Jesus’ Life And Mission
The Mission of Jesus: A Journey of Incarceration, Relationships, Inefficiency, Cost, Humility, and Worth
Bible
The Bustani-Van Dyck Arabic Bible and the Discussion Around Inerrancy
is the Word of God really without error or fault?
The Blood Money and the Field
Some reflections this Easter on these verses from the crucifixion story. Mattthew 27:6-7 But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said, “it is not lawful to put them into the treasury, since it is blood money.” So they took counsel and bought with them the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. …
Prepared
This is part three in my Called?! series of blog posts. Click for parts one and two. Listen to me, you islands; hear this, you distant nations: Before I was born the LORD called me; from my mother’s womb he has spoken my name. He made my mouth like a sharpened sword, in the shadow …
Persuaded
So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon …
Isaiah 60, the magi and the child
The following is an extract from my book The Bethlehem Story: Mission and Justice in the Margins of the World There is another ancient oracle that seems to have been in Matthew’s thinking as he wrote of the wise men. There are definite resonances of Isaiah 60:1-7 in the Matthew 2 story. Arise, shine, for your …
How to make peace: Jeremiah 3 and 31.
Part of Jeremiah’s calling was to reach out to those living in the province of Ephraim, north of the dividing line between the southern kingdom of Judah (with its capital Jerusalem), and the northern kingdom of Israel (with its capital Samaria). The dispute between Ephraim (Joseph’s son) and Judah was an ancient one, going back …
Sitting in Athens thinking about history
Sitting in Athens thinking about history. Anthony Sattin’s book Nomads: The Wanderers who Shaped our World is therapeutic and persuasive in its argument that the modernist telling of history represents ‘an invisible line’ through to civilisation and progress as defined in the West, to ‘people like us.’ In this idea, settledness, dominion over nature, and …
Mission and the Wind
We’ve just spent a week in a Central Asian city famously known as “the windy city” (let the reader understand!) – and it really has been very blustery. Shutter-bangingly, tree-bendingly, dust-raisingly properly windy. So we’ve spent a week thinking about wind, and thinking about mission. They key verse we’ve been reflecting on together is John …
You Don’t Have to Read to Know Scripture
Regularly engaging with the Bible helps people to come to faith and to grow in maturity as believers. Reading the Bible individually is just one way…
Cyprus: The Island, the Donkey and the King
Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, not a horse. The Cyprus donkey is a well-loved symbol of the island. What kind of king do Cypriots really need to meet?
The Man, The Woman and the Garden: Easter Reflections from John 20
The resurrection appearances in John’s brilliantly crafted narrative bring to poetic conclusion so many themes. There are multiple reiterated ideas from John’s gospel itself which find their climax in Chapter 20, as well as deeper underlying, intertextual, Biblical-theological ideas. Consider the significance of it being “the first day,” (20:1, 19), light and darkness (20:1), seeing …
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Sea of Galilee: Part 2
Now, lets go forwards in time to Jesus. Jesus went to live in the region of Galilee. Matthew tells us that this was, “to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah: “Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles— the people …
Sea of Galilee: Part 1
People of the Middle East love word plays. We use rhyming phrases all the time, for example: Kul Franji Branji = which means “Everyone foreign is exciting.” Late night conversations outside our building with our neighbours are richly flavoured with these short sayings, proverbs and rhyme. It is part of the Art of Middle Eastern …
Belonging: The Bible’s Story of Race
I know that people are always looking for resources to help them think about issues like race, diversity and justice from a Biblical perspective. The church where I serve as Teaching Pastor has been on a journey on these issues over the last few years, that has been both hugely challenging and richly rewarding, and …
The good shepherd
One of our friends in the Middle East was in the mountains last week and bumped into a shepherd. They had a chat about the Parable of the Good Shepherd and caught it on video. Enjoy a brief watch.
Moses: Envy
This is part four of a series of blog posts on Moses. “And I will give this people favour in the eye of the Egyptians; and when you go, you shall not go empty,” Exodus 3:21 “Eye” is a word often associated with Envy. To “place one’s eye” on someone or something is to invoke …
Moses: The Staff
This is part 3 in a series of posts on Moses. The LORD said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A staff.” Exodus 4:2 The shepherd’s staff in Moses’ hand was the very symbol of his marginalisation. And yet through the wisdom of God it would become the instrument of his …
Moses: The Stranger
“And he called his name Gershom, for he said, “I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.” Exodus 2:22 Gershom’s name comes from the 3-letter verbal root in Hebrew (g-r-sh) which actually has quite a violent meaning; it means to be driven out or expelled. Expulsion In Gen 3:24 Adam and Eve were g-r-sh …
Moses: The Slow Movement
Having fled Egypt and stumbled into a new life in Midian, Moses enters what Rabbi Jonathan Sacks calls “the slow movement of the symphony of his life,” as a wilderness shepherd, close to the cycles of nature, far from his destiny in Egypt. I’ve always loved the narration on this moment from Charlton Heston’s Ten …