The Enhanced Games versus the grace of limitations
Jonny Reid
Date posted: 22 Oct 2025
British Olympic swimmer Ben Proud has joined the Enhanced Games. It’s a decision, and a potential trajectory, for sport, with significant consequences and challenges for Christians to reflect on.
The Enhanced Games encourages the use of performance-enhancing drugs to break world records. It claims to be the future of sport “on a mission to redefine super humanity through science, innovation and sports.”
Christianity & Islam answer: 'What is wrong with the world?'
Andrew Marsay
Date posted: 22 Oct 2025
This is the second in a short series of articles looking at Islam from a more theological perspective.
In the last article I looked at what Yahweh and Allah are really like based on the structure of the Bible and the Qur’an. In other words, what is God’s character like?
Jewish identity: Ethnicity first, religion second
Ziggy Rogoff
Date posted: 21 Oct 2025
Jewish people are a diverse people.
Some are assimilated and live much like their neighbours. Others wear black clothes with distinct black hats and preserve what they call a Torah-observant life. There are Liberal Jews, Conservative Jews, Charedi Jews, atheist Jews, and every kind of Jew in between. Some are very religious, others not at all. But they are all Jewish.
I watched a film I shouldn't have watched
Russell Moore
Date posted: 20 Oct 2025
Maria and I had one of those rare nights when it was just the two of us at home.
Our youngest went with his two older brothers (back home for an autumn break) to some friend's house. Wanting to watch a film, we finally settled on Unknown Number: The High School Catfish on Netflix. I started to type that I will give no spoilers, but I’m almost tempted to do so just so you will be dissuaded from watching it. I wish I hadn’t.
‘Blessed assurance’? Sadly not for Catholics
Leonardo De Chirico
Date posted: 20 Oct 2025
In my conversations with Catholic friends, I have found it useful to reference the five “magnetic points” expounded by British theologian Daniel Strange. There are five fundamentals that all human beings are looking for and to which they are magnetically drawn. Because of their universal presence in people’s lives, they can be seen in Catholics.
According to Strange, each religion responds in various ways to these five questions. Their responses are points of attraction for people to be drawn to them. The questions are:
Gaza and the gospel
Russell Moore
Date posted: 16 Oct 2025
After two years of bloodshed since Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October, 2023, the war in Gaza seems to be over. The living hostages are back home, as President Donald Trump and Hamas and Israel hammered out in a cease-fire agreement.
In that, all of us can rejoice, even if the peace will be fragile—and even though wounds from the loss of so many innocent lives, both Gazans and Israelis, will take decades if not centuries to heal. Christians around the world might be tempted to think this matter is now over, at least for us. Gaza, though, has more to do with our own gospel story than we might think.
Pastors get depressed, too
Howard Satterthwaite
Date posted: 16 Oct 2025
In recent years, many of us have become more aware of the toll that emotional, spiritual, and mental struggles can take.
Christian leaders, of course, are not immune. In fact, some of us are quietly limping through discouragement, or even depression, while still seeking to lead with strength and clarity.
Holiness rooted in the heart
Michael Reeves
Date posted: 16 Oct 2025
The difference between an evangelical and a non-evangelical understanding of holiness can be seen well in a difference between the 17th-century Puritans and their contemporaries, the high-church Caroline Divines. Perhaps the most influential of the Carolines was William Laud (1573–1645), Charles I’s Archbishop of Canterbury.
Laud loved what he called “the beauty of holiness”, by which he meant liturgical orderliness. He strictly insisted that the clergy must follow all the rubrics of the Church of England’s prayer book, and was deeply concerned with clergy attire and the maintenance of church buildings and their physical beauty. And it was a particular sort of building he preferred: despising the Reformation – or “Deformation,” as he called it – he preferred new churches to be built in the pre-Reformation, Gothic style, with an architectural emphasis on an altar instead of a Communion table. For, he said, “the altar is the greatest place of God’s residence upon earth, greater than the pulpit; for there ’tis Hoc est corpus meum, This is my body; but in the other it is at most but Hoc est verbum meum, This is my word.”
How do we disciple Gen Z men?
Graeme Shanks
Date posted: 15 Oct 2025
“If you’re not a liberal when you’re 25, you have no heart. If you’re not a conservative by the time you’re 35, you have no brain.” A friend reminded me recently of this quip often attributed to Winston Churchill. It is, of course, a massive generalisation. However, it is not one without a kernel of truth to it.
