Category Archives: Church
Perspectives on ‘church’
Church is An event A community A ‘government’/ institution [And once we accept this, all sorts of problems start getting a little bit simpler, imo] [It is also A nation (the people of God) A bride (the body of Christ) … Continue reading
‘Good morning and welcome to Christ Church Mt Zion…’
I earmarked this brief comment on Hebrews 12:22-24 in ‘Remaking a Broken World’ by Christopher Ash: I take it that when the writer says, ‘You have not come … You have come …’ (v18, 22), he speaks of the heavenly … Continue reading
World Made New
I’ve just finished reading the really very good ‘Remaking a Broken World’ by Christopher Ash. It’s essentially a bible overview based around the theme of gathering and scattering in the bible, and therefore an account of the bible’s overall storyline … Continue reading
Why Church?
We are often told that salvation is not about going to church. And there’s a sense in which that is true. Sort of. For sure, the mere act of attending a church service doesn’t ‘make’ you a Christian any more … Continue reading
Muddle on the Mersey
The Bishop of Liverpool continues to embroil himself and his Diocese in an increasingly odorous policy on human sexuality. His recent address at Diocesan Synod argues that the CofE should (and one day will) tolerate a range of theological positions … Continue reading
It is not good for the man to be alone…
Exodus 18 again. Something blindingly obvious that I’ve missed. Jethro’s words in vv17-18 are a deliberate echo of Genesis 2:18. What Moses is doing is not good, because he cannot do it all alone. The escape from Egypt has been … Continue reading
Tolerating evil?
In the previous post I said a little bit about the church at Thyatira and their problem with church discipline (in that they didn’t do it). In this post I want to suggest a few ways that contemporary conservative evangelicals … Continue reading
Thyatira?
The letter to Thyatira scares me. The letters to the 7 churches are sober reading as it is. But looking at Thyatira with a student the other day was a disconcerting experience. It was too close for comfort. You see, … Continue reading
trinity, community, apologetics
Just knocking some half-formed thoughts around… Is there is a link between Monadic conceptions of God (God the undifferentiated One) and rationalistic/ ‘evidentialist’ apologetics? Why do I ask? Because there’s a clear link between the Trinity and the church as … Continue reading
The book of revelation and ‘what we do in church’
“In addition, the close link in Revelation between the struggling churches in Asia Minor and the church triumphant around the throne of God in heaven assumes a correlation between heavenly and earthly worship.” Letham, The Holy Trinity, 46-47
How do you tell the story?
Tim Chester with a nifty little post here on how, whilst essentially true, our default way of telling the gospel story is often overly-individual in focus. “The individualistic version of the gospel makes the church a useful help to individual … Continue reading
Worship, special worship, & ‘date-night’
See this simple, obvious, but deeply important observation from Glen Scrivener.
Elders and angels, heavenly and earthly
Yesterday I noticed something for the first time in Revelation. Now I’ve noticed it, it seems obvious. The representatives of the church down on earth are called angels in each of the letters to the 7 churches. Though ‘angels’ it … Continue reading
‘Judgment’ isn’t just important to evangelism
It is really very strange when conservative evangelicals of all people are weak on church discipline. One of the battles fought most strenuously and loudly from this (my) camp has been against the tendency to downplay the significance, severity and … Continue reading
