These are they

the importance of rehearsal

as he says, breathtaking!

Job 38:22

Haiti Update

Rob & Naomi

THE Big news! 

Come Dancing

The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are each centering on the others, adoring and serving them. And because the Father, Son, and Spirit are giving glorifying love to one another, God is infinitely, profoundly happy. 
Think about this: If you find somebody you adore, someone for whom you would do anything, and you discover that this person feels the same way about you, does that feel good? It's sublime! 
That's what God has been enjoying for all eternity. 
The Father, the Son, and the Spirit are pouring love and joy and adoration into the other, each one serving the other. 
They are infinitely seeking one another's glory, and so God is infinitely happy. 
And if it's true that this world has been created by this triune God, then ultimate reality is a dance. 


p8 King's Cross: The Story of the World in the Life of Jesus

a swirl of story

Demos or Bureaus?

We seem to be very concerned to let democracy have its 'Saviour' like way in all kinds of Arab countries at the moment. 

Yet well might others around the world look at us as in need of liberating from an undemocratic tyranny sucking the life from us!

Baptismal Revelation

Some early thoughts. 

Jesus' baptism (Mark 1:9-11) is: 

His anointing to the Kingship (Psalm 2 & 2 Samuel 7:14). 

His washing for the priesthood? 

His Spirit-filling as a prophet of God? 

There is also something of an echo in Mark 1:11 from Isaiah 42:1-2. Jesus is the Son and the Servant. 

Getting Back to Work!

Scotland's Finest!

The kingdom of God is near

‘The kingdom of God’ is God in saving action, God taking control in his world, or, to use our title, ‘divine government’. 

… Mark begins his book with a prologue designed to appeal to Jewish expectations of the fulfilment of the hopes of Israel, and to point to Jesus of Nazareth as the one in whom that fulfilment is to be focused. At the same time he has alerted his readers that the stage on which the drama is to be played is not merely that of human relationships, even of national politics, but of the cosmic encounter of the Son of God with the kingdom of Satan. (Divine Government: God's Kingship in the Gospel of Mark p21) 

What do you mean ... stuck?

What if I'm stuck with a job I hate from Canon Wired on Vimeo.

The World We All Want

doing time

God destroyed Pharaoh through Moses, and Elijah received God's divine protection from Ahab, but God allows John to be imprisoned by Pharoah's and Ahab's successor. This gives us a clue that, though Joshua defeated the Canaanites, and Elisha died in his bed, Jesus may not be spared from His enemies.The Victory According to Mark p36-37. 

EUggghhhh!

Who is he?

The Gospel has the flavour of Christ's servanthood throughout, and no one is interested in the ancestry of a servant.  

The Bible Panorama: Enjoying the Whole Bible with a Chapter-By-Chapter Guide

What if there are no jobs?

is there work to be done? ... 

spiritual kinks in your hose?

nice nugget: 'discipline transfers' 

But my child won't change!

with WIDE application!

Julie Lowe - Teaching children who are reluctant to change from CCEF on Vimeo.

James Joy

On our marks ...

our new series starts today

Papias was a bishop in Hierapolis (in Asia Minor) in first half of second century ... so 100-150 AD. He had been discipled by John (probably in Ephesus). He writes (recorded for us in Eusebius's History of the Church): ' Mark ... was the interpreter of Peter and wrote accurately all that he remembered, not indeed, in order, of the things said or done by the Lord. For he had not heard the Lord, nor was he a follower of his, but at a later date followed Peter, who used to give teaching as necessity demanded but not making, as it were, an arrangement of the Lord's oracles, so that Mark did nothing wrong in writing down single points as he remembered them. For to one thing he gave attention, to leave out nothing of what he had heard and to make no false statements in them.'


Peter as a Galilean, probably spoke some Greek along with his first language Aramaic; and as this passage suggest, Mark's role may have been to assist the ageing apostle tell the gospel to Greek-speaking audiences. 


The NT links Peter to Mark in a number of ways. Acts 12:12 where Peter goes to the house of Mark's mother after his escape from King Agrippa. 1 Peter 5:13 where Peter refers to him as 'my son'. 


John Mark was from a house in Jerusalem, sufficiently large to accommodate many people (Acts 12:12) and with servant girls (Acts 12:13). Affluence in antiquity was usually associated with literacy and some level of education. John (Hebrew) and Mark (Greek) are names that seem consistent with a picture that emerges of an educated, bilingual Jew. 


Mark was related to Barnabas (Colossians 4:10) and accompanied him on two missionary tours of Cyprus in about AD 47-50 (Acts 13:4-5; 15:39). 


Paul was part of the earlier tour which, however, Mark quit after the group arrived in southern Asia Minor from Cyprus (Acts 13:13). Although Paul was not prepared to have Mark accompany him in the overland tour of Asia Minor, his letter written in the 60's suggest that by then they had reconciled their differences (Philemon 24; 2 Timothy 4:11). 


An interesting term is applied to Mark by Luke in Acts 13:5. When Barnabas and Paul proclaimed the word of God on Cyprus, 'John [Mark] was with them as 'catechist' or 'minister' (Luke 1:2 the same word is used). This was a word used of synagogue assistants who, among their other duties, taught boys to read and recite the Hebrew Bible.   [The Servant King: Reading Mark Today]. 


Andrew Page alerts us to another early church document, this time from Clement of Alexandria: 

Mark the follower of Peter, while Peter was preaching the gospel publicly in Rome in the presence of certain of Caesar's knights ..., being requested by them that they might be able to commit to memory the things which were being spoken, wrote from the things which were spoken by Peter the Gospel which is called According to Mark. 

The Mark Experiment

Vision 2025

thus the odds!

Dad, help!

Awake awake O Zion

Not being able to interpret these tongues I am glad that the singing is in English!

Isaiah 52:1-2 

more psalm psinging

Calling the wrong number?

24/7 360º

Why Work?

wired!

Temples of the Holy Spirit!

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.” ― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Away Day Memories

The talks from last weekend are here.

Sluggard Repellent

Today's Harvest Parade Service Visual!

When I am afraid

wake up for England!

my favourite advert at the moment! 

Fun in the Sun