One of the fun things we did at the Palm Party this year was to recreate Jesus’ Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem. We printed up 75 flags for the children who were coming with four different pictures on them; a palm branch, a t-shirt, a crown, and the word joy. The first 75 children to ask for a flag could have one to wave when we did our reenactment.

1. The palm branch reminds us that real palm branches were waved for Jesus. In some sense you could say that Jesus’ mastery over the previously unridden donkey’s colt and these palm leaves were symbolic representations of Jesus’ Lordship over nature. He is Lord of all, including an unbroken donkey’s colt, and all the the plants, trees, mountains and streams. It is during the Triumphal Entry narrative in Luke’s Gospel that Jesus in response to being told to rebuke his followers says: “I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out.” Luke 19:40.

2. The t-shirt symbol reminds us that real coats and cloaks were spread on the floor on the first Palm Sunday to make a makeshift red carpet for Jesus. He was deserving of a special welcome, as special entrance. We could say that our own works, the things we have made and the things we’re working towards, should all be laid at the feet of Jesus. All our work should be submitted to Him and under His rule, just like those coats were on that first Palm Sunday; “…a very great multitude spread their clothes on the road; others cut down branches from the trees and spread them on the road.” Matthew 21:8.

3. The crown is simply a statement that Jesus us the true King. On the very first Palm Sunday Jesus was heralded by crowds crying out: “Hosanna! ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’ The King of Israel!” John 12:13. This is not a cryptic reference that requires clever interpretation, they crowd called Jesus king directly in John’s gospel and in Luke’s gospel: “Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!” Luke 19:38.

4. It was joy that motivated Jesus’ Passion: “looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Hebrews 12:2. Jesus went through the cross, for His own joy - and to enable us to live in that joy too. That joy is to be the very source of our strength as Christians.

You can see below a couple of the flags that we handed out to the children so we could join with the cheering crowds who shouted “Hosanna”:

The crowd shouted “Hosanna” - which means something like “save we pray” to a man called Jesus - which means “Saviour”.

Saviour, save us!

And so we join with them, “Saviour, save us!”

And Jesus does save us, but He doesn’t do it the way we might imagine. He certainly didn’t do it in the way His disciples had imagined… just days after His Triumphal entry His disciples thought His mission had failed. In his 1897 book ‘The Men Who Crucify Christ’ the former Bishop of London, Arthur f. Winnington-Ingram speculates if this is part of Judas’ motivation to betray Jesus. Jesus simply wasn’t making the right choices (in Judas’ view) to overthrow the Romans and restore Israel’s kingdom. Winnington-Ingram wondered if Judas, who was known to be the treasurer of the disciples fancied being Chancellor of the Exchequer in Jesus’ new revolutionary government… and grew disillusioned when he saw Jesus’ failure to capitalise on the Triumphal Entry and threw in his lot with the Priests and betrayed Jesus.

Whatever Judas’ reasons, the fact remains. More often than not, God doesn’t work the way we imagine He will. Twas ever thus.

Part of us laying down our cloaks before Him, is laying down my desire for God to do things in the way I want Him to. You can probably think of many examples from scripture or in your own life when things have not gone the way you would have chosen. But, somehow, you are always thankful afterwards.

In Numbers 21:4-9 we get the story of the fiery serpents who are sent by God into the camp of the children of Israel because they had been complaining about the nature of God’s miraculous provision for them - in fact they detested it according to verse 5. Many people were bitten by these fiery serpents and many died. When the people realised what they have done, they understandably asked Moses to intervene and to plead with God to send the serpents away. God, does not. Instead He does something else:

God doesn’t do what the Israelites wanted, but He did provide a way out. In fact this way out is so significant that Jesus Himself refers to it in one of the most famous passages of scripture… Jesus’ meeting with Nicodemus found in John 3.

Don Carson astutely points out that Nicodemus doesn’t just come to visit Jesus at night, but he also comes ‘in the dark’. Nicodemus comes to find illumination directly from the Light that shines in the darkness (John 1:5). It is in this moment that Jesus reminds Nicodemus of the Bronze snake in the wilderness:

It’s as if Jesus was saying: remember back when the serpents came in the wilderness and you looked to the bronze serpent and be freed from sickness and death? I am the One that needs to be lifted up, so that you can look to Me and be freed from the sickness of sin and from death itself.

We still need to look to Jesus. We can still find freedom from sin and death in Him.

This is a beautiful truth, and it is actually quite poetic when you think about it. But, that doesn’t make it easy to understand or live out. Even for the people who were there at the first Easter. Jesus’ own disciples thought everything had gone wrong, horribly wrong.

Think about it. One of their close friends betrayed Jesus - and them too. Judas had turned his back on all of them. This caused the group to shatter for a while, Jesus was arrested and they went their separate ways (some clothed, some not).

Peter followed along, but denied even knowing Jesus when asked. This wasn’t going the way he expected it to. John, Mary the Mother of Jesus, and some others watched Jesus be crucified. This wasn’t going the way they expected it to. Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea buried Jesus in Joseph’s own tomb. This wasn’t going the way they expected it to.

Then we face the silence of Saturday. This wasn’t going the way they expected it to.

The ladies went to the tomb on Sunday morning… only to find it empty. This wasn’t going the way they expected it to. The resurrection appearances all bear that same hallmark - nothing is quite as anyone expects. Mary doesn’t recognise Jesus in the garden. The disciples on the road to Emmaus don’t recognise Him either (until He breaks bread and then leaves). The disciples fishing in John 21 also don’t recognise Jesus calling to them from the shore until they make the miraculous catch of fish. This wasn’t going the way they expected it to.

We rather skipped past Saturday don’t you think? That silence. What a silence. The tomb may well have been silent, and the disciples may not have said much, but I’m sure their minds were racing and their hearts were broken. That silence on Saturday was all part of God’s plan. He was just as much the Triumphant Lord of all Creation on that day as any other. But, in the silence there was room for fear and for doubt. The strength of the trust and faith of His family and friends was tested.

Jesus doesn’t do things they way I expect Him to. I have my own faith and trust tested too. I face my own silence at times too. I can see things which happen which I would never want to see… or wish that God would prevent. But, for whatever reason, He doesn’t step in, and the way I would like, and yet He is still good, and He is still God.

Jesus doesn’t do things they way I expect Him to and that’s ok. I only have a small and finite brain. I know that His ways and His thoughts are higher than mine. Knowing this in theory is a lot more comfortable than knowing this in reality… but all of us will face that reality at one time or another. It is precisely in those times, when all I have left is trust (or faith) that I am reminded that I need to look to Jesus, just like the children of Israel looked upon that bronze serpent in the wilderness.

May you have a wonderful Easter weekend. As you pass through the silence of Saturday this weekend, look to Jesus and trust in Him.

I’ll close this ramble with my favourite quote from Os Guinness.

Thanks for joining me on my ramble this week. If you have a friend who you think would enjoy this week’s ramble, why not send them a link? I’m on holiday next week so there won’t be any ramble next week, but I’ll see you again in a fortnight for another ramble with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

Thank you for serving. I just wanted to write you a letter to encourage you in what you’re doing.

Many of you won’t know me in the real world, so allow me to briefly introduce myself so you know where I’m coming from. I’m one of you. I’m a youth worker… I have been my whole adult life. I’m a classic example of that bald headed beardy bloke who “never left the youth”. I turned 18 in 1999 and rather than taking that as my cue to leave the youth group at my church, I doubled down on it and started volunteering. I’ve been involved with youth work in one way shape or form ever since.

I’ve been a volunteer, part time worker and also full time. I have worked as a secular youth worker and a church youth worker at various points. In fact I still do… I work for a church in my town where we run a weekly youth club, and I volunteer two days a week in a local school running drop-in lunch clubs for teens there.

As you can imagine, if you do anything for over 25 years you experience some pretty serious highs and lows. I’ve worked in a residential setting with homeless young people, spent hours digging in cables for a summer festival, taught DJing, coached football, gone on trips, and been thrown into a swimming pool against my will. I’ve done detached youth work, centre-based youth work and church based youth work. I’ve preached in front of thousands and I’ve opened up for nobody to show up at all! I have been a chaplain and sat with people in their brokenness, hurt and grief - and I’ve celebrated victories large and small.

This letter is a few things I wish someone had told me when I first got into youth work many moons ago. Perhaps these points can be of some use to you as you make your way in the wonderful world of youth work? These five things are by no means everything I have learnt - or everything you’ll ever need to know, but a hopefully they’re a pointer in the right direction:

1. Love Jesus. This is something which is so obvious it can easily get overlooked. However, if you get your priorities right, the rest will fall into place. If we truly do seek Him first, all the other questions seem to fall into their place better.

   ³¹ “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ ³² For after all these things the Gentiles seek. For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. ³³ But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. ³⁴ Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

   Matthew 6:31-34 (NKJV)

   The way you look at your work is important. Loving Jesus well is the most important thing you can do, before thinking up cool new games or fun activities. You may not be working in a church setting, but I still think that loving Jesus is the best first step… I worked for years in a secular youth work setting, but still used my faith to anchor my guiding principals. In fact, a friend of mine runs the largest secular youth club in town, he once told me he wished his staff were as good as my volunteer team: “you have such great people”, he told me. I believe that’s because they all love Jesus and that is the foundation for the work they do with our young people. You may be reading this and not be a Christian yourself, in which case allow me to recommend loving Jesus to you again - it genuinely is the best way to live. Please message me privately about that if you’d like to know more.

2. Love the young people. I know this sounds obvious, but over the years I have met quite a few youth workers who have spoken about the young people they work with as if they were a nuisance, or an inconvenient part of their job. Let me be clear, loving them does not mean giving them whatever they want - that would be irresponsible. However, you are there to work for their good, for their flourishing. Like a parent who makes tough decisions for the wellbeing of their child, you need to make decisions which are tough sometimes for the longterm benefit of the group you are responsible for. Is what you are doing today pointing the young people to Jesus? Did you design that game or activity just because you wanted to do something fun or exciting - or did you do it to engage and involved the largest number of your youth possible? If you heard that as a veiled accusation, (sorry) but that’s OK. It’s good to test our own motivations at times, our hearts are deceitful above all things. We are mysteries to ourselves. Everything we do should be for the benefit of the young people - not us.

3. Make sure everyone hears their name. One of the most common experiences young people have is the sense of missing out. If I had a £1 every time I have had a parent pull me aside over the last 25+ years and tell me that their child was struggling to make a friend I would have been able to retire long ago. Why is this? Am I running a club that is uniquely bad at integrating new members? No, not at all. In fact on the contrary, our club has new visitors almost every week. The drop-in lunch clubs I run in a local school are the most popular clubs in the entire school. What I’ve noticed is that the feeling of being left out or just missing out in general is a universal experience (which may well have got worse since the advent of social media). I have a simple rule to combat this with my team… every session every child must hear their own name said aloud. This way everyone knows they have been seen, and included in some way. We also take photos each week and add them to a rolling powerpoint photo album which plays in the room we meet in. Every week we update the display so there are always photos of current members on display. The message is simple; you have been noticed, you are welcome, you belong here.

4. Don’t waste money on tech. I remember when we first used an XBOX, Wii, and Playstation at our youth club. We’ve tried all these things down the years. Nowadays we don’t have any electronic gadgets, gizmos or games consoles and we never get asked for them either! Video game consoles are very expensive, and keeping up with the new games releases is impossible. These days it is inevitable that many of the kids have a more u p to date games console in their bedroom that you can afford… don’t waste time and money on tech. Focus on the one thing kids can’t replicate at home (or anywhere else); a bustling positive community to be part of. No amount of sound and light equipment will ever replace that. No amount of gadgets, gizmos and video games will ever replace the feeling a young person can get when they walk into a room full of people who know their name and are happy to see them. I know the temptation to make the room dark and have cool moody lighting, but trust me - sell the fancy lights and buy a pack of UNO cards, you’ll never look back! A pack of UNO or Dobble cards are far cheaper, and infinitely superior for building a meaningful community of young people than any piece of tech.

5. Stick at it! The saddest statistic I hear in youth work is that in the UK on average a church youth worker will only stay in their role for something like 3-4 years. There is a lot of discussion around this stat, as some say it is much less (18 months), whilst others claim it may be as long as 5 years. However, it’s safe to say, if any of the numbers I have mentioned so far are true, the young people stay in youth group longer than the leaders! In our church it’s normal for young people to join at in year 7 (11 years old) and leave at either the end of year 11 (16 years old) or the end of year 13 (18 years old). It’s unacceptable that young people should all be expected to deal with a change of youth leader in every generation. That is simply not good enough… the adults need to be more adult. The grown ups need to act more grown up! As the church, if we are serious about investing in the next generation at all, we need to give them a stable church setting to grow up in. How would the adults in the congregation fare if we changed leaders every 3 years? Nobody would stay… we need to commit to committing. We need to decide to stick at it. I am not the most experienced youth worker in my church because I’m the best, or the most gifted. I’m the most experienced because I refuse to give up. I love what I do and I want to keep on doing it - so I do.

When I was at the start of my journey in youth work I heard someone say:

I have tried to live up to that statement ever since. I haven’t always managed, it’s pretty tough at times. But, you have keep on showing up. A simple example of this in practical reality is every week I stand outside the front door to welcome all the young people by name for about 30 minutes or so. Rain, shine, hail or high winds, I’m there. Why? I want every one of them to know we noticed them arrive. I want to show the parents that are dropping them off that we have received them. I want to introduce myself to every new parent who will stop and chat to me.

Loving the young people has to look like something… for us it looks like having me stood outside welcoming, while the rest of my team are inside registering them and then inviting them to join a game and make some friends. It’s not clever, flashy or expensive, but it sure is effective.

Here’s the bottom line. The most important resource you have in the ro om is you. If you are a Christian, then the Holy Spirit of the living God lives on the inside of you and that means that you have everything you need. The fruit of the Holy Spirit will inevitably work its way out of you, you are bound to be loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, gentle, faithful and expressing self-control in some way shape or form as a result.

So much of our work as youth workers is just showing up. Let me tell you one quick story before I go. Last summer I bumped into someone who really surprised me. They were someone I worked with many years ago who was never really into what we offered at the youth. They came along grudgingly to to keep their parents sweet, but it was pretty obvious they were not into it. Anyway, I’ve not seen this guy for maybe almost 10 years or something and he bumps into me and proceeds to give me a big hug and thank me for what I had done (I was shocked). He proceeded to tell me how he had drifted away from church quite dramatically then had an amazing encounter with God and was now fully committed. In all my encounters with him I had never felt like he had got anything positive from it… but here he was thanking me for faithfully sowing into his life years later. Humbling or what!

Whatever fruit you see in front of you today - keep going. Don’t grow weary, there is a harvest waiting for you, if you do not give up.

Thank you for everything you are doing. God is good and your life matters - your contribution to the youth work in your setting matters! It is making a difference.

