The Referendum

Not that it will come as a surprise to anyone with whom I've discussed the matter, but I'm almost certain to vote No in the referendum on Scottish independence. I have, as honestly as I can, tried to keep an open mind. I'm not one of those who says that Yes voters are by definition daft. Many people who I love and respect are heading towards a Yes - even my wife is making noises in that direction (though possibly just because she likes disagreeing with me). But personally, it's going to be a No.

For what it's worth - here's a quick list of reasons why.

1. The whole world is becoming more connected. It makes no sense to put up more barriers.
2. The burden of proof has to be on those who support the change. Nothing has proved the case to me.
3. The Scottish Parliament is immature. I don't trust most of its politicians to make reasoned decisions.
4. UK Parliament wouldn't have overridden centuries of legal development and abolished corroboration.
5. The Scottish Parliament has an inadequate legislative system with no supervisory chamber (Lords).
6. For those reasons and more, the Scottish Parliament doesn't effectively hold government to account.
7. Economies of scale - pooling resources will always get a better deal.
8. Following on from that, Scotland could not support the banking system on its own 2008-style.
9. Same goes for defence etc. Makes sense to do it together.
10. Scottish culture is distinct, but we fool ourselves to think it's somehow superior and is held back by UK.
11. We have a shared combination of culture with the UK - frankly, I don't want to leave that.
12. Change always brings increased uncertainty and instability - why do it if there is no clear benefit?
13. Our economies are inextricably linked. Clear risks to business re additional costs of regulation.
14. Scotland has produced politicians and statesmen who literally shaped the world by the UK platform.
15. It seems based on the idea 'I'm not sharing'. I don't think that's very nice. Let the English have some oil.
16. It's a bit arbitrary. Why not an independent Glasgow? The peoples republic of Byres Road?
17. On that note - most of new oil is Shetland's. They will vote No. Bit unfair to take their oil, then?
16. North East or Northern Isles - all the oil is running out. That's no solid basis to build an economy on.
17. There are problems - but why not try and fix the UK rather than leave it, and still have same issues?
18. 'Independence' misunderstands history. We were never conquered or colonised. Our King became theirs.
19. The Yes campaign respond to genuine questions with vitriolic personal abuse. That's not nice.
20. Scottish distinctives flourish in the UK - Law, Education, Culture. No need to change.

I love being Scottish. I love being a part of the UK. I don't see why we should change that. No reason has been given to me that actually makes sense to me. 'Scotland's Future' just sets out a whole lot of political policies that any party could decide to pursue or not. It doesn't give good reasons to change the constitutional make up of the state.

So let's stay together. But even if not, let's try and be nice to each other where we disagree?

Indispensability

I'm speaking on leadership this Sunday evening, and have gone back to some thoughts I jotted down about 6 months ago, about the house group my wife and I lead at the Vineyard.

Our group has grown in the last year, and in fact now multiplied into two. A striking feature of that growth, is that it has happened at a time when I was less present than I would have liked to be, due to other commitments. There I was, worried about how the group would fare without my guiding hand (!) and it turned out they got along just fine. Better than fine.

Which got me thinking about the idea of being dispensable. We all want to be needed, don't we? And God loves to use us in ways which allow our giftings to flourish. But when we're involved in God's work, his plans go well beyond the limits our self-importance tries to place on them

There is a place for pioneering leadership. A big place.

But there is a problem when the leader makes him or herself indispensable to the cause for which he or she fights.

Without pioneering, creative, bold leaders, nothing new happens. Until David chucks the stone at Goliath, a whole army stood immobilised. Until Moses proclaimed freedom for Israel, a whole nation sat enslaved.

God does wonderful things through pioneering leadership.

The pioneer falters, however, when he or she becomes indispensable for the long term. When there is no vision beyond the charisma of the leader.

Elijah raised up Elisha. Moses Joshua. Even Jesus raised up 12 men to 'do the stuff' he'd done, to use a favourite vineyard phrase. And the thing with Jesus was he taught his disciples to do it, and to teach others to do it. He charged the disciples to make disciples. To make disciple-making disciples.

He didn't tell them to go and get others to follow you. He said go and teach them to be like me, doing what I do.

Paul, to a certain group of believers, said 'follow my example as I follow Christ's'. In other words follow me.

