We all desire freedom. We seek and pursue it. We cheer for individuals, groups or nations fighting for their freedom, and rightly so.

All of us want to be free.

We want to be able to make our own choices about how we live and what we do, where we live and who governs us.

The opposite of this is total control and domination. No choice. Everything decided for us, everything done for us. Imposed on us from outside.

This, we know, is not good.

There is something inside of us which understands this instinctively.

We fight against regimes like this.

They do not last. Eventually, they all fall.

Because to be human is to desire freedom – and eventually freedom wins out.

However, although there are many benefits and blessings from freedom, there is also a risk which comes with it. (more…)

I recently heard a story about a Christian couple. They had been married several years and had two children. They were part of a thriving church. All good.

But the husband then decided he was a woman. He began dressing like one, putting women’s clothes and makeup on. He decided he was going to have the operations so he could fully become a woman physically.

The wife desperately tried to talk him out of this and convince him otherwise, but she could not. She still loved the man she married and they had been happy together. She loved their children. She would not leave him, and didn’t think it was right to do so.

You’d think this was hard enough for her. Sadly not.

The worst thing was how her church reacted. (more…)

In the last year or so I’ve become more aware of the work of Jeff Goins. He is a writer, successful blogger and soon-to-be published author. I published a two-part interview of him for this site earlier in the year and I recently wrote a guest post for his site.

He’s just written a new e-book, ‘You Are a Writer‘, and I’ve had the privilege of getting an advance copy to review. There’s also a great website related to the book, which you can find here.

I don’t often review others’ work, but Jeff is a compelling, challenging writer and it’s no understatement to say his work could be life-changing for you. Even if you don’t think of yourself as a writer,  wait and give this review a read – then go and get this book.

Trust me, you won’t be disappointed.

Jeff Goins is a writer.

In his new e-book, he makes clear you can be one too.

In this relatively short but powerful e-book, he calls us out to embrace who we can be – to stop dreaming of being writers, stop waiting to be picked and to start calling ourselves writers – and teaches us how to be writers.  (more…)

I recently went to the birthday party of a good friend. I only knew one person at the party – the person who’d invited me.

By the end of the evening I’d chatted to at least 5 or 6 new people in depth – and made two new Facebook friends. I’d also managed to grow my own self-confidence into the bargain.

Somehow, being around people, physically interacting with them, made a difference to me. I have new friendships in the digital realm now, but there was a connection made in physically interacting that couldn’t have been made otherwise.

It works in reverse too.

For example, the day before the party above, I met and had dinner with someone in London. A friend who I had chatted to on both Twitter, Facebook and Skype. Someone who I had built up a good friendship with and talked to about some important issues only in the digital realm.

A person I considered a good friend, but who I’d never met in the flesh before that day. (more…)

Our lives are all a journey aren’t they?

Like many journeys, along the way we often get disruptions – like death, end of a relationship, people moving away, illness – which are almost forced upon us. We don’t choose them, they simply come upon us when we least expect them, and nothing at all can prepare us for them. They are painful, overwhelming, emotional and a real struggle.

Valley experiences. Losing my mother was one of those for me. You may be in your own one right now.

But there are other valleys we walk too. The ones we choose.

Jesus chose a valley when He chose the cross. He didn’t have to do it, it wasn’t forced upon Him, it wasn’t a complete shock – and He could have escaped it.

He chose instead to surrender Himself completely to it – and fortunate for us that He did.

About 14 months ago I was sitting in a pub with a good friend. We were talking and one of the matters that seemed to come up was the issue of me trusting God. Those who know me well know that trust is always a struggle for me, because of my background being bullied, coming from a broken home and losing a parent at young age.

But this was God. (more…)

Today I’m going to be going back to the topic of social media . In the time since I last blogged on the subject I’ve decided that this topic is far too big to merely have a short-term series on it.

The issue of social media is so significant  and there are so many areas to cover that we need to devote time to it, and so from now on it’ll be one of the ongoing discussions/themes of my blog.

I recently decided to take some time off from social media. I’ve always believed it important we take regular sabbaths from social media  – but I’d always struggled to really lay it down and actually do it.

Which is a good sign that I really needed to stop.

So with the help of a couple of accountability partners, I decided to spend 48 hours out of the digital realm.

Cut off. No Facebook, no Twitter, no Google + or e-mail, for 48 hours. (more…)

Welcome to the final post of my series of posts on the Passion of Jesus. To resurrection Sunday, when Jesus rose from the dead. Triumphed over death, sin and suffering.

We live in a world where people put their faith in all sorts of things. Money, success, career, power, status. We also put our hope in people. There is this very natural human desire to put our faith and our hope in something, to believe in something or someone better than ourselves, and a way of life, a way of seeing the world that is better than we have right now.

We want to believe it.

We need to believe it.

Indeed, we were created to believe it.

The problem of course, is that we put all this into people and desires we really shouldn’t. That maybe aren’t bad in themselves, but we put in the wrong place in our lives. One of the reasons we have become so cynical as a culture is because we put impossible expectations on leaders and public figures.

Culture and media encourages us to do this. It’s so easy we can do, and we’re so trained to do it that we can often begin to do this subconsciously. (more…)

Holy Saturday (or Easter Saturday as I have always called it) is a strange day. Often so quiet. Rarely discussed.

Yet I think there is so much we can learn from this day about following Jesus, and our need for Him.

The first Holy Saturday was a day without hope. A day of grief and despair for followers of Jesus. The previous day they had seen their leader tortured and crucified, publicly humiliated and seemingly defeated.

Jesus body was in the tomb, sealed in (see picture left). It wasn’t rolled away and there seemed no chance of it.

The disciples themselves were hidden away, fearing for their lives.

They had put their faith in Jesus. They had given up their livelihoods and possessions to follow Him, surrendered their lives as they knew them. They had lived with Him, eaten with Him and trusted that He was the Saviour foretold in the Holy scriptures.

They had no doubt He was the one who had come to save them, to liberate them. In their eyes to rescue them from the Romans.

Now He was dead.

Gone. (more…)

It’s Good Friday. Today in our Passion series we come to Jesus on the cross.

He has been abandoned, betrayed, let down, humiliated, misrepresented, beaten up, tortured, publicly stripped naked and rejected by almost everyone.

He asks God why He is forsaking Him.

Now there’s a time and place to talk about doubt and faith. That’s not what I want to examine today.

But in this moment, Jesus asks why. Again, associating Himself with us.

How often do we ask why suffering happens and get no answer?

How often when life gets disrupted and we suffer, or when we get rejected or abandoned, do we ask why and simply get silence?

The simple answer is that most of us have done this, at one time or the other. We’ve all had these moments.

Often, however, we always get the answer later.

Jesus, when He asks the question of why God has forsaken Him, is quoting the beginning of Psalm 22 knowing it’s ending:

“He has done it”

Jesus is trusting that God will take care of the ending of the story. (more…)

Welcome to the first post of my series on Jesus’ Passion. We begin today, Maundy Thursday, the evening Jesus was arrested.

So let’s try and picture the scene. Jesus has been in Jerusalem all week preaching. It is now late Thursday, going into Friday. Jesus has had a last supper with the disciples and broken bread with them. Judas has already gone to fetch those who will arrest Him.

Now to Gesthemene.

Jesus goes on ahead, and prays. He tells His disciples that His soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.

A sorrow so deep in His soul that it is taking over His physical body.

He knows what lies ahead. He knows the path laid out for Him. He knows what He must do.

He grasps it so fully it is overwhelming Him.

So He prays, and He is brutally honest in His prayers.

“take this cup of suffering from me…” (more…)