A debate is currently raging within the theological community and much ink being spilt on a topic that evangelicals would once have regarded as settled and unquestionable: whether Adam was a real, historical individual, ancestral to the whole human race 1. Belief in an historical Adam was mainstream for the first eighteen centuries of…
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The world has changed a lot in 20 years. No. It has changed a lot in five years. Courtesy of ‘the father of lies’, it will keep on changing too. Social media will continue to be a big part of this. And besure that the law in the UK that brought ‘gay marriage’ on…
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Hopefully, the sales of Evangelical Times have not dipped calamitously since last month’s Guest Column! If you are still there, I want to pursue a couple of lines of inquiry. Last month I described something of my journey to date. Since moving from the world of the Reformed Charismatic, I have been honoured to…
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I have a confession to make. There was a time in my Christian life when I did not read Evangelical Times! I know this is a shocking admission. But please don’t turn the page in horror, or send a strongly worded letter to the editor. As you can see, things have changed. My ‘pre-enlightenment’…
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We have been exploring the Bible’s teaching on the Sabbath as the special day of rest God has given his people. We have seen how the church has largely forgotten it, in our day, but also why it needs to be rediscovered. One of the reasons many Christians have abandoned the idea of such…
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A recurring error of evangelical Christianity is to dislocate itself from the evangel, the gospel. That is, despite its claim to be gospel- and grace-centred, it slips all too easily into being law-centred, and grace becomes the casualty. To say this is in no way to imply that God’s law is not important or…
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The past 30 years have witnessed huge moral and spiritual changes, not just in the life of our nation but also of the church. Much of that change is a reflection of the cultural revolution that started to sweep through the Western world when the so-called Baby Boomers of the late 1940s and 1950s…
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What does Jesus demand of his followers for them to be recognised as true disciples? A brief look at the Sermon on the Mount helps us find out.
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The book of Hosea relates the story of a man with a divine message that was out of sync with the outlook of his age - and yet very suitable for his age.
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There will be important events during 2015 and, no doubt, significant changes in both state and church. We all know that a general election will take place, and perhaps we may see so-called minor parties receiving a greater influence than could have been imagined a few years ago. The situation in politics that we…
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There are some trends in evangelical thinking that delight me; others create concern. I am still shocked by how quickly fads come, cause immense fascination and euphoria, and then disappear like a vapour. How much evangelical energy is wasted on these is beyond calculation. But, since I have been a Christian, I have noticed…
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I have never been to Israel, and have no burning desire to go. But, if I did, I would want to visit Anathoth. It was there that my Old Testament hero was born. Called as a young man to leave an obscure, restricting, yet predictable ministry of maintaining the status quo (he grew up…
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