Jesus, said we'd do the same things, and greater things than him. Follow me, then go beyond me. (Lest I blaspheme, this applies to Jesus in his ministry as a human on earth, rather than in his divine supremacy).

Pioneering leadership begins with 'follow me'. But it's goal should always be 'go beyond me'.

When pioneering leadership does the 'follow me' but stops short of saying 'go beyond me', it stagnates into pride. The indispensability of leader damages the cause.

So let me bring it home. I can, like all of us (I hope), suffer from that bizarre combination of over- and under- confidence, arrogance and insecurity that is so unique to our species. God has made me a leader (mysterious ways, right?). But if I am leading as I should, I should see people being raised up not just to learn from my dubious example, but to go further than me. To far exceed my giftings, to leap well beyond my small wisdom and to exponentially better any fruitfulness I may have had. And when I see that, it is a cause for joy rather than sorrow.

Sometimes, to raise up disciples, to inspire new leaders and to ensure long term fruitfulness, we need to set aside our pride, and get of the way.

Class, Poverty and the Law

I'll warn you now.  This series of loosely connected thoughts has no conclusion. Rather, this is all question and no answer.  At least not yet.

Lately I've had an awful suspicion that the world is not really as I've always seen it. My life - my economic background, the stability of my upbringing and the variety and quality of my opportunities - isn't actually typical.

I know, I know. We've all heard that if you have a toaster and a sock you're in the top 0.1% of wealthiest people (or some only slightly less extreme stat). But still, you can't get away from the fact that you assume everyone has experienced life like you have. At least everyone from the same country as you.

I once assumed everyone had two parents who were married.

I assumed everyone had a loving, open, supportive family who encouraged them to express themselves and be emotionally healthy.

I assumed that everyone had a decent shot at doing well in school if they knuckled down.

I assumed that everyone could get a job if they really wanted one.

I assumed that anyone with a job could buy a house (because otherwise it wouldn't make sense, would it?).

I assumed that everyone who said they liked cricket was lying. Ok that one isn't so relevant. True though.

I assumed that everyone had financially stable parents who would help to bail them out if they couldn't quite get their career started.

I assumed that for those very very few unlucky ones who couldn't support themselves, and who didn't have family to support them, the state welfare system would take care of them generously - at least enough to feed, clothe and house themselves. Because in our society we don't let people go hungry, go cold or go homeless.

The result of all those assumptions is that I thought that if someone was poor - I mean really poor, unable to feed or clothe or house or heat themselves - it must be because they are somehow refusing to take the help offered. It must be because they don't want to live differently.

These subconscious preconceptions ran pretty deep in me - in fact I think I have only just realised how much they still informed my views and impressions.

Those are not true statements (cricket the exception).  So many people grow up with abuse or it's passive cousin neglect.  Hundreds of pupils in Scotland are going to school with no idea or example of what it means to be a working member of society.  A huge number of those visiting the UKs food banks are people who have jobs, but the wage isn't enough to feed the family.  Anecdotally, I am discovering that the benefits system, particularly in the last few years, uses any excuse to stop payments - even to those who are destitute.  From my studies I know that a huge category of asylum seekers are not entitled to any kind of benefit payment.  Is this the picture of a caring society that Lloyd George et al envisaged 70 - 100 years ago?

I've never been someone who is passionate about the poor. I mean I've bought my fair share of the 'Big Issue'. Right thing to do. Ease the old conscience. I'm a Christian, so of course I care. Just not any more than the bare minimum. My passions are elsewhere.

And that's ok - we're not all called to battle every single problem. I think God puts each of us here for a specific reason, so it makes sense that some are more passionate about certain things than others. But something has been stirring in me recently. I've been wondering why I'm a lawyer. Why the degree. Why the training.  So that I can make money for a big firm? So that I can work for huge corporations and bolster their profits? Wow. That'll put a spring in my Monday morning step.

Maybe God made me a lawyer, so that I can seek justice.

The bible tells us to 'speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy'

Which is fine.  Until you see people poor, destitute, needy and voiceless.

There is no conclusion to this blog. These thoughts are very much unconcluded.