As youth workers, we all know life can be a bit lonely at times. We spend so much time around the young people, we often miss out on meaningful relationships or conversations with adults (aside from the chatter with parents that accompanies drop-off and pick-up times). Why not take a minute to encourage someone else you know who is serving in youth ministry this week - it might make a real difference to them.

Your brother in Christ.

Dave

P.S. If you’re a pastor of adults in the church and you’ve found yourself reading this far out of curiosity, please feel free to forward this letter to the youth team in your church to encourage them… but under no circumstances are you to use it as a rod to beat them with. Don’t be that guy, that’s never helpful. I am not saying these are ‘fool-proof tools for numerical growth’. These are just principals to help keep the main thing the main thing.

If you’re one of my regular rambling buddies, thanks for sticking with me on this temporary diversion. I just had this on my heart this week… normal service will resume again next week.

Grace & Peace

Easter is the ‘surprise’ busy time of the year. By that I mean, Advent gives the whole world fair warning that Christmas is coming… the world and his wife is well aware that Christmas is fast approaching, and we all make allowances for how busy people will be. Even though the vast majority of folks in the UK are not observing Advent in any religious way, subconsciously we all count down to Christmas - whether we have an actual Advent Calendar or not. We all know that Christmas makes demands on our calendar. But Lent does not have the same cultural traction and is largely overlooked by people outside of the traditional church. As a result, Easter is surprisingly busy every year.

Easter is every bit as busy as Christmas if you work in a church setting like I do, but nobody makes any allowances for this. I have never heard anybody ever saying “shall we not do that, it’s busy at this time of year - it is Easter after all”. Yet, such an observation would be considered normal at Christmas. Nobody tries to squeeze in extra events at Christmas, but this is Easter, somehow it flies under the radar.

Easter means schools work. Last week my colleague and I were in a local school running the Easter Murder Mystery activity. It’s an Easter-themed activity which encourages young people to investigate the most talked about death in history, and decide for themselves where His body went. It’s a very cool thing to be able to do, and we’re fortunate enough to have a local school that loves what we do and have invited us three years in a row to do this activity with their year 5 students. I have been running this activity in various forms for various age groups for 10 years now (I have run this activity with 9-16 year olds, but a friend of mine used it as a Bible study with adults!). Every year I update and improve the pack… continual small improvements are all part of the job. Re-writing or tweaking the questions is something of an annual activity for me.

Later this week, we’ll be back in school again reading the Easter Story rhyme with the year 2 students there. You can find out about that book here, and download some free craft activities for your church event if you like. This is another really fun thing to do, and such a privilege to be able to share with the children. We usually spend half of the time telling the story and getting them to tell the story back to me as we recap the slides that accompany the story. Then we make some resurrection themed craft for the rest of the lesson. The children love it.

This weekend we’ll also be hosting a charity night with our youth. We have found that the young people in our church are very generous and love to give to charity, so we try and run a couple of charity nights for them each year. At Christmas the young people supported the Bake Sale we ran so well that we were able to pay for the Christmas dinner for all the residents at our local YMCA - amazing!

Today I’ve spent my time printing shopping bags and making badges to sell this Friday night. This time we’re raising funds for a school in Uganda that some of the volunteers who work on our youth team support. We’re excited to enable our young people to be generous again. Generosity isn’t just me speaking in code as a more polite way of saying “they give us money”. Not at all. Some of the young people volunteer to bake for us so we can sell their cakes. One young girl is a budding fashion designer and she has made and adapted some clothes which will be on sale… I love that they are willing to donate their time and their talents and not just their money (or ‘treasure’ to complete the three T’s).

Next weekend is Palm Sunday, so we’ll be hosting a Palm Party at church. This is a great opportunity to invite in families from our local area to celebrate with us, and learn something of the real story of Easter. This year we will continue the same theme as last year which is to try and help people imagine what it would have been like to witness the events of the first Palm Sunday. In fact, I’ve bought in a load of mini flags for the children to wave as imaginary palm branches. Let’s participate in the story, rather than just tell it… I want to see if we can get a big “hosanna” shout from everyone who comes along. In my head I can already see us acting out being among the crowds who lined the streets that day, sharing in the joy and excitement of that historic moment.

As ever, we’ll be giving away copies of the Easter Story to the children who come along, and encouraging them to take copies for their friends. We have found that the Palm Party is an opportunity for people to bring friends along who may not normally ever come to church. We get lots of people bringing their friends, neighbours and relatives along who wouldn’t normally come to church.

In all of this activity, it will not surprise you to know that I have not been able to give much attention to my writing project. It’s an ‘evenings and weekends’ project for me, so it’s not something I’m able to dedicate that much time to. I am currently working on my third draft, trying to make corrections, add a little more descriptive colour and make sure all the details are correct. I have also decided my story needs a map… so that’s something that needs working on too. I last mentioned the book I was working on back in December, and although I have made progress since then, when I look back at what I wrote in my last ramble of 2025 my actions have not lived up to the optimism I had back then. Once Easter is out of the way I really need to knuckle down and get it finished off. Once this draft is done I will do one round of querying publishers and after that go straight to self publishing if nobody shows an interest. I don’t expect a publisher to take a risk on it, as it’s my first book in this style and I haven’t got a ready-made audience to market the book to… but I’ll give it a go just in case.

Long-time readers of these rambles will know that writing a children’s book was the goal I set for myself last year. I managed it, inasmuch as any unpublished book can be considered ‘written’. This year my goal is to get it published in some way shape or form. Who knows, it might just happen - we still have 10 months to go in 2026.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for joining me on the ramble this week. I know it’s been a bit of a different one. Truth be told it’s the third ramble I have written this week. The first one I wrote I don’t want to publish yet as I’m not quite happy with it. The second one I started with gusto, then collided with a brick wall and I completely lost interest in it. So this update is the third and final ramble of the week. Sorry about that… I hope that you can join me again next week for another journey with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

Although the reality of doing this was nowhere near as idyllic as it sounds, it remains one of my favourite memories of being a dad. Most precious of these memories would be reading the book daily whilst camping. Somehow, having everyone wrapped up in blankets in the evening and reading together just seemed like we were doing something very ‘right’ (if that makes sense?).

One of the books I’ve always struggled to connect with in The Chronicles of Narnia has been The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Despite the fact that the book has got one of the best opening lines I have ever read:

Notwithstanding the hilarious opening line, I had previously found this story harder to connect to than some of the others. I think it was partly due to the stop-start nature of it as you travel from island to island. The inhabitants of which are so varied and strange in their own ways… however, this time round I found a connection to the story I hadn’t previously enjoyed. There were a number of things which stood out to me one of which was the encounter with Ramandu, the retired star.

If you haven’t read the book, yes, I did just write “retired star” - as in the “twinkle twinkle” kind of star, not a pop star. You’ll have to read the book yourself to get to grips with that concept. But, it was an interaction between Eustace and Ramandu which provided the line which caught my attention:

I was reminded of this passage again when I was watching one of Malcolm Guite’s wonderful weekly videos a year later:

He read the passage so beautifully and he concluded with exactly the same line that had stood out to me before. This got me to thinking. Not what a star is, but only what it is made of… what else do I know which is commonly thought of in one way, but is actually far more.

When you think about your car, what is it? On one level, your car is a bunch of component parts, nuts, bolts, seats, tyres, pipes, and fuel. But on the other hand, your car is freedom (you can travel far and fast relatively easily and cheaply), it is superhuman strength (like the ability to carry home way more shopping that you could carry with your hands) and you car is an indicator of status (I saw a blacked-out Bentley in town today with big alloy wheels and a private registration plate - certainly a statement car).

So to butcher Ramandu’s quote we could say that “the component parts are not what the car is, but only what it is made of.”

But, this isn’t a ramble about cars, or even Narnia really… let’s think about this idea in the context of church.

The last year has given me reason to be more consciously aware of my appreciation of being a member of a church. It’s an accumulation of lots of little things rather than one big reason. And, if I’m honest, many of the reasons are seemingly very ‘un-spiritual’.

• Church makes me spend time with people who are nothing like me. That’s good for me, it makes me richer as a person. It’s the opposite of our natural inclinations… in our daily lives we tend to do the opposite. We join clubs, associations, and interest groups based on our similarity. We deliberately move ourselves closer to those who are more like us. Church isn’t like that. We’re all very different; temperamentally we’re different, politically we’re different, and in terms of social status or class, we’re all different. We are united by Jesus, somewhat amusingly often it seems we literally can’t agree on anything else.

• The possibility of friendship is all around me. I am rich in friendships, I have lots of people I can call on if I am in need of help or in trouble. I have easy access to people who are at different stages of life than me to ask questions of if I ever need advice or support.

• My boys have friendships with people who are not like them. They have friends who are older than them, younger than them, rich people, poor people, sharp people and simple folk. That’s rich. What a brilliant preparation for dealing with all kinds of people in life. Without a church community, I have no idea how they would find such a breadth of people to be friends with.

• There is strength in numbers. Life throws curve balls at you at times, but I am part of a group of people who have endured a great deal. The collective group have endured far more than I will ever face on my own, this is a source of strength and comfort to me. This applies to my own church locally, and also the church through the ages, my little story is connected to the saints of old whose lives are brought to life for me in books. They are all part of the same story I am being included in.

We know that the church, the ecclesia, is the gathered people of God. Not the building (though those are very important). The gathered body is the church.

Yet, in the same way Eustace Scrubb sold stars short for just being a “flaming ball of gas”… we do the same if we say the church is just a group of people. Ramandu might tell us “that’s not what a church is, but only what it is made of.” A church is far more than just a group of people who are coincidentally gathered in one place at one time. It is the living body of Christ, visible, here present on the earth.

Today the church is food for the neighbour who doesn’t have enough on their plate. Today the church is friendship for the lonely and isolated. Today the church is healing for the person who is struggling with sickness. Today the church is life and hope for those whose world seems small and hopeless. Today the church is the presence of God made accessible to everyone as we go about our business.

Members of our church are all different on purpose. We’re different by design. We each have different strengths and weaknesses. Each of us has different gifts and abilities. Together we are a local embodiment of Jesus here in our town. This is precisely what Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 12:

It’s interesting that the follow-up to these verses is not a celebration of the uniqueness of the individual, and individual gifts… it is the importance of interconnectedness.

Yes, we are different. But the focus of the passage isn’t to celebrate the difference as such, rather it is to point out their need for each other. Interdependence. Each part is given value and has importance, but their need for - and dependence on - one another is also highlighted.

This is the same point which is highlighted to us in Romans 12:

Individually we are each temples of the Holy Spirit, but together, we are the body of Christ. Thinking back to the Ramandu quote, as the church we absolutely are a collection of people… but that is not the fullness of what we are. We are the body of Christ. We are His hands and feet. What a privilege.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks so much for joining me on this ramble today. If you have a friend who you think would like any of the bits and pieces we’ve though about today, why not send them a link? I hope you can join me again next week for another ramble with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

Today I felt like going through one of the most loved Psalms in the world. Psalm 23 has to be one of the most popular, and well read Psalms of any of the 150. It’s like a well worn stone in the hands of faithful saints that has been passed down through the generations.

If we remind ourselves of the whole text first, then I’ll go back through offer some reflections on a few points which stood out to me last week as I was reading it.

Psalm 23 (NKJV)
1 The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
2 He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
3 He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.

4 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord
Forever.

The Lord is my shepherd - He is the one who protects me, provides for me and is working for my good. He has chosen to reveal Himself to me as the Good Shepherd, He wants me to think of Him in that manner. Because of that, I lack nothing that I need.

There are times when he makes me lie down in green pastures. I may be keen to keep going because I don’t know when I’m beaten. Or to run off and explore and enjoy a new adventure. There are times when for my good, He makes me lie down and rest. It’s good for me to embrace my own limitation and admit the world doesn’t revolve around me, but it does revolve around Him. When He does this, it is for my good, and when I open my eyes I will see He has me in a green pasture. A place of plentiful supply.

He leads me beside still waters, which makes a change from the turmoil and choppy waters which are all around me in the world. Being where He wants me to be, brings me to a place of peace. Finding myself in that place restores my soul. This is a place from which He can lead me forward in paths of righteousness.

This next line has made me think for many years. He does all this for my benefit, yes… but, He does this for His name’s sake. His reputation and His good character is being demonstrated. He treats me well because of who He is and because that is who He wants to be seen to be (a person’s ‘name’. or reputation can be seen as a stand-in for their whole person) I am a beneficiary of His good character. He is good to me, not because of any specially deserving qualities about me… but because of how good He is.

Yes, there are times when I walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Things will happen around me - both real and imagined - which cause me to walk in the shadow of death. Shadows become overwhelming when we allow objects to stand between us and the source of light. The Lord is my light and my salvation, I don’t want anything to come between me and Him causing me to be in shadow. This may sound like I’m trying to diminish the reality of death, pain or suffering, I’m not at all. This part of the Psalm is designed to remind me not of the size of my problems, but the size of my God. The problem may be large and very real… but my God is larger and very real too.

Despite my circumstances I will fear no evil because You are with me. You are with me. You are with me. Him being with me is the reason for my hope. I fear no evil, not because I’m clever enough to see a way through it, or strong enough to fight my way through it. Nope. I fear no evil because He is with me.

His rod and staff bring me comfort in the same way that a child holding a parent’s hand in a crowd does, or perhaps a toddler on reigns being pulled back feels the presence of their parent. When you’re a kid and you feel the hand of a parent pulling you back from traffic you don’t just feel the hand of correction, you feel “parent” as such. The entirety of the parent is expressed via that brief pull-back from the road, or the hand squeeze when you’re in a crowded square in busy London, reassuring you that they are still present. Correction, safety, love and care are all expressed. Yes, the rod and the staff of the shepherd are used to bring correction, but they are also used to lead and to guide, to rescue and to bring safety. When the sheep feels the touch of the shepherd’s rod they know the shepherd is close. The whole shepherd is present, the one who we encountered in the first lines who ensures I lack nothing.

At no point does this Psalm - which so often gets the “fridge magnet” treatment - deny the existence of pain, evil, suffering, death and us having active enemies… in fact it makes no sense in the absence of those things. This is not a Psalm for the days when life is all sunshine and roses, it has meaning because of the contrast to the backdrop. He prepares a table for me in the presence of my enemies, which is the last place I would ever think of having a snack, let alone a meal. In the natural I’d be scared that my enemies would snatch or steal the good things I had got to eat… but God doesn’t think like me (thank goodness). In the presence of my problems He provides a meal for me. This reminds me that the important thing to keep in mind is not the size or sound of my enemies, but the knowledge that God is bigger. He is greater. He is able to provide a table for me to eat at whilst standing between me and my enemies, keeping me safe.

