I’ve heard many people talk about ‘calling’, ‘mission’ and ‘purpose’. It’s becoming almost part of our DNA as Christians now to have a ‘calling’.

One of the standard questions Christians eventually ask when they get to know one another is what that person feels ‘called’ to do. Come on, we’ve all heard it haven’t we – we’ve probably asked it ourselves, perfectly legitimately.

But calling has been undersold. It’s much more – and different – than we have been led to believe.

Calling is not just supernatural. It’s an evolutionary process, which goes on through our entire lives.(Tweet this here)

Last year (more…)

Whilst away at Greenbelt two issues that raised their heads were the issue of sabbath and its role in my life, and also social networking and worship. I went to a good discussion between four prominent Christian tweeters including @vickybeeching and @drbexl, and just today I was involved in a debate on Twitter, ironically enough, started up by @vickybeeching, on the role of Twitter and social networking in church, and whether it’s appropriate or not to Tweet in church.

I think the issue of social networking and how we engage and use this tool in our worship, as it becomes an increasingly big part of our daily lives, is one that desperately needs addressing and discussion. As ever, I don’t think any of us has a final answer, it’s a discussion that will go on for years to come with good arguments on every side.

To me it opens out bigger questions – what do we mean by church? What do we mean when we use the word worship? How do we see God – and how would Jesus use Twitter? These are all very important questions, which we need to be reflecting, and pondering on, which aren’t all going to get answered in a short blog post here. But it’s important to engage with the discussion and be part of it, it’s one of those balancing acts of faith, and we need to be participating in it, not standing on the sidelines, so here’s a little look from my own perspective and a few thoughts. (more…)

Change.

It happens all the time, it’s inevitable. No matter what you do, your body is going to age and eventually it’s going to die. Your body is never the same, it’s always creating new cells to replace old ones. You get a new skin every 30 days (which also happens to be the moon cycle for months, and the length of the female menstrual cycle – strange coincidence, it’s almost like it’s all designed…). Things have to change. If they don’t then they become dated, they stand still and get left behind. Our character and personality changes all the time too. Every day we gradually become different as we experience different things. We are never static, we never stay the same. Many changes we don’t notice are happening until a period of time has passed, because many are small or internal changes where the fruit only comes out later.

I’ve said many times we are all on our own individual journeys with God – whether we know we are or not – and a lot of what appears on this blog is about my journey. God has really been putting me through some big changes in the last four years, and this site and my own writing has developed along with it. (more…)

As you can see, I’ve changed the look of the site. Don’t worry though, you’re still in the right place. At least I hope you are. I felt it was time, given all God has been doing recently, that I freshened things up a bit round here, hope you like it.

But I have to confess, I’m giving some serious thought to taking a sabbatical from the blog, possibly for a month until the end of the year. I’ve not made up my mind yet, and want to discuss it with a few people. I’m trying to write and developing my creative gifts, especially writing. I know that I am a creative person, I love to make new things. I like writing & talking about Jesus, church and discipleship. I love creating things which help people connect with God in a deeper way.

I’ve progressed in developing this gift and started to take it more seriously, but I realised that as was doing this I was trying to take control of this gift. I was trying to come up with ideas myself. I forgot briefly that all the times I’d written before, all the times I created the my best stuff, was when I was open to God inspiring me, and I wasn’t worried about being in control of it, because it didn’t matter so much. (more…)

I know that in the times we live in – the so called ‘age of austerity’ – where things are difficult financially, people are losing their jobs and there are cuts everywhere you look, that it’s a difficult time to be optimistic and feel alive. Or so it would seem anyway.

But I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling alive right now. Really, truly alive.

Some things have happened to me recently which have made me feel alive more than ever. Or more accurately, I’ve made some choices recently which have resulted in me feeling more alive. I’m an optimist my inclination, but I feel even more positive about myself and what God’s doing in me than normal right now, largely down to these choices I’ve made.