But one thing I'm clear on.  It's not right for me - or you (sorry) - to sit in a middle class bubble thinking everyone looks, thinks and lives like us.  It's not right to go on our way to pursue careers, move to the suburbs and raise rich kids with no thought for those who just don't have those choices.

So what do we do?

Maybe I'll sell it all and be a monk.  Nah I'd be rubbish.  I talk too much for that.

The Slaughter of the Amalekites

One of the things I love about God is that he never seems to sugar coat the truth. If the Old Testament histories and narratives have one striking feature, it is how 'warts and all' they are in their revelations. In fact, this is one of the most interesting aspects historically of the Old Testament narratives. Those who write history usually omit their defeats, and yet the Old Testament is full of mess-ups, muck-ups and mistakes. The bible doesn't just tell us what we want to hear. Which I love. But at times it's a little tricky.

One of the most troubling passages of Old Testament history occurs in 1 Samuel 15, where God commands the destruction of an entire nation - specifically to include women and children. The story is part of Saul's downfall because he becomes conceited and obsessed with his own power and begins to flippantly disobey God. But when you pause and look from another angle, it's pretty hard to ignore what God asks him to do in this passage.

If we are honest, our immediate reaction to God's command in this passage is moral disgust. And yet, as Christians, we hold this passage alongside the rest of the bible as the word of God, the primary source of all of our knowledge and understanding of God, and arguably our sole source of understanding of his intervention in the story of Israel. So how do we get our heads round passages such as this one?

I am not a theologian or a biblical scholar (other than in the sense of every Christian being a scholar of God's word to some degree). I am just a Christian. That is by way of disclaimer should anything that follows offend or disgruntle the reader! But as someone who knows God, passages like this strike me as out of kilter with the character of the God who I have come to know. And so the following has been my thought process as I have tried to work this one through. If it helps you, great - if it doesn't, I refer you to my disclaimer above and accept no liability for your disagreeing with me...

First, a preliminary thought.

The very concept of morality is dependant on God. That doesn't, of course, mean that people who know God are more moral than those who don't - it is a statement of objective fact that there is no basis for the existence of moral thought without an external standard to which we are accountable - see an interesting debate here:  http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=61XaBy8JYHA. Without a god-given moral conscience, we are eventually left with the answer 'it just is' when we are continually asked 'why' a certain thing is wrong.

What that means, logically, is that judging the morality of God is a nonsensical endeavour. It is like using a calculator to prove that the calculator itself is wrong. Every basis we have for judging morality comes from God. And so when we tell God he was wrong, we are telling him that he has contravened a moral code which is itself defined by what God does. We chase our tails. We are telling him he is acting in an ungodly manner, but if God acts, the act is godly. This sounds like semantical gymnastics, but the point I am making is that God is God. He does as he pleases, and we are simply unable to assess or judge the basis of his activity. It is beyond our capacity.

That said, the reason this story causes such concern is that the command by God to destroy the Amalekites appears inconsistent with what we know from the rest of scripture of the revealed character of God. In other words, we don't understand. We don't understand why a God who reveals himself as a God of love, slow to anger, and patient, would require the destruction of an entire people. And it has to be OK to not understand. We have to be comfortable, to an extent, with not understanding, because God is beyond our understanding. It's a tension we have to live with.

But irritating people like me need something more to chew on.  What follows will by no means provide a full and satisfactory answer to that question. It is, after all, one of those things which we simply cannot fully grasp - his ways are higher than ours. But there are some factors which, for me, assist in scratching the surface just a little.

So here goes.

I'd suggest that the slaughter of the Amalekites was not what God wanted. Stay with me. I'm suggesting that from the fact that God required this awful thing to be done, it does not flow as a consequence that this act was the perfect will, desire and intention of god. All of this is post-fall, and has to be seen in that context. We always say 'well, in a perfect world, (X) wouldn't happen...' and the same applies here. In a perfect world, the Amalekites would not die. God created a perfect world. And we ruined it. From that point on, the story has been one of God redeeming, correcting, and changing things to bring us back into perfect relationship with him. And when things have gone wrong, it can take things that otherwise we would never do, to bring them right again. We would never send men running into a fire. But when something has gone wrong, and a house full of people is about to burn down,  we do. Think of the cross. Would a father ever want to have his own son nailed to a cross? No. But God did, because the conditions of the perfect world no longer applied, and for a reason beyond our understanding that act was necessary.