As if to ratchet things up a notch at this point the next verse tells us that He anoints my head with oil. Having just provided for me physically (with a table of food), He is now providing for me spiritually (with anointing). He satisfies my desires with good things, as it says in Psalm 103:5.

Because of this, my cup runs over. I am full to overflowing. This is the standard unit of measurement for God. More than enough. Think about it, it’s a pattern you see throughout scripture, our God gives more than enough:

• 1 Kings 17 - Elijah meets a widow and her son who were on the verge of death, with the little flour and oil that they had but God intervenes and it miraculously didn’t run out for many days. More than enough.

• 1 Kings 18 - Elijah’s stand-off against the prophets of Baal. The sacrifice, altar and water-filled ditch that Elijah built are all consumed by the holy fire. More than enough.

• 2 Kings 4 - Elisha and the widow and the miraculous oil that didn’t run out until all of her containers and her neighbour’s jars had been filled. More than enough.

• John 2 - Jesus at the wedding in Cana turned so much water into wine (approximately 400 modern bottles of wine) that there would have been loads left over unless the guest list was truly vast. More than enough.

• Luke 9 - Jesus provided enough food from five loaves and two fish that twelve baskets of leftovers were collected after everyone had eaten their fill. More than enough.

And, that’s not to mention that the sacrifice of Jesus Himself was more than enough for you and me. Which leads me to be convinced that this Good Shepherd will make sure that goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life.

If I stick close to Him, He will ensure that I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. That will be perfect.

I hope that these thoughts and reflections of Psalm 23 are helpful. If you think that you have a friend who would benefit from this ramble through this very familiar Psalm, why not share it with them? I very much hope you can join me again next week for another ramble with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

It’s been really encouraging to see more people reading and sharing the rambles over the weeks. This isn’t a numbers game, I genuinely do these rambles to help me organise my own thoughts on various topics - but it’s impossible to not notice that the numbers exist. I’m thankful that other people have found these rambles interesting or helpful and worth sharing. The biggest proof of that is how the readership has grown in the past year. This time last year I was tentatively dipping my toe in the pool of regular writing, and so far in 2026 just over 100 people are reading the ramble each week. Amazing!

Probably the most satisfying part of this whole process has been the messages and conversations I’ve had with people who have read what I’ve written. It’s been pretty humbling to receive such positive feedback, and whilst obviously (as with all things in life) the feedback hasn’t been universally positive, on balance it’s been very positive.

Probably the greatest irony of the past year is that I started writing on Substack as a way of processing my thoughts without talking the ear off my wife and colleagues - I’m a verbal processor. I’m aware that talking things through with others is a luxury and not a right, so I took pity on my nearest and dearest and decided to try and process my thoughts through writing instead of talking it out whilst my wife was tying to cook the dinner. The most amusing development in this is that half way through the year my wife started occasionally reading my rambles… and then became one of the champions for me recording them each week so people could listen rather than read it. So the very person who I was trying to shield from these rambles now listens to them every week. You can’t make it up.

It takes all sorts to make a world!

I have spent my entire adult life being told by people “you don’t think the same way other people do”. Normally this is framed as a compliment, but sometimes I have been told this out of frustration. It’s always hard to know how to take this feedback, even when it is well-intentioned, because of course I don’t think that I think differently. To me it’s totally normal. However I am very familiar with the feeling of stumbling headlong into disagreement with people completely by accident, because I say something as if it is obvious - when it clearly wan’t to the other person.

I suppose these rambles are my way of showing my working. Like a maths problem that has been solved in an unfamiliar way… I may have got to the same answer as you, just by using a slightly different way of crunching the numbers (I’ll stop the maths analogy there, I’m rubbish with numbers!). There have been a couple of times in the past year when I have accidentally said in conversation “I wrote about this recently”. Not as any form of one-upmanship, but because I knew if the person read what I had written they would understand why I thought what I thought about something. I guess I’m trying to decode the reasons I have arrived at certain thoughts and ideas. Some of the weeks you can literally watch my thoughts forming in real time as I have written them - very few rambles end where I thought they would when I started writing!

It’s worth noting that I am well aware that just because I have a different view on something, that doesn’t mean I’m right about it. I am under no illusion of believing I am always right (or not any more than the next man anyway). But, if you can see how I came to the conclusion I arrived at, at least then you can see why I think the way I do.

Showing my working like I do in these rambles, gives you an opportunity to see where I go wrong (or right) when I make a different turn that you would on any given journey of thought.

Anyway - this has turned into something quite other than a brief “thank you”, so I’ll end it here.

Thank you for joining me each week as we have taken a little journey with my thoughts. I really do appreciate your company, and I hope that you find some benefit from these in the year ahead.

Grace & Peace

These ‘gatekeepers’ are the people who we spend our modern lives trying to sidestep or outsmart. We all want to release our music without the hassle of a record label getting in the way. Or we want to publish our books without the publishing house interfering with anything. We want to release our films without a big studio or production house telling us what to do. This is why Spotify, Substack and YouTube exist, they are mechanisms we have built to sidestep the traditional methods.

Who needs a record label when you can be your own label and release your own music on Spotify? Why go through the demoralising process of multiple rejections from publishers when you can publish today on Substack? Why wait for the industry to recognise your talent - make a video and upload it today and start building momentum on YouTube. You can even earn money on all of these platforms, so who needs gatekeepers anyway?

But are gatekeepers really all bad? Could gatekeepers still have a role to play in our modern world?

Well, I suppose the answer to that very much depends if you’re viewing the problem from the inside or the outside.

My family have just spent the first six weeks of this year watching all the movies from the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings in order - one film each weekend. It’s been a very enjoyable thing to do and I’m delighted to say that my boys loved the movies! It’s always a nervous moment sharing something you love with your children like that, as you can often be reminded that they are different people to you and there is no guarantee they will like it.

Since starting our little family Tolkien themed adventure our youngest has bought himself a copy of The Hobbit (which he started reading it a couple of weeks ago when we finished the film). And, our oldest has declared that they are the best films he has ever seen - phew. Great relief all round.

In the stories there are many scenes which include gatekeepers. The first gatekeeper in The Hobbit is of course Bilbo Baggins himself (pictured above chatting to Gandalf). He fails to protect his own gate, and gets overwhelmed by a party of Dwarves who eat him out of house and home… which is the meeting which first introduces Bilbo to the big wide world, and the adventures that lay outside the Shire.

There are a great many other encounters with gates and gatekeepers throughout the stories... in fact almost every location has one. For me, the two most memorable scenes to demonstrate this inside-outside dynamic have to be the battle at Helms Deep and the siege of Minas Tirith. Both of these scenes feature vast armies of Orcs outside relatively small defensive strongholds.

In The Return of the King, Denethor, the Steward of Gondor, looses his mind at the sight of the gigantic Orc army who have massed outside the city gates. Denethor is so shocked at the size of the army that he tells his men to abandon their posts and save themselves - the city gates will not be able to keep the enormous army out. He really needs a good strong gatekeeper or two.

Conversely of course, the Orc armies outside, are bullish, because they believe their battering rams and trebuchets will make short work of the Minas Tirith defences.

So we see that the value of gatekeepers very much depends on if you’re trying to break in or keep others out.

Today, the gatekeeper I want to address doesn’t work in Middle Earth, or publishing, the media or in advertising. I am interested in the gatekeeper you have for your own heart and mind.

Imagine, if you will, that your heart and mind are like a classic storybook castle with an outer defensive wall and a keep in the centre. Your mind is like the castle itself, with its defensive walls and safe areas inside. The heart, within that is the keep… an inner area which is the real ‘heart’ of the operation, so to speak. It can be dangerous when bad thoughts, ideas and ways of thinking break in or gain entry into your mind… but it can be fatal for them to gain access to your heart.

You may quibble with how I have described them, and perhaps you would lay it all out differently in the way you imagine your own castle of your ‘inner man’. But, hopefully we can agree your inner-man has defences and gates. You know that there are some areas in your life which you are more vulnerable to attack, as well as other areas you have of great strength. Perhaps you have a moat that goes around your castle, a faith or belief system which gives clear borders and provides an effective defence against certain types of attack? But, equally, perhaps you have other areas in your life where the drawbridge is down and the gates are left open?

You and I have our defensive layers. Good. You and I also have an enemy outside. Not good. But, better an enemy outside the gate than one who has breached the walls!

The picture of our enemy prowling outside the door waiting for me is an image that snaps into focus a bit more sharply when I think about my life as a castle. The task of being alert and on guard is a very real one, and an important one.

This verse from Proverbs 4 is why I think of the heart as the centre of the castle, the keep that is the central defence tower:

It’s the central thing that we need to guard.

However, we need to maintain good defences in all areas, not just the centre. Proverbs 25 warns us against the folly of allowing our defensive walls fall into disrepair:

It is so important that the fruit of the Spirit is actively at work in our lives. I often refer to is as the “evidence of His presence” rather than “fruit” as sometimes that helps people see the fruit as a necessary consequence to the Holy Spirit being active in our lives.

If we live filled with Him, we will be more loving, strengthened by His joy and marked by peace etc. Importantly, we will have His self-control… which brings strength to our defensive walls.

Don’t be tempted to think I’m laying this all on you, I am absolutely not. In fact, it would be prideful madness to try and do it all on your own. You can’t. I can’t.

We need God’s help to guard our hearts and lives.

By this point, some of you will be one step ahead of me… or you may have guessed where I am going. God doesn’t just offer to help us guard our hearts. God Himself is our hiding place, He is our strong tower.

One of my favourite Psalms is Psalm 27, the opening is just brilliant:

I grew up singing the song inspired by Proverbs 18 that says the Lord Himself is our strong tower. He Himself is our safe place that we need to hide:

Run to Jesus. Don’t walk, run.

It sounds too simple to be useful. But, the truth is all emergency information signs are written in clear language (when trouble comes you don’t have time to read endlessly caveatted waffle).

When troubles come, run towards Jesus, not away from Him. When you sin and fall short, run to Jesus, don’t try and hide from Him like Adam and Eve did in the garden. Or in the words of Philippians 4:

Whatever you are facing, whatever anxiety comes knocking at your door… make your requests known to God. Talk to God about it. Run to Him, not from Him. Then, His peace will guard your heart and your mind. He is your hiding place, your strong tower.

Well, it seems to me that this week’s ramble has accidentally turned into a Bible study. If you’re still reading, thanks for sticking with me. If you know someone else who you think might find this helpful, why not send it to them? Thanks again for joining me today for this ramble, and I hope you can join me again next week for another journey with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

Having mentioned Oxfam, I feel obliged to provide a quick side note about them. I don’t like the charity, in fact I think they are potentially doing far more harm than good in the world given the revelations about the sexual exploitation accusations against senior members of their organisation (particularly those working in Haiti). However, they are the only local charity shop that reliably has good quality old books donated to them. I would much rather spend my money elsewhere.

Their former CEO, Halima Begum, gave a damning interview to Channel 4 this week about a culture of antisemitism within the organisation which had increased since October 7th (no trivial accusation for Halima to make given that she is a Muslim). She described a culture within the organisation that struggled to maintain its relationship with neutrality and impartiality… something that is of no surprise to anyone who has ever seen a Oxfam shop window.

This small personal quandary I find myself in… wanting to find and buy interesting old books. Yet, Oxfam of all places being the only place locally that stocks them is a nice picture of real life. Life constantly supplies us with opportunities to make tough decisions. Life can be complicated at times.

Last summer The Co-op members voted to remove all Israeli products from their shelves with the support of nearly three-quarters (73%) of their membership. I would consider that action to be antisemitic too. The convenience store on my housing estate is a Co-op. I try not to shop there anyway (mostly because of their prices if I’m being completely honest with you). But, would their new anti-Israel stance be enough to stop you giving them your money when you’re out of some vital ingredient and you’ve already started cooking dinner? Life can be complicated at times.

This past week has seen door-to-door canvassing by activists in Brighton, Bristol and Sheffield who are encouraging all households to boycott products from Israel. In an even more sinister twist, they have been spotted marking down which houses they “don’t need to return to”… whatever that means. Are these volunteers marking the houses which have Jewish residents, or household who are happy to boycott Israel? Either reason seems off. This is hatred masquerading as compassion. Unsurprisingly this canvassing has gained support from The Green Party and Jeremy Corbyn - both of whom have an uncanny ability to find Israel as a country and Jewish people as the ‘bogeyman’ behind any given situation.

Who can forget the Gipton and Harehills local council result in 2024 where the winning Green Party candidate very clearly dedicated the win to the people of Gaza? For clarity, Mothin Ali’s election to a local council in Leeds has got nothing to do with Gaza - nor do he have any power (or budget) to help anyone in Gaza in his capacity as a local council member in Leeds. If you’re going to watch the video below, watch it right to the end for a sample of his passion on the subject.

The last puzzling event that caught my attention this week was that of the MP Rupert Lowe’s “Rape Gang Enquiry” going completely unnoticed by our national broadcaster. Despite 20,000 people having donated £600k to fund the inquiry, they simply haven’t covered it - positively or negatively. It just didn’t exist in their mind. In a statement issued yesterday following complaints, they said:

They did however find time to let us know that this week a crisp packet from 1989 was found by litter-picker in Leeds. Exciting stuff, hold the front page! Life can be complicated at times.

I have already mentioned that I like old books. That’s not particularly unusual, lots of folks do. But, the benefit of this is sometimes people find old books and give them to me - what a treat! This week a friend of mine came and gave me three old books simply because they were old and he knew I’d be interested. Sadly I forgot to take a photo, otherwise I’d include a picture of them for you.

The first looks like a personal journal. It contains cigarette packet sized cards of churches in the Bromley area dating from the 1860s and 1870s. It is filled with notes and loose papers which are a combination of advertisements and important things the writer didn’t want to forget 150 years ago.

The second is a collection of victorian periodicals called The Leisure Hour (my copy is just like the one shown in the collection of the British Museum here). They were produced by the Religious Tract Society as a magazine for people to read that was going to put their leisure time to good use.

The last of the three books is a blank notebook which dates from the same era as the other two books. It has been lovingly filled by someone handwriting each of the 150 Psalms in a beautiful fountain pen script. I have a friend who did this as a devotional exercise a few years ago. I tried it, but my own handwriting is so frustratingly bad I didn’t find it a helpful exercise personally.

I liked this book the best of the three - perhaps because it was a discipline I have tried and failed at myself. Perhaps because it is an objectively beautiful thing to hold in your hand. And, perhaps because you can feel the time the person has spent hunched over the tiny pages of the blank notebook - with their fountain pen in one hand and their other pointing to the relevant verse in the open Bible in front of them. A scene that must surely have been played out 150 times.

I feel like I know this person just a little. They succeeded where I failed. They put in the work. Hats off to them, whoever they are (they didn’t mark their name in the book as far as I can see).