I’ve invested in some personal coaching which is bearing fruit in ways I never expected with someone who has been a great encouragement, blessing and support to me, even friend (you know who you are, thank you so much!), I’ve got accountability with someone for decisions about my faith and life, I’ve started thinking practically about what God might be wanting me to do and taken the first tentative steps in following those things through. (more…)

Today I bought a new album (which shall remain nameless, though as it came out today that narrows it down considerably, especially for those who know me) and as I purchased it in the shop I suddenly had this thought come over me, which has come over me a lot more often recently.

‘Do I need this?’

‘Why did I buy this?’

Now to be fair it’s a great album and one I’ve been planning to buy for a while by one of my favourite acts, it wasn’t that expensive and will get a lot of use. But that wasn’t the point.

Me being a deep thinker, these two thoughts very quickly went beyond the superficial and into why any of us buy anything, why we have possessions, why they are so important to us, and my eyes began to open.

It’s all about control.

When we buy something, we gain control over it. We gain the right of possession, we can do what we like, when we like, how we like with what we have bought without consequence (as long as its legal of course). But there is a feeling, an emotion, a sense of satisfaction we feel inside when we buy something we really want. (more…)

Have you ever heard someone say something about you, and the instant you heard it, it made sense?

Like it ticked a box, you connected with it in some deep divine kind of way, almost like you always knew this thing about yourself, or had felt it on some level, but someone saying it had merely confirmed it or vocalised it for the first time? You may even have thought this thing about yourself, but had either been too afraid or unwilling to admit it.

That happened to me the other day.

As part of my discipleship and growth I have booked myself in for some Skype coaching sessions with a well-known worship leader, someone with experience in ‘full-time ministry’ (though I dislike that phrase, as we all are one way or another) and who has studied theology and reflection at length, someone who can sharpen me, challenge me, and push me and move me on in my walk with Jesus and indeed in my writing. (more…)

Many of you who’ve read this blog know my story, and it’s not a pretty one. I say this not to gain pity or sympathy – I request nor require either – but merely to state the facts. My life hasn’t been easy at times, especially my teenage years and early twenties, and for a long time I lived in the after-effects of that, and that suffering had a big role to play in shaping who I am now.

That’s what suffering does.

It changes us.

It shapes us.

I realise now a lot of the anger that has driven me in recent years in making many changes in my life, and indeed in my writing, has come from anger I felt at this and other things I lacked in my life, and a sense of feeling second best to everyone. That God was able to use that and redeem it is indeed a miracle – especially as I thought that anger was merely a ‘righteous anger’. It shows that with God, everything truly is redeemable. (more…)

I don’t often comment on specific Bible passages, but this one has really stood out for me this week. Check this passage out:

“Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7 v9-11)

I don’t know about you, but I have struggled a lot with this verse.

I mean, have you ever struggled with God giving you good things? Or have you ever felt guilty when God’s blessed you in an amazing way, when grace has been extended to you, whether directly from God or through someone else? (more…)

This weekend its Halloween, as I’m sure many of you know. Time for dressing up, trick or treating, having parties and watching scary films. To be honest, I’ve never really seen the point in Halloween. I guess, being a church-goer my whole life, its never really meant anything to me.

But then I found out the real meaning of this day.

It’s All Saints Day.

What’s that, I hear you ask. Well, All Saints Day has been celebrated for centuries. Its a day when, essentially, Christians remember all of those who have gone before. Now it would be easy to say its all about those who we would traditionally call ‘saints’ – St Peter, St Paul, and modern ‘official’ saints like the last Pope and Mother Theresa (pictured).

We can understand those people being called saints can’t we?

After the lives they led, what they endured for their faith, the sacrifices they made and devotion to God, they somehow seem to ‘deserve’ that status don’t they?

Well at least, that’s the general understanding of it.

The problem with this understanding is that it implies that somehow God loves and blesses these people more than He does everyone else. That there’s this scale with God, this measure of how worthy you are of His blessing, and that only special people get this blessing.

Its kind of like saying some people are specially qualified for God’s special blessing.

Now I’m not for one minute saying that the people I’ve mentioned aren’t outstanding examples of disciples of Jesus. They are all great role models for us, they have all shaped our faith in one way or another, they show us what is possible and their example challenges us to live a more Christ-like life – or it should. (more…)