So we know that there was some reason by which this act - which is not something God would ever want - became necessary. To stay with the example of the cross, we are given insight into why God sacrificed his son. We see the consequences of it. We rejoice in the mercy, grace and incredible sacrifice demonstrated by God to win our freedom, to defeat our sin and to bring us back into relationship with him. God has revealed to us, at least in part, why the cross had to happen. And so we can see this as an aspect of what god does: he turns evil into good. Things that can seem when looked at in a vacuum to be terrible things, when considered in the light of god's greater plan are seen to be as much a reflection of god's righteousness and love as anything else God has done.

We understand the cross in this way because we know the other side of the story. We know that Jesus was God and so the cross was in fact an act of self-sacrifice. We know that Jesus rose to life again, having been obedient to death, and so the cross was not the final word over the life of Christ. We know that the cross won for us eternal salvation, reconciliation to God, and the opportunity of living a life of genuine joy, purpose and fulfillment. We know these things, and so we worship God for the cross.

The problem with understanding the slaughter of the Amalekites is that we aren't told all of the other sides to the story. It isn't immediately clear what this act achieved or was intended to achieve. It isn't immediately clear to us what provision God made for his mercy and love to be made known to the Amalekites. We aren't told what eternal fate met the Amalekites. We don't know.

There are a number of potential aims or explanations for the slaughter of the Amalekites, and I make no comment on the persuasive power of any of them in justifying what happened in our minds. This is all, of course, in the context of having to come to a point of being OK with not fully understanding it. The list of explanations I've heard or read fall into two broad categories.

1. God commanded their destruction to save Israel (and by extension, his plan to show his light and love to the whole earth) from the people the Amalekites would become. The Amalekites, so say biblical historians, became an oppressive people who included an individual by the name of Haman.  Haman would become an ancient Hitler figure, who came close to having the entire Jewish race eradicated. In the book of Esther his story is told. Had Saul obeyed God and destroyed the Amalekites, Haman would never have come to be. Into this category would also fall the argument that the slaughter of the Amalekites was intended to prevent the world at large being dragged further into sin and depravity by their example, given that they are thought to have been one of the most brutal societies around at that time.

2. This was simply divine judgement on the Amalekites. They had become an evil people, engaged in depravity rarely or never seen, including child sacrifice. They had been given 400 years to repent and change their ways as a people, but they had continued in a downward spiral. God simply called time on their disobedience. There is also an argument, supported by the passage itself, that this was divine judgement for a specific act of oppression in the recent past. The Amalekites had oppressed and opposed Israel as they settled into their land, because they were weak and an easy target. Years later, when God has prospered and strengthened Israel, they are repaid for their aggression. This was a demonstration, so the argument goes, of the fact that you cannot oppose God and win in the end.

All, or some combination of the above may be part of the answer to the question 'why would God do this?', or these factors may simply be human ideas which fall way short of what it was God had in mind. We just don't know.

Where does that leave us? How do we respond to this passage?

I would argue, the same way we are to respond to every calamitous thing that happens, every mass loss of life that we see. Our God is sovereign and could end suffering with a cosmic snap of his divine fingers if he so wished. He hasn't, so far. And, whilst there are some reasons suggested by well meaning humanity for why god might decide to allow these things, and there are some theological frameworks (usually going back to the fall as the game changer) which are put forward as a way of dealing with these problems, they still leave us with something short of an emotionally satisfying answer.

So what would God have us do? He would have us trust. Trust that he is good - all the time. Trust that his will is perfect. Know that he takes pleasure in no-ones destruction, that he wills no-ones demise. Trust that he brings goodness from badness, light from darkness. To know that he is in control - and when the world seems out of control, it will only go so far as he allows.

And if you are wrestling with the question of God's goodness, either when you read passages like 1 Samuel 15, or when you face awful tragedy in life, it is OK to ask. If Job and the Psalms teach us anything it is that it is OK to ask. To complain. To plead. It is OK to not understand. But what we can do is ask God to help us to trust that he knows what he is doing. We can ask God to show us what light he is bringing from the darkness.

