James’s Blog: The End.

James’s Blog: The End.

So this is it – my final blog post after five years. I don’t know when (or if) I’ll be back, but I’ll be taking the rest of 2020 off at least. We’ll see what happens, eh.

There’s not going to be any profound words of wisdom in this post, no poem or parable. It’s just going to be me saying “Thank you” to everyone who’s taken the time to read what I’ve written, even if it’s only been once. Thank you if you took the time to comment on anything I posted. Thank you if you ever shared anything I’d written with someone else, digitally or not. Thank you for being a part of this particular leg of my journey.

I hope that something I’ve written over the past five years has been personally encouraging or challenging in some way. In short, I hope that neither of us has wasted our time.

There have been some exceptions, but on the whole I have been happy with everything that has appeared on these pages. The ones that haven’t been very good have invariably been so because the well of ideas had run dry for that week, despite me having committed to posting something regardless – but there have been a fair number of posts that I’ve pulled out of thin air at the last moment that have ended up being much better than they had any right to be. Of everything that I’ve written here, I don’t have a favourite, but I think the one that means the most to me is ‘The Man who Sold me a Pear’, which appeared on these pages in year one. I guess I peaked early.

I’m not going to ask you to post in the comments what your favourite entry has been (this isn’t YouTube) but I imagine that – if I’ve been doing this properly – it will have been different for each person. I’m the one sitting here tapping the keys, but ultimately I have always hoped that this was just another means of building the Kingdom of God. If it has been then I’m sure that the Holy Spirit will have His own selection of favourite posts. Hopefully, the list of posts that He didn’t like is a short one.

So, one final time, thank you for being a part of this. May God continue to bless you all.

James’s Blog: When We Feel Wronged by God.

James’s Blog: When We Feel Wronged by God.

Poor old Job. He gets a bit of a raw deal, losing everything that he had in such a short space of time. He has a lot to deal with but the author of the book is keen to point out, even though Job is confused about the source of all his trouble, that “In all this, Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing.”

That’s chapter one and chapter two anyway. From chapter three onwards Job gets a little less…stoic. Here are some of the things Job throws at God:

“He would crush me with a storm and multiply my wounds for no reason…”

“Does it please you to oppress me, to spurn the work of your hands, while you smile on the schemes of the wicked?”

“God assails me and tears me in his anger and gnashes his teeth at me;”

“…know that God has wronged me and drawn his net around me.”

There’s more. It’s quite a long book. If Job avoids sin in the early chapters by not accusing God of wrongdoing, then he’s going to be in for it once God gets around to reading the rest of the book.

Now, I’m sure that a first-rate lawyer would pour over Job’s words and argue that “my client, Your Honour, doesn’t ever explicitly accuse God of wrongdoing (except maybe in that last bit quoted above, though he was under immense strain at the time)…”. We, however, are not under the Law but under the Spirit, and there’s no doubt in my mind that the spirit of Job’s words are very much about wrongdoing. God is to blame for his plight and He’s not being fair. God is unjust.

So, we’d expect that when God finally shows up, Job’s going to be in trouble and, sure enough, God has something to bring to the table. Namely, four chapters of “Job, you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

And yet…God reserves His anger for someone else. It’s Job’s friends who get it in the neck because, as God says, “You have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has.”

Really? After all that stuff Job said about God crushing him unjustly and smiling on the wicked and wronging him? “You have not spoken of me what is right as my servant Job has.”

I suppose I can think of two possible explanations for this. One, God tunes out and stops listening when we go off on a rant. He wouldn’t be the only parent to adopt this posture. Or two, when we’re struggling, when we loathe our life and give free rein to our complaint, when we’re dealing with genuine tragedy and just want to scream and shout and find someone to blame, God cuts us some slack.

I know which of those two I think it could be.

James’s Blog: Winding Down.

James’s Blog: Winding Down.

