Index of posts
Everything that's not a book review
If you’ve ever thought, “oh, where was that post on X”, well fret no more. This post is a list of every non book-review post on the stack, updated every month or so. I also give a quick thematic description. Book reviews can be found in a similar index here.
Tags
(Each of the following key words will bring up a page of posts that deal with that topic): 1 John, Anxiety, Australian Aboriginal History, Community, Enemy-Love, Ethics, Evangelism, Film, Forgiveness, Friendship, Gender, Generosity, Grief, Habit, Hope, Lament, Liturgy, Love, Mental Health, Music, New Creation, Peace, Prayer, Preaching, Psalms, Racial-Justice, Reading, Sermon On The Mount, Sin, Sorrow, Technology, Virtue, Worship.
2022
Scars in the New Creation - will we have scars in the resurrection and what might that mean?
On Reading - reflections from Alan Jacob’s book, and on reading as a practice.
Habitus monachum non facit - some reflections on character formation and virtue.
Shaped shapers - reflections on attention, technology, and character formation.
Loving your enemies - reflections on how to do that.
Old Ivan and St Benedict - how stability and community, forced or intentional, relate to dealing with conflicts.
On Psalm 13 - a reading of this psalm through three lenses.
The cracks in community (Part 1) - reflections on when communities fail at being community.
Everything sad will come untrue, but not yet - on eschatological hope and not turning it into a cliché.
On Lament (Part 1) - reflections on the practice of lament, especially in community.
On listening to books - reflections on picking up the practice of listening to audio books.
In the long run - barefoot running, habit building, and the Christian life.
Parables B-Side edition - considering the minor points and characters of some of Jesus’ parables.
Hopeful lament - reflecting on how lament actually exhibits both trust in God and hope that things will be put right.
Reading through different eyes, praying in strange tongues - reflections on reading the First Nations Version, and on language, culture, and bible translation.
Why Evangelicals are terrible at social justice - just what it sounds like.
The Liturgy of Death - on professionalised lament, funerals, and liturgy.
Numbers 12 as a story of Restorative Justice - just what it sounds like.
Mile wide, inch deep - what the global north can learn from global south Christians - a deeper spiritual life.
Just Friends - reflections launching from Aimee Byrd’s book, Why can’t we be friends, on cross-gender friendship.
Waiting in Faith (Advent 1) - reflection on Genesis 12 and Abram’s waiting.
Wakanda Forever (Film Review) - as it says.
Waiting in Chains (Advent 2) - reflection on Gen 15 and Exodus.
Waiting in Psalms (Advent 3) - reflections on waiting in the Psalms.
Waiting in the Night (Advent 4) - Reflection on Simeon’s song from Luke 2:29-31
2022 in review (1): Three things I learnt - reflections on life lessons 2022.
2022 in review (2): Books read and unread - book round-up from 2022.
2022 in review (3): Over to you - an invitation for feedback.
2023
2022: a year of musical change - reflections on my music in 2022.
Sevenfold - the connection between Cain and Lamech, and forgiveness in Matt 18.
Between Lament and Bonhoeffer - how Bonhoeffer became the kind of person who could resist Hitler.
All your heroes are trash - How we deal with the great failings and sins of great figures.
Typology in Jonah 1 - what it says on the box.
Only the most broken people can be great leaders - Namor and Christian service/leadership.
Loving one’s enemies and one’s friends in prayer - reflections on prayer for those nearest to us, and those that hurt us most.
Presence - reflections on revival.
Job, Camus, Ashes - reflections on Albert Camus, Job, suffering, and Lent.
The Way of Jesus - Reading the Sermon on the Mount in conversation with Jonathan Pennington. Part 1. Matt 5:1-16
Whole-Heartedness - SotM with JP. Part 2. Matt 5:17-48.
Night Psalms - learning to pray through the night.
Holy Saturday - reflections on the Saturday between Good Friday and Easter Sunday.
