“This is as good as it gets” the man assured me. I was initially shocked, but then deeply saddened by his statement. It was an astonishing statement—but there was no doubting the sincerity with which he was speaking. (more…)
Category Archives: Culture
Suffer the little children
Life, Sola Panel
The political pressure to redefine the meaning of marriage has recently become more intense and obvious in certain English-speaking countries. But you might have noticed that the vast majority of people in our society aren’t particularly concerned by these developments. Why is that? Here’s one possible reason: in the hearts and minds of the vast majority of modern Westerners, marriage has already been redefined. We just didn’t notice. (more…)
A better country
Life, Sola Panel
Readers from Melbourne will probably guess this was written a couple of days ago, at the end of a heat wave. But today seemed a good time to post it: it’s Australia Day. For all who feel at home where they live – and for those who don’t.
flickr: Hasitha Tudugalle
It’s been breathlessly hot for days. At night, it’s hard to sleep: we have to choose whether to close the window and swelter in the stuffy room, or open it to invite in the occasional puff of air and the mosquitoes.
Effective discipling and disciple-making
Everyday Ministry, Pastoral Ministry
Late last year a conference was put on with the title Exploring Effective Ministry Under God. There were a number of presentations about church membership, training, mobilisation, and lots more from a range of contributors, spearheaded by Tim Sims (who conducted the research on Sydney Anglican churches published recently in The Briefing). (more…)
Christmas Poetry
Life, Sola Panel
Thanks to the CASE team (CASE = Centre for Apologetic Scholarship & Education) at New College, I’ve enjoyed receiving their quarterly journal for the past few years. Each one has a theme, and they’ve had some real winners in the last two years, including on: (more…)
The reason for the season?
Everyday Ministry, Thought, Sola Panel
If you insist to a friend that the ‘real meaning of Christmas’ is the birth of Jesus Christ, there are two kinds of response you’re likely to get. (more…)
A conversation with John Piper
Thought
David Starling: I want to begin by saying thank you for your books and your sermons, and for making the trip out here to Sydney. We really appreciate all that’s involved in coming across the world to see us. (more…)
The truth that dare not speak its name (3)
Life, Sola Panel
Why do we find it hard to say out loud that same-gender sex is wrong and perverse, even if we know it to be true?
The obvious answer is that no-one wants to be a pariah, for that is what voicing such a view will quickly make us in our culture. A narrow-minded, homophobic, bigotted pariah—because hardly anyone believes any more that gay sex is wrong and perverse. Quite the reverse. The mainstream view is that gay sex is just sex like any other sex, and should be accepted, validated and even celebrated.
But do they really believe that? (more…)
The truth that dare not speak its name (2)
Life, Sola Panel
If same-gender sex is not the natural consequence of an innate homosexual essence or identity (as I suggested last time), then why do people do it? What leads them to this sort of behaviour?
The shocking answer of Romans 1 is that God does. (more…)
The truth that dare not speak its name (1)
Life, Sola Panel
We were reading the second half of Romans 1 in Bible study the other night, and I asked the group what they thought would happen around the water cooler at work if they actually expressed out loud what Romans 1 says about gay sex.
There was an awkward silence. (more…)
Why aren’t we growing?
Pastoral Ministry
Tim Sims, a businessman and corporate strategist, has applied his analytical skills to the Anglican Diocese of Sydney, and asked why churches have been growing no better than the population as a whole. Tony Payne outlines and engages with his research. (more…)
Does the future have a church?
Pastoral Ministry
Tim Thornborough offers here a rough guide to where Protestantism is in the UK, and a look at some particular indicators that suggest several major strategic directions that we need to consider for the future. (more…)
Dividing walls of teenage hostility
Everyday Ministry
“Who am I? … I don’t know. I guess I have a lot of things to ponder.”
-Derek Zoolander, speaking to his reflection in a puddle, in Zoolander.
In an interesting twist on the Narcissus fable, the really ridiculously good-looking Zoolander neatly sums up one of the main pressures of the adolescent years: the search for identity. Teenagers have a lot of things to ponder! (more…)
In praise of holiness
Life, Sola Panel
I’ve just read an article that I agree with, but can’t relate to. The article, by Carl Trueman, is about the problems with hagiographies (a hagiography is a ‘saint-biography’: an account of somebody’s life that treats them as a hero of holiness and leaves out the naughty bits).1 He argues that hagiographies are bad for multiple reasons: they’re not good history, they promote an unhelpful black-and-white view of the world, and they make readers feel depressed and inadequate when they don’t measure up. I think he’s right. But I just don’t feel his pain. (more…)
One more sip of the coffee
Life, Sola Panel
Sandy Grant is a man of integrity.
Back in the early days of Sola Panel, I wrote a post about the fad of Christians supporting the fair trade coffee movement, in which I basically suggested that while the sentiment of wanting to help poor third-world coffee growers was noble, trying to do it by a centralized price-fixing mechanism would probably do more harm than good.