Back to the C.S. Lewis book I started this ramble with. On page 13 there is a fantastic quote which we would all do well to take note of:

That’s a cracking quote. But, it’s followed up by this, which is equally good.

These two quotes sum up how I feel about the complexity of the world we live in. All of us have difficult decisions to make daily. Where do I shop? Who do I vote for? Am I really learning to love the Lord my God with all my heart, mind, soul and strength? (Mark 12:30)

As Christians, it is tempting sometimes to shrink back from thinking too deeply about certain things. We’re often happy to love the Lord with our hearts and souls… but we can get a bit uneasy when we pause to think what it might look like to love Him with our mind and our strength.

The attitude of “It’s all about me and Jesus” has an allure to it, it’s easy to accidentally slip into… no matter how misguided it is. Our faith shouldn’t be kept inside the walls of our own heart, it should overflow into the way we live our lives, into the choices we make. It needs to find outward expression in our friendships, our lifestyle and our thinking. Or in Lewis’ words it’s “going to take the whole of you, brains and all.”

It is absolutely not my intention of burdening anyone with a sense that they need to “do more”… that’s not what I’m saying at all. However, I think it’s good to intentionally face some hard questions from time to time. It’s good for you, it helps your faith grow.

Today is the start of Lent, why not use these next six weeks as a chance to stretch your mind muscles a bit? For some people, that might look like reading these rambles each week. Some people tell me I make them think about topics that they otherwise wouldn’t (which is a compliment in my book).

For others you may want to grab a devotional book for Lent… or choose to read the Passion narratives in all four Gospels. If you’ve never tried this, please let me recommend it. You can grab a cheap Bible online (I found an ESV on a deal not long ago for just £2!) and mark up each character in a different colour as you read through. I did this a couple of years back and it helped me see details I had never noticed before. It’s great fun to do and you can’t help but learn things as you do it.

Whatever loving God with your brain and strength looks like in your own life, make space for it. Please don’t take that in a patronising way, I just want to encourage you as brothers and sisters in Christ. Let’s be like those who watch our lives and doctrine closely. Remember what Lewis said about Christianity itself being an education… we’re supposed to allow God to transform our thinking. Our minds need renewing.

That’s enough for today - thanks if you have stayed with me this far. It’s safe to say this was not at all what I had planned to write today. I am as surprised as you are that we took a tangent into Green Party politics and calling out Oxfam. But, you can’t say that I didn’t warn you that this genuinely is a ramble with my thoughts. The clue is literally in the title. Today has very much been a journey with my thoughts. If all this has stirred up thoughts for you too, why not leave me a comment or come and have a chat next time you see me. If you have a friend who you think might like rambles like this, why not send them a link.

Thanks for joining me today, I hope you can join me again soon for another journey with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

I had that this week. I was listening to speaking with about Islamist extremism, and what the best approach is to dealing with it is. Whilst listening to their discussion about the problems of dealing with radical Islam, it hit me at how poorly the church has described the Christian faith down the years.

There are many things than can and should be said about radical Islam and the risks it poses to us in the UK (or anywhere else in the world for that matter). But that’s a subject for another day… today there is just one aspect of Islam which is of interest; Islam demands total control.

This might sound like I’m making some overly dramatic over-reaching statement… but the clue is in the title. “Islam” literally means “submission” in Arabic. It does what it says on the tin.

To live in the way of allah, would include you submitting every area of your life to him. This is why Muslims have food laws, a dress code and even their own legal system. “Halal” means “permissible” in Arabic, which keeps choosing your food ingredients nice and simple - just choose what is permissible. Where do you turn if you need justice in Islam? You turn to Sharia law of course. “Sharia” means “the correct path” in Arabic.

In short, this means that it is impossible to separate the Muslim faith and Islamic political ideas. This is a feature, not a bug.

It is wrong to frame the political ambitions of the various fundamentalist Islamic groups as “radical”, there position is just pragmatic. How else would you be able to effectively ensure that the food is prepared in the manner you prefer and that dress codes are enforced unless you had political power? I’m not by any means condoning this approach, I am just recognising that to achieve submission to allah on the broadest scale you probably only have two options…

1. Convince everyone that allah is the one true God and that Muhammad was his messenger. This is the route chosen by the evangelists who you see in the town centres handing out copies of the quran (well worth picking one up if you haven’t already - quite the eye-opening read!).

2. Legislate the “right” behaviour to ensure that submission is achieved willingly or unwillingly. This is where Sharia law comes in, and historically where we get the concept of “Jizya”, the tax that non-believers would be forced to pay for the privilege of living in a Muslim land.

When you take a look at the countries which have the highest populations of Muslims living in them, you see that they are often living under a form of Sharia law as well. This is a feature, not a bug. Islam is not only concerned about which god you choose to pray to or which holy book you read - it wants to impact every area of your life.

This can all sound quite overwhelming to a liberal Westerner like me. But, I think that much of the shock of encountering an all-encompassing religion like Islam is partly down to a failure in Christianity.

From my own experience of growing up in the South East of England, it seems that in the public square Christianity has come to a settled position of being almost entirely neutered. It sounds strange to say this in the UK where the King is the Supreme Governor of the Church of England and we have Bishops in the House of Lords… but there is a yawning gulf between what laws we have, and what the church would wish we had. We are a far cry from being a Christian nation (which is a slippery term in itself), but people are correct to refer to Britain as post-Christian in most respects.

We do not have a formal separation of Church and State like our American cousins but, we’re not a million miles away from it. The King and the Bishops may well still be involved in the Palace of Westminster, but that has had zero impact on the direction our nation is taking with regards to any key issues which orthodox Christians might have strong opinions on.

They failed to have any meaningful impact on the debates about assisted dying, abortion, same-sex marriage, no-fault divorce or war. Each of these topics require nuance, and careful consideration… but the Bishops in the Lords, and a weekly audience with the late Queen or present King as Supreme governor of the CofE seems to leave no trace of a Christian impact on these laws.

We are living in what many consider to be a cut flower society.

We cherish the freedoms we enjoy, like equality under the law and protection for the most vulnerable among us… but totally fail to see where these virtues have come from. We have been separated from our roots.

If you’ve never read ’s Dominion, or ’s The Air We Breathe, please consider doing so. Both books do a brilliant job of explaining how we came to be where we are as a society. Our roots go down deep into our Christian past… or at least they used to.

The reason people argue we are living in a cut flower society is because we have decided that we want the benefits of our Christian heritage - but without Christ.

We like being viewed as equal in the eyes of the law, having freedom and protection for the most vulnerable among us. But, we don’t want the single unifying story which helps us to unite and pull in the same direction. We want to have the bloom, separated from the root. It’s obvious to anyone who has ever seen a cut flower that this approach inevitably leads to the withering of the flower - which is also what many would argue is happening before our eyes.

Is it really any coincidence that as the impact of Christianity has receded in culture the weakest are no longer seen as in need of protection? They’re now seen as easy targets. Our culture seems to value saving money and avoiding inconvenience over the lives of unborn babies and terminally ill people.

God have mercy on us.

A Christian life cannot be lived out between the hours of 10am-11:30am on a Sunday morning… it has to have an impact on the Monday mornings of our lives. God is just as interested in the way we live on a Tuesday or a Thursday as He is on a Sunday. Just like the Muslim faith (when followed properly) you would expect to impact every area of their lives - the same is true for us as Christians.

English readers may remember that this came to a head in our culture when Tim Farron (the Liberal Democrat Party leader at the time) was forced to resign because he had the audacity to be open about his Christian faith whilst being the leader of a prominent political party. If this sounds ridiculous, it’s because it is!

Rishi Sunak lit Diwali candles on the steps of 10 Downing Street as the first British Prime Minister who was a practicing Hindu. Humza Yousaf hosted an iftar and evening prayers in Bute House on his first night in residence as the Scottish First Minister. Both of these acts were viewed as admirable demonstrations of the diversity within our nation - rather than an unwelcome infringement of a person’s private faith on their public life.

But, it is our faith that motivates our actions - we must never lose sight of that. Our faith should impact and inspire every area of our lives.

We’re faced with the same dilemma that the Muslims are - how do we appeal to the general population around us to change? It seems there are two choices…

1. Convince everyone that Yahweh is the one true God and that Jesus is His only begotten Son. This is the route chosen by the evangelists who you see in the town centres, folks running Alpha courses and Youth leaders running clubs up and down the country.

2. Legislate the “right” behaviour to ensure that submission is achieved willingly or unwillingly. This is the story demonstrated in the Old Testament, where we see you cannot legislate someone into right relationship with God. It’s very tempting to try, but it just doesn’t work. Who knows, maybe this is why Christendom ultimately failed… we had an under-reliance on the first approach and an over-reliance on the second?

So there I was - listening to a debate on radical Islam, getting convicted that I wasn’t living out my own faith enough.

It’s the same challenge that I had reading St Athanasius’ On The Incarnation. Why is it that people are not pointing at Christians and saying: “look at the impact Jesus is having in their lives”? Scrap that. Why are people not pointing at me and saying “look at the impact Jesus has had on Dave’s life.”

The answer to that is painfully obvious. In the words of John the Baptist, “He must increase and I must decrease” (John 3:30).

To state the obvious, our nation is divided. We’re pulling in different directions with different ideals all claiming to be the right path to take. We won’t make any lasting or significant progress as a nation that is positive until we can decide on what the common good actually is and what we need to do to work towards it.

Our nation needs a single narrative to unite behind - yes, it’s called the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s not a political statement, it’s entirely theological.

I’m not at all against Christians being involved in politics, or running for office. But, our nation can’t be legislated into better shape. We can’t place our hopes or trust in some political project which will make everything right again. We all know that you can’t legislate the human heart into behaving in the right way.

All governments around the world pretend this isn’t true, they all promise us that they will correct the woes of their country. One recent example of this was Kier Starmer’s pledge to halve violence against women and girls in the UK. This is a laudable goal, but it struck me as a wildly hubristic statement - is the British Prime Minister really able to change the human heart? I think that is slightly beyond his reach even as the Prime Minister. The human heart cannot be legislated into shape, our overcrowded prisons are evidence of this.

But, “the nation” is too abstract. The nation is a collection of communities and individuals. I need a narrative to unite behind, and so do you. Each of us are facing the Joshua ultimatum: “choose you this day whom ye will serve”.

What is you response?

For the flower of our nation to blossom again, we need to reconnect to the roots which caused our nation to bloom in the first place. We need to rediscover the Christian underpinnings that made our nation.

Were there problems in the past? Of course, humans we’re involved… have you met any of those recently? Will there be problems in the future? Of course, humans are involved, have you met any of those recently? But, if we choose to stumble forward, earnestly and sincerely picking up our cross daily we will at least be moving in the right direction.

That’s quite enough for today - if you’ve made it this far through, thanks for sticking with me on this ramble. If you have any thoughts or comments why not share them below or have a chat with me next time we bump into one another. If you think you’ve got a friend who would appreciate reading or listening to this sort of thing why not send them a link? I hope you can join me again soon for another ramble.

Grace & Peace

I kicked off 2026 by receiving a parking fine - which threw me into an appeals process right before I had a chance to find my bearings. I wasn’t parked anywhere illegal, in fact quite the opposite. I was given a fine by a CPM patrol because I had parked in my own assigned car parking space, directly outside my own house… with a valid CPM parking permit clearly displayed in the front windscreen. Upon appeal, they have dropped the fine - but this sort of thing is extremely frustrating.

It eats up your mental bandwidth.

I was chatting with my wife earlier on and she said that she doesn’t think we’re designed to handle the amount of interactions we have in the modern world… like being constantly contactable by phone every waking hour of the day. I agree.

It eats up your mental bandwidth.

This is not a new thought, lots of people have said the same thing. But, it’s a thought that lots of us have - and then proceed to do nothing about.

The news cycle tells us of things happening far outside our small worlds, and yet we are expected to care and demand change or feel outraged. Phrases like “If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention”, and “silence is violence” are aimed at forcing you to speak on topics you know nothing about. You become a puppet for whichever cause told you the news. They ventriloquize their message through you, the willing participant. At some point we all need to recognise that it’s ok to ‘sit this one out’. Or as James puts it:

Culture tells you to speak up, have an opinion, make your voice heard. Don’t sit this one out… if you’re not angry you’re not paying attention!

James tells us the opposite. Be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to get angry.

For those of you that don’t know, I have two brothers (both older than me). Matt now lives in Bosnia & Herzegovina, Adam now lives in Australia, and I still live in the town I grew up in in the South of England.

I mention my brothers for good reason, each of them in their own way are much cleverer than I am. Both of them are gifted musicians and songwriters. Both of them are very visually gifted too; Matt in a graphic design sense, and Adam in a drawing and painting sense.

However for the sake of today’s post, possibly one of the qualities I would like to note is that they both live a slower pace of life than I do. They have consciously, or unconsciously adopted to the pace of life in their new homes - both of which are less fast-paced than here in the UK. I say this with no judgement, I would like to be able to emulate this in my own life. I know it would do me good.

Adam doesn’t write much on Substack, but he did write very well about “Rest as Humility” last year. I’d encourage you to have a read, but here’s a little taster of what you can expect from him:

I like how Adam draws our attention to the fact that we should embrace our limitations and rest - rather than pretending the whole world revolves around us and may somehow stop spinning if we were to stop our invaluable work.

Nope. Not true, we can only say that of God. Not us.

Matt has registered a Substack, but hasn’t yet written anything - despite my best efforts to encourage him. But he has an enormous back catalogue of YouTube videos. In this week’s episode he was celebrating reaching 500 weekly vlogs that he and his wife Rowan have made. That’s remarkable. I had a bit of a video chat with him about that last week and touched on the topic of limitation in our discussion.

We’re only human, we can only do so much. It’s ok to admit that. The only person to whom this is news is ourselves, God is already well aware.

So what do I mean by embracing our limitation exactly?

Have you ever noticed that God made you and me with a built-in mechanism to keep us humble? It’s called sleep. If you don’t literally stop everything and admit the world doesn’t revolve around you every day - you will break.

You stop working properly when you refuse to stop working.

Don’t for one second think I’m anti-work. I hope we established three weeks ago that I am very much in favour of work. It’s just that I think God’s design for you is to be limited, not limitless. Technology and the digital age wants you to think that everything is possible, and that every limitation should be cast off… but clearly God doesn’t think like that. He makes you surrender to sleep every day.

In fact when you think about it God Himself is the least limited being in the entire universe… yet He makes a habit out of limiting Himself voluntarily.

In Genesis, God creates the world in six days, then rests. He didn’t need to, He chose to.

He is the source of all life. He is the creator of all things, and yet He rests. This is not the behaviour of a God who is sat on the edge of His heavenly throne frantically pressing buttons and twisting dials to keep everything on track. Nope. He acts and rests with the confidence and assurance of one who can see the end from the beginning (a position that only He holds).