And as I've walked that path with Jesus, I've found myself convinced that even though so many things in the world seem so wrong, and there are so many things I just don't - and may never - understand... He is very very good. He is faithful. He is just. He is kind. He is so patient. And he loves each and every one of us with a furious love.

The Discipline of Joy

Lately I've found myself complaining of that sneakiest of ailments - 'a lack of joy'. Nothing big or dramatic - I watch the news and feel dreadful for complaining - just that old mundane Monday feeling. But as I was praying (or just complaining by another name) with my wife this morning, God surprised me. He kind of suggested that maybe my joy was my own responsibility. Bit of a spanner in the works of my morning moan, right?

But I guess he is right. (I know he always is.)

He reminded me that there are two similar concepts - which for ease of reference I will call happiness and joy. External things can make you happy - a good curry, a great movie or success at work. But we know that happiness is time-limited. It is also based on our immediate pleasure. Joy, on the other hand, is awakened within you - it is internal, not necessarily rooted in external circumstances. In fact joy, unlike happiness, can endure in the face of negative circumstances. And joy is a discipline. At least partly.

Joy is a discipline. Happiness is a feeling. Often they overlap, and we experience them simultaneously. Often the discipline of internal joy will lead to the experience of external happiness. Sometimes experiences of external happiness can be a part of the building up of joy internally. But they are distinct.

Joy is intrinsically connected to your understanding of the world around you. The level of joy that underpins your life is dependant on what you believe about life. If you are a fortuitous combination of molecules with no purpose but the perpetuation of your species, then what cause (or point) is there for joy? If you are religious and you believe in a deity who is a bully, a Scrooge who grudges all pleasure and piles on burdens at every turn, whose only emotion is disappointment and wrath, then you won't take much joy in life.

But if you believe certain other things about your life, your existence, and the nature of God, certain attitudes and logical responses to those beliefs manifest in a different way of looking at the world, which leads to joy. Joy might be experiential, but it comes from a discipline of remembering.

All the way through the Old Testament the message of God is to REMEMBER. Remember who God is. Remember what he did and therefore what he does. Remember how he provided, how he rescued, how he forgave. And so remember that God will provide, he will rescue, and he will forgive. My history teacher used to say that those who fail to study the mistakes of the past are doomed to repeat them. I would say that those who forget God's goodness in the past are doomed to live a pretty depressing future!

If we operate in a lifestyle of remembrance, we will always have in mind who God is and what God does, and so we will never look at our circumstances as the world does, ever again. In that way, joy is one of the fruits of the spirit: something that flows organically from a life surrendered to God.

It doesn't mean an inability to experience suffering: a laughable refusal to recognise the facts of life. But it does mean a deeper joy that allows you to smile in the midst of sadness, to worship in the midst of grief, and to see light when all around is dark. As Nehemiah said 'The joy of The Lord is our strength'.

It's clear in the 'joy in suffering' passages that joy comes not from refusing to recognise the truth, but from a recognition of the whole truth. If Paul and James didn't experience it as suffering, would they have referred to it as suffering or trials or tribulations? Of course they experienced the pain of it! But they had joy because they knew God was still God, he was good, and he was at work in the midst of the pain.

If you are lacking joy, you have forgotten something about God. When I lack joy, it is probably because I have forgotten to remember. I have forgotten to remember all of the times that God has brought me through difficult times, changing me for the better in the process. How God has rescued me, sometimes gradually, sometimes dramatically, from stickier situations. In a more general sense, it is probably because I have forgotten just how ridiculously loved I am by God.

I live for a God who spared no sacrifice to rescue me, and has given me his word that he is with me always. I live for a God who fills my life with good things, if only I'll open my eyes and see them. A God who works all things together for my good, turning mourning to dancing, darkness to light, and tears to joy. God hides beauty and opportunity in every day, and he does nothing by mistake. That means that today is a day mapped out for me by a God who loves me.

And when I remember that, joy doesn't seem so difficult. Even on a Monday!

A Voice Worth Listening To?

The last few years have seen a remarkable amount of debate and discussion on the issue of religion. From paedophile priests to “The God Delusion”, gay marriage, faith schools, bishops in the House of Lords and the cartoonishly indignant caricature of the “Christian Right” which appears to hold such sway over American politics, we keep on talking about this persistent, bothersome and rather nebulous entity called “religion”.

