A small victory in the fight against child slavery

July 18th, 2012

There has been a long campaign for chocolate companies to only source their cocoa from farms that don’t use trafficked child labour, and who pay the workers a fair wage. And progress has been slow. I have previously reported how I have joined many others in writing to chocolate companies here in Australia asking them […]

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The heat is on!

July 14th, 2012

This page is now out of date. Please go to Is the world really heating up? for up-to-date information.

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Who's afraid of climate change?

July 12th, 2012

I have blogged on climate change before – see Climate change and christians and Christians and climate change. Almost another year has passed and new information is now available. It’s time to review. Over the next couple of weeks I’ll look at the evidence, the causes and the effects. Most importantly, I’ll be looking at […]

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Faith vs works?

July 8th, 2012

The battle lines used to seem so clear. Religion taught that we earned favour with God by “being good” or “doing good works”. Christianity, on the other hand, taught that we received favour from God by grace, through faith. Ephesians 2:8-9. QED.

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Make your life extraordinary

July 2nd, 2012

“Make your life extraordinary” is the advice school teacher John Keating gives his class in Dead Poets Society. Otis Clark seemed to achieve this without really trying. Otis died recently at the age of 109. He had a long and eventful life.

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Don't think twice, it's alright?

June 27th, 2012

What is the future of the church as we know it in the western world? I have written about this many times (see The future for the church), believing that much needs to change. It is like the tide is coming in, the island the churches are sitting on is shrinking, our feet are wet, […]

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1 billion hungry: the global food crisis

June 26th, 2012

Almost one billion people, an eighth of the world’s population, are hungry as you read this. Why?

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Billy Graham on who will be 'saved'

June 24th, 2012

I have previously posted on the various views christians have on who will be saved (Can only christians be saved?). The exclusivists say only those who specifically believe in Jesus. The universalists say everyone, eventually. And the inclusivists say anyone who follows whatever light they have been given. Recently I came across a quote that […]

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Gospel centred or salvation centred?

June 18th, 2012

Evangelical christianity has historically had a strong emphasis on personal salvation, which it sees as coming from repentance and faith in Jesus’ atoning work on the cross. This is generally seen as the main purpose of Jesus’ life and death. This basic evangelical teaching can be drawn from the letters of Paul (although some theologians […]

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Christians and cathedrals

June 14th, 2012

Jesus famously said “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head” (Luke 9:58), but since the fourth century, christians have been building enormous cathedrals for him. Why?

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A list of all blog posts, in reverse chronological order, is on the Blog archive page.