The end of October will be this blog’s fifth year anniversary. That means I’ve been posting something more or less weekly for five years now, and I’m feeling it. That’s around 260 posts, whether I had something to say or not, whether I wanted to post something or not. I’m not delusional enough to think that I have a limitless supply of wisdom to distribute over the internet – I’m surprised I’ve lasted this long, to be honest.

But I have made a decision. The Law of Diminishing Returns is a real thing and five years is long enough. This means that I’m going to take a break once we reach the end of October. I don’t know for certain what this break will look like – whether I’m hanging up my blogging pen for good, or if I’ll be back after a break, or if I’ll just hang around indefinitely, posting something every now and then. I’m not sure. It’ll also depend on what works for Lioness Publishing and Elsa – after all, it’s her site.

I didn’t know what was going to come of all this when we started it. We’d just published The Listening Book and this blog was supposed to be its companion. Like most authors, I nursed a secret hope that this might be the beginning of something huge, but I’m far from disappointed with where we’ve ended up. God has been very gracious to me, mostly through Elsa and Mark and all of you who have taken the time to read what I’ve typed up every week. Thank you.

So I hope you enjoy the blog posts that follow over the next month, and will join with me in giving thanks to the God who created everything and gave us the gift of being able to create our own little worlds.

James’s Blog: Lines in the Sand.

James’s Blog: Lines in the Sand.

We’re pretty good at drawing lines in the sand, but I wonder where God draws His. What’s God’s deal-breaker? Maybe it’s a good thing to not be able to provide a concrete answer to that question – after all, human beings have a tendency to take lines in the sand and turn then into a box and then to wish hell upon everyone who’s on the outside.

Take ‘Statements of Faith’ for example. These can be helpful things for organisations and churches. They can help individuals find a home where they can grow in some measure of security and comfort, without having to navigate tricky conversations every day. You know what you’re getting. They’re like stablisers; training wheels as we learn how to relate to and love others.

But they can also consist of nothing more than ornate lines in the sand, drawn by human hands; the stone cold truth about God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, Sin, Humanity, the Bible, Heaven, Hell, Predestination, Women in Leadership, Baptism. Death by bullet points.

Those lines can become a box, or perhaps more acurately, a cage, where what you think about the person and work of Jesus Christ carries as much orthodoxy as what you think about the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and someone who thinks differently to you on whether or not women should be allowed to preach is as much ‘in error’ as someone who thinks that God is a cola-flavoured ice lolly.

(Sigh) I’m not against theological wrestling, by no means, but I remember one of my lecturers once saying that the goal of theology is not to provide answers but to categorise mysteries and I think there’s a lot of mileage in that. Certainly, it helps us deep thinkers with the old humility problem. No, what I’m against is drawing lines in the sand in places other than where God might have drawn them.

As I’ve pondered these mysteries, I have adapted my views and changed my positions over the years, and I have no doubt I will continue to refine my worldview as I continue to better understand the rhythmn of God’s heart. But here’s the thing: God has been with me and guided me and helped me and blessed me and used me all the way along my journey – regardless of my views on predestination or tongues or baptism. God has remained faithful while I’ve stumbled along, sometimes holding views that were quite damaging to myself and potentially others. So God must draw His line in the sand somewhere other than along the denominational or theological boundaries that have provided the framework of my faith for so long. Otherwise, at some point in my journey I would have been persona non grata to Him for some belief I held.

I think God does draw lines, and I think there is a point where God says, “You and I can no longer do business together”, but I think this has much more to do with Jesus than it does to do with all those other details that take up so much space on the page – after all, you know who you find in the details…

James’s Blog: Small Lies and Big Truth.

James’s Blog: Small Lies and Big Truth.

Recently, I’ve found myself dwelling on mistakes that I’ve made in my relationships, and not in a healthy way. It’s like I’m being aggressively confronted with the 10% that I got wrong rather than the 90% that I got right. I’ve spent a lot of time out of my depth with people, but the truth is that I have very few drowned relationships to my name. These thoughts don’t seem to care. They just seem to want me to feel guilty about something, anything. It’s odd to find yourself thinking about somebody with whom you have a good relationship, somebody who you know you have helped and has expressed gratitude for the help that you have given them, and yet immediately be thinking of the little ways in which you feel like you failed them, or things you wish you had or hadn’t said or done.

