The concept of the Church being a mother emerges from the continuity between Old Testament prophetic imagery and New Testament apostolic interpretation. Isaiah 54 portrays Zion (God’s covenant...
She was just a small thing, all black with long fur. It was minus temperatures and the snow covered the ground. I called her, but she would run away and I would not see her again until the next day. I...
As I was growing up one of the TV programmes that I liked to watch was Mission Impossible. It depicted the missions of a team of secret government agents known as the Impossible Missions Force (IMF)...
Have you ever heard someone being referred to as a ‘Doubting Thomas’? If you have, then you were probably aware that this was not meant as a compliment. It is typically used to describe someone...
By the Spirit, our risen, ascended Lord is with us always. And through his presence, he extends to us his peace (shalom), even in the most trying circumstances. Do we, trusting in Jesus, receive that...
The disciples had seen the resurrected Jesus (John 20), and yet several of them returned to what they knew best – fishing. All night they toiled on the Sea of Tiberias, and yet despite being...
Now that everyone has coloured eggs for the kids, been to church, had the family over for Easter dinner, cleaned up and put everything away, life goes on just as before. Easter is...
Easter is a time when we rejoice over Christ’s completed work of salvation. The empty tomb was and is an open door to a new humanity in Jesus. It is at this time of year that we often retell the...
From this statement we can conclude that Mary expected to see the stone in place and the way locked to enter the tomb. So, how did she expect to get in, she could not remove the stone without help....
In James Cameron’s film Titanic, treasure hunters seek out 102-year-old Rose Calvert, who is believed to be the last person to have seen a fabulous diamond called the ‘Heart of the Ocean’, a...
There are moments in life that bridge the realms of what was and what will be. Places of transition, a threshold between what was and what will be. This is the liminal space, where the old fades away,...
When we read the story of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, we usually focus on the big moments: the nails in his hands, the darkness over the land, or his last words and final cry. But scripture also...
Love, a force both gentle and mighty, has the extraordinary power to transform hearts and souls. It is a beacon of light that guides us through the darkest of storms, a force that reshapes us and the...
When Adam and Eve chose to go their own way, apart from God, and were expelled from the Garden of Eden, Cherubim and a flaming sword were put at the entrance to guard the way back to the tree of life....
Chapter 21 of the first book of Samuel tells the somewhat bizarre story of David electing to flee from Saul into the hands of his enemies – people who had not forgiven him for the recent killing of...
From a Christian perspective the calendar this week marks the culmination of the most significant events in all of human history. We remember Jesus’s final meal with his disciples, and the bread and...
We come to one of the most dramatic and sobering moments in scripture. A governor stands before a crowd. A criminal and the Son of God wait in chains, and a question echoes through history: ‘Which...
Crowds once filled the streets of Jerusalem, waving branches and shouting ‘Hosanna!’ as Jesus rode into the city. Their voices rose with hope, longing for a king who would restore, redeem, and...
Checkmate! It’s the word the winning player declares in the endgame of chess when the losing king is trapped and as good as dead. Jesus died. Is our King a losing king? This King of Israel, after...
The Gospels reveal how Jesus built his ministry around relationships rather than possessions. From the outset with his disciples, his focus was clear. Come, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers...
Many Christians believe when Jesus died on the cross and took our sin and depravity upon himself that God had to turn his face away, because God, who is so pure and holy, wouldn’t be able to...
David’s situation in 1 Samuel 25 was that he had been anointed but had not been enthroned as king, and he was on the run, leading weary men through the wilderness. He and his men had been protecting...
‘When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” He asked this only to test him, for he already had...
At first glance, the header scripture seems perplexing, and troubling. It is baffling to read that when Jesus heard that his dear friend Lazarus was sick, he didn’t rush to Bethany but stayed where...
Have you ever heard someone say, ‘There are two kinds of people in the world’? This is usually followed by a joke or some oversimplified statement about people. Here is one that does both:...
In the second half of chapter one of Paul’s first Corinthian letter, his focus is on the power and wisdom of God, made manifest in the profound and simple message of the gospel. How was it, that in...
Early in our walk with Jesus, we can easily feel like God and Jesus are far off. They may seem distant – so holy, so far above our human experience – that we struggle to relate. But that is not...
I was recently intrigued with two stories of fig trees we see in Matthew. We find the first fig tree in Matthew 21, ‘In the morning, when he returned to the city, he was hungry. And seeing a...
In 1 Kings 19 we meet the prophet Elijah at one of the lowest points in his life. After experiencing a mighty victory on Mount Carmel, he suddenly found himself fleeing in fear from Queen Jezebel....
Here in 1 Timothy 4, we are given reminders of what it means to be a good servant of Christ. We have the distinguished figures of Paul and Timothy here before us, but we all are meant to be servants...
In the ninth chapter of John’s gospel Jesus healed a man who had been born blind. It was a wonderful healing, enabling this man to see physically for the first time in his life. I truly can’t...
Were you ever afraid of the dark? Many of us have had this fear at some point. Oftentimes, the darkness conjures our nightmares, causing us to see things that are not there. Generally speaking,...
Praying in accordance with the Father’s will is of paramount importance. Jesus, the very Son of God, declares that he will not do anything that is contrary to his Father’s will: “For I...
One of the most profound sections in the whole of scripture is Colossians 1:11-20, where the apostle Paul powerfully sets before us the divinity, majesty, and pre-eminence of the Lord Jesus Christ, in...
Most of us live crowded, noise-filled, busy lives. What device consumes a great portion of our time? Ding, ding, ding. You’re correct if you answered mobile phones. Ninety-eight percent of adults in...
Hagar was a marginalised person in her society. She was a foreigner, a servant woman, and a single mother in crisis. Because of tension in Abraham’s household, Hagar had been sent away with her son...
We read in Numbers 7:89 that, ‘Whenever Moses went into the Tabernacle to speak with the Lord, he heard the voice speaking to him from between the two cherubim above the Ark’s cover—the place...
In the fourth chapter of John’s gospel, he tells us about a Samaritan woman who met Jesus at a well. They talked about water, worship, truth, and ultimately her life. Then suddenly we read:...
Have you ever been assigned ‘busy work?’ I despise doing ‘busy work’ It’s the type of work that doesn’t have a purpose except to keep you…well…busy. Sometimes this happens on a job...
March is a time when we may spend more time reflecting on Jesus’s sacrifice for us. And many use it as a time for self-assessment, considering Paul’s advice to us to, ‘Examine yourselves’....
We use cookies to optimise our website and our service.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.