A quick glance at the way Britons voted at the 2024 general election would indicate that age was indeed a significant dividing line. It’s a trend that’s presented itself through the generations. To quote another group of influential wordsmiths from my childhood: "it’s like that and that's the way it is." Or is it?
sharing Christ with Muslims
Beyond debate: Pointing Muslims to the gospel
E.M. Hicham
Date posted: 15 Oct 2025
When we share our Christian faith with Muslims, we don’t do it out of obligation, so that one more box is ticked on our to-do list. Your Muslim friend may ask you for information in order to test or even attack your faith. Fine, that’s his business. But what is your aim?
I’m hoping that you would like to introduce him to Christ. So keep this goal in mind. Questions and objections must be answered, but you don’t have to let your friend lead the whole discussion. You also have the right to steer the conversation in the direction that you would like it to go.
Prison Bible studies are changing lives
Peter Cunliffe
Date posted: 14 Oct 2025
I will never forget my first time inside a prison in 2015 as a chaplaincy volunteer. After nearly 35 years in business, being surrounded by convicted criminals was far outside my comfort zone.
At that time, the prison population in England and Wales was 86,193. By September 2024 it had reached an all-time high of 88,521. By mid-2025 it stood at 88,087, supported by the Government’s Early Release Scheme. Fears of a “revolving door” proved unfounded, but HM Inspectorate of Prisons reported another concern: because of staff shortages, many prisoners were spending excessive time locked in cells. This limited their access to education, development, and spiritual growth - all vital for rehabilitation.
everyday evangelism
We need to talk about judgement
Gavin Matthews
Date posted: 14 Oct 2025
God’s judgement is a central Biblical theme, and for vast numbers of evangelical Christians, it was the experience of conviction of sin which led them to trust Christ as Saviour.
It certainly did for me. Knowing that I had sinned against God, and seeing the sombre truth about the rotten state of my soul before His righteous judgement, made the realisation that Christ had borne my punishment total liberation and joy!
Tending to our souls in a distracting world
Dan Steel
Date posted: 13 Oct 2025
Pastoral ministry has always been demanding, but our current age presents a peculiar challenge: distraction. (Even as I write this I realise I’ve forgotten to turn off notifications!)
The constant hum of tones and beeps, the relentless pull of emails, the lure of social media, and the subtle pressure to appear productive all conspire to scatter our attention.
engaging with culture today
Sharing the gospel in a multicultural world
Jonnie Green
Date posted: 13 Oct 2025
Who is your neighbour? I’ve enjoyed living in some very mixed neighbourhoods: Cantonese families next to Pakistani families, Ukrainian young professionals sharing housing with Indian graduates. In a culture which is growing increasingly fearful of the foreigner, the church has an amazing opportunity to share the gospel globally by sharing it locally.
But how? If, like me, you have existed within Western culture your entire life, we have been submerged into the waters of modernity. The very way that we see the world sits within the frame carved out by Plato, Kant and Nietzsche. We cannot help it. As Christians the way we think, feel, and see the gospel also sits within this frame. So how can I possibly share the gospel in a way which connects with someone who sees the world in a different frame? Someone who thinks, feels, and sees the world in a different way to me?
How often should Sunday School leaders serve?
Jonny Woodbridge
Date posted: 11 Oct 2025
How often are you on the Sunday School rota? And if you’re the one organising it, how often do you expect your team to serve - every week, or once a month? For some churches, practical circumstances decide the answer. But where there’s flexibility, people often hold strong views on both sides.
It’s worth saying from the outset that the Bible doesn’t prescribe one approach over the other. This is a matter of wisdom, not right or wrong. So it’s helpful to think through the strengths of each model.
Ministering in an area of deprivation today
Jonathan Macy
Date posted: 11 Oct 2025
Reflecting on one’s journey through life and ministry is always a fascinating exercise, helping us see where God has been actively working beyond our efforts.
In 2014, I joined the Church of the Cross (Thamesmead), which is in an area of significant deprivation, at a time when it was facing significant challenges, and I quickly realised that my college hadn’t prepared me for the realities I was now stepping into.
How can I support someone in psychological crisis?
Dave Burke
Date posted: 10 Oct 2025
Colin sat on the edge of his seat in my office, his eyes darting around the room as if searching for something. Then he said: “I know this is going to sound weird but it’s true. I was watching TV this morning, and the announcer gave me a message to pass on to you today."
The message from the newsreader was nonsense, and I began to suspect that Colin was experiencing psychosis; he was a bit delusional, and his thought processes pretty scrambled.
