Relationships
-
I might not love everything that Mike Pence stands for, but I’m impressed at his self awareness and choice to recognize his own limitations.
Apparently Vice President Mike Pence has a policy to never eat alone with a woman other than his wife and that he won’t attend events featuring alcohol without her either. Pence’s policy is very similar to one adopted by Billy Graham at the start of his ministry (which came to be known as the Billy Graham rule). The revelation of Pence’s strategy in a Washington Post story last week has caused quite a stir. The Post article was simply re-stating something that was printed 15 years ago however publications like Fortune and Newsday have slammed Pence, and, as the Atlantic pointed out some celebrities have responded very strongly. What’s the big deal you might ask? From…
-
I need to share about what this week has actually been like…
This is now the fourth time I have sat down to write this weeks reflection. I have been doing some useful thinking about the place of belief in shaping our behaviour, however no matter how hard I have tried, I simply cannot write about it. Faith Reflections is my attempt to reflect on the real journey of faith, and this week in order for that to be true I need to share about what this week has actually been like… It was a privilege to officiate at the service to celebrate Rod Hoople’s life on Saturday, and then to preach on Sunday, however with these two things mixed with the process…
You May Also Like
Too many of us live in a two dimensional, colourless world of our own making.
Listening as Mercy: Why It Changes Everything
In the wake of #metoo we need to rediscover the implications of a controversial passage of the bible that points to a model of a healthy relationship between the sexes.
-
Only people who have suffered, grown, matured and developed real values can actually have relationships of trust.
I caught Obama’s farewell speech, along with the ceremony where he bestowed the Presidential Medal of Honour with Distinction, on Vice President Joe Biden. What has been interesting to watch has been the way that almost no-one has criticized the character of either man. Obama quoted a Republican who said: If you can’t admire Joe Biden as a person, you got a problem. He’s as good a man as God ever created. Senior Republicans have almost been unanimous in the praise of the character of both the first family and the Vice President. In the very next breath, they move to talk about Obama as one of the worst Presidents America…
You May Also Like
We need to rediscover the self-giving generosity that actually is love, and stop settling for cheap imitations.
Steve Jobs may have had a bigger impact on the spiritual formation of a generation than any other person in the last 50 years.
This is an important moment for the church to have a long hard look at itself and how it relates to same sex attracted people.
-
Embrace big changes. Both the joyful, and the horrible moments of discontinuity produce life.
There are moments in life when everything changes. We tend to forget that. We think that what we are experiencing now is “normal”, forgetting that our “normal” has changed time and time again throughout our lives. Of course things are actually changing all the time, but because the changes are so small we tend to ignore them until we are confronted with a photo or some other reminder about how things were a few years ago. Today, though, I am not so much thinking about those gradual changes, I am thinking about the life-altering moments that change “normal” in an instant. I had one of those moments on Wednesday. Maddi…
You May Also Like
We need to rediscover the self-giving generosity that actually is love, and stop settling for cheap imitations.
In the wake of #metoo we need to rediscover the implications of a controversial passage of the bible that points to a model of a healthy relationship between the sexes.
I don’t know where the next 23 years will take us but I do know who I will be sharing the adventure with… the bravest person I know.
-
Are we losing our lives to distraction?
I have a confession to make… sometimes I find it hard to say no to things that waste my time and take me away from being healthily present to others. I’ve never really grown out of my capacity to become fixated on computer games. I remember spending long hours in front of a friends Commodore 64 when I was 14, and now I’m 44 I find myself deleting Madden mobile from my iPad for the 3rd time this week. It’s not just computer games. I find myself unable to watch just one episode of a television series on Netflix, mindlessly reading news that I don’t care about, or spending hours on end scanning through…
-
How can I bring my children up in the training and instruction of the Lord without exasperating them?
I am a trained youth worker. I know most of the theories of adolescent development. I have worked with all kinds of youth from all kinds of backgrounds. You would think that being a parent of teenagers would therefore be easy. Its not. Being a youth worker is completely different to being a parent. A few months ago I wrote a reflection on the realization that parenting teenagers is fundamentally about a clash of Kingdoms. My realization was that parenting teenagers is about stepping into, and not avoiding the right kinds of conflict. Leeanne and I committed ourselves to seeking first the Kingdom of God in every area of our lives…
-
The enemy’s agenda is to kill communities and marriages. We all need to learn what it actually means to stand firm.