Amazing. And it’s not the only time He has embraced limitation. We know that He cannot lie:

This is another way of saying that God cannot deny who He is… He is the Truth, therefore He cannot lie. You can see here how Paul is celebrating this fact when writing to Timothy.

God voluntarily limiting Himself is an idea that makes some folks uncomfortable, and that’s OK. Some Calvinists don’t like the idea as it can seem like it steps on the toes of the absolute Sovereignty of God. But, I don’t see it that way. In the Incarnation, when Jesus embraced the limitation of human flesh. Jesus voluntarily chose to restrain His divine attributes, He did not relinquish them. As in the words of the old song; “You laid aside Your majesty, gave up everything for me, suffered at the hands of those You had created.” The majesty was laid aside, not lost.

Perhaps a more pressing detail is that God also limits Himself in the sense that He chooses to work through us His people. He spoke through the stuttering Moses. He led through Gideon who was hiding and He spread faith through doubters like Thomas. We are His hands and feet. It is His good pleasure to work in the world through you and me today.

I can’t do it all. I’m not made to do it all. But, God has made me to work with Him and for Him. Anything I need to cut back or cut out are only the things I’ve tried to squeeze in in the first place. I don’t think the good Lord cares if I stay up to date with all the comings and goings of current affairs. I don’t think it’s a sin to not be on top of the 24 hour news cycle… even when it includes massive stories like the Epstein files, civil war in Iran or ICE deportations. These things will happen whether or not I am emotionally invested in them.

However, I absolutely do need to love my neighbour. There’s no easy escape clause from that one.

So, that’s what thoughts were taking a stroll through my mind this week. Thanks for joining me on this ramble. If you think you know someone else who might appreciate this collection of thoughts why not share it with them. Do please check out my brothers’ Substacks if you have a moment (Matt & Adam). Thanks again for joining me today, I hope you can join me for another ramble again soon.

Grace & Peace

I have been a youth worker ever since I was old enough to serve on the youth team at church. It’s been a long time, over 25 years at this point. I once listened to a recording of John Piper preaching to a conference of youth workers - which in itself was funny, because I’m not entirely convinced he thinks youth workers are even necessary. But, that aside, it was a very memorable talk for two reasons:

1. The first is he said something I have written in every youth team handbook ever since I heard it. “The biggest battle in your youth ministry is in you - not in them.”

2. Secondly he said “at the end of their time with you, you should be able to say ‘your blood is no longer on my hands’”.

Now, whatever your thoughts are on John Piper and that tweet from over a decade ago. It is important to say that whilst John is not everybody’s cup of tea, he is a good preacher. And, I have to say I can still hear his voice ringing in my head just writing those words on the page. Plus, his points were sharp and very valid.

In fact, my own journey through youth ministry has been one which has proven his first point to be true… as the years have gone by, I have needed to change. I have needed to grow. I was the main battle ground in many ways, my own thoughts, doubts, fears and failings. I remember getting asked such obvious questions that I couldn’t answer adequately, by genuine earnestly seeking young people that it drove me to study. That feeling of not having a good enough answer was and is horrible.

I couldn’t care less if the young person seemed satisfied with my half-baked answer to their accidentally brilliant question. I knew I had fudged it, and that would gnaw away at me. First I studied apologetics, it seemed as good a place as any to start. I loved it. I remember having the privilege of hearing Alister McGrath speaking at a small conference at the time he was finishing writing his biography of C.S. Lewis. He was brilliant, such an obvious wealth of information and study, and a far richer speaker than I was used to listening to. I was hooked. Later I went on do to a Master’s degree in Missional Leadership (Theology and Ecclesiology in simple terms).

Through Alister I found the Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics (OCCA) and a whole new world of Christian apologists opened up to me. I remember going through their website and just typing the names of the people on their speaking team into YouTube and watching whatever I found. I have listened to hundreds of hours of apologists speaking down the years in the background while I work.

One of the most compelling speakers was a man called Ravi Zacharias. He was unquestionably one of the best communicators I had ever heard. His ability to take questions unflustered from a crowd and respond with thoughtful and incisive answers with little or no notes was remarkable. I was very much a fan of his work… I took his online apologetics course, and then took part in the online training a further two times as a course moderator helping other people through the process. In May 2020 Ravi passed away, and was roundly celebrated… Vice President Mike Pence called him the “greatest apologist of the 20th century”. Sadly this tribute couldn’t have been further from the truth. Just month after his death, Ravi’z whole ministry (and staff of hundreds) were all pitched headlong into a fight for survival. Thanks to the tireless work of Steve Baughman the lies and misconduct of Ravi which had been perpetrated over years began to unravel. It was clear that Ravi was not living to the same standards he preached. He had not finished the race well… he died without repenting or giving his victims an apology.

The logical apologetic move made by most pastors and evangelists I heard was the same… “look to Jesus, not His flawed followers”. And that is fair enough, Jesus Himself had flawed followers, Judas literally took money to betray Jesus… it is not a new phenomenon that followers of Jesus might not live up to the high calling that they have been given.

As the years have gone by I have observed many more Christian leaders fall like Ravi did. Jean Vanier, Carl Lentz, Brian Houston, Mike Bickle, Todd White, Michael Tait, Philip Yancey, and, Shawn Bolz most recently. All in slightly different ways, but all devastating nonetheless. The logical apologetic move made by most pastors and evangelists I heard was the same… “look to Jesus, not His flawed followers”.

At this point I should point out that there are entire ministries dedicated to helping root out abuse and misconduct… some of them are the ones which provided the evidence for the links I supplied to you. It is worth saying the obvious at this point, any and all abuse like this has no place in the church and should be rooted out. It is painful to see things go wrong like this, but it is far worse to think of it still happening so action must be taken. This is an important note, but not the subject of this week’s ramble, so I must continue my train of thought.

Three years ago at Christmas I read St Athanasius’ “On The Incarnation”. I had found a copy of the book which contained the infamous introduction by C.S. Lewis commending the reading of old books, and was keen to read it. I had saved it as something to read during Advent that year. Hands down it was the best book I read that year… and probably for many years before.

In the book there are repeated exhortations to “look at the martyrs, virgin and ascetics for proof of lives truly changed by the power of the cross of Christ.” The contrast couldn’t have been more sharp. St Athanasius spends a good deal of time arguing something along the lines of: “look at the changed lives of those who follow Jesus.” What a breath of fresh air!

I say “fresh air”, but St Athanasius lived in the 3rd and 4th century AD. He wrote his book 1700 years ago, but his perspective was refreshing. I loved the way his whole line or argument was grounded in the reality of the changed lives of the Christians who he observed walking around at the time. He was challenging his readers to look at them, observe the clear sacrifices they had made in their lives… look at how the cross of Christ had changed them and given them new hearts.

The challenge for me personally is to live a life worth looking at. Try to live faithfully and not become yet another cause for apologist to trot out the overused “look to Jesus, not His flawed followers” line.

1 Thessalonians 4:11 is not a verse you hear preached on often, but there is great wisdom in it.

Why must everybody feel the urge to build a world-changing ministry? How about you focus a little closer to home and just focus on actually living the things you say you believe? I do sometimes wonder if we can be guilty at times of “baptising” our own ambitions by trying to achieve our own goals of greatness or notoriety, but using the church as a vessel for them - thus making “everything ok.”

In my mind many of the times we see Christian leaders go wrong it is because they have simply “baptised” their own selfish ambition to be famous or live a life of consequence. It’s not just Christians who are guilty of this, you see it all around. The search for meaning and the desire to leave our mark on the world is all around us. It is same urge that motivates Just Stop Oil, Extinction Rebellion, the Animal Justice Project, the pro-Palestinian marches in London, and many more.

The desire to be like those giants of our history Martin Luther King Jnr, Emmeline Pankhurst, Nelson Mandela and William Wilberforce… what can I do to add my name to the list? The reality is, probably very little. Each of those characters was a once in a generation figure. Each one of them is singular, they are individual people who lived lives in a particular time and place - they are not just people who filled mere job roles “primary protestor” at a given time. When I watch protestors march through London, I often think they see themselves to be the successors of Wilberforce, or Mandela. As if like the papacy the authority is passed down to the next person in the queue. It is not. Just because you think you are the next Emmeline Pankhurst, does not mean you are.

I am under no illusions of being the “next” anything. I am just me, and I don’t want to be anyone else. If I could be so bold, I don’t think you should either.

I have often said that the hardest piece of scripture for any of us to wrestle with is Matthew 5, 6, and 7. Once you have that mastered you can move on to the rest. If you’ve ever read the Sermon on the Mount you’ll know that there is plenty to keep you busy there for more than one lifetime within it.

This brings me back to the John Piper quote at the start.

I don’t need to change the world. But I do need to change.

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be Your name,
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done,
in me as in heaven.

I want to be someone who if St Athanasius was still with us he could point to and say: “look at the changed lives of those who follow Jesus.”

So there you have it, that’s the collection of thoughts that have been rambling through my mind since last week. If you have any thoughts or comments, why not share them in the comments below. If you know someone else who you think would enjoy this ramble (or others like it) why not send them a link? Next month I’ll be celebrating one year of writing weekly, It will be nice to see how many folks chose to subscribe in the year.

Grace & Peace

From what I can see this quote was popularised by Marian Wright Edelman, an American lawyer and civil rights activist. I have nothing against Edelman, she seems to be a remarkable lady whose own life has certainly not been limited by the very idea she is associated with. Edelman graduated from Yale Law School and had a distinguished career in law. She was the first black American woman to pass the bar exam in the state of Mississippi. Yet, even as a trailblazer herself she is associated with the idea; you can’t be what you can’t see.

The quote usually comes packaged up as part of a broader “representation matters” assertion. Something like… “We must show female fighter pilots or lawyers from minority ethnic groups” is the plea. It sounds entirely reasonable - why would anyone not want these people shown in these roles? But, some people have gone as far as to claim that not showing people groups that they consider to be marginalised or underrepresented in certain roles is a “symbolic annihilation” of them. That’s simply not true.

It all sounds reasonable right up until you hear the reason why people request this representation. That’s when they trot out the “can’t be what you can’t see” myth: “How will little girls know it’s possible to be fighter pilots unless they see female fighter pilots?” or “how will young minority ethnic kids know they can be lawyers unless they see minority ethnic lawyers.”

It’s well intentioned, but it’s not true.

You already know it’s not true, I think that even many of the folks using this argument know it’s not true (Edelman lived a life demonstrating it wasn’t)… worse than that, I think it is patronising and demeaning to the very people it claims to be helping.

It’s easy to show why it’s not true. The simplest refutation of the “can’t be what you can’t see” myth is: cavemen. We’d all still be cavemen if we needed to see something modelled for us before we had the imagination that our lives could possibly be a little better in some way.

Yet, we are not cavemen. Humanity did discover how to make fire. Humanity did learn the value of teamwork, and humanity did learn how to pass on this learning to the next generation using a real life superpower - written communication. Humanity seems to be blessed with an abundance of creativity and imagination. Almost like we were made to be imitators of a supreme being who was the source of all creativity?

Now, an ardent adherent of the “can’t be what you can’t see” myth will almost certainly push back against this point and tell me that I’m being “far too literal and absolute”. They will confidently tell me it’s about probability, aspiration, and social permission, not about literal impossibility.

They say this because inventions and first time occurrences are impossible to ignore - they are all around us.

Roger Bannister famously broke the four minute mile in 1954, opening the door for others to “be what they could see”. John Landy was the next athlete to break the four-minute mile, and he did so within a year of Bannister’s trailblazing performance. By 1964, 336 other runners had achieved the feat. Today over 2000 athletes have joined the sub four-minute mile club. But, when you think about this progress the more inevitable it seems that Landy would have got there on his own regardless of whether Bannister had already broken four minute mile. Do you really think that all professional runners would have remained incapable of braking this benchmark unless Bannister had enabled them?

Dave you’re being too literal again. Am I?

I think it’s patronising to say that all the other talented runners would have been constrained by an imaginary line that prevented them from progressing had Bannister not paved the way. I’m not knocking Bannister, I think he’s great, and deserves lots of credit for what he did, but you get the point.

We know that it is true that multiple people can arrive at the same breakthrough simultaneously - independently, at the same time. The most famous instance of this may well be Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray both filing a patent for the telephone within hours of each other. The same invention, by separate people in separate places. Likewise, Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz independently developed the foundations of calculus, including differentiation and integration. This sparked a bitter priority dispute, though modern historians recognise both contributions as independent. If you find yourself with hours to fill, you can peruse an entire Wikipedia article listing hundreds of these instances down the centuries. This is not a rare phenomena.

As if that wasn’t bad enough for the purveyors of the “can’t be what you can’t see” myth, it gets worse. Sometimes hardship is actually an advantage when it comes to creativity. Malcolm Gladwell wrote a whole book about it back in 2014, before the myth went mainstream. Gladwell goes in depth into stories of instances when disadvantage can actually be advantageous, riffing off the Biblical story of David and Goliath.

The summary is simple, Goliath is a champion and a literal giant. He was a mountain of a man who was challenging people to hand-to-hand combat, and all of Israel’s army refused. But David dared to take him on, not because he is a natural born warrior, but because he thinks about the problem innovatively. Think about it, David brings a gun to a sword fight. Goliath had a stronger arm and more experience than David, he had a longer reach and was battle hardened. David would have been beaten in an instant had he tried to battle Goliath on Goliath’s terms, but David had no intention of doing that. He attacked Goliath with a slingshot, enabling him to stand well out of harm’s way to deliver the blow which rendered the giant incapacitated before rushing in to cut off Goliath’s head with his own sword. David’s disadvantage forced him to think outside the box.

Gladwell’s underlying point is essentially that disadvantages can become advantageous when they compel innovation, effort, or adaptation that “Goliaths” (who are comfortable or complacent) rarely need. Thus making space for David to overcome Goliath, for the tortoise to outrun the hare, for people to be what they can’t see.

Hopefully now your brain is already coming up with your own examples of instances when being at a disadvantage has actually served people well. Gladwell mentions the ubiquitous presence of immigrant-owned convenience stores in Western countries. This is a feature, not a bug. These shops thrive because they have a competitive advantage - they’re outsiders. This seems like a disadvantage, but it frees them up to charge the prices they want, they are less liable to be asked for “mates rates” and they have no qualms about confronting shop lifters as they already believe it’s them against the world. The disadvantage of being outsiders, provides the perfect conditions for their success.

You’ll possibly already have thought about how Jewish people in the last century were so persecuted and discriminated against they needed to create their own banks and businesses in order to make a living for themselves. Yet, nowadays terminally-online idiots will happily tell you that Jews are in fact secretly in control of all the banks and are pulling the strings behind the scenes in all sorts of areas. Whilst it is clear to see that Jews have been wildly successful for such a small people-group, what has brought about their work ethic? Existential threat. Necessity.