These thought patterns often crop up when I’m praying for people, and have the fingerprints of accusation all over them, so these days I file them under ‘spiritual warfare’ and try to deal with them appropriately. How I go with that depends on how well tuned in I am to what is true.

We all make mistakes in the way that we relate to others, we might damage relationships and make less than perfect decisions at times, but that’s rarely the whole story. I want to remind myself, and you dear (and not-so-dear) readers, that our relationships are not usually as bad as we think they are, our mistakes not necessarily as damaging as we fear they might be, our failures not the giant blots on our record that we suspect they are, and that we have done more good than we know just by being a friend to someone. We can’t necessarily stop those accusing thoughts from coming, those regrets and should-haves, but we don’t have to give our failures too much credit, and we don’t have to give the enemy an easy victory.

James’s Blog: The Love and Pain of Starting a New School.

James’s Blog: The Love and Pain of Starting a New School.

So this week Parker started secondary school. I’ve been anxious about this moment for a while, not because I’m having trouble adapting to my children getting older but because – as long time readers of this blog will know – Parker is autistic. Covid-19 has thrown the normal school transition process out of the window, and if any of our children needed the chance to get acquainted with a new school, it was Parker. On the plus side, Covid restrictions mean that he’ll probably spend all his time with the same people in the same classroom. That’s a plus.

As it happens, day one went well. That helps a lot, and day two is a lot easier with that success behind us, but there’s still a way to go before both dad and child feel confident and comfortable with this new era.

Obviously, he’s the one facing the big changes and the new situation, but I’m anxious about his anxiety. I’m the the parent in charge of the school run, so the responsibility for managing his meltdowns falls on me. I’m not good at it. Ruth is so much better at this kind of thing. She’s much better at parenting generally – and coping with stress.

Part of the problem is my that own autistic tendencies don’t help. My experiences allow me to empathise with Parker and his struggles, as the things that cause him stress are the same kind of things that cause me stress, but in reality it just means that I can see the trouble coming. It doesn’t mean I can do anything about it, or even help Parker navigate it.

I can look back on my own childhood with the wisdom of age, and I can see how I worried about things needlessly, and how I could have much better managed the things that I did need to worry about. But have you ever tried to use your wisdom to override a child’s experience in the moment? It doesn’t often work, so I mostly just get to experience his stress without having the having the power to influence it. His stress becomes my stress, and then we’re both just stressed.

It’s the universe’s cruelest joke, to make you care for another but unable to live their life for them – to have to suffer vicariously. Love unlocks new ways of pain. It’s one thing to suffer yourself, to suffer as a result of your own choices. It’s another thing to see someone you care about suffer, to share their pain, and to know that they don’t have to suffer. If they were just able to see the world the way you see it for a moment…but instead you’re both left with the suffering.

But that’s how it’s supposed to work, loving your children and carrying their burdens even though it doesn’t really benefit you at all. That’s the example that we’ve been set. It blows my mind that God had a choice, and that this is what He chose for Himself.

James’s Blog: Like Us or Like Him?

James’s Blog: Like Us or Like Him?

The heart of the gospel speaks, I believe, to all people, regardless of culture, creed or race. Because of this, we can make the mistake of thinking that the gospel belongs solely to us; to our culture, creed or race. If it speaks to us, then God meant it for us, right? And if He meant it for us, then you have to be like us to fully appreciate and understand the gospel, right? Then we find ourselves in a position where we assume that being a true follower of Jesus means fitting in with a particular culture – or as Steve Taylor puts it in I Want to be a Clone, ‘if you want to be one of His, got to act like one of us.’

