It is no secret that I am a big fan of books written by Nick Page. His book, The Longest Week about the final days of Jesus is moving and wonderful. His book The Wrong Messiah is similar and very eye opening. His books tracing the history of the church are brilliant. They're funny, erudite and well researched.

I have come recently to read his book "A Nearly Infallible History of the Reformation" carries on in this vein. It is well researched and it is very well written. For me, it is like visiting an old friend. I have studied the Reformation many times and the book doesn't really teach me anything new (well, it has an interesting take on the Anabaptists which is somewhat new for me) but it is still well worth a read.

You see, the Reformation is much misunderstood and some people are far too familiar with it. In the same was that he reintroduces Jesus' Jewishness in The Wrong Messiah (Jesus' brother was Jacob, not James for example), Page manages to reintroduce the readers to the radical nature of the Reformation. It is Luther but most definitely warts and all. It does not shy away from the deplorable aspects of much of Luther's work but neither does it throw him away as useless. He was a man with a man's foibles.

Likewise with Zwingli (and here I will pause and say that if you read the book, just before you get to the section on Zwingli you will be treated to possibly the greatest Christian pun of all time; seriously genius) he doesn't become a hero worshipping fanboy like many are with the Swiss Wunderkind of the Reformation. He is treated well and in an adult manner.

The book is full of Page's usual humour and good natured ribbing. He does a great job of re-visiting the Reformation and has made me glad that I have taken the time to read it just before the world suddenly remembers that something special happened to a door in Wittenburg 500 years ago (or did it? You will have to read the book to find out).

Buy it here

Yesterday was tough in church. We have been trying our best to make sure that we are listening to God but, as is usual with church leaders, we are only human. We had a vision Sunday. We tried to get people to think about the vision that God has for us and how we can bring it to fruition. This wasn't easy as it really isn't something that we have done in the past. Anyway, there have been a plethora of emails this week. So many. I have found myself getting frustrated and annoyed at things. Things that people had agreed to were forgotten and ignored. Ideas I had had and that were agreed to were ignored. Why did this frustrate me? I am a grown up. More importantly, I am a Christian and I don't need this sort of stuff. I should fix my eyes on Jesus the author and perfecter of our faith. Not in any religious way but when it comes to church things he is the model I should follow and not my selfish self. When we were praying and thinking yesterday, I went off to a corner of the library where we meet and knelt down. I was praying to God about what we could do to reach out the community. There were many thoughts running about inside my head. Thoughts that were selfish and mean. As I centred myself on God and asked the Spirit to help me I felt better. Then, extremely quickly the Spirit began to remind me of something. Here was I, a church leader, on his knees in prayer to find GOd's vision for the local community. good old me. But, pointed out the Spirit, there's a man behind you who isn't in the church. He isn't a member. He is cold, wet, dirty and, quite frankly, scary. He's come in for a free cuppa and some warmth. You want to get more into the community, get off your knees and talk to him. When I am selfish and think of the different things that I have missed out on or been "slighted" by, I miss out on what God wants. He doesn't want me to look inward he wants me to look upward and to see through his eyes. It doesn't matter that my latest sermon isn't on the website yet; it doesn't matter if I am doing Sunday School again this week. What matters is that God wants me to look into the community and see the need there. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, help the poor and talk to the ignored. So, it wasn't all bad at church ...

I have just updated my worship page. Didn't realise the link hadn't been published!

Recently, I have been getting back into listening to some worship music when I am on the bus into work. This helps me focus more on the Bible, when I read it, and the books I am reading. I tend to have my favourite songs and my favourite artists.

This last year has been all about the band called I Am They. Some of their work has been brilliant and has really helped me focus on God during my personal worship times. They came hot on the heels of For King and Country who, likewise, have some excellent music.

Anyway, the song that has been speaking to me most in the last couple of weeks is the on below. It is by Chris Tomlin and is called Home. It is a beautiful song that talks about no matter where we are or what we are going through, in the end it is all going to be alright. In the end the new Jerusalem will come down and we will live in a place where there will be no more sorrow and no more tears.

This year is the 500th anniversary of the beginning of Luther's protest against the Catholic Church. I won't say it is the anniversary of the Reformation as that is a little problematic. I am a reformed Christian. I firmly believe in the core doctrines of reformed theology; namely justification by faith alone, the inerrant and superior nature of scripture and the symbolic nature of communion.

I am working my way through a book about the Reformation. It is by Nick Page, an author I highly recommend (if you are looking for a book to read next Lent, I would suggest you read his book The Longest Week) and an author I enjoy greatly. His book isn't any great development in the field of Reformation scholarship but it is a great book nonetheless.

I studied the Reformation at A Level with Mr. Davies and Mr. Payne. I thoroughly enjoyed it and I think that it played a part in me becoming a Christian. It was through my studies of the Reformation that I first saw the joys of a decent hard Bible Study. I first engaged with Scripture and the meaning of the words in the Bible.

I am a Christian and I am not ashamed. As we go through this anniversary year I am increasingly grateful to the Reformation for bringing me closer to the truth. I am not ashamed to state my belief and never will be. As Luther famously said (or rather didn't) "here I stand, I can do no other!"

Isn't it interesting how God can use the most mundane of things to help you complete his mission? I was at church on Sunday and was able to chat with a couple who had come all the way from New Zealand. They were on a sort of Grand Tour of Europe and had ended up in Fort William. Anyway, the mundane thing was a quiche (how very Christian!).

