What makes a sermon a good sermon? Everyone will have a different personal opinion. Some like loud, enthusiastic preachers who call for ‘Amens’ and ‘Praise the Lords’ at regular intervals. Others like careful, logical, well-thought out dense sermons. Many have a favourite preacher. But how might we assess preaching in a Biblical way? The basic …
The advertised time for the church service I am part of is 10am on Sundays. This is not a new time, but is the time our church has met for decades now. Yet, most Sundays, less than 50% of the people who will ultimately be present are there at 10am. Sometimes the service leader stands …
You know what it’s like. Partway through a service, you hear a baby cry. It distracts you, but you try to ignore it; the parents are trying their best. Then, a little later on, there is a rustling noise while a toddler opens a packet of chips during a prayer. And during the sermon, some …
Today’s children are very busy. In previous generations, at least in Australia, it was common for children to spend a great deal of time outside, in parks, riding bikes, and relaxing. Now life is different. There are many after school activities, music practice or sports training, and for Christian families, church. How does this reality …
I have recently published my second book! The cover looks like this: What is this book about? While the topic is retirement, this book explores what the Bible says about older age more generally. Here is the official blurb: Most of us assume that when we reach a certain age, we will retire from …
In the past few years, we have seen the rise of a new career choice: the influencer. An influencer is someone who has many followers on social media and is therefore paid to advertise products. As they ‘influence’ many people, some can make a lot of money in this manner. From an advertiser’s perspective, and …
What shape do your prayers tend to have? I know how easy it is to be so self-focussed when it comes to prayer. Whatever issue is dominating my thinking at the time is what I ask for. It is so easy to come to God with our shopping lists, expecting him to fix everything. And …
I recently led a short theology class on singleness, love sex and marriage. The second session explained the Biblical teaching on sex. There were 27 people in the room, most of whom had grown up in Christian households. As part of this, I asked the group how many of them had their parents make some …
Last Sunday night, my church hosted the annual Reformation Day combined service for our denomination. We are part of the Westminster Presbyterian Church. This is a small denomination of 11 congregations in Western Australia and 6 congregations in other states. The combined service was a couple of hundred people from these congregations singing with gusto …
An increasing proportion of the population of the world is single. According to the latest census figures (2016), 24% of Australian households contain only one person. That percentage is rising sharply. There are a number of reasons for this, of course. An ageing population means there are a larger number of widows and widowers. A …