November 2, 2020
Lost for many against the ‘horror’ background of halloween, global pandemic, American elections and a looming no-deal Brexit was the commemoration of Reformers’ Day on October 31. For on this day in 1517, ‘Hallowed Eve’ (hence Halloween) in the church calendar, the eve of All Saints Day, the reformer Martin Luther posted his 95 theses […]
October 26, 2020
Why are we Christians not usually more positive about life? about the future? about people who are different from us? If we believe in a sovereign God who is working out his purposes in history, why are we so quick to adopt gloomy end-time scenarios or even embrace conspiracy theories multiplying these days via social […]
October 19, 2020
The Dutch version of a book written by Pulitzer Prizewinner Anne Applebaum arrived this week, sent to me by my friend who had translated it for the publishers. As the English title suggests, The Twilight of Democracy is a sober warning of the rise of authoritarian systems and the eclipse of liberal democracy. Applebaum, a […]
October 12, 2020
Protest movements last week in the name of free and fair elections in the former Soviet satellites of Belarus and Kyrgzystan echo events in Central and Eastern Europe three decades ago. Similar scenes were witnessed the streets of the eastern German city of Leipzig thirty-one years ago, leading up to a turning point on Friday, […]
October 5, 2020
The hospitalisation of a 74-year-old male American corona patient a few days ago overshadowed the 30-year commemoration on Saturday of one of the most successful geo-political experiments of all time: the reunification of Germany. For the last three decades of German history arguably have been the most prosperous, productive and harmonious since Charlemagne, at the […]
September 28, 2020
What should Christians be saying to Europe’s politicians about the shameful hypocrisy of European migration policy? The EU’s core values of equality, freedom and human dignity have been conspicuously absent in the the response of European nations to the plight of desperate human beings, as exposed by recent events in Moria camp on Lesbos Island […]
September 21, 2020
Next month in Wisla, Poland, a gathering of 800 European evangelical leaders under the umbrella of the Lausanne Movement was to address the challenges of a continent facing crisis. But the pandemic crisis itself has delayed the event until November 2021. However, the process of preparation is already underway and the set-back can in the […]
September 14, 2020
Should the fire in Camp Moria, Downing Street’s threat to disregard international law, and opposition protests in Belarus and Russia, concern us as Christians, lay and leader alike? Or are these issues only for politicians and experts? True, few of us have the experience or the means to engage in the corridors of power. But, […]
September 7, 2020
COVID-19 may be a necessary slap in the face to re-awaken the church to her mission and calling. Rather than the death-blow to an already-ailing institution, church leaders from around the world engaged in developing online congregations see more opportunity than threat in the current pandemic. Researcher in digital religion, Heidi Campbell, created a network […]
August 31, 2020
Almost six months after the start of lockdown in Europe, we still have no clear answer to the psalmist’s question, ‘How long, Lord?’ (Ps. 13). A matter of weeks, we first thought; then conceded that it could take months before ‘normality’ would return. Now we hear it could be years before we return to our […]
August 17, 2020
For many thousands of Christians in south Asia, the name “Bart” is a household concept with a double association. The first is the ministry of ‘power evangelism’, modelled by Dutchman Bart Doornweerd, as originally inspired by the work of John Wimber in the 1980’s. The second is the support of countless south Asian YWAMers in […]
August 10, 2020
As ‘virtual pilgrims’ this past week, our summer school students and online participants – from Finland on the Arctic Circle to the Hawaii in the Pacific – traced the story of transformation in Ireland and Britain during the first millennium through the planting of communities fleshing out the life of Jesus. Communities, rather than churches, […]
