At the risk of being too general, most Christians agree it’s good and wise to keep the intention of the Sabbath by taking a day off every week and resting.1 We don’t do this because we’re under the law of the Sabbath, for Jesus has fulfilled that law for us. We don’t have to have it on a certain day of the week, and it’s not done to win God’s favour. Instead, we observe these Sabbath-type days because we trust the God who loves us in Christ and who rules all things; taking a day off once a week is “an expression of this commitment”.2 (more…)
Some reflections on team leadership
Pastoral Ministry
There has already been so much published on team leadership that, upon being asked to write this, my immediate response was, “Not another one!” I’m not even sure that ‘team leadership’ is the right category to use, for it leads us into business pragmatism rather than the Bible’s relational categories. (more…)
Talking about predestination with kids
Resource Talk, Sola Panel
Some parents resent being the taxi driver. I offer to do it whenever I can. When else do your teenagers actually consent to sit within 10 metres of you, let alone talk to their friends while you listen? And besides, the opportunity to pay out their appalling music and inflict your own Classic Hits and Memories upon them is too much to resist. (more…)
Book review: Unpacking forgiveness
Review
Unpacking Forgiveness: Biblical answers for complex questions and deep wounds
Chris Brauns
Crossway, Wheaton, 2008. 240pp.
She approached me with her daughter after the Sunday night meeting. I usually love questions from listeners—especially if they are related to the sermon. Her question was, but only obliquely: she asked me whether I thought she ought to forgive her husband who had been systematically violent towards her for years and years. I knew straight away I was way out of my depth. I also knew that the answer I gave her was probably going to ring in her and her daughter’s ears for a long time. How on earth can you prepare for pastoral situations like this? (more…)
Marketing 101
Life
The assembled students were oblivious to the presence of the sharply dressed man of indeterminate age who had appeared silently in the doorway at the rear of the buzzing lecture theatre. He stood there for a few moments, surveying them with a curious mingling of desire and loathing. Then as he smoothed his greasy ponytail with one hand, he flicked a long, narrow tongue across thin lips, twisted his mouth into something approximating a smile to reveal a glimpse of abnormally pointy teeth, and made his way to the front of the room. (more…)
On casting stones and sinning no more
Life, Sola Panel
Jesus said, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone”. He also said, “Now go and sin no more”.
Keen Bible readers will know that Jesus said both things on the same occasion. (See John 8:3-11—especially verses 7 and 11 respectively.1) My question is how do we hold and communicate both truths together to a society that denies the second statement’s relevance and does not think we Christians believe the first?
My sister Mary
Life
I have to confess that for much of my Christian life, I’d not really stopped to consider the person of Mary and what she contributes to the church today. I knew about the major controversies of church history, and the significant differences between the Roman Catholic understanding and that of reformed Protestantism. But at a personal level, I’d never stopped to ask the question, “What does Mary mean to me?”
Unravelling truth
Thought
There are many kinds of truth.
This opening statement may cause rejoicing in the hearts of the many relativists who now populate western society. However, the statement is not meant to encourage relativism, but proper thought—and, of course, those two things really don’t go together.
Why I am an egalitarian
Thought
The issue of gender roles within marriage is one that has become increasingly controversial during the feminist revolution of the last 30 years. It is interesting to read a book like New Testament Nuptial Imagery1 from 1971, where the ‘traditional’ concepts like the submission of the wife and the headship of the husband are simply stated without revision or alternative suggestions.
Only 14 years later, a work like Bilezekian’s Beyond Sex Roles2 is typical of much recent scholarship that has proposed different interpretations of passages like Ephesians 5:21-33. In opposition to the traditional understanding, many commentators like Bilezekian portray their position as ‘egalitarian’ (defined as “asserting the equality of all people”3). Equality of all people, they assert, is a biblical principle demanded by passages like Galatians 3:28: “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”.
Girl crushes and a petulant princess
Life, Sola Panel
Have you ever had a ‘girl crush’? You know, that admiring, platonic devotion women sometimes feel for other women. (The male version is, of course, the ‘boy crush’—most often expressed in adulation for preachers and thinkers like Don ‘The Don’ Carson and or John Piper.) Perhaps you adore Elisabeth Elliot, that beloved missionary. Perhaps you revere Susannah Wesley—she of the apron and the many children. Perhaps you idolize one of those regal, older women—someone you know who radiates calmness, wisdom and humility.
Sarah, wife of Abraham, seems like an ideal candidate for a girl crush. Her very name means ‘princess’. Her beauty was legendary (Gen 12:11). Many women (I’m one of them!) have been inspired by the Bible’s call to imitate her persevering faith and trusting submission (Heb 11:8-12, 1 Pet 3:1-7).
So when my Bible study group came to Sarah’s story, I think we were all expecting something pretty special. But we were unimpressed.
Creedal conundrums (part 3)
Pastoral Ministry, Sola Panel
Dealing with inner demons
Everyday Ministry
The distresses of the human soul and ‘inner world’ can be many. Sometimes people speak of having to deal with their ‘inner demons’. Most of us can cope when this is simply a vivid metaphor. But what happens when we realize the struggler is speaking literally—that is, they think that their inner distress is due to real demons at work in their soul?
Okay, that’s freaky—so medieval.
Unfortunately not.
Creedal conundrums (part 2)
Pastoral Ministry, Sola Panel
Recently I received the following comment after a sermon series on the Nicene Creed:
The Nicene Creed is like a favourite old horse that has died. No matter how you flog it—no matter how well you groom it—it needs to be buried and a new horse bought. It was good, but now it’s dead!
Here is my reply: thank you for the colourful (but anonymous) expression of your opinion. However that’s all it was: an expression of opinion without any reasons why the opinion was valid! I would have been helped by less certainty about your conclusion and more evidence for why you consider the Nicene Creed to be obsolete.
Talking about predestination with children
Everyday Ministry, Sola Panel
It’s the question that every Christian parent knows is coming sooner or later. I’m driving when six-year-old Thomas pipes up from the back seat. We’re alone, which doesn’t happen often in a family of six, so it’s a precious time for us. Deep thoughts are clearly running through his head: “Mummy, why do some people believe in Jesus and not others?”
Creedal conundrums (part 1)
Pastoral Ministry, Sola Panel
As a change of pace from regular systematic expository preaching, and often to fit in with school holidays, I have developed a couple of sermons series entitled ‘Creedal conundrums’ that looks at phrases in the creeds that often puzzle people.