It’s universally popular. You can find it cross-stitched on Granny’s mantle-piece and emblazoned on a rock star’s T-shirt. It tumbles from the lips of bible-thumping fundamentalists and soft-spoken gurus. But what does it mean? Let’s consider four points… Because God is love, there is relationship, radiance, room and response. Relationship 1 John 4:8 says “God […]
Imagine two scenarios. Scenario 1: We are on a ship. It springs a leak and starts to sink. While we’re fleeing to the life-rafts, you manage to grab a bag. Unbeknownst to the rest of us, your bag contains a bottle of water and some canned meat – tuna, spam, etc. We all huddle together […]
Earlier this year I was strolling along a Mauritian beach with my wife. We bought tropical fruit from a roadside vendor, went for a swim and then lay down on a deckchair sipping a cold beer. I said to Emma “This is the life.” When have you said that phrase? “This is the life”? You […]
What do you buy the man who has it all? Advertisers pose that question this time of year. And usually they answer: some kind of razor. But here’s the one occasion where the question is not hyperbole. Jesus really is the Owner and Inheritor of the universe. As Colossians 1 puts it: “By [Christ] were […]
The wise men and the shepherds tend to get mixed up in our recollections of Christmas. But actually they couldn’t be more different. The shepherds were poor Jews. The wise men were rich foreigners. For the shepherds, the birth of Christ was a ‘bolt from the blue’ as they went about their ordinary business. For […]
— “Old Testament folks were not particularly Messianic in their faith. And even if they were, it was very confused.” — “Expectation for Christ revolved around a conquering Warrior who arrives on a white horse.” — “Believers BC wanted the Messiah to come and defeat the nations oppressing them.” It’s common to hear many views […]
In science fiction, alien life forms are always showing up from another world. Most often they come to destroy and dominate. In Luke chapter 2, there is a very different kind of alien invasion: “8 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 […]
You didn’t choose to get born and neither did I. Only Jesus has ever chosen to be born. But if such powers were at our disposal, would we have decided upon the path that Jesus took? Surely not. Surely we would have opted for powerful parents, fabulous wealth, plush surroundings, an easy life. And it’s […]
How do you feel about musicals? Many people dislike them because ‘in real life, ordinary folk don’t burst into song.’ Well, hopefully Luke chapter 1 will win over the doubters because here we read, not one, but two examples of spontaneous lyricism! At the end of the chapter (Luke 1:68-80), Zechariah – the father of […]
Gabriel says to Mary: “have gratia plena!” Or at least, that was Jerome’s Latin translation from around 400AD. In English it would read “Hail Mary, full of grace.” But that’s not a good translation of Luke 1:28. Jerome’s version sounds as though Mary is a repository of some spiritual substance called grace. And if we […]