For some, these discussions are an opportunity to point out the laughable stupidity of the hapless unthinking believer.  For others, they represent an opportunity to strike out at the moralistic proclamations of a corrupt and hypocritical church. Unfortunately, these discussions are rarely approached with the maturity they deserve. The atheist who considers the belief of the faithful pure fallacy rarely stops to consider that many of the greatest minds of the past and present centuries have acknowledged spirituality and often Christianity specifically. The anti-hypocrisy snifferdog rarely pauses to consider their own fallibility, and the possibility that something can be true even if those proclaiming the truth are themselves flawed.

As a Christian in the legal profession I find myself considering a question which has been asked, usually rhetorically, by many detractors of Christian morality:

What gives the church the right to tell us how to live?

This question is at the core of all other objections in this field. Those who argue vehemently against the existence of God and the veracity of the Christian faith do so not because they passionately believe in the absence of the evidence (indeed, as Dawkins regularly points out, why would someone be passionate about not believing something?), but because they passionately believe that nobody should tell them how to live. Those who point to the flaws (many real, some imagined) in the ethical track record of the church in its various forms do so because they resent, like we all do from time to time, the feeling that we are being told what to do, particularly by people who don’t practice what they preach.

So what right does the church have?  What right does any man have to tell another how to live?  If we mean “tell” in the sense of a compulsion, an order, an instruction, then the answer must be none, with the exception of narrowly defined areas of life, under a specific authority bestowed by law (e.g. police powers) or by nature (e.g. father to young son).

If we mean “tell” in the sense of an encouragement, an exhortation, a plea, then the question is quite different. I have no right nor authority to force you to live as I wish.  But, in the right context, I can tell you my sincere and heartfelt belief about the best way to live.

If that is true, then we have established that the church does have a right – the same right as the World Health Organisation or proponents of vegetarianism – to attempt to persuade you to and encourage you to live in the way they think best.

So the real question is not whether the church (and by the church I mean followers of Jesus, wherever they may be) has a right to raise its voice. The real question is whether there is any reason to consider that voice worth listening to. In other words, whether there is any reason to believe that these Christians might be right.

Since Christians claim that their moral framework has been given to them by God, in order to evaluate the moral claims of Christianity, one has no option but to consider the question of whether Christianity itself is true or not.

This is the core of the matter. As much as some Christians may argue that biblical advice for living so well founded that “even if it’s not true, I’d live this way”, the real crux of the Christian argument comes with the question of truthfulness.  As CS Lewis said:

“Christianity, if true, is of utmost importance. If false, it is of no importance. The only thing it cannot be is moderately important”

A more modern take is from Matthew Parris:

“If a faith is true it must have the most profound consequences for a man and for mankind. If I seriously suspected a faith might be true, I would devote the rest of my life to finding out… ‘Familiar’ be damned. ‘Comforting’ be damned. ‘Useful’ be damned. Is it true? — that is the question. It was the question when I was 12 and the question when I was 22. Forty years later it is still the question. It is the only question.”

The evidence of the truth of Christianity is there. You may have to see beyond the hyperbolic straw-man arguments of many atheists and secularists. You may have to peel back the layers of church tradition and human corruption. You may even have to think for yourself rather than allowing popular opinion and the secular press to sway your mind. But the evidence is there.

And if the real issue is the truth or otherwise of Christianity, then the specifics of the moral claims fall to the wayside. The accusation is often levelled that Christians who hold to a certain view of, for example, sexual ethics, are “stuck in the past” and need to recognise “society has moved on”. Surely, if something is true, it is true regardless of what the society around it believes.

When Christians led the charge to eradicate the slave trade they were praised (eventually). When Christians were at the forefront of aid missions to Africa they were doing what was right. Yet when Christians refuse to bow to public pressure to adapt their view on the rights and wrongs of sexuality, they are bigoted, homophobic, and behind the times. What is it to believe something both when it makes you popular and unpopular? Does it show mental strength and heartfelt conviction? Or does it show an inability to move on, a mind “stuck in the dark ages”?

