Welcome to my website
Trying to see the world from a Christian perspective
This Blog
I only write occasionally here now, as you will see. However, there is an archive of over 2,000 posts which I’ve made over the last 20+ years, which are all still accessible.
Latest Posts
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Hymnology: Dear Lord and Father of mankind
The hymn “Dear Lord and Father of mankind” is one of the UK’s most popular hymns. It is usually (in the UK at least) sung to a brilliant tune (REPTON) and its poetic lyrics capture many people’s imagination. It is a well loved traditional hymn and an established part of our repertoire. But there is…
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Sexual harassment in schools: is education the answer?
I’ve noticed a spate of worrying articles coming out over the past year or two. It seems that sexual harassment is on the rise among young people – especially in schools. It’s becoming such a problem that earlier this year MPs launched an enquiry into it. This is something which is especially an issue for young…
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Islam, extremism and political correctness
I’ve had a growing sense of frustration over the last few weeks and months. A lot of airtime has been devoted to the “so-called Islamic State” (as the BBC always says) and the many acts of terrorism which have been so much in the news. My frustration stems from the fact that so often politicians and…
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Brexit, politics, and counterfeit gods
Every so often I am asked to contribute a short piece to end our local spoken news service – the Tendring Talking Times. This was my contribution for this week. It seems like the world is going mad at the moment. The Brexit vote a few weeks ago triggered an avalanche of bad feeling in…
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The Bible and (same-sex) marriage: Cutting through to the root issue
Long-time readers of this blog will know that I have blogged quite a few times about marriage, and in particular same-sex marriage. You can see my previous posts under the “marriage” tag. Anyway, it seems we are still talking about marriage: the debate has simply moved from society – where same-sex marriage is now a…
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King Saul and King Jesus: Thoughts on 1 Samuel 10
In the past few weeks at church we’ve been working our way through the Bible, trying to get the ‘big picture’ of the whole Bible story. This week we reached 1 Samuel 10, where God chooses Saul to be the next King of Israel and Saul is anointed by the prophet Samuel. It’s a fascinating…
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Brexit and the decline of Christian understanding
The last few days I have felt particularly ashamed to be British. Not because the country voted to leave the EU, but because of the backlash following it. I appreciate that many people felt deeply unhappy with the result – it’s natural and understandable. Many people believed that leaving the EU was the wrong decision.…
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Cathy Warwick and Pro-Choice Logic
Cathy Warwick has been in the news lately – she signed the Royal College of Midwives up to support a legal campaign for the removal of abortion limits in the UK. (Currently, if a woman undergoes an abortion outside of the law, it is a criminal offence.) This would effectively allow abortion to happen up until…
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Hymnology: Love Divine and perfectionism
This morning I read an interesting post on the Church Society blog: Should we stop singing ‘Love Divine’? Charles Wesley is a great hymn writer and Love Divine has always been one of my favourites, but this post did make me reconsider. The goal of this little ‘hymnology’ series is to think about hymns and the theology…
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Genesis 3 and Gender
This morning I was preaching on Genesis 3 – ‘the fall of man’. It’s a fascinating passage, very carefully and cleverly constructed, and bears studying carefully. One of the things I noticed in my preparation time but didn’t really have time to elaborate on in the passage is the way gender is portrayed. In Genesis 1-2,…