One of my responsibilities as a tutor with a Christian Counselling Training organisation is to assess my students written assignments, of which “Evaluate and Provide Therapy for Psychopathological Disorders” is what I am currently marking. It is interesting how in a clinical context such as the DSM-5 (the long-awaited, controversial new edition of the bible of psychiatry), the word “disorder” ...

The Kingdom road that Jesus called us to follow him down is narrow with large ditches on either side! In the world of theology, there are two equal yet opposite extremes that one can fall into to as we navigate the bibles teaching on the Kingdom of God and it’s implications for how Christians live gospel centred lives in this ...

When I was a younger man, we were told to bring people to church so that they could hear the gospel. And many people were brought to church, and many people heard the gospel message – and some responded to that message. And you sort of graduated from the gospel, to other teachings and deeper spiritual principles. But is this ...

Some time ago, I was conversing with an agnostic who made the statement that exclusive truth claims should be avoided, because they are what causes conflict. It’s quite a common perspective that people, even Christians hold. What it boils down to, is the importance of truth; and more importantly, how do we better understand the truth? At some level, the agnostic ...

A pastor I know once told the congregation that she doesn’t like the phrase “I’m a sinner saved by grace”, because we are no longer sinners – we are saints, and we need to have a higher view of ourselves! This really got me thinking… And I remembered a friend of mine from before I met Jesus. He was loyal ...

There is a question being thrown around a lot recently, in particular aimed at Rob Bell in an interview soon after the devastation of the Boxing Day Tsunamis in 2011 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg-qgmJ7nzA). “Which of these is true: ‘God is all powerful, but he doesn’t care or he cares but isn’t all powerful’.” After reading it several times, I stopped to think about the ...