This couple had been walking the Camino and he, who happens to be allergic to certain things, was hungry. His wife went and bought a quiche for him, having carefully explained that certain ingredients need to be avoided. After eating the food he was taken very ill and his EpiPen wasn't working. Another couple just happened to be walking past so his wife asked if they could help. She (the female member of the new couple) turned out to be a nurse. Her partner was a doctor with a fully stocked emergency medical kit! This was the start of a very nice week of hiking and led to an agreement to visit the other couple (at least one of whom is not a Christian I should add) in Norway next week so they stopped off in the Fort this Sunday.

I happened to be preaching. I had on a crisp new shirt, nicely ironed I might say and was armed with about half a sermon. The end of it wasn't really written yet as I had no peace about it. You see, it has been a tough week (I hope to post on that later but am not sure yet really as I don't want to get too personal) and on top of that I had unexpectedly been given a sermon to write. I knew I was preaching but I already had the bones of a sermon to give when the passage I was given changed from Isaiah back to Joshua.

Thus, I ended up preaching on Joshua 24. I really felt that God was prompting me to certain things and trusted that He would lead me to the right words to say. Feedback was really positive but once i had finished preaching and praying I had to pop to the loo and ended up feeling really sick. Was it stress? Spiritual attack? Reaction to a dodgy bacon roll? I don't know but I have never felt that way about a sermon in the past.

Below is a link that should take you to the sermon if you would like to give it a listen. Comments would be appreciated but they are not necessary. Enjoy!

Joshua 24

This is becoming an increasingly censorious world. Every week it seems there is a twitter storm. Some public figure makes a statement and is forced, after outrage on twitter and in the press, to recant their words and issue an apology.

Increasingly there are certain subjects that are becoming off limits to those who wish to comment. Race, politics, medical ethics, sexuality, religion and several others are subjects where you have to tread a fine line.

This goes hand in hand with our government increasing their desire to have us all hold to their notion of "British Values". In the last few months we have seen government ministers criticise Catholic schools for holding to a doctrinal position on marriage that is held by billions of people across the world. They have also said that churches need to "catch up" with modern society in the area of attitudes to sexuality.

Quite apart from the government having no right to interfere in what the churches teach, who are they to decide what "British Values" are?

What is creating the problem for me, as a Christian, is that it is becoming clear that the government would like to see us becoming a less vocal church. Having a religion is OK in private but your religious ideas should remain just that, private.

Christ doesn't give us that option though. We are not supposed to remain quiet. Where there is a cause of outrage we must speak out and we must act. Now, I realise that there are Christians who seem to see that there is only one problem in the world and speak only on that issue but we cannot silence the church merely because some of our more vocal members are a bit shouty.

Likewise, we have a duty to share the good news of salvation offered by Christ. He commanded us to do it. Staying silent means not really sharing the good news. Yes I know that we can show the love of Christ in our lives but we need to spread the Gospel vocally.

Increasingly it is becoming tough to speak openly about our faith. To say that you believe in Christ will often get you labelled an idiot. People assume you are anti-gay, believe in a 6,000 year old earth and want to remove all joy from the world. And heaven forbid you should dare say that Christ is the only way to God! If you do that you are an intolerant bigot. We should accept that all religions lead to God and that people of all faiths and none (what an annoying statement that is) have the same rights and have equally true religious beliefs.

This, of course is errant nonsense. All religions cannot be true. Their relative theologies do not allow this. Christianity has a triune God. Islam doesn't. Hinduism has many gods, Buddhism has none. How can they all be true? They can't.

Thus, I should, as a Christian, have the right to try to persuade people that they are wrong and that I am right. Likewise, so should Muslims, Jews, Hindus and all the others. I should do it gently and with due care and consideration but I must be allowed the right to defend and share my beliefs.

However, as time goes on there are more and more people being arrested for preaching the gospel. Some of them have even been told that they are not allowed to preach in churches until their cases are settled. Thankfully, the judiciary in this country have thrown out all of the cases against Christian street preachers in recent years but it has become worrying. In one recent case the defendant was found guilty of causing offence and the judge went so far as to explain which part of the Bible was against the law. A judge decided that some of Scripture was illegal and shouldn't be used for preaching. This was overturned on appeal but was a dangerous precedent nonetheless.

There has even been a case of a preacher taken to court over a sermon he gave in his own church. That's correct, his own church. Someone thought that they had the right to prosecute a preacher for comments made in his own pulpit. I will just let that sink in.

Taking a wider view, this is nothing to be worried about. We are to expect persecution and opposition after all. In the past the government has been far more firm in its suppression of good solid preaching. We are, of course, not in the state that our North Korean brothers and sisters are. We don't face the problems of Christians in Somalia, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sudan.

Despite this though we are seeing an increase in pressure on Christians and on churches. More and more churches are caving in and moving away from Scripture. There are churches where the unique nature of Christ is downplayed. There are churches (and I have sat in them and heard the preaching) where the miracles of Christ are dismissed as coincidences or given feeble explanations to avoid being seen as actually believing them to be true. I have heard preachers say that there may be more than one way into heaven.

Which brings me back to having to hold my tongue. I don't speak out on certain issues and I watch what I say on my social media platforms. This is OK because there are things that are not that important and God doesn't have a particular issue with them. These things are important to some and not important to others.

I will not, however, hold my tongue on the fundamentals of my faith. I will not deny Christ in any form. I will not deny he existed, I will not deny he died for me on the cross, I will not deny he rose again on the third day and I absolutely will not deny that he is the only way to heaven. I will not deny the authority of Scripture (even the difficult bits) and I will not deny the core doctrines of my faith; Sola Scriptura, Sola Gratia, Sola Fides.