Joseph models a courageous willingness to be stripped of his sense of entitlement that he might become all God wanted him to be.
Joseph models a courageous willingness to be stripped of his sense of entitlement that he might become all God wanted him to be.
While faith is a gift, blessings come to those who are prepared to wrestle with their faith.
Jesus is the door through which we pass to receive life – life in his name – a life of authenticity, a life of freedom, a life of purpose.
God’s refining work is done not through judgement and punishment, but through the transforming power of love.
Jesus calls us to model ourselves on him to embrace a new pattern of full humanity rather than just constrain the worst excesses of an old failed humanity.
The righteousness give to us in Christ, and which we grow into in our following of him, fulfils and exceeds the trajectory set by the biblical law and prophets.
Jesus doesn’t come looking for ready-made heroes, but for the small, damaged and fragile people we are, so that in the company of Jesus, we can become the giants we always dreamed of.
The Bible can be used to justify anything, but when it is approached humbly as a place of prayerful encounter with the risen Christ, it is alive with the breath of God and leads us to life.
Thanks be to God, we are in safe hands. God who has been the author, will also be the finisher of our faith.
God evaluates us only in terms of our growth to fruitfulness, expressed as Christ-like love, and such fruitfulness comes only from our interrelationship with Christ. God deals with us in whatever way will lead to further growth – sometimes that is gently, sometimes it is harshly, always it is for the same purpose.
The foundation of our faith is in a living Christ who enables us to understand the Bible, rather than in a Bible that enables us to understand a dead Christ.
As creatures made in the image of God, imitation of God is the pathway to fullness of life.
The pathway to a life of joy and gratitude is to imitate Jesus in filling our minds with things which are worthy, honourable, merciful and loving.
The self-emptying of Jesus reveals both his divinity and the pathway to our full humanity.
We have to choose between being squeezed into the world’s mould or re-moulded from within by God.
Staying true to the disciplines of ordinary faithfulness is part of our calling as we follow the way of Jesus Christ; and engaging in them eases our burdens considerably.
In the growth of children, God reveals to us much of how we all should be growing and developing.
When fidelity to Christ’s call is failing to bear the expected fruit, but is bearing good fruit, however humble, the call may be to persevere in hope.
The coming Christ will do whatever he can to get through our defences.
Those who trust God and remain flexible enough to change and grow will have nothing to fear from God’s strong hands.