Thank you everyone who’s encouraged me about my last post kicking off this ‘Verging on Heresy’ segment on the blog. It’s been cool, and I’m excited to crack on with it now. Today, my first worry about the way we sometimes think and speak has to do with this phrase: “It’s a justice issue.” Surely justice is […]
Discussion is great. Dialogue is important. But there are things we do which make it much harder. One of them is to talk about how ‘biblical’ we are being. I seek to be biblical! I just don’t claim I am Please don’t get me wrong. I believe the Bible is the word of God, inspired, […]
This is the 67th post on this blog, and every one so far has been written by me. That is going to change very soon! I’ve decided to do something a little different, which I’m really excited about. I’ve asked some people – and will be asking some more – to answer this question: “Why […]
What does going to a big, nerdy card-game tournament have to do with churchy language? In my mind at least, quite a bit! I’ve always been interested in words and language. I’ve written about it on here a couple of times, but I was struck on Saturday by the immense power of language to make […]
I was asked a question recently as part of a staff retreat day: When was the last time you changed your beliefs? It’s not an easy question, but a good one. Why I don’t like changing my mind Changing my mind about what I believe is true has a lot of drawbacks. It means accepting […]
I’ve been a little hung up on words recently. We need to be growing in our understanding of the language of our faith, but not in a way that excludes people or makes learning theory the most important thing. There’s one other thing, though, which I think we need to be wary off… Getting sloppy […]
I’ve been exploring the importance of learning and using the language of our faith. Last week I considered one potential danger: being exclusive in our use of language. Today, I want to consider a second way language can go wrong. Words have limits Words are great. I love them. I used to spend my free periods […]
I wrote a post on here last week called ‘Learning the Lingo’. I suggested we pick up vocabulary about the things we care about. Sport, TV, hobbies, professions – they all have technical language. If we care enough, we pick up the relevant lingo. I also suggested the same is true for Christians. If our […]
This is another thought I’ve had while sailing (the last one is here), but it probably actually applies to most activities or things which we learn. It’s about learning the right words. Using the right words When I first started to sail, the most helpful instructions would have sounded something like this: “When the big […]