Lately I’ve been reminded yet again that those of us who follow Jesus really ought to be living lives that don’t make much sense unless there is a God. I’m a little cautious using the word ‘ought’ because I think a lot of faith has been distorted by an abuse of it, however that’s not [...]
From Paul
I have pretty much just copied his post as it needs some context. Of course we wouldn’t want to hear this, so best to ignore it
I was struck by the following, a quote within a quote from the June 7th 2010 issue of Time Magazine. The article I’m referencing was the feature [...]
I always find myself intrigued by the different analyses of various faith stages. I have written previously about Fowler and how Alan Jamieson used these stages in his ‘Churchless Faith’ research. Very helpful I thought.
Last week Len Hjalmarson wrote about this from a different perspective and I thought its simplicity was also quite useful.
Len writes:
In [...]
I finished ‘Untamed‘ this morning, a fantastic book on missional discipleship by Alan & Deb Hirsch. Having been around these guys for so long and knowing them well, many of the stories and ideas were familiar, but I still found the book itself is an inspiring and challenging read. When do we ever stop needing [...]
Lately every time I read the book of John, (and I’ve been doing it a lot), I see Jesus seriously headbutting the Pharisees and the religious system of his time.
I thought maybe it was just me and my own disdain for pharisaism that was shaping what I see, but I’m not sure that’s it any [...]
When your ‘time budget’ for a sermon is a maximum of 8 hours you need to find a plan to make sure you use that time well.
I am a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to communication and several years used to spend probably twice that time in preparation. I guess when you’ve [...]
Lately I’ve been doing some reflecting on the gospel of John – just looking afresh at Jesus and trying to remove some of the cultural conditioning we place around him to be a certain kind of person.
If you look at Jesus in John then he really is quite a disturbing person. He just doesn’t fit [...]
Recently I have been pondering how I should approach these various ceremonies and considering whether I should be available to ‘one and all’ in the community or simply to people with whom we already have a significant relationship.
Up to now I have generally maintained a pretty open and flexible approach being willing to try and [...]
Here’s a challenging quote from Bonhoeffer for you this morning.
“God hates visionary dreaming; it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. The man who fashions a visionary ideal of community demands that it be realized by God, by others, and by himself. He enters the community of Christians with his demands, sets up his own [...]
Today I am a pastor of a pretty regular church again – Quinns Community Baptist Church – and I imagine I will need to do some adjusting.
The last time I did this was at Lesmurdie where I was the pastoral team leader for a couple of years before heading off to Brighton. It wasn’t a [...]