So am I saying that I don’t value “heroes” and that none of us need good examples in our lives? No. Absolutely not. I think there are plenty of folks worth looking up to in life - like those who run towards danger like firefighters, police officers and paramedics.

I think having people you look up to in life is not just helpful, it’s healthy… and Biblical too. And, if we’re going to use a Biblical example - let’s kick off with the man Himself; Jesus. I’ve always found it interesting that despite the many things Jesus’s critics accused Him of, they still called Him a Rabbi. Why? Because He acted in the manner of a 1st century Rabbi. He had followers - not the modern social media variety, the real ones who use to physically walk around behind Him (travelling all around the country at times).

1st century Rabbis believed that their teachings about life couldn’t be reduced to a mere set of lectures, a book or a teaching course… they thought that the best way for someone to learn was for them to spend time living like they did. Eating, sleeping, travelling and teaching together so that students were fully immersed in the world of the Rabbi. Jesus was no different, this is precisely what we see Him doing with His disciples in the four gospels.

Having taught His ways to His disciples, Jesus then commissioned them to do the same thing with others:

This pattern is clearly picked up by the early church as we see Paul writing to the Corinthians:

This attitude of '“copy the way I live, don’t just follow the words that come out of my mouth” serves as an aid to both the leader and the follower. The follower (or disciple) has someone to observe and follow… they can see the theory lived out in practice and decide if that is a life they would like to emulate living themselves. And, the teacher is held accountable by their followers. They have to live a life worth emulating.

So I guess the long and the short of today’s ramble is, you can definitely be what you can’t see. However, it helps to have someone to copy, and furthermore we should all strive to live a life worth copying. Paul again:

That’s challenging stuff. Forget the challenge of finding someone else worth imitating for a moment. Am I living a life worth imitating? Would I be happy if other people around me started behaving more like me… or would I prefer it if they were less like me? Hmm, I think I’d like an easier question.

Thanks so much if you have joined me for my ramble this week. I hope you’ve found it interesting, why not leave a comment to let me know what you thought? If you have a friend who you think would like to read this ramble, please feel free to share it with them. I hope you can join me again next week for another journey with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

Holidays are good and necessary.

That’s not a particularly controversial thing to say, not should it be. We must be careful however, saying that holidays are good and necessary is not the same as saying that work is bad and bothersome. No, not at all.

Work is good and necessary too!

For the sake of this ramble, the kind of work in question doesn’t really matter… it’s the principal of working that I would like to think about rather than the particular work being undertaken.

Our society has worked very hard to be able to offer us an abundance of ways to simplify our lives, ways to reduce our workload. This is nothing new, we now enjoy electric lighting and central heating. We all benefit from clean water on tap being piped directly into our homes. We have refrigerators which keep our ingredients fresh until they are needed, and ovens to cook them efficiently. We are even given the ironic privilege of getting frustrated at a microwave which is “wasting my time” as I watch the seconds count down to zero.

Our workload is being lessened and made more easy on a daily basis it seems. You can send things to your printer without any cables, you can pay for things with just one tap. It seems the main goal of technology currently is to remove the need for you to do any work - you could even ask AI to write your substack for you. But, to what end?

Clearly, I am not a complete Luddite, I am writing this ramble on a computer, and posting these thoughts all over the world via the internet… technology can be a very good and helpful thing. But it always includes a trade-off. All technology is a balance of give and take. It will give you convenience with one hand and steal your competence with the other. All of us now enjoy reliable cars, with fantastic features like power steering and reversing cameras… but the trade-off is none of us are competent enough to do an oil change any more as the technology is too complicated. Technology gives and takes.

On a basic level there’s nothing wrong with technological advances (that’s not the point of this ramble)… but, as humans we need meaning and purpose. We were built for it, and we crave it.

To me, the most uninspiring phrase I ever hear is “what would be the easiest thing to do?” There are times I have been working on a joint project with other people, and I have heard someone say “what would be the easiest thing?” and it’s like a pin popping the balloon of creative potential. I have genuinely had to fight the urge to leave the room when I have heard those words. Instantly you know the person you are working with has no desire to do this project well, or make any advances in this area - they just want to get through it. From a creative perspective, this is a killer! You can hear the energy of the project slam the door on its way out any time someone utters that phrase.

Overcoming difficulty is a massive incentive which people have used to inspire them for millennia. We’ve all heard the phrase “necessity is the mother of invention”.

There is a concept called desirable difficulty. There are some instances when you want the work in front of you to be harder - not easier - for your own benefit. Elizabeth and Robert Bjork working out of UCLA researched this at length. By creating certain boundaries or obstacles to your learning you could improve your retention rates of information. To (somewhat ironically) oversimplify the concept; the fact that you had to work harder to learn the information means that it was valued more and you retained it better.

In simple terms work is good for you.

There is a subtle way in which our current culture tries to tell us that work is bad for you. So much of our advertising is about escaping the the responsibilities and escaping the work that needs to be done in order to do the things you want to do. This is wrong. Don’t fall for it. Of course there are parts of our daily life which are dull and boring, times when the task at hand seems mind-numbing and inconsequential. Washing up is not something that anyone particularly relishes, but if you want to have a clean plate tomorrow, it needs to be done.

Work is good for you.

I first started this substack back in February 2025 when I had just attended ARC and I wanted to process some of my thoughts about it. One of the most impactful talks at the conference was by Arthur Brooks on Happiness. His thesis is that in order to find happiness a person must have four key components in their life: faith, family, friendship, and work.

In the arena of work (since that is the topic of today’s ramble), Brook’s key predictors for finding joy are:

1. Earning your success.

2. Serving others.

There is great importance of working for what you have, the sense of accomplishment of having earned the position you have. Earning the success you enjoy is vital - not for others, but for you. And, serving others as part of your work is also vital. The knowledge that you are working towards something which is helping improve the lives of other people is a source of joy and meaning for all of us. Whether that is improving their lives through providing financial services or as a bus driver taking people to important appointments, serving others is key.

His whole talk was only 15 minutes and it’s totally worth a listen… since the conference I have listened to it three more times.

Work is a good thing.

The work we do can and should build up our own self-esteem and fend of those intrusive thoughts of insignificance or worthlessness. Your life matters, one of the ways you can see that is the contribution you make, both for our own sake and for those around you who you are working to serve.

In my mind, one of the reasons we find work to be unsatisfying is because of a poor view we can have of “work” as such. For some of us, we accidentally slip into a mode of resenting work, and treating it as an inconvenience that stands between us and the magical state of “the weekend” when all thoughts of work are abandoned.

Work is what you do between the important things in life - like holiday and rest. What rubbish! Work is part of what gives you your meaning and purpose… it’s part of what makes your life

Side note - I genuinely shocked a friend yesterday because I was chatting away and they asked me about when I was going on holiday this year (my wife has already booked us an exciting weekend away at Longleat this summer) and I had no idea what the dates were. I know when it roughly is… but it is of no interest to me. Until a fortnight before we go, my holiday will occupy none of my thoughts - why? I enjoy what I do. I find it meaningful… I’m not desperate to escape from it.

Sometimes we have a bad view of work because we haven’t stopped to consider it in a biblical framework. It’s well worth reading 2 Thessalonians 3 on this. It’s a great little chapter that is very helpful.

“But Dave, you work in a church… you don’t understand, I work in the ‘real world’. You wouldn’t speak so highly of work if you worked in the world like I do”.

I have two responses to that objection. Firstly I would say my experience is quite different. There are many ways I found it easier working outside the church than I have done inside it. Don’t get me wrong, I love what I do, an it’s a privilege to get paid to work for a church - but that doesn’t make it easy.

Secondly, I would also add that all of us who are Christians are charged with the responsibility of working as if we were working for the Lord, regardless of who we are working for.

Working in a regular business is of no less importance than working in a church. You could work in a greengrocer and meet people who would never visit a church - brilliant! You could be the only person in your customers’ week who can share the hope that you carry. That’s exciting stuff.

It’s also important to remember that we were saved for good works. Ephesians 2:10 tells me I was created anew in Christ Jesus to work… not to avoid work.

Work is part of God’s call on our lives. I shouldn’t allow myself to fall into a mode of thinking that belittles that. If I am to take the call of God seriously, I can’t let a competing love of “not work” or “holidays” challenge for the top spot of my affections. My next holiday or day off is not the highest good in my life - it’s not what I’m living for. Nor should it be.

However, the point of this ramble is not to play down the importance of having holidays, it is to talk up the impo rtance of work.

Interestingly in Matthew’s gospel, rest is famously spoken about in the context of work… not stopping work altogether.

Come to Jesus if you are working and feeling burdened, He promises rest. Yes, absolutely. How?

By taking His yoke upon you… that’s an invitation to work alongside Him. His rest is not to stop working, it’s to work with Him. Working in step with Jesus. Not ahead, not behind. To rush or to fall behind is to cause that yoke to choke you and cause pain and discomfort.

This is reminiscent of that famous Augustine quote form the opening of Confessions:

The highest good for us is to find our rest in Him. Rest here meaning, we have stopped our restless wanderings and come to a place of rest in Him. Like a snooker ball that has been rolling and finally stops in the pocket.

Well, that’s plenty for today. This has already taken me far to long to write and it will never find its way out into the world unless I stop writing. So here goes… I still don’t feel like I’ve nailed it. But I’m trying to say, work is good. God is good. And it’s brilliant when we do the work God has planned for us to do.

Thanks for joining me today on this ramble, feel free to leave your comments, thoughts and feedback below. If you know someone else who you think might like to read it, why not send it their way? I hope you can join me again soon for another ramble.

Grace & Peace

You haven’t seen them in the movies, or heard the songs they sing… but the names of these temptresses are on the lips of all the men of business all throughout the city. They are bewitching seductresses who demand much, and seem to offer very little in return. Many who have pursued them have found that they have lost everything, even the very connection that they desire. The truth is, there are some who are pursuing these ladies, even though they don’t know who they are or why.

These ladies seem to be the highest good that can be sought out - they are the prize for which all else must be pushed aside. They have no equals and they stand alone as objects of desire for every captain of industry. They have everyone in a spin.

That is until you look a little closer and see that which is beyond the hype, maybe these two ladies aren’t all they’re cracked up to be. When you look harder at them, their masks begin to slip. Perhaps they promise much and deliver little, because they don’t have the true gold you seek… maybe they are hollowing you out of the very thing you actually desire and give you shallow comfort in return?

These ladies are the twin seductresses of our age; Efficiency and Convenience.

Yes, that introduction was unnecessarily dramatic, and proof that I don’t have a future as a romance novelist (thankfully that’s not the goal)… but it was the only way I could picture the infatuation some people seem to have with efficiency and convenience - it’s like a love affair where otherwise sensible people lose all reason.

You can make an obviously bad decision, and people will (rightly) push back at you… but if you say that this same (bad) decision will improve efficiency or convenience somehow people step back and wave the bad decision on through with smiles of approval. Why is that?

Why do we sacrifice things to efficiency and convenience? And precisely whose convenience are we working towards? And who is finding all this more efficient? Furthermore, who decided the criteria by which we are judging this efficiency and convenience?

This is about the time I should be providing you with some examples - otherwise this is more of a rant than a ramble, so here goes.

In the height of the first lockdown, when things were really crazy, I was in the queue at my local Tesco. Fortunately the sun was shining and the sky was blue, because I was stood in a queue in Tesco car park with 110 people in front of me (yes, I really counted). We were socially distanced using the painted lines for the car spark spaces as markers. We alternated, one person stands on the painted line, the next in the car space, then the next on the line and so on. We were all waiting diligently for the traffic light at the door to turn green so one person could enter the shop. It was one in, one out. For ages we stood in that queue. Inevitably we all started distracting ourselves on our phones, then felt the embarrassment of having been caught on your phone so you start chatting to the other people in the line - those awkward English conversations. Yes, of course we chatted about the (unusually glorious) weather. I had just sent a photo of the enormous line to my brothers - both of whom live overseas, and neither of whom at that time were suffering with anything like the shortages the UK faced. I said as much to the old lady behind me who chuckled and said, “well yesterday when I came here the queue was nothing like this. It was only about twenty people or so. It’s not normally this bad.”

What?! My mind was blown, although I was of course too polite to say it. She came here yesterday? I hadn’t been to a shop in almost a week. I thought we were all staying home to try and protect the elderly and the vulnerable - like her… and she’s popping out to Tesco every day to get her supplies?!

To be fair, no sooner had the reality of what she had said sunk in, that I realised the obvious thing I was missing… I live at home with my wife and two boys. She probably lives at home on her own, no wonder she was popping out to Tesco daily, she was trying to see people.

This past Christmas holidays I spoke to a couple of separate people who both mentioned that they go out of the house in the hopes of bumping into people to talk to… not anyone in particular, just someone.

That is a level of isolation I cannot even imagine.

I am fortunate enough to live with a family around me, and I work in an office where I share a room with three other people. On some days we even have a fifth person try and squeeze in, who knew that my cramped office with a leaky window was the place to be?

The reason I suggested that efficiency and convenience were seductive but ultimately hollow goals, was because I think they are measured using the wrong metrics. Financially speaking, the decision to appease convenience and efficiency makes perfect sense… but you are made of so much more than just your monetary value. You are a whole person, not just a walking bank balance. Saving you a few pounds here and there is not worth losing your soul for. It’s not worth losing human connection over.

Am I being dramatic again? Maybe. But, Os Guinness says that “contrast is the mother of clarity”, so I am trying to throw out a sharp contrast for you.

In my country just under half of all people say they experience from ‘some degree of loneliness or isolation’. 47% it’s a massive number! And there are medical experts - far more qualified than I will ever be - who inform me that loneliness or isolation can have a very serious detrimental impact on your health (equivalent to smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day). Whilst the impacts are thought to be most pronounced on those aged over 65, it is to our shame that in England people aged 16-24 were more likely to say they felt lonely ‘often/always’ than adults over 35 years of age.

We are doing something wrong. Societally, we are aiming at the wrong target somewhere along the line if our young people who should be in the social prime of their life are feeling lonely! This shouldn’t even be controversial.

It will come as no surprise to you that I blame (in part) our good friends efficiency and convenience.

At at this point I should note that we are our own worst enemy. Efficiency and convenience are not being thrust upon us, we are walking into their embrace willingly. We even seek it out. We embrace convenience uncritically. We cling to her, and the promise of an easy life that she whispers in our ear… all the while failing to question whether she has our best interests at heart or if she even means us well at all. What if she is a trickster with a cold heart who doesn’t love us? What if she is only interested in enabling your phone to order your home-delivery pizza easier, but has no care for your soul? What if she promises you the convenience of doing your shopping with a self-checkout so you don’t have to face the ‘hassle’ of making small talk with the cashier - without telling you that loneliness and isolation are bred from actions just like these?

