“Every child, every person needs to know that they are a source of joy; every child, every person, needs to be celebrated. Only when all of our weaknesses are accepted as part of our humanity can our negative, broken self-images be transformed.” — Jean Vanier Astounding.  I was introduced to the existence of Jean Vanier … More Casualty

Back in 2004/2005 I made a couple of trips to Romania and Russia to encourage the work of The Salvation Army there.  I met some wonderful young Salvationists, many of whom served the Lord with such passion, abandonment and dedication in spite of their own circumstances.  One such young family are the Kozlovskys.  They were … More The Kozlovskys

  There might be some of your reading, maybe, who remember this.  Listening to some ‘Francis Chan’ reminded me of it. At William Booth College, on Thursdays they had cadets meetings every now and again.  I can’t remember what they called them.  Bascially, a night of worship etc organised by cadets for the college community.  … More What are we doing?

None of these thoughts are particularly new, probably neither to you nor me.   In lots of ways these are the ‘what ifs’ which keep me up at night and the ones that create in me disatisfaction with the place we’re currently in; the things that motivate work for transformation. what if we followed Jesus as … More What if….

So some church planting advice from Floyd McClung. The black type is his, the grey type are my comments. Pray – Meet – Make – Gather – Multiplyby Floyd McClung  Pray. Pray fervently with God’s heart for the people you are reaching out to. Pray to meet people by “divine appointments.” Pray until you can … More Five key practices

The lid on the coffin of my Salvation Army officership was probably the series of articles I wrote on leadership which didn’t just appear on my ‘Army Renewal’ blog, but appeared a few places in online journals and stuff.  I can’t really think of anything else which would have provoked the cold shoulder we eventually … More More on leadership…

WWJS?  Who Would Jesus Shoot?!? So, yesterdays blog post and comments earlier in the week on the death of Osama Bin Laden has meant some rather strange comment exchanges with some Americans around the area of taking up arms as a Christian.  Now, even before looking at the particular text that was being banded around, … More "Jesus tells you to buy a sword"

One of the great things of this last year has been the opportunity to take journeys of exploration down avenues that, for various reasons, I hadn’t yet fully travelled.  Much of my ‘theology’ and even ‘ideology’ has been evolving significantly over the last 3 years, some of the things are only now coming to clarity…or … More On Not Voting

Its natural, I suppose.  Both at Christmas and in the run up to Easter especially, my mind has turned very much to The Army.  I went to the Army on Commitment Sunday and it was very difficult.  I’ve rejoiced in the election of a visionary Jesus-focussed General in the form of Linda Bond.  I have … More Reflecting on a year

I got myself to reminiscing earlier.  Was watching a film starring Robert De Niro called ‘Everybody’s Fine.’  Sad film really, but it really reminded me of my grandad.  Didn’t help much that De Niro has some facial likeness to my Grandad Andy.  Anyway was looking at some picture of him – he died in 2005 … More Life’s loose connections