This was perhaps at its most blatant in past missionary eras, where the line between ‘Christianizing’ and ‘Westernizing’ was blurred at best. In the 19th century, the London Missionary Society established a mission in Bechuanaland in Africa, and the Missionary Magazine reported on its progress in the following way:

‘The people are now dressed in British manufactures and make a very respectable appearance in the house of God. The children who formerly went naked and presented a most disgusting appearance are decently clothed…’

Of course, it’s easy to look down our noses at the missionary pioneers of the past, but we’re guilty of the same crime when we insist that there’s only one ‘proper’ way to do worship, one ‘proper’ way to preach, one ‘proper’ way to look and sound. We’re too quick at times to slap the label ‘Biblical’ on things that turn out to just be cultural traditions, and too slow to deny the implied criticism that traditions which differ from our own are therefore ‘Unbiblical’. Our cultural perspectives enable us to share something of the truth of God with others, but not everything of the truth.

In this blog’s first year, I posted a ‘poem‘ (I use that term loosely), suggesting that sometimes an author will write a book about what Jesus is really like and, what do you know, it turns out that Jesus is just like them.

There’s something in our humanity that seems determined to repeatedly recreate God in our own image, to want to turn Him into one us – whatever we are. The irony is, of course, that God has already turned Himself into one of us, through Christ. When we do it, we make God smaller. When He does it, He makes us bigger. We do it to bring God down to our level, to make Him easily digestible. He does it to bring us up to His level, to make us more than we are.

We can’t help but be shaped by our culture and history, but we can certainly try to make sure that it’s God who is shaping us more.

James’s Blog: Rubbish.

James’s Blog: Rubbish.

Ruth and I have very different ideas on ‘stuff’. She thinks that if it’s not being used, and is just lying around making the place look untidy, then chuck it out. I think that if it’s not being used, and is just lying around making the place look untidy, then leave it alone. It’s not hurting anyone.

My parents were happy when I moved out. They turned up on my doorstep with cardboard boxes full of stuff I’d left in their attic. Boxes of things like cinema ticket stubs, old posters and last year’s exam papers. Basically, boxes full of fire hazards.

When we got married, Ruth said, “You don’t need that stuff. Get rid of it.” I stood my ground, because I knew that a day would come when she desperately needed to know the name of a film I had seen at the cinema ten years previously, and then I’d be laughing.

But that day never came, and now it’s all gone. It’s not the first time my wife has been right about something, and it won’t be the last.

You throw out stuff that you don’t need, but you don’t throw out the useful, shiny stuff. I’m sure we’ve all got stories of people we know, on their hands and knees, going through the bin because they think that they threw away the receipt or the money from a birthday card or some other good thing that they didn’t mean to lose. No-one deliberately throws away good things. Well, as Fred Craddock once suggested, no-one except Paul of course.

Whatever was to my profit, he told the Philippians, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.

He was talking about all the useful, shiny stuff he had. His academic achievements, his hard work, his A+ credentials. You don’t need that stuff. Get rid of it.

That’s the thing about following Jesus. No-one bats an eyelid if you say, “I used to lie, cheat and steal. I used to say really hurtful things to people. I used to throw bricks through people’s windows if I didn’t like them. But now I am a Christian and I consider all of that rubbish compared to the greatness of knowing Christ.” No-one is going to object to that. That’s what religion is for.

But if you say, “I used to work hard at my job. I made good money. I was a valuable and productive member of my community. But now I am a Christian and I consider all of that rubbish compared to the greatness of knowing Christ.”? Well, that’s the kind of thing that raises eyebrows. That’s the kind of thing that gets bricks thrown through your window.

Once again, we must consider what it really means to follow Jesus. It’s not just the boxes of old exam papers that are fire hazards now. You have to be prepared to consider it all, everything, rubbish compared to the greatness of knowing Christ. It doesn’t matter how shiny and impressive it is. It doesn’t matter that it took you years to collect. You don’t need that stuff. Get rid of it.

But who among us has the courage to do that?

James’s Blog: Fair Weather Friend.

James’s Blog: Fair Weather Friend.