Think about the youngster in your place of work who is more than capable of sending out hundreds of text messages or emails a day, but can’t pick up the phone to make or receive one phone call. I visited the local District Council offices in my town a couple of years ago and one of the younger team members had a note on her desk which she had written saying “pick up the phone coward”. Perhaps the convenience of being able to order things online and book our conveniences ahead of time without the ‘hassle’ of speaking to another human had accidentally trained our brains to think that people are the problem… they’re not. Our inability to speak to them might be though.

In our work we do whatever we can to attract efficiency. We court her, trying to catch her attention in the hopes she will move in with us. But what if she does? What then? Do we know that she has our best interests at heart? What if she is a poison which is slowly damaging us without us even noticing? What if the act of saving money or time is exactly what we should be avoiding? Why is the default assumption efficiency is our friend?

Think about a doctor-patient relationship. Who does the efficiency serve best? The Doctor; it enables them to see more patients in a day… the quicker they can see the patient, the quicker they can make a diagnosis and move on to the next one. The winner here is the Doctor, but only whilst they are thinking selfishly. For the patient, they want the Doctor to treat them as if they have all the time in the world. Why would anyone want to visit a Doctor who resembles a human conveyor belt? This is what enables the private medical industry to thrive in a country with a ‘free’ National Health Service. Apparently there are plenty of people who are happy to pay for the privilege of not being treated in an efficient manner. Being treated as a human matters. Being treated as if you are important is something people will pay for… even when a ‘free’ alternative is available.

I should probably mention that I am not anti-technology. I am not anti-progress and of course I am thankful for the dental anaesthetics that were not available to my forebears. However, I am definitely pro-human connection. I want to speak to a customer service human on the phone, not an AI chatbot. I don’t want to avoid talking to people, people are great… I am one, and so are you!

Yes, of course there are things about other people which can and do annoy us. That goes without saying. But, fear not, other people have a list of ways you annoy them too - so it’s all square. Despite all the complexities and awkwardness of speaking to and dealing with other humans, apparently it’s good for our health!

Think about it, the worst punishment the State is able to wield against you is solitary confinement for 23 hours a day (we dress this up as "removal from association" or “segregation” as it sounds nicer). However, this is considered such an extreme punishment in prison that there are limitations placed on it legally and you are entitled to daily visits from a Doctor to ensure your health does not suffer from it. You can read the accounts of prisoners who have had their mental health destroyed by solitary confinement (in this country and overseas). It is shown to have lasting effects that can cause serious problems for people. And yet… we actively pursue this isolation voluntarily when we court efficiency and convenience.

We treat our prisoners better than we treat lonely people. We rush lonely people in and out of the local GP surgery in the most efficient manner possible - even though we know the dangers of loneliness and isolation. You and I in our private lives pursue convenience and automated solutions to problems to help us avoid the ‘hassle’ of speaking to a person - despite the fact that this is actively bad for our health.

The sad reality is many of the features that make things attractive to us these days are the very things which are harming us long term. Are we at risk of “conveniencing ourselves to death”?

Before I wrap up this ramble, I have two thoughts from scripture to share on this… they are not ‘proof texts’ of anything, but they are food for thought:

1. Leviticus 19:10

   And you shall not glean your vineyard, nor shall you gather every grape of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the stranger: I am the Lord your God.

   The idea to wrestle with here is that efficiency wasn’t the goal - intentional wastage was part of God’s order. That’s a proper head-scratcher. God's plan for the people of Israel, was for them to work their fields with a built-in margin for wastage. Don’t muzzle your oxen whilst it is working - let it eat. Don’t ‘glean’ your vineyard (which is to pick up the bits that fall on the floor) let people who need it more come and tidy it up after you. These are both acts of charity aimed at someone else. An attitude of efficiency only benefits you.

2. 2 Samuel 24:24

   Then the king said to Araunah, “No, but I will surely buy it from you for a price; nor will I offer burnt offerings to the Lord my God with that which costs me nothing.” So David bought the threshing floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.

   The idea to wrestle with here is that it would have been convenient for David to sacrifice the thing which cost him nothing… very convenient. However, that seemed to go against the grain somehow. David wanted it to cost him something otherwise it wasn’t meaningful. Our lives can be filled with myriad convenient and meaningless things - but the things we value the most we will not desire convenience in. No Bride or Groom ever wished their wedding had been more convenient, perhaps a little shorter with less fuss? No. It’s a meaningful celebration, we should deliberately do the inconvenient thing, set aside the time, cancel all other plans and make it special.

These thoughts have been running around my head for about six weeks or so, and I have been going backwards and forwards in my mind as to whether or not to share them… but here they are. I present to you this ramble, a collection of thoughts. I don’t have a firm place I have landed on with it, and to be honest each time I think about it the problem expands rather than reduces. All that is left for me to say is “thank you” if you have made it this far. It’s very enjoyable to have people join me on these rambles with my thoughts. If you have any thoughts, comments or questions why not leave me a message or have a chat about it when we next bump into each other.

If you have a friend who you think would enjoy reading this ramble about convenience and efficiency, why not share it with them and see what they think?

Grace & Peace

It’s been a fun journey since then. I’ve found the discipline of sitting down to write every week helpful. If you’ve read any of my posts so far you will probably have picked up that I have a persistent wrestle with the nagging doubt that I’m just adding to the ‘noise’ online. That’s all just part of the process I guess? What’s funny is, most of the weeks when the doubt is loudest in my mind are the rambles which seem to resonate most with people. I am not claiming that there is some deep significance to that - it’s just a funny fact about how things have gone thus far.

The ramble that first made me think what I was doing might help someone besides just me was: Wisdom in an age of experience. This was back in April, and it was this post that started the slow process of gaining some subscribers. I am still a little bemused that me sitting down each week to try and clear my head and get some thoughts out now gets read by all sorts of people. It’s not exactly setting the world alight, but there are people from at least 5 different countries who are regular readers which is pretty humbling.

The most popular ramble I’ve written this year was: Vituperation - what even is it? I suspect people read it because, like me, they stumbled across the word ‘vituperation’ and though “what on earth does that mean?”

Back in October I experimented with recording an audio version of the ramble, which was surprisingly easy to do, but I think I embedded the audio file incorrectly in the post so I am not sure if it was particularly obvious that I had done this… also, I can’t seem to find any stats from substack to let me know if anyone actually listened to it?

You probably won’t know this, but my first experiment with “Rambling Dave” as a concept was actually a video I made last December about the BBC TV drama Strike. You can see the video below:

I only made one video, and to be honest there are lots of different reasons why… but something I would like to do next year at some point is record an audio version of my favourite substack posts from this year and share them on YouTube just to see if anyone is interested in them. I first started posting videos on YouTube in October 2006, and one thing I have learnt over the years is I have no idea what does well on YouTube. I’ve had videos I’ve spent ages on get no views, and then videos I threw together in a rush get tens of thousands! It’s a very strange platform, endlessly intriguing. But, it’s the second largest search engine in the world, so it’s always worth posting content there.

In the middle of this year I started to write a children’s book - and enjoyed the process enormously. During the autumn and as we headed towards Christmas my progress has slowed considerably (truth be told, recent progress has glacially slow). I’ve had feedback from a few very kind test readers, and I’m knee-deep in revisions and additions. To be precise I have revised 4 chapters… with more than 20 still to go. I know that I will make no more progress unless I deliberately set aside time for that - so that is something I need to be better at in 2026. Normally the New Year isn’t too busy compared to Christmas season, so I am hopeful that I will find some time.

I am in a very fortunate position, I have some very supportive people around me who have been more encouraging that I had anticipated - so I am determined to finish the story, and improve it in such a way that it comes up to the same level as the illustrations I have very kindly been sent by my brother. I am well aware that as a newcomer to the world of middle grade fiction I have a lot still to learn. But, I am trying to do that, and I’m hopeful that next year I might be able to complete the book and get it available for people to buy.

I am very much looking forward to the Christmas holidays. It’s an incredibly busy time of year - all for good reason, but I’m tired and I need a rest. Plus, I rather like my family and look forward to spending some quality time with them without one of us having to rush off here or there. I’m sure you are probably feeling the same way too.

So, this is my last ramble for 2025 - if you have joined me on any or all of my rambles I’d like to thank you for your company. It’s always nice to able to talk things through with friends. I hope that next year you will be able to join me for another ramble.

Grace & Peace

Somehow I feel the need to rush to my own defence right at the get-go. I am a fan of books… I collect books. The beautiful old books in the photo below are my own, they’re on the side in my lounge.

The first two books on the left are both copies of Pilgrim’s progress (don’t tell , he’d probably complain about it being overrated again). The smaller dark brown copy on the far left has an inscription from 1883 on the inside cover. I love being able to hold these connections to our shared history in my hands. It’s so cool.

The copy of “Addresses by D.L. Moody” shown below is the first properly “old” book I read (it dates from around 1880-1890). During one summer about 15 years ago when I was still fairly new in my job when there was a lull in activity in late August, I wandered into the library at work and picked up this book simply because it looked interesting. I then read one chapter a day during my lunch breaks. It was brilliant.

A good friend of mine, someone who I would genuinely call an inspiration, was a man called Paul Morley. Paul spent some time studying at the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago whilst we were out in America at a puppet festival. Paul was who introduced me to Moody, so I was pleased to be able to read the sermons of the man who had inspired my friend.

Anyhow - this isn’t a ramble about my growing book collection, although maybe one day I will write about that. Today I am cautiously rambling about whether reading is overrated.

A couple of weeks ago I came home from work and found my wife in the kitchen listening to the New Testament on the stereo. It was an old CD box set she had stumbled across whilst clearing and she had decided to give it a listen. The practice of just listening to the Bible being read well whilst going about her business was something she enjoyed so much that CD box set has stayed beside the CD player ever since - in fact quite often these days I walk into the kitchen to hear a faint “tick, tick, tick, tick” sound. The first time I heard it it really threw me… I hunted high and low to find the source of this irritating sound. Eventually I located it, it was the CD player, on pause with the CD still furiously spinning round and round inside the machine. So happy was I to have found the source of my torment I gleefully turned off the CD player - promptly loosing my wife’s place in her listening so she had to start that chapter again. Sorry Shelley, it won’t happen again.

The Bible was written to be read aloud, and I totally understand why Shelley has found it so refreshing to listen to the Bible being read well at home. It’s a joy.

You may have noticed that I written “read well” twice now? That is because I am of the unpopular opinion that there is nothing worse than hearing the Bible read badly… I find it physically painful if I’m honest. Some people optimistically say things like “it’s better to hear it read badly than not at all”… and they are probably right. But there is an art to reading the Bible aloud well, and we need to rediscover it. One person who has done a fantastic job of this recently is Matt Whitman who recently studied the book of Galatians for a year so that he could read it as close to how Paul wrote it as he was able - and it’s brilliant!

You can listen to him read the whole book in just under 18 minutes on the video below, and it’s well worth your time.

About 10 years ago I had the pleasure of meeting up with the Streetlights Bible team for a meal when they were passing through London. If you are not familiar with them, please allow me to suggest you are missing out? They have been working for the past 15 years to painstakingly record the entire Bible with musical underscore, a true labour of love. This summer they finally finished the entire English audio Bible with music, and it is such a wonderful resource for the whole church.

We use the Streetlights audio Bible with our youth group when we’re doing Bible readings with youth who are not familiar with it because Streetlights read it so well and they capture the expression in the passages so brilliantly, it’s a real gift to the church. Having completed the whole Bible in English, they are already well underway with the Spanish version and they have also completed pilot projects in other languages too.

Where am I going with all this talk of vintage books and audio Bibles?

Perhaps reading is overrated? Think about it. Throughout history the vast majority of people were unable to read. The past 150 years is the exception, not the rule. For most people, for most of history owning books and reading them was a real privilege, not a right. Think about it, Gutenberg invented his printing press in 1455, so books as we know them are a relatively modern invention.

I am not saying our forefathers couldn’t read. Not at all. But, they would have had less occasions on which to read, given that the manufacture and distribution of books and posters and artworks requiring you to read would have been far more sparse (and far more expensive).

Many Christians today espouse the benefit of daily Bible reading… and of course, it is a great habit to have. However, we cannot pretend that this has been the habit of the majority of Christians for the past 2000 years - far from it. The majority of Christians throughout history wouldn’t have been able to read the Bible in their own language (many still can’t), and many Christians didn’t have the required reading level to be able to read the Bible on their own (many still can’t).

This may sound like a slightly snobby point to make (which is not my intention), but it’s just true… it’s one of the reasons the Streetlights team started their enormous project to record the Bible with a musical underscore. They are based in Chicago and there was a large number of kids they were trying to do discipleship small groups with who lived in deprived areas of the city and who simply couldn’t read the Bible. They didn’t have the reading ability. So the team began recording passages of scripture, read well, with a musical underscore (they are gifted musicians) to enable the young people to listen to the scripture in a format they enjoyed and in a way which made it more memorable. This enabled the young people to listen to God’s word, and memorise it too, without needing to be able to read.

A couple of months ago my wife lead our team meeting at work. She chose to have us listen to the entire book of Philippians and then discuss it afterwards. It was such a rich time together… it’s too rare that we have the chance to sit down as church and listen to someone read large chunks of scripture well. Try it yourself, it’s 17 minutes of goodness that you absolutely will not regret:

I recently heard someone mention the various ways we can read the Bible - I can’t remember the exact words they used but it was something like this:

• We read for Inspiration. To hear God speaking to us, those words which jump off the page, that passage which comes alive as you read it.

• We read for Information. It is good to study the Bible and really dig into it to work out what it is saying and how it should be shaping my life.

• We read for Saturation. We want to know what is in the word and be saturated by it. To be filled in every part by the word.

This last one is the one that gets overlooked most often in my experience. We love getting inspired by a particular word or phrase. But, few take the time to be saturated in the word (myself included) to just read (or listen to) large sweeping passages of scripture without stopping. It’s so helpful for shaping our thinking. It gives you a much clearer view of the narrative shape of a story than reading line by line, or slowly reading a paragraph at a time doing deep dives.

Each method of reading is beneficial, but there is something life-giving and upbuilding to hear the Bible read well, have I mentioned that yet?

I feel like we have reached the point where if I carry on rambling I’ll probably tip you over the edge and put you off trying their resources, and I would hate for that to be the case. Please consider making time in your day or week for hearing the word read aloud to you. The Bible comes alive in a different way when you heard it read well aloud, especially (if like me) you are a slow or clumsy reader. Whilst I like reading the Bible myself, I find it so much more helpful when someone else reads it without tripping over the words and needing to re-read paragraphs.