St Paul might describe this as preaching the gospel in season and out of season. Secular humanists describe it as “fundamentalism”. What is fundamentalism, and why is it a bad thing? Should we not be “fundamentalist” about liberty, about justice, about poverty, about equality? Or do we no longer have fundamentals?  Perhaps the issue is that “fundamentalists” have fundamentals that society no longer values. Let’s give up the name-calling and the stereotypes – fundamentalism is a meaningless term. We were fundamentalist about free speech until we started disagreeing.

To those who would seek to suppress Christian opinion on matters where it refuses to chime in with the conformism of our post-post-modern secular humanist morality, I say that the church has a right to argue, to persuade, to encourage, to plead. In response you can either ignore, or you can address the argument and genuinely consider its merit. What you mustn’t do is boil it down to unsophisticated superstition and thereby belittle the majority of souls on the planet, and indeed the majority of people in the country, who remain open to the idea of the existence of God. It not only belittles them, it belittles the integrity of your own thinking.

To Christians I say this: Do not be silenced. You do not just have a ‘right’ to speak up, you have a duty. You have a duty to preach the gospel – the whole gospel – to persuade the world of the best way to live, to point to complete forgiveness for every past present and future wrong in Jesus, and to call a lost culture to the light of God. This must be done with respect, with love, and out of a desire not to see yourself vindicated, but to see the world redeemed.

You may be met with, to use the favoured moralistic terminology of the day, intolerance. You will be misrepresented and accused of bigotry and hatred. Your intelligence will be insulted and your character slurred.

Only a few months ago Archbishop John Sentamu spoke eloquently and – I thought – sensitively about his opposition to government changing the definition of marriage. He was at pains to express his passion for equality, yet argued that marriage was not a matter of equality, given all the legal rights already contained within the Civil Partnership regime.  In response, campaigner Peter Tatchell called him a “religious authoritarian” and he received racist abuse in letters and emails.

Jesus said “the world hates me” and “if they hate me, surely they will hate you”. Nevertheless, he commanded “take up your cross”. But he added the promise: “I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it”.

Keep the faith, stand firm, live with integrity and love, and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ fearlessly, shamelessly and clearly. Love God - don’t shy away from his word. And love people – no judgement, no condemnation, no self-righteousness, no tribalism, sectarianism or hatred. Love. And in the context of a life of love… speak up. You have a voice worth listening to.

Heaven on Earth

There's a peculiar view of Christians that has rather unfortunately become quite a common misconception. It's the idea that Christians hunker down, hate the world and all it's awful worldy things like television and cakes, and wait for heaven.

But what is heaven?

And what did Jesus mean when he said 'the Kingdom of heaven is close at hand' back in Matthew?

The way I understand heaven is quite simple: stuff being as it was meant to be. A return to Eden, if you will. Things being right, or as the Revelation puts it, all things being made new.

The thing about Jesus is that he didn't talk all that much about the 'after you die heaven' that some views of Christianity tend to focus on. In fact, he didn't really talk about death in the way we do at all. Jesus talked about those who follow him having 'already' passed from death to life. Kind of fitting in with all this incessant 'kingdom of heaven' talk. It's not all for later, over the hill and far away, in the happy every after. It's 'at hand'. It's now.

Which means that heaven is on earth. Not completely, not fully. But hints, glimmers, tastes and reflections of heaven are all around us. Whenever stuff is right, working as it should. A little taste of heaven. Whenever we get back into right relationship with God and with each other. A foretaste of heaven.

When husband and wife live in committed, selfless and passionate love for each other. A little bit of heaven. When family works as it should - love, grace, forgiveness, laughter, joy. A bit of heaven. When you get a sun bathed view of Loch Long, the Cobbler and Loch Lomond from the shoulders of Ben Narnain. A taste of heaven. For me anyway.

And just think. None of those things, not one, are the true picture of heaven. When things will truly be made new, when we will finally be reconnected fully and eternally with the source of all joy, life and fullness. If all of those reflections of heaven are so glorious, just imagine what the glory of the true thing will be like.

See Christianity isn't about the rejection of the good things. It is about the discovery of what really is good. Eternal life starts now. Like the Psalmist, we can say not only that we will 'dwell in the house of The Lord for ever' but also that 'goodness and mercy follow me all the days of my life'. In other words, heaven starts - little by little - on earth.