What’s the relationship between holiness and love? For starters, we might say that God’s love is directed by God’s holiness. It’s constrained by his holiness, as water is constrained by the pipe through which it flows. God’s love always and only moves toward holy ends.” Jonathan Leenman Continue reading What’s the relationship between holiness and love?
Have you ever struggled with the idea of church membership? Have you ever thought it sounds rather archaic or Victorian? Have you ever thought it sounded rather intense or even over the top? If so take a read of this fabulous quote by Jonathan Leeman from ‘The Rule of Love’. “Christians cannot fulfill their new covenant obligations of love and holiness with all Christians everywhere. … Continue reading Church Membership must be archaic… right?
“A spacious place” (Ps 18:19) is rich with imagery. It speaks of someone who has been walking in a restricted, enclosed or even imprisoned environment who then bursts into wide and unrestricted living. Imagine, walking for some hours through thick and prickly undergrowth and then suddenly stumbling out into a lush woodland meadow! The contrast is massive and even thinking about it makes me take … Continue reading A Spacious Place
“The house of my soul is to small for you to enter: make it more spacious by your coming” Continue reading Classic Augustine: A too small soul
“Clearly, it is a happier lot to be the slave of a man than of a lust:” Augustine of Hippo from The City of God Continue reading Classic Augustine: Lust
“What grace is meant to do is to help good people, not to escape their sufferings, but to bear them with a stout heart, with a fortitude that finds its strength in faith.” Augustine of Hippo from The City of God Continue reading A Stout Heart
READ “And some were convinced by what he said, but others disbelieved” (Acts 28:24) THINK “Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don’t really matter.” – Francis Chan Success is such a tricky word. What do I actually mean by success? How do I know if I’ve been successful or not? According to what criteria am I measuring … Continue reading Acts 28: What does success look like?
READ Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? It is hard for you to kick against the goads.’ And I said, ‘Who are you, Lord?’ And the Lord said, ‘I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. (Acts 26:14-15) THINK I want you to picture Saul (soon to become the Apostle Paul) on the road to Damascus, and in particular, I want you to consider the interaction … Continue reading Acts 26: Yikes that Hurts!
“For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2 Cor 4:6-7) True worship is Bible shaped, Bible rich, Bible saturated, Bible informed, Bible dense and Bible dripping, because we only get to see the face of Jesus in and through … Continue reading True Worship
I ‘live’ in the Charismatic world. As a result there are a set of questions that are not necessarily unique to Charismatics but are probably more frequently asked. One such question is, ‘can I hear God’s voice?’ Over the years I’ve heard so many responses to this question and lots of them have left me disappointed and frustrated! Personally I think the answer to this … Continue reading Can I hear God’s voice?