I remember fondly my first wedding. As I prepared for Andrew and Pamela’s big day, I was reminded just how profound a privilege it is to officiate at a moment like that. Marriage is important. It has far reaching implications for our health and that of our kids. According to the American Psychological Association: Healthy marriages are good for couples’ mental and physical health. They are also good for children; growing up in a happy home protects children from mental, physical, educational and social problems There are big theological implications for marriage too. At the heart of our faith is the picture of the three-in-one God. At the heart of our faith…
-
The Great Commandment is only possible if we allow ourselves to see.
Writing these Faith Reflections is an important part of my own faith journey. They are where I wrestle with what whatever issue seems top of mind in my own life. I hope they might be helpful for you, but they are at least equally important for me. In early 2016 I was reflecting about the implications of the great commandment for me and for our church. I was preparing for another busy weekend and I wrote the following reflection: It’s time for Share and Wear again. If you are not sure what I am talking about, this two minute video will give you an idea: Share and Wear is a very…
-
The six sick practises we have developed to avoid conflict, which eat away at the church like cancer.
Yesterday I sat in a room with a bunch of pastors as we tried to work out what it meant to genuinely be in fellowship. For a number of years we had met and been warm and polite, but yesterday something shifted, just a little bit, and we were starting to be more real than we had ever been. Later in the afternoon I sat with another pastor as we reflected on the Christian church, and together we agreed that one of the biggest challenges we faces is that we are generally isolated as individuals. We agreed that this was largely because we avoid the potential for the pain that conflict might…
-
The real question of healthy sexuality
I wrote a reflection about how Christianity is not anti-sex and I was blown away by the number of people who responded positively, and by the number of people that read it. In just two days that reflection became the most read item I have written on Faith Reflections. As I wrote last week, we as a church are engaging in a sermon series about Jesus, the bible and sexuality and one of the core things that is coming through in that series and also in what we wrote about last week is that the bible puts forward a completely different story about sexuality than the world does. Unfortunately the story the world…
-
Christianity is not anti-sex
I’ve been thinking a bit about sex. I realise that is not a sentence you will see often on a site dedicated to faith, but perhaps it should be. Sexuality is such a big part of our lives and different perspectives about what is, and isn’t, right and healthy are constantly being fed to us through the media and also often through our friendship circle. We need to talk more about sex. Part of the reason I have been thinking about it over the past few weeks is that I have had to speak about it twice to two different groups of people. In addition to this I’ve been in…
-
For me the battle between the god of commercialism and the baby born in Bethlehem is very personal.
Christmas time seems to be the epicentre of the real spiritual battle in the Western World. On one side of the fight is the god of commercialism who wears a coca-cola coloured suit, rewards people for being good boys and girls and encourages them to use credit. On the other side of the battle is the baby born in Bethlehem whose death on a cross means that love is unconditional. The god of consumerism requires us to be dissatisfied with who we are and what we have, and this version of Christmas holds the promise that we might finally get the stuff that will help us feel better about ourselves. Apparently, the…
-
The baby born in Bethlehem invites us to reconsider our whole lives and re-orientate around who (not what) truly matters.
I love Christmas. I know its commercialized. I know that the reason for the season is going missing for many, but I still love this time of year. I love the promise and the idealism of Christmas. I love that for a few days people hum tunes about peace on earth, joy to the world and snow (even in countries where there is no snow). Most of all I love that for a few days, life priorities get rearranged. For a few days, it is our relationships that get the most attention. Family gets visited or skyped, meals are savoured and gifts are given. Even pain associated with this time of…
-
To walk alone is possible, but the good walker knows that the trip is life and it requires companions.
I’ve been a pastor for a couple of weeks, and I’m slowly getting used to the idea. One of the things I am appreciating about our church is the way in which we are committed to wrestling with what God is saying to us. Part of that is a current commitment to explore a range of bible passages to see what they might be saying to us as a church. This week we were looking at Acts 2, and as I engaged with the chapter something hit me.MActs 2 chronicles the establishment of the Christian church, and as it does one thing is obvious: the church is a fellowship. From…
-
A confronting Punk Rocker challenges me to trust and ask for help
I have been wrestling with what it means to not have a predictable wage lately. A big part of me would like not to have to rely on the generosity of others to support the ministry that I believe God has called me to. In our capitalist society, living without a wage doesn’t make sense and means that I, and my family, are continually in a place of vulnerability. In my quiet time this morning, I was struck by Jesus’s command to his disciples as he sent them out for their training run in Matthew chapter 10 verses 8-13 “The message was free when you got it; make sure it’s…
