In 2008 I graduated from St.Andrews University with a slightly random degree in Biblical Studies and French. I had spent four years studying several different books of the Bible including their history, authorship, historical and cultural contexts and linguistic challenges that exist with them.
Category Archives: Theology
We Are Gomer
This is the seventh and final post that I’m going to do on the book of Hosea. But seventh in the series though it may be, I want to treat it as though it is the first and the last. Layered over the timeless theology of this minor Prophet’s book, and this series, has beenContinue reading “We Are Gomer”
Hewn Husband: “Come back!”
It’s impossible to journey through the book of Hosea in a casual way. You would never slip into your favourite flip flops to start an ascent of Arthur’s Seat and neither can we receive from this book what we’re meant to receive without the serious footwear of meditation and prayer. There are many lows inContinue reading “Hewn Husband: “Come back!””
Tired of Terror
Our Father Who art in heaven Hallowed be Your Name Your kingdom come, Your will be done On Earth as it is in heaven Give us today our daily bread And forgive us our sins as we forgive those who’ve sinned against us Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil For YoursContinue reading “Tired of Terror”
Mr Cameron, Please Take Note
According to PM David Cameron in his 2015 Easter speech that most of us have heard, the UK remains a Christian country because the government help to repair Cathedrals and older church buildings that, supposedly, represent the ‘living active force’ who are the local church. Mr Cameron also pointed to the phenomenal welfare efforts of the churchContinue reading “Mr Cameron, Please Take Note”
War of the Laws
Circa 1988-2016 It has been my life’s ambition, since under the age of ten, to follow Jesus Christ as closely as I can and to love Him as passionately as I should – with my everything. This is now more than a 27-year journey: through the undulating rhythms of teenage life; through the University seasonsContinue reading “War of the Laws”
Cairn Gorms
I was driving thorough the Cairn Gorm National Park today. Fancy a butchers?
Hosea 2: The Promise of Allurement
There is a higher summit. It hangs overs base camp like a shadowy, silhouetting God, incarnate in ancient rock…God is showing us His deepest, highest, widest affections through the churning heart of a husband bereft of the love and loyalty of his wife.
every time you sense God’s anger, try to instead imagine God as being grieved and as being gutted rather than as just waving His great, big, cosmic stick around in fury. I’ve found this a massively helpful distinction in coming closer to the heart of God.
Live Like a Limpet
English Riviera Back in the day, one of the best summer-time things to do was to roll down Headland Park Road on our mountain bikes and go crabbing in the rock pools of the English Riviera. We’d raid the ‘fishing box’ (an old Wall’s ice cream container) and arrive at the big pools with aContinue reading “Live Like a Limpet”
Hosea 1- Acclimatising to the Mess (& the wonder)
In order to speak prophetically to a Nation and to achieve redemption and righteousness for them, God invades, exposes and demands the masculinity of Hosea’s ego, his social and spiritual reputation, his lineage, his peace, his joy, his sanity, his sexual satisfaction and purity and, most ultimately, the emotional bed of his heart.