The Incongruent Believer

A favourite singer/comedian/preacher of mine is a lady by the name of Vickie Winans. This soulful, beautiful African-American lady stole my heart way back in 2001 when I first saw her music video, As Long as I got King Jesus , and since then I have been a big fan of hers. Referring to her songs and preaching often in my own sermons or anecdotes. One particular teaching of hers is when she talks about her own upbringing in a large, poor family and then that of her experience of being a parents with her own children. She talks of the need for discipline, particularly among children in areas where there is so much temptation towards drugs, violence, crime, gangs, and more often a combination of all four. Her philosophy is simple, and her expression -  little graphic but one has to temper this by remembering who she is, where she is from, and the culture in which she exists - is that someone has to discipline the children, to paraphrase slightly, 'They either get beat at home, beat b...

Last week saw the passing-on of two sporting greats Eric Bristow from the world of darts and Ray Wilkins from football (or soccer if you are reading this on the other side of the Atlantic). These sad events, not least of which because of the relatively young age of both men, created quite an impact amongst pundits and sportsmen, both current and previous. I myself heard of Eric's passing whilst watching darts, the two men on the ocke (Daryl "Superchin" Gurney and Peter "Snakebite" Wright) struggling to maintain their composure as the news was announced live to a shocked crowd of some 5,000 spectators. I was also shocked, but not by this but of another event, or should I say non-event!! Last week, Wednesday 4th April, marked the 50th Anniversary of one of the greatest human beings ever to walk the face of the earth, ever to grace the pulpit with their presence; Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Junior. His name alone is something extraordinary; he was an Bapti...

Tonight is the unification fight for the WBO, WBA and IBF heavyweight title fight between Anthony Joshua and Joseph Parker, and I, for one, will be glued to the TV! I have watched boxing most of my life, one of my earliest memories was watching "Smokin' Joe" Frazier defeat Muhammud Ali on a black and white portable TV in the kitchenette of my foster parents home. It was March, 8th 1971 and back then I was glued to the TV, my "Uncle" Ted was a huge boxing fan and had introduced me to the Art of pugilism from a very young age. Even back then there were a number of titles available; the WBC and the WBA, this was in spite of a rationalisation of the IBU, NYCA and NBA into the World Boxing Council (the WBA). These were joined in 1983 by the IBF and in 1989 by the WBO. There has only been one period - between 1885 and 1919 - when there was only one unified title, last held by Jack Dempsey. To me it seems totally ridiculous, putting the two darts titles BDO and PDC i...

Have you heard of Puddles the clown? He caused a sensation on America's Got Talent with his rendition of the song, "Chandelier" made popular by the zany Sia from Australia. If not, clink on the photo below to sample the brilliance of this odd, somewhat scