life
The Bible starts with seven words. Then the second sentence has fourteen words. Then there are seven paragraphs each describing a day in this week of seven days. The seventh of these includes three parallel seven word phrases. None of this is an accident. In our modern day with our modern eyes it can look… Continue reading Carving Time
I’ve spent much of my working life in or around education. I worked for an education charity, I trained to teach and taught in secondary schools, I ran training courses and designed award-winning global graduate programmes, I was a pedagogic expert at a University and now manage quality assurance in a small corner of another.… Continue reading On Education
Have you ever noticed that in Genesis chapter one, the days are the wrong way around? When I say the wrong way around, I mean backwards to what we expect, and before you rush off to compare the order of creation and question whether it means anything meaningful that the sun and moon come so… Continue reading Learning from the hours
If we believe James K. A. Smith’s work in his Cultural Liturgies trilogy, then we are constantly being formed by everything around us and the ‘liturgies’ that they tell us. Everything from shopping centres to televisions to motorways are influencing the way that we view the world. While I think Smith’s solutions are helpful but… Continue reading The liturgy of social media
Do we need more evidence of divine love and affection than the existence of the egg? Most of you will be thinking, “yes Tim, stop being weird.” Which is unfortunately not in my gift. So, you’re right, we do need more ‘evidence’ than that—we need the incarnate Son to give himself over like a lamb… Continue reading The argument from eggs
In John chapter nine, Jesus heals a blind man and declares himself to be the Light of the World. John wants us to see Jesus as the light that brings sight to dead eyes, physically and spiritually. To compare the arrogant Pharisees who condemn Jesus for healing on the Sabbath to the blind man who… Continue reading Spit & Mud
We recently had our once-a-decade census here in the UK. Every time it clocks around there is a Christian discourse about the religion question. We expect, you see, that the census will show us that the number of Christians in the country has decreased—we’ll find out in Spring 2022, but I don’t think anyone is… Continue reading Census Fallout
Back in the summer of 2019 I spent a few months reading everything I could find on Generation Z. I think I’m not exaggerating to say I read every scholarly paper I could access through my University, and every book on the subject in its libraries. I wrote a paper for my network of churches,… Continue reading Generation Z
Our age loves unfettered desire. This sounds like I’m talking solely about sex, but if you allow desire to take its broader meaning and think of wants, then it’s true isn’t it? We all intrinsically feel that we should live in a way that fulfils us, that gives us what we want. We all intrinsically… Continue reading Fettered Desire
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