Practices of Personal Piety - SotM with JP. Part 3. Matt 6:1-20.
Hopeful Helplessness - reflections on how prayer requires both hope and helplessness.
Anxiety and the Kingdom - SotM with JP. Part 4. Matt 6:19-34.
Liturgical Animals - an attempt to draw together some threads on habit formation, virtue, character, liturgy, and the like.
The Golden Rule - SotM with JP. Part 5. Matt 7:1-12.
On novelty in worship - an argument for non-spontaneity, or that spontaneity doesn’t equal authenticity.
Vale, Tim Keller - my immediate reflections from when Tim Keller died.
Resisting evil by non-resistance - thinking hard through how to relate to those doing harm and evil.
(Counter-)Culture(s) and Christian Praxis - reflections on church life as counter-formation of who we are and how we be.
The Way of Life and the Way of Death - SotM with JP. Part 6. Matt 7:11-27.
a greater wisdom - a reflection on how in the midst of suffering we can and should trust God’s providence and wisdom.
Hesed - a short primer on this important Hebrew word, [God’s] forever-loyal-love.
Talents - a reflection on Jesus’ parable in Matthew 24:14-30
Psalm 88 - a reflection on the darkest of psalms.
Gardenborn - speculation on sex & reproduction in the new creation.
The fig tree and the mountain - Part 1 on a series on prayer in the New Testament. Mark 11
The myth of sovereignty - A summary of Henry Reynolds on sovereignty in Australia, in relation to Aboriginal people and colonisation.
This kind can only come out by prayer - Part 2 of Prayer and the NT. Mark 9.
Early NSW and Aboriginal missions - Part 1 of a book summary of John Harris’ One Blood.
The shape of gospel obedience - a long-form essay on how I think the gospel changes us to produce obedience.
A continent of nations dispossessed - another summary from Henry Reynolds’ work on colonisation and early Australian colonial history.
You open up this door right this minute, you hear me - Part 3 of Prayer and the NT. Luke 11 and the persistent friend.
Club or cult - sharing the gospel as an act of love, rather than loving people instrumentally.
The widow that never gave up - Part 4 of Prayer and the NT. Luke 18 and the relentless widow.
Let's eat together - why eating together is so important and meaningful.
Dying to self - a reflection on the three synoptic gospel sayings about “deny oneself”.
Our Father - Part 5 of Prayer and the NT. The Lord’s Prayer.
nothing can be needful that He withholds - a commentary on John Newton’s letter on God’s providence.
The aetiological fallacy, contamination theory, and deficit readings of culture - a reflection on how we deal with cultural and religious practices.
Voting yes to the Voice: reconciliation, restitution, theft, and repair - a long-form essay arguing in favour of a Yes vote to the Australian Referendum on Oct 14th, 2023.
Rage and Grief - On reading the Iliad.
On marriage, friendship, and divorce - some reflections on the need for friendships to speak into marriages.
Rites of Loss - some reflections on rituals surrounding grief and how we might do them better.
When Jesus is the instrument of our idolatry - how a vision of heaven without God leads us astray.
Psalm 16 - applied exegesis.
What we have heard and seen - reflections on 1 John 1:1-5.
If…then… - reflections on 1 John 1:6-10.
Light and darkness, love and hate - reflections on 1 John 2:1-14.
Pursue Hospitality - some thoughts on hospitality as a concept and practice
Eyes on the Prize - reflections on 1 John 2:15-27
Inclusion and Exclusion, Baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and excommunication - reflections on all those topics in conversation with each other.
T-Shirts, redux. - The Let’s Eat Together t-shirts
Those born of God, act like their Father - reflections on 1 John 2:28-3:10
2023: A Year in Review - what it sounds like.
Unhomeness - travelling home, in conversation with James K.A. Smith and Augustine
Am I my brother’s keeper? - reflections on 1 John 3:9-24
The best version of yourself - the concept of arete
The ones that didn’t make it - the problem of unanswered prayer and long-term suffering.
