Samuel had a most unusual childhood. He was born as the result of God listening to the prayer of his mother, Hannah, who had been barren for many years. Samuel was given to God’s service and spent his life serving the priest Eli at Shiloh. He was faithful to God from a very young age …
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 …
The city of Jericho had a memorable and ungodly history. It was the first city defeated by the Israelites west of the Jordan River in the book of Joshua. After its destruction as part of the Conquest, Joshua ordered that it never be rebuilt (Joshua 6:26). The site lay as a testimony to God’s power …
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 …
Christians can speak to God anytime, anywhere, in prayer. Have you considered how special that is? It is easy to get so used to the idea of prayer that we take it for granted. We can speak to the Almighty God, the Creator of all that exists, and He listens to us! How can that …
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 don’t have a lot of hair, which means that this short episode in 2 Kings 4 catches my eye: 23 He [Elisha] went up from there to Bethel, and while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him, saying, “Go up, you baldhead! …
One of the greatest cultural crimes you can commit today is to be intolerant. We must be accepting of everyone’s beliefs, whatever they might be. Now to most of us who have grown up in this world that seems perfectly reasonable and rational. We’re all free to make our own decisions about things, and we …
The Old Testament is rich and full of useful things for Christians to think about. We see how God relates to his people, his faithfulness to the promises, and instructions about how to live. All of that is true. Yet there is a real danger that we don’t see the Old Testament in the right …
In 1 Kings 22, King Ahab had a decision to make. The king of Syria had promised to return a series of cities to him, and after three years one key city had not been returned to Israelite rule. Should he ignore this breach or go to battle over it? He sought advice from four …