Close to misunderstanding Jesus?
November 1st, 2015
Difficult issues series On the first Counting Crows album, Adam Duritz sang about Maria, who said she was “close to understanding Jesus”. But I can’t help feeling that modern western christianity has covered Jesus in layers of theology and convenience, and is close to misunderstanding Jesus. If you think that’s harsh, please read on.
Morning rituals
October 23rd, 2015
Spiritual principles series Every morning, unless something extremely unusual happens, my wife and I spend about half an hour praying together. We pray for each other, for our children, our friends and other relatives, for the ministries we are involved in, and anything else that comes to mind. Maybe you’re thinking there’s nothing so unusual […]
Truly a great alternative
October 15th, 2015
Book review I wonder what comes into your mind when you read the word “Anabaptist”? Or the word “Mennonite”? Perhaps, like me until a few years ago, you might remember these words from the time of the Reformation, when Anabaptists were a loose collection of idealistic “fringe” christians persecuted by Catholics and Protestants alike for […]
What you sow, you will reap – or perhaps someone else will?
September 29th, 2015
MennoNerds SynchroBlog on Refugees There have always been refugees – people fleeing from oppression and death that they cannot fight. And there has always been oppression and killing, as greed or fear or power lust drive people to destroy, enslave or oppress those who belong to another tribe, another belief or another power grouping. But […]
Christians and abortion
September 25th, 2015
When does human life begin?
September 12th, 2015
Difficult issues series We have seen (Who were the first human beings?) that it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to say when in natural history the first human beings existed. Quite possibly it was a gradual process over thousands of years. This leads on to a related question: when in the process of sexual reproduction does […]
Who were the first human beings?
September 3rd, 2015
Difficult issues series Last post (Why the fuss about evolution?) we looked at how the science of biological evolution impacts on christianity. We saw that the DNA evidence indicates that there was never a single Adam and Eve style couple as the ancestors of the human race. This then raises the interesting question – who […]
Why the fuss about evolution?
August 26th, 2015
Difficult issues series When Darwin published his On the Origin of Species in 1859 it provoked a range of reactions from christians and from scientists too. Many christians were quite comfortable with the idea of evolution (though many others were not), and it wasn’t until about 60 years later that the more ‘hardline’ christian opposition […]
Seek the peace and prosperity of the city
August 18th, 2015
In the west we generally live in post-christian societies. Although the majority of people in many countries may list their religion as “christian”, weekly church attendance is down around 5-15% in many countries, and somewhere around 30% in the US. It seems that in many cases, churches haven’t really adjusted to the end of Christendom […]
Dream ….. for tomorrow
August 9th, 2015
Just watch this …. and weep with joy and hope. No more words necessary. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHVRZ5R2UDY&w=560&h=315]
A list of all blog posts, in reverse chronological order, is on the Blog archive page.