Immigration & integration: A debate on how can we consider it wisely
Krish Kandiah & Tim Dieppe
Date posted: 14 Nov 2025
en invited Dr Krish Kandiah and Tim Dieppe to consider the question: "How can UK Christians respond in a Christlike way to issues of immigration and integration?"
Tim is Head of Public Policy at Christian Concern, the campaigning evangelical organisation and author of The Challenge of Islam: Understanding and Responding to Islam’s Increasing Influence in the UK (Wilberforce Publications 2025). Krish is the Director of the Sanctuary Foundation, which supports vulnerable individuals, families and children including refugees and those seeking asylum. He is a regular advisor to government on refugee resettlement and child welfare reform.
‘The last two years have been the most encouraging... of the past 30 years’
John Woods
Date posted: 13 Nov 2025
en Reviews Editor John Woods speaks to John Stevens about his time thus far serving with the FIEC.
en: You have been serving as National Director of the Fellowship of Evangelical Churches (FIEC) for 15 years. What was you first experience of the FIEC?
‘Tell people at home that there are Kazakh Christians’
Tim*
Date posted: 12 Nov 2025
This summer, seven students and one staff member from Oak Hill College travelled to Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. The trip aimed to help students reflect missiologically about how Jesus may be served in these contexts as part of Oak Hill’s desire to see the church, in the UK and around the world, flourish. Tim, a student on the trip reflects on their time and some lessons for us all:
Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan are strange and beautiful places seemingly in between worlds. They feel strikingly modern in their shopping malls and glitzy districts, yet also raw and traditional in bazaars and potholed roads. Islam is a strong cultural marker, though less evident in daily practice. Soviet influence lingers – especially in Kazakhstan – while young people are increasingly drawn toward Western ideas.
In war’s shadow: Spiritual welfare on the frontlines
SASRA
Date posted: 11 Nov 2025
Up and down the country today, Tuesday November 11th, Remembrance Day, just as they did on Sunday, many people will honour those servicemen and women who sacrificed their lives in previous wars and conflicts so that we could be free and could live in peace.
Not only must we remember those who fought and died, but also those who brought the spiritual courage and hope necessary for victories, amidst the suffering.
Why awe of God matters on a Monday
Carolyn Lacey
Date posted: 10 Nov 2025
Last Monday a friend sent a message that stirred up feelings of frustration and resentment.
I went for a run through the woods near my home, and although the sky was brilliant blue and the trees were bursting with life, my heart seemed to shrivel as I replayed a hurtful conversation in my mind—and rehearsed my lines for the encore!
earth watch
A flourishing earth is possible - and promised
Paul Kunert
Date posted: 10 Nov 2025
It’s COP season again. COP30 – or to give it its full title, the 30th Conference of the Parties under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change – gets underway imminently.
Dimly we might recall COP26 hitting headlines in the UK four years ago when Glasgow hosted it. Boris Johnson’s one minute to midnight speech, perhaps? Maybe “keeping 1.5 alive”? Or Alok Sharma’s tears when India pulled the rug on his deal to phase out coal?
PfE women
Lily's testimony: Amazed by the heart of Jesus
Sharon Coates
Date posted: 9 Nov 2025
I first met Lily 17 years ago when she joined our toddler group. We chatted occasionally, and her children took part in our church's kids clubs and activities. Over time, we lost touch except through Facebook. I had no idea then that the safe space we offered - through friendship and community - would later become a vital part of Lily’s spiritual journey. It’s a beautiful reminder that God is always at work, even when we don’t see it. I’ll let Lily share the rest in her own words.
Lily's story *
I was raised within the Catholic Church, and often felt confused and unworthy. As a child, I was told that being born to unmarried parents made me a product of sin and destined for hell. That message of shame and fear shaped my early view of God. Church became a place of kneeling, confessing, and never feeling forgiven. That sense of never being “good enough” drove me away from both church and God altogether.
Did seven days of prayer save Britain?
John Williams
Date posted: 9 Nov 2025
Seven national days of prayer were called for by the King at critical times throughout the Second World War. After each one, the natural chain of events which had been occurring suddenly changed and deliverance took place.
Looking back, clergyman Henry Albert Wilson wrote: “If ever a great nation was on the point of supreme and final disaster, and yet was saved and reinstated it was ourselves…it does not require an exceptionally religious mind to detect in all this the Hand of God.”
Why should we love the Psalms?
Mitch Chase
Date posted: 8 Nov 2025
A few years ago, I remember a young man—a professing Christian for a long time, I might add—saying without any qualification to me, “I don’t really like the Psalms.” And he had no interest in seeing why that might be a problem.
Now, if you claimed that other books were more impactful for you than the Psalms, that would be one thing. Or if you noted that the poetry of the Psalms was challenging and you were trying to grow in your understanding of it, that would be another thing. Or if you said that you were new to the Bible and you didn’t really grasp what was going on in the Psalms or why they mattered, even that would be acceptable.
helping children find faith
Gentle parenting or Biblical parenting?
