When you can’t unfriend…
I don’t know what your relationship with Facebook is like, but on the whole, mine is pretty good. It’s introduced me to over 2000 friends, the majority of whom I didn’t know before, and they often like or share my posts, introduce me to new concepts or generally enrich my life. On rare occasions a few have proved troublesome – some trying to offer me services I definitely don’t want, others being rude about things I had said in ways that showed they were playing to another audience and yet others linking me to long tag lists which implied that I supported...
Read MoreGuarding God’s Reputation…
Have you ever sat through a sermon or a talk and heard the speaker express a view about God that made you think, “Well that makes God sound petty and small”? Usually the speaker means well, but has not thought deeply. An advantage of being 65 and of having preached my first sermon when I was 15 is that I now have half a century of sermon “thou shalt not’s” to sift through. In their own way they each say something about what the speaker thought about God, or perhaps didn’t think, because sometimes we make God sound so very mean and so very trivial. One that...
Read MoreUnbusy, Subversive and Apocalyptic: Three Big Eugene Peterson Words
One of the joys of teaching theology is that I get to engage with many student projects. Some remind me of things I have forgotten, others introduce me to ideas I have not previously considered. At present I am supervising a project which highlights the importance of the work of Eugene Peterson. One of his books The Contemplative Pastor suggests that pastors should be unbusy, subversive and apocalyptic. The only change I’d suggest is that we don’t limit this to pastors – but advocate it for all followers of Jesus. Why do I think Peterson’s selection of unbusy,...
Read MoreKnowledge or Wisdom?
I chair the academic board of an Australian University College and at a recent board meeting we were discussing “the democratisation of knowledge”, which is a lovely little expression noting that information is now readily available to almost anyone. It’s simply true. I have been lecturing in class and said something like “that happened in 1827 – or was it 1828” and in less than 30 seconds I will have a student say, “Actually it was 1826 , the 4th of May 1826 to be precise – I’ve just checked on Google.” Mercifully most of my...
Read MoreGod is my: A Psalm 3 Testimony…
This blog often discusses weighty matters – the future of the church, social trends, significant ethical issues, Christian apologetics, personal growth. Every now and then I like to step back and simply remember and celebrate the God whose existence and goodness is the assumed given behind all that is written. In this post I would like to do this by reflecting on a 3000 year old testimony – one which King David writes when in the middle of one of the many crises which made up his life. You find it in Psalm 3 when David is facing a coup ‘etat instigated by none other than...
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