Yet I Still Dare to Hope: When Hope is a Virtue.
So what virtues do you aspire towards? If you want a conversation to take a turn to the serious, it’s a good question to ask. Some people will answer promptly – perhaps citing some of the more commonly listed virtues – courage, justice and integrity. Others might be more exotic in their choice. Perhaps they will leave you perplexed because they selected procrastination, doubt and detachment. Yet others will be rendered speechless. That’s not to say they don’t have any virtues, but it probably means they haven’t spent much time thinking about them. In a recent podcast on Stirrers...
Read MoreThe Proverbs Project: Know your name…
A few weeks back I alerted you to my proverbs project – spring boarding from the thirty sayings that start in Proverbs 22:20. “How is it going?” I hear you ask. “Pretty well,” I reply. “I am up to number 23, and my plan is to drip feed them out over a longish period – and this is one of those posts.” “So what is this week’s saying?” you ask and I reply, “Know your name.” Some background… A few months ago I was fooled into attending a time share presentation. Yes, Rosemary and I did get a free meal at the...
Read MorePromise, Challenge and Task: Three Reminders…
I’m due to preach on Joshua as a one off message in a series exploring interesting Bible characters. It’s hard to condense such an important story into 25 minutes, and any lens selected will miss a lot, but I’ve opted to filter his story through three key ideas – what he was promised, what special challenges he faced and the tasks he had to do. I decided to steer the story in this direction because it struck me that these are three big categories that can be helpful for most people, and perhaps you are one of them. So what was Joshua promised? Primarily, God’s...
Read MoreBeyond Disappointment…
We all have to deal with disappointment. While our expectations are sometimes exceeded, often it works in the opposite direction. You were sure you’d get the great job you applied for, but then didn’t even get an interview. You thought a new relationship was going to go to a new level, but then the other person ended it. You thought you had aced an exam, but the examiner failed you. Disappointment comes in many different forms. It’s easiest when it is linked to a specific event – because then you have something tangible you must come to terms with (I didn’t make...
Read MoreBecause courage is a necessary virtue…
American poet and social activist Maya Angelou famously noted, “Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can’t practice any other virtue consistently.” If you think about it, she is probably right. After all, what good is it to be passionate about justice if you don’t have the courage to stand up and do something about it. It doesn’t help to feel awful about what is happening to someone else while knowing that you don’t have the courage to say something in their defence for fear of what might happen to you. To make a...
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