Ed Drew
Date posted: 7 Nov 2025
A Christian grandad has just returned from a weekend with his "clan". His children are all Christians, married to great Christian spouses and he adores his grandkids. He knows he is blessed indeed. He wanted to have a quiet word with me: “It was chaos! I can’t see how modern parenting methods can work. The parents aren’t in charge.”
Church is a place where we can compare and discuss different generations’ styles of parenting. It might not be a common or simple conversation. Most of us would walk away from a conversation about our parenting style feeling awash with insecurity, judgement and fear! My friend, the Christian grandad, remembers being obeyed the first time he gave a command. Smacking was a part of his armoury, so were big bear hugs and family Bible times. In his day, it would have been normal for children to feel an element of fear when their father confronted them over their behaviour.
Will we know each other in heaven?
Oliver Rice
Date posted: 7 Nov 2025
Many years ago, I had a conversation with a true Bristolian who was on the oversight of the church I attended (I loved how he said ‘oversight’ in his Bristolian, and can hear it still). He explained to me why he believed that we will not recognise one another in glory. He thought that it would just be too painful because, simply, we have hurt one another, and it would recall the painful memories for all eternity.
I can’t recall if he mentioned this (it was over 30 years ago), but I guess it would be possible to meet someone who had even murdered you (and later came to Christ), and so if there was recognition that could be very traumatic.
What is the 'good life' for Christians?
Tim Vasby-Burnie
Date posted: 6 Nov 2025
What does the good life look like? What sort of good life can turn the heart of unbelievers towards God?
We are “foreigners and exiles” in this world – what sort of life shows that we belong to the age to come, the kingdom of Jesus? In this dark world, what can we do to shine the wonderful light of mercy we have discovered in Christ?
Is nostalgia fossilising your church's ministry?
Jonny Pollock
Date posted: 6 Nov 2025
The other week I watched the new Jurassic Park movie with our eldest son, and as soon as the movie finished (and it was ok by the way!) a curious thought entered my head. How many times has Jurassic Park been rebooted since the first movie in 1993?
There was the original, then the remake, now another reboot, and never mind the kids' Netflix series. I definitely think that velociraptors have now lost their sheen. I remember vividly watching that first movie and yet it has been rebooted more times than I have renewed my passport!
Manage your emotions better: be M.A.D...
Jo Johnson
Date posted: 6 Nov 2025
Do you remember what happened when the teacher left the class? The naughty kids went bonkers, and the quiet ones hid in the corners!
Unsupervised emotions behave like unsupervised kids. They play up or give up. The relevant research shows that people who are unaware of their emotions are more prone to anger and physical and mental illness, and less able to relate well to others.
The hidden stitch - and the truth it tells
Graham Daniels
Date posted: 5 Nov 2025
Earlier this year, during the Nordic World Ski Championships in Trondheim, members of Norway’s ski-jumping team were found to have manipulated their suits — adding tiny, hidden stitches to alter aerodynamics and gain extra lift. It was ingenious, even creative. But it was also deceitful. Within days, medals were stripped, coaches suspended, and reputations torn.
It’s tempting to distance ourselves from that kind of scandal. But any competitor, in sport or life, knows the pull to bend the truth — the quiet pressure to perform, to justify our worth, to hold our place. That’s why this story matters. It exposes something far deeper than a few altered seams; it exposes the human heart.
Pornography & a disturbing post-human future
Russell Moore
Date posted: 4 Nov 2025
Somewhere near you—next door, in a room down the hall—there may well be a "gooner".
You might not know what that is, and I’m trying to figure out how to tell you without making me too squeamish to write this or you too squeamish to read it.
pastoral care
Two ways to ruin a sermon
Steve Midgley
Date posted: 4 Nov 2025
I remember (though I cannot now find the reference) a comment that the American pastor Tim Keller made about the connection between preaching and conversational ministry.
His message was this. If preachers spend too much of their time engaged in conversational ministry, then their preaching will suffer – because they won’t have time to prepare properly. However, if they give too little time to conversational ministry their preaching will also suffer – because they won’t truly understand the people to whom they are preaching.
culture watch
Taylor Swift and the mistreatment of women
Rebecca Chapman
Date posted: 3 Nov 2025
What do the new Archbishop of Canterbury and Taylor Swift have in common? They have both been subject to some pretty unpleasant behaviour – online and offline – as women in the public eye.
The new Archbishop, Sarah Mullally, broke down at the General Synod earlier this year. She told the Synod, “I would love to encourage women, which I do all the time, but there continues to be institutional barriers, we continue to experience micro-aggressions,” before turning away from the microphone, fighting back tears. On the announcement of her appointment to the top Church of England job in October, those of us still on X/Twitter couldn’t fail to miss what one user called the “venomous reaction” from “hardcore Catholics” and “culture war atheists”.
