Church of England Evangelical Council on Human Sexuality

The Church of England Evangelical Council has produced a short-ish document – ‘Human Sexuality: Thinking It Through Biblically’ – available as a pdf here.

It seeks to offer brief responses to several questions and statements that are being raised by people in local churches, such as:

We all read Scripture from our own position – it does not speak ‘on its own’.

This is who I am. God made me this way – who am I to reject or change it?

Equality and justice demand recognition of non-heterosexual relationships.

Mission demands that we change our ‘out of date’ position.

Scripture isn’t clear on a number of issues regarding human sexuality.

Inclusivity is the Jesus way.

We must avoid schism – unity is the source of blessing.

Slaves/women/homosexuality... it’s a right and inevitable trajectory of increasing freedom and justice.

A Prayer About Time

I came across the below prayer about time in Robert Banks, The Tyranny of Time (Homebush West: Lancer Books, 1983), 200-201:

God our Father,

you are the Maker of everything that exists,

the Author of the world of nature

and of all living things,

the Creator of both space and time.

Without you there would be no past, present or future;

no summer or winter,

spring or autumn,

seedtime or harvest;

no morning or evening,

months or years.

Because you give us the gift of time we have the opportunity

to think and to act,

to plan and to pray,

to give and to receive,

to create and to relate,

to work and to rest,

to strive and to play,

to love and to worship.

Too often we forget this and fail to appreciate your generosity:

we take time for granted and fail to thank you for it,

we view it as a commodity and ruthlessly exploit it,

we cram it too full or waste it,

learn too little from the past or mortgage it off in advance,

we refuse to give priority to those people and things

which should have chief claim upon our time.

Help us to view time more as you view it,

and to use it more as you intend:

to distinguish between what is central and what is peripheral,

between what is merely pressing and what is really important,

between what is our responsibility and what can be left to others,

between what is appropriate now and what will be more relevant later.

Guard us against attempting too much because of

a false sense of our indispensability,

a false sense of ambition,

a false sense of rivalry,

a false sense of guilt,

or a false sense of inferiority:

yet do not let us mistake our responsibilities,

underestimate ourselves,

fail to be stimulated by others,

overlook our weaknesses,

or know our proper limits.

Enable us also to realise

that important though this life is, it is not all,

that we should view what we do in the light of eternity,

not just our limited horizons,

that we ourselves have eternal life now.

God our Father,

you are not so much timeless as timeful,

you do not live above time so much as hold ‘all times... in your hand’,

you have prepared for us a time when we will have leisure

to enjoy each other and you to the full,

and we thank you, appreciate you and applaud you for it.

Amen

One Step at a Time

I wrote the below piece for ‘Connecting with Culture’, a weekly email service from the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity. It is a light rewrite of one first written in 2013.

How are the resolutions looking this far into January?

So far as we can tell, people have habitually marked the beginning of new years. And the resolve at such times to ‘do better’ goes back at least to ancient Babylon. Something about the turn of the calendar carries with it a pervasive and powerful desire for a fresh start, a clean slate.

According to recent polling, 25% of us make resolutions each New Year, most of them to do with becoming healthier, managing money, and improving ourselves. And yet, research also confirms what we already suspect – perhaps from personal experience – that the majority of us will abandon our resolves by mid-January, with many of us not making it beyond the first week.

Still, the making of resolutions at least implies a felt-need for transformation of some kind – a need that Christians of all people should understand. That need, and our failure to meet it, is addressed in the gospel, which declares that the heart of the Christian faith is not mere potential for self-improvement, still less the need to secure ‘salvation’ through following a certain ‘code’, but freedom – leaving us free from the pressure of having to do things to gain favour with God, free from trying to prove ourselves to others, free to submit to Christ.

The gospel not only explains the need for change, but also provides the power to bring it about, a power which comes from the finished work of Christ on the cross, from who God is and what he has done, with the Spirit as the agent of transformation in our lives.

The biblical image of ‘walking’ to describe the Christian life is particularly apt. While it’s beneficial to take stock of where we are and make some changes if necessary, the walking metaphor suggests a more regular pattern. It’s an ongoing process which occurs in the everyday places where we live and where we work – on the commute, in the home, at the office, at the gym, in the checkout queue.

In such contexts, we discover, it’s the consistent, everyday habits and actions that make a difference, as we continue to walk step-by-step – our lifelong process of transformation into the likeness of Christ through the ongoing work of the Spirit.

John Wyatt on Artificial intelligence and Simulated Relationships

The latest Cambridge Paper from the Jubilee Centre is available online here (from where a pdf can be downloaded), this one by John Wyatt:

John Wyatt, ‘Artificial intelligence and Simulated Relationships’, Cambridge Papers 28, 3 (December 2019).

Here is the summary:

‘Interactions with apparently human-like and ‘emotionally intelligent’ AIs are likely to become commonplace within the next ten years, ranging from entirely disembodied agents like chatbots through to physical humanoid robots. This will lead to new and troubling ethical, personal and legal dilemmas. Will the promotion of “relationships” with machines contribute to societal wellbeing and human flourishing, or provide new opportunities for manipulation and deception of the vulnerable? As biblical Christians we are called to safeguard and to celebrate the centrality of embodied human-to-human relationships, particularly in essential caring and therapeutic roles, and in our families and Christian communities.’

Anvil 35, 3 (2019)

The latest edition of Anvil is available online, this one including several pieces devoted to the theme of ‘Church: Inside Out?’

In the Editorial, Jame Butler writes:

‘This issue of Anvil began life as a CMS Pioneer Conversations day back in March of this year, exploring church and mission. The questions around “What is church?” and identifying whether something “is church” are well rehearsed and many innovative and helpful things have been written, but the reality is that these questions remain pertinent to those working in fresh expressions and pioneer ministry. The title of the conversations day, and of this issue, “Church: Inside Out?”, was an attempt to raise some of these questions in a fresh way.

‘All the contributions to this issue push us to reconsider our understanding of church and suggest that the church, and certainly the work of the Holy Spirit, goes beyond our carefully drawn lines and our own expectations.’

Individual articles are available from here, and the whole issue can be downloaded as a pdf here.

Bible Reading Plan Generator

This looks interesting –  Bible Reading Plan Generator.

It allows you to choose a start date and the number of days, to select Old Testament and/or New Testament (as well as Deuterocanonical books), tick or un-tick particular days of the week, include a daily Psalm and/or daily chapter of Proverbs, etc.

Donald Whitney on Questions for a New Year

Don Whitney writes:

‘The beginning of a new year is an ideal time to stop, look up, and get our bearings. A great time for us to “Consider our ways.” To that end, here are some questions to ask prayerfully in the presence of God.’

1. What’s one thing you could do this year to increase your enjoyment of God?

2. What’s an impossible prayer you can pray?

3. What’s the most important thing you could do to improve your family life?

4. In which spiritual discipline do you most want to make progress this year?

5. What’s the single biggest time-waster in your life, and how can you redeem the time?

6. What’s the most helpful new way you could strengthen your church?

7. For whose salvation will you pray most fervently this year?

8. What’s the most important way, by God’s grace, you will try to make this year different from last?

9. What one thing could you do to improve your prayer life this year?

10.What single thing that you plan to do this year will matter most in ten years? In eternity?

See the full piece here.