Well that really is it for today - have a brilliant weekend whatever you get up to. If you can think of someone else who might like to read this little ramble, why not send it to them? I hope you can join me again soon for another ramble with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

There were three rhymes I was reading for the children today. One was a rhyme of the Christmas story, which you can listen to the YouTube video below:

This is a rhyme I wrote a few years ago now, if you decide that you can’t bear to live another day without owning a copy for yourself then you can purchase a copy from my church’s website here (there are a load of free craft downloads you can find online too). The rhyme is part of a larger activity book which we give away to local children every year. So far we have probably distributed almost 2000 of them. Last year a box of them were even sent to a church in the Falkland Islands, which is quite humbling.

Writing activity books and resources for children and young people is a large part of what I do for my day job… but this particular book holds a special memory for me. It was the first rhyme I ever wrote.

I remember very clearly that for Easter 2022 I wrote an activity book which included a retelling of the Easter story and lots of activities and crafts. It was just a straight retelling nothing rhymed or anything like that… it was good, but it wasn’t the world’s most exciting version of the story. I had attempted to synthesise the four Gospels into one summary of events. It wasn’t bad, but it was carried by the beautiful illustrations which really lifted the quality of the book.

When Christmas came around I clearly remember sitting down to plot out the key points of the story and work out what illustrations I was going to need to request from our friendly illustrator James. I share an office with our church’s graphic designer Andrew, and I remember finishing the story and saying to him “well, I’ve finished the story… the only problem is, even I’m bored of it and we haven’t even published it yet.”

Andrew is used to me being slightly dramatic and over-reacting to things (he is very patient) and he probably replied with some suitably polite and encouraging words. I wasn’t listening to whatever his reply was, but clear as day I remember starting a new Word document and writing “what if it rhymed?” on the top line, clicking save and going home.

The next day I started the whole story again, but writing the story as a rhyme. By the end of the day I had a half-decent rhyme put together. Over the next couple of weeks, Andrew and I knocked back and forth a few word changes here or there. Truth be told there are still some pages I’m not happy with, but we did it. The rhyme was written, and it was so much more engaging than just a story was. This was such a helpful step for me, it unlocked new possibilities and helped me become more brave with my writing.

The following Easter I revisited the Easter story. I kept the pages we had already created and even added more (James kindly supplied extra illustrations), and I re-wrote the Easter story as a rhyme. Again, the flow and engagement of it was so much better than just reading a normal story. Doing a live story reading (like I’ve been doing this afternoon) in schools works so much better with the rhymes. They have a predictable pattern and it acts as an invitation to the children to join in and say the last word on the line with you when they can see what’s coming. It creates opportunities for fun, and also holds their attention well.

But, this ramble isn’t about rhymes (even though thus far it has been). This ramble is about giving yourself the freedom to play.

Life gets busy, and deadlines can run towards you from all directions… so carving out time and space which doesn’t have obvious limitations placed on it is a very important discipline for me. I regularly try and create space to work on ideas that have no logical output yet. For instance in my world of writing regular teaching, we will continue to pump our the same kind of resources unless we give ourselves the opportunity to do something new. That means trying new things, which is inherently scary, because we’re always bad at new things.

So I have to create side projects to learn new skills on. As the godfather of ‘makers’ Jimmy Diresta says “you always go to school on the first one”.

I deliberately experiment on projects which I like and find fun, but have no consequence if and when they go wrong. This gives me the safety to explore, learn and enjoy the process as the stakes are low. This is probably when you should probably spare a thought for my poor wife who has to put up with hearing about all my half-baked ideas as I’m trying to work out how to do something which is inevitably something very silly and inconsequential.

Many stickers, posters, t-shirts, videos, instagram accounts and plenty more side projects have been created in the name of ‘play’. For me, the freedom ‘play’ provides is so important as it has no deadlines, no urgency, and limitless upsides. Skills that are learnt through play are easily transferred into work as and when I increase my competency, but play precedes work. Experimenting on real work that needs to be done (and done to a high standard) carries too much pressure, I don’t need that. I much prefer to upskill myself through play and transfer those skills later.

‘Play’ has enabled me to do all kinds of things down the years that would never have happened without this approach. A basketball shooting alley, a giant model railway, a 12ft tall giraffe puppet, rhymes for Easter and Christmas and many more things.

Thanks for joining me on this ramble with my thoughts today. Do you make time to ‘play’ or think outside the box in what you do? How do you make space to experiment with new ideas and create new solutions in your work? I’d be curious to hear your approach in the comments below. Have a great week, I hope you can join me again soon for another ramble with my thoughts.

Grace & Peace

I love Christmas, I love what the Nativity story tells us about God, and I love sharing that good news with others.

Advent starts this weekend and we are anticipating the arrival of Jesus. The church calendar rightly reminds us that we are not just anticipating the arrival of Jesus as a baby, born 2,000 years ago, we are also anticipating His return. However, it is worth pausing to consider just how mind-boggling the story of the Nativity is. It’s amazing.

We can treat it all in a very matter of fact manner, explaining the events in a mechanical way to show how it was all very necessary, but not very interesting - the really important part of Jesus’ story comes along much later. But that misses the point entirely.

Sometimes I think it’s a good idea to admit that we’re confused by Christmas and a little unsettled by it. When Jesus starts His ministry later in His life He speaks clearly and demonstrates His power openly… everything is quite out in the open. The Nativity is not like that, it can seem a little more hidden (or absent in Mark and John’s case). When read with an open mind, the Nativity still has the power to make people stop in wonder and in awe. I know I have done so many times.

What was it the shepherds saw when they visited? What were the things Mary pondered in her heart? What on earth must Joseph have felt during this whole process, especially the escape to Egypt?

There are plenty of questions. Really good ones, that you should ask… Matthew and Luke are standing by waiting for you to look into it all further. Read the story again, read it again, read it again.

Every year I find more in the story to contemplate and enjoy. Last year I was particularly struck by Simeon and Anna, they are often the unsung cast members of the Christmas story. Much overlooked, yet powerful contributors when given the chance to share their lines with you.

This year I was taken by surprise. I was listening to an old episode of the Theology Pugcast and shared a quote by St Augustine which just stopped me in my tracks. It was so good I thought I would share it with you all:

I love it. I love those symbolic pairings that St Augustine places beside one another, it’s genius.

Christmas isn’t something to be embarrassed by, it’s a massive sign of God’s love for us that we should celebrate.

Christmas is the loud and triumphal declaration that physical presence matters. God seeing our poverty and desperation could think of no better way to heal our pain and save our souls than to come and live among us… to join us in the mess so that He could lead us out from it. In an age when physical presence, spending time with real people in real rooms is getting increasingly rare, remember that God displayed His very real love in the incarnation.

Immanuel. God with us.

Do I want to correct the empty and mindless way the world around me ‘celebrates’ at this time of year? Absolutely. I want to combat the shallow and unfulfilling commercialised sugar-fest with the full-fat meaty reality of a real Jesus, born in a real Bethlehem, who lived a real blameless life, and who really gave Himself for me. The best outcome of Christmas wouldn’t be that people would stop their mindless celebrating, it’s that they would celebrate something worth celebrating. Jesus is all of that and more.

This Christmas, spread the good news of great joy that the angels spoke of.

Grace & Peace

Have you ever seen a family tree? Maybe you’ve seen one on the wall of a big historic house or castle? Or do you have a family member who loves history and has mapped out all of your family going back through the years? This advent devotional is based on the family tree of a man in the Bible called Jesse - hence The Jesse Tree - and is inspired by the opening verses of Isaiah 11:

It traces the story arc of the Bible from Creation to the birth of Jesus. Each day there is a passage to read, some questions to discuss and then a suggestion of how to respond and pray together as a family about what you’ve learnt. We hope you enjoy learning about some key figures and important stories in the family of Jesse and his most famous descendant - Jesus! There are also a few craft suggestions you can try along the way, which are all free DPFs you can download to help make the stories even more memorable.

We’ve just had the book re-printed and it is available to purchase online if you want a physical copy… or you can read along at home for free by visiting the website: kf.church/jessetree The reading for each day will appear on screen along with the questions to chart about in your family and suggestions for prayer (just like it does in the book).

Whilst we think Advent is a brilliant time to do this family devotional, it is of course equally worth doing in July as it is December… and the web page rolls through the daily readings every month of the year, so you don’t have to wait for Advent at all - you could do it at any time.

If you can think of anyone who might like this book or would like to take a look at the website, why not share this with them? Have a brilliant weekend, I look forward to joining you for another regular ramble next week.

Grace & Peace

My wife and I had it earlier this year, when we leased our new car. We had seen adverts for it on TV, but we hadn’t ever seen one in real life before, until we test drove one. This is the frequency illusion… it wasn’t that the Cupra was suddenly a more popular car, or that sales had spiked immediately after our test drive. It was that we now knew what that car was, and recognised it more quickly.

I think I had a similar moment with leadership conferences and leadership books in the Christian world this week. They’re everywhere - it seems that way at least. Everywhere you look there are books, courses and conferences encouraging you to be a leader.

It got me thinking… why? Is that a goal we want to aim for?

We should probably start by doing a rapid-fire round. Given that leadership books and conferences are all around us, how many times is the word “leadership” mentioned in the Bible?

Obviously, it depends on the translation. But, you’re looking at a number between zero and seven. This is of course, unless you count versions like The Message, then you’ll get eighteen mentions (but The Message is a paraphrase like The Passion “Translation”, and not an actual translation as such). Less than ten mentions of a word in a book containing around 775,000 words seems to be very few.

In fairness, “leadership” is a very specific word, let’s expand the search. Let’s have a look at a few similar words.

• Leadership = 0 (NKJV), 1 (ESV) 4 (NIV), & 7 (NLT).

• Leader = 85 (ESV), 164 (NKJV), 236 (NIV), & 509 (NLT).

• Lead = 213 (ESV), 260 (NKJV), 403 (NIV), & 806 (NLT).

• Ruler = 116 (ESV), 137 (NLT), 151 (NKJV), & 172 (NIV).

• King = 2527 (ESV), 2552 (NIV), 2571 (NKJV), & 2696 (NLT).

Given the relatively small number of occurrences of these words in the Bible, you may be as amused as I was to discover today that Eden.co.uk (a good English Christian book seller) has 2224 books on Christian leadership! So if you read the ESV there are over two thousand books written for every instance of the word “leadership” appearing in the Bible. That’s hilarious!

Obviously at this point I need to confess to playing a little game with you. I’m well aware that the Bible can address the topic of leadership without directly using the word “leader” or “leadership”. We also shouldn’t weight topics in the Bible based purely on their word count - it’s just a bit of fun to get your attention. There were lots of leaders in the Bible, and we have countless stories about leaders being brilliant and useless in both the Old and New Testaments. I’m just playing with the idea because it got stuck in my head.

In our culture we have a default that automatically says: leader = good, follower = bad. But I’m not convinced, I think there’s more to it than that.

Leaders are essential, we need them. The Bible shows us clearly what a blessing they are when they are good… and a curse they can be when they are bad. I am not anti-leader. But, there is a worthwhile conversation to be had about the need for leaders - and perhaps the potentially even bigger need for people who are happy to follow… or work under a leader. Some of our most famous Bible heroes played precisely that role. Joseph (with the fancy coat, not the carpenter), was a man who rose to power and influence in Egypt at just the right time - but he was a man under delegated authority. He was appointed something akin to Prime Minister of Egypt, but he was doing this in direct service to the Pharaoh. He wasn’t branching out on his own to blaze a new trail… he was carrying out specific duties and tasks he had been assigned to benefit the nation.

Esther, is an inspirational character who was also very much under the authority of the King… yet, her role was pivotal. She had to win the king over to be able to effect the change she wanted to see. Daniel was also very much under the law and serving under the authority of the King - so much so he got thrown in a lions’ den for stepping out of line.

It’s interesting to note how often the theme of serving well or being a good follower comes up as a theme in the Bible (Eden.co.uk have 158 books on this if you’re interested). Surely the most famous example of this has to be Jesus calling His disciples…

For the sake of balance, here is how often you’ll find the word ‘follow’ in the same translations I mentioned earlier. It’s not a huge difference to the word ‘leader’, but for what it’s worth it is more.

• Follow = 269 (NKJV), 274 (ESV, 435 (NIV), & 632 (NLT)

Jesus tells people to follow Him on many occasions. He called His first disciples by saying “follow Me”, as we already saw. All the synoptic Gospels record Jesus calling Levi by simply saying “Follow Me”.

All three synoptic Gospels also include the following:

The three synoptics also include the story of the rich young man who comes to Jesus asking how he can inherit eternal life. How does Jesus respond?

Jesus seems to repeat this often. John’s Gospel also contains multiple Follow Me moments, not least the famous statement about His sheep:

It was a statement rather than an invitation in this instance, but regardless of how it is framed Jesus repeatedly emphasised the importance of following Him. It was and is a non-negotiable. In that following we get to be like Joseph working under Pharaoh, leading but not the leader. As we follow Jesus and seek to do the good works that He planned for us long ago, we are acting not out of our own inspiration, initiative, or authority but His. We become followers of Christ, not the leaders of the pack.

The risk of focussing on being a leader is the subtle shift of attention. It necessarily shifts the spotlight onto you, what you’re doing and how you can change things. What can I do better? How can I improve things for my team? How can I be more effective? They’re all good questions - but for the Christian the challenge remains; the focus has shifted into the wrong place. Your team would notice an improvement in you if you loved Jesus more and loved those around you more. Your team would notice a difference in you if you lived to serve and not to be served.

Again, it’s important to stress, I am not anti-leader. I believe that Romans 12 shows us clearly that leadership is a spiritual gift that some people are graced with. I am a leader in my local church context. I believe that leaders and leadership are necessary and the church would not function in a healthy way without them. I also happen to think that our churches would be more healthy if people actively looked for roles to be followers rather than leaders. If we all actively searched out places we could serve others rather than lead others I think we’d all be in a better place.

It’s not too hard to recognise that there are few people it is worse to work for than someone who is desperate to be a leader. Nobody wins in that scenario. Being self-seeking, or ambitious in a wrong way doesn’t help anyone. James is characteristically blunt when he writes:

Unsurprisingly just one chapter later James adds:

Pride and self centred ambition are wrong. Paul gives a list of what the hallmarks of a good leader should be - spoiler alert, the bar is set very high and is very much against people who are puffed up, greedy or covetous.

So why do we have so many books and conferences on the topic of Leadership today? I’m not sure. Is it important? Yes… but probably not as important as we seem to think. All of us are commanded to follow Him daily. There are some roles where you may be a leader daily (in your household, as a parent or even within your workplace or church) - but you are still called to follow first, and lead second.

Your identity should be in your role as a follower, not a leader (as good and necessary as leadership roles are - good grief have I caveated that point enough yet?).

I think I’m going to bring this ramble to a close before I say something that ruffles too many feathers. Thanks for joining me today on this ramble with my thoughts, I hope it has been helpful. If you know someone who has been thinking about similar things, why not send it to them? I hope you can join me again soon.

Grace & Peace