Big Family of God?

I’ve written a few articles recently where I’ve talked about the importance of revisiting how we think about and talk about God if we are to see significant cultural change.  I’ve suggested that we need to try and get away from corporate/business imagery and start to talk about the church as body and as family.… Continue reading Big Family of God?

Learning to love one another (changing our culture)

So, how do we develop  a culture of grace within the church where one another love is witnessed and experienced? In this post, I want to make a couple of suggestions.  First of all, it has to be modelled by pastors and leaders.  This means that we need to prioritise choosing elders and appointing pastors… Continue reading Learning to love one another (changing our culture)

Recovering our first love

I’ve been writing over the past week or two about how we encourage reform that affects church culture so that what we believe about grace affects how we live.  We’ve seen that central to that is seeing the importance of love as central to the mission of the church. Today, I want to talk a… Continue reading Recovering our first love

Changing the culture: What is the mission and purpose of the church?

I’ve begun to share some thoughts about how we change and reform the culture of our churches in order to see churches where the doctrines of grace affect our life together so that there is a culture of grace. Here are some of the things I’ve suggested already: We need our church life to be… Continue reading Changing the culture: What is the mission and purpose of the church?

Cancel Culture and the death of academia

I’m continuing to reflect and write about culture in the light of recent abuse scandals and I want to pick up on something that has come up in social media conversations.  As we begin to consider the question of healthy church culture, our attention is drawn to examples of leaders, speakers and writers who have… Continue reading Cancel Culture and the death of academia

Fathers and mothers – implications of family models for the church

In my posts about church culture and in my recent article about complementarianism, I’ve argued that we need to seek a church culture that functions more like a family and less like a club, institution or business. In that context, I want to suggest that elders in the church function a bit like the fathers… Continue reading Fathers and mothers – implications of family models for the church

In defence of complementarianism

One of the things I’ve seen coming up again and again is the suggestion that part of the problem with conservative evangelical culture that needs to change is complementarianism. Indeed, you will notice that the push is to argue that complementarianism is not only a risk factor for creating abusive cultures but furthermore is, in… Continue reading In defence of complementarianism

Talking about church culture -and how to change it

One of the things coming out of the recent bullying and abuse scandals within the evangelical church has been the beginning of a conversation about church culture and the need for reformation.  I am going to give a little bit of attention to the question here. At this stage, it is important to emphasise the… Continue reading Talking about church culture -and how to change it

Scandalised

One of the really sad things about recent abuse scandals in the church is the way they mirror some of the horrific things we see in the world around us.  We should be able to respond and to offer something that is beautifully counter cultural.  Yet instead, we are seen to ape some of the… Continue reading Scandalised

Conservative evangelical theology SHOULD mean there is no excuse for abuse

Predictably, one of the responses to two high profile cases of abuse has been for some to identify a specific problem with conservative evangelicalism and therefore with its underlying theology..  conservative evangelical, or more properly, “Reformed Theology” holds that. God is the great and glorious Lord, the Triune God who is love, holy and just. … Continue reading Conservative evangelical theology SHOULD mean there is no excuse for abuse