word | spirit | world | church
Our home has a beautiful garden—it’s a large part of why we bought the tumble-down shell we’ve lovingly formed into something beautiful. We live in a large city, so its 45-metre-long stretch is quite something. It brings my wife much joy. In the early days of living here, when we had one finished room, barely… Continue reading One sows, another reaps
Anthropologists say there are three kind of cultures. It’s a crude heuristic but it conveys something that’s true. There are guilt cultures, where social order is maintained by reinforcing guilt for condemned behaviours. People are concerned with right and wrong action. Laws and punishment are the usual social mechanisms for enforcing order. Broadly speaking this… Continue reading Dealing with Shame
Two years ago, you might have approached the pink house with its purple garage door and knocked wondering at the riot of colour you would have been greeted with inside. Instead, as you open the door it would clash loudly on another door within, the two of them too close together to be opened. “Come… Continue reading Crossing a threshold
I’m a charismatic, and plenty of others who would claim that label believe some fairly kooky things. It thus occasionally falls to us to carefully disassociate ourselves from what others might believe. It’s pretty normal that we would occasionally denounce what is commonly called the ‘Prosperity Gospel’—essentially that if you follow the way of Jesus… Continue reading When I believe the prosperity gospel
There’s something about trees. Being around them is good for us. There’s a wealth of evidence that our mental health is positively affected by being around trees, but for now let’s take that as read and try to think a little more theologically about why that might be. The Bible uses trees a lot. We… Continue reading On Trees
Last week I wrote a rambling exposition of some of the features of Genesis chapter one, but to keep to a reasonable length I didn’t attempt any application. I thought I’d take some time to tease out these ideas in a little more depth what that means for our lives. I’ve written previously that rest… Continue reading Living in Time
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