We’ve had some really nice weather over the past few days but, as they say, every silver lining has a cloud. In this case the warm weather has played havoc with our Wi-Fi signal as it climbs the stairs to my office. It’s not an uncommon issue for me – in the past few houses we’ve lived in, the room where I do my work has often seemed to form the nexus of a cyberspace Bermuda Triangle. I have noticed that it’s particularly bad when the weather is good, with the signal dropping out frequently. Simple tasks like sending e-mails or logging on to WordPress become lengthy trials, turning my internet usage into some kind of hostage negotiation.

Of course, this plays out like a metaphor for my relationship with God. I’ve also noticed that when I’m enjoying my own warm weather that I can be a slow to invite God into my days. I know full well how much I need to be attentive to God in every moment of my life but when the sun is shining and life is good along comes the temptation is to drop out and cruise. Sometimes it takes the sun vanishing behind a cloud to remind me that I haven’t been connecting with the one who made the sun and the rain. I hate the idea that God serves no purpose in my life other than to be a comfort blanket, and I know that – on balance – that’s definitely not the kind of relationship we have…but every now and then I am reminded how easily I fall into the trap of calling out to God when it rains, and ignoring Him when the sun shines.

Alright, it’s not a great analogy. In fact, it’s rather weak – but then so is my Wi-Fi signal. Speaking of which, it seems to be working at the moment, so I’d better save this while I can…

James’s Blog: The Face of the Pilot.

James’s Blog: The Face of the Pilot.
Shortly after Ruth and I were married we received a letter. It was a letter that promised us huge amounts of money provided that we respond immediately. There was, however, a catch. There’s always a catch. In order to qualify for the cash, we had to take out an insurance policy with the organisation who had sent out the letter. The bulk of the letter outlined the benefits of taking out the policy that we were being offered, but as I read the letter I felt a little…well, threatened. For example, I read: Imagine what would happen to a relative or friend, who suffered an injury and could never lead a normal life again. Everyone is at risk, no matter how careful. Accidents do happen! Although still very much alive, they may not be able to see, or may lose the use of a limb…and that can lead to serious money worries. The letter also included testimonies from people who had, it seemed, suffered terrible life-changing injuries within hours of taking out the insurance policy: “I’m so lucky…In October I took out insurance. In December I had an accident which has left me paralysed and facing a bleak future…” You and I have very different ideas of what constitutes being ‘lucky’, friend. Anyway, I was undecided. If I didn’t take out the insurance then perhaps they’d send someone round to follow up on the promise that ‘Accidents do happen!‘, but if I did take out the policy then I was pretty much guaranteed to suffer some horrible injury in the next few months anyway. What was I to do? I did nothing. I’m a risk-taker by nature. I doubt there was anything genuine about the offer that we received in that letter, but it was clear that they had a very deliberate marketing tactic. Fear. Fear. There’s a lot of it going around at the moment, and it can be hard to keep it at bay, even when you’re not receiving letters designed to terrify you into parting with your money. And why shouldn’t we be afraid, not just of the things that are happening, but also of the things that might happen? After all, accidents do happen and many of us know all too well that a bleak future is always a possibility. Paul writes that we are ‘…hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed’.  J.B. Phillips translates the last part of this verse as ‘[we are]…knocked down, but never knocked out’. If we are knocked down, but never knocked out, what should we fear? What can fear do to one who is not destroyed, never abandoned? And what might I see if I gathered up my fears and took them directly to God? Robert Louis Stevenson tells the story of a ship experiencing a storm at sea. The passengers were terrified as the ship rocked to the right and the left, and as the waves crashed against the deck. Eventually one of the passengers, against orders, left the hold and crept up the deck to see what was going on. Amidst the torrential rain and wind the passenger saw the pilot, lashed to the wheel, steering calmly as though it were a pleasure cruise. The pilot turned and saw the passenger, and simply gave him a reassuring smile.  The passenger went back below and comforted the others, saying, “I have seen the face of the pilot, and all is well.” Fear. There is a lot of it going around at the moment, but I have seen the face of the pilot, and all is well.
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