word | spirit | world | church
In Acts 20, as he is speaking to the elders of the church in Ephesus, Paul tells them that he has taught them ‘the whole counsel of God.’ In context he means that he’s told them all of God’s plan, meaning his plan to redeem the whole creation in Christ. He’s told them all of… Continue reading The Whole Counsel of God
The seed that dies is the one that bears fruit. That’s what Jesus said in John 12, Truly, truly I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. John 12.24 A biologist might take issue with us saying… Continue reading Bearing Fruit
Christian Formation IV Our formation involves our minds, freeing them from sin and growing in knowledge of God, and our lives—learning habits and being embedded in Christian community—but it also involves our hearts. To grow to be like Christ is to gradually change our loves, to war for them, so that we love God above… Continue reading The Matter of the Heart
Dust hung in the air. My skin was rough from living in this house for so long. The taste thick at the back of my mouth, though I was getting used to it. Somehow that was the scary bit. It was brick dust, the one with the thicker, grittier texture and almost biscuity taste: dry… Continue reading The Mess of Making
If I asked you to summarise the story of the Bible, I wonder what you’d say? I do often ask this in classroom settings with Christians and there are a whole host of frequently given answers. Typically, people tell some version of the story of redemption from sin involving the fall and then Jesus’ incarnation… Continue reading The Bible’s 3 Stories
In the Old Testament, the Temple was a microcosm, a miniature copy of reality. We see this in the way it’s structured; it’s built as a copy of the Garden of Eden: a mountaintop land with trees. The Temple is on the apex of a mountain, it’s full of trees (the lampstands and the decorations),… Continue reading Church as Blueprint
Character matters. I suspect everyone agrees on that much. We say when appointing pastors that character is the thing that matters most—whether we follow through on that is a good question, of course—and we say the same thing about what matters in the Christian life. It’s vitally important. Jesus wants us to grow up into… Continue reading Restor(y)ing Character
I’ve spent the last few months working through the works of St. Irenaeus. Which to most readers probably sounds utterly uninteresting. You aren’t going to do that. That’s OK, though if you’re an Elder or Deacon or anything similar I’d like to gently suggest it would be good for you to read some Christians from… Continue reading Why Read St. Irenaeus?
We live in a strange moment of time and cultural winds that gets called all sorts of different names, but we can all agree its ‘modernity.’ Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, how concerned we are by it, and what features it has that we should embrace or push against are all… Continue reading The Bombadil Option
An easy question you would think, and it probably should be. I’ve seen it treated very vaguely very often though, there’s a depth and complexity here which people like to skate over the surface of. Jesus is baptised (Matthew 3, Mark 1, Luke 3) with John’s baptism which is clearly stated to be a baptism… Continue reading Why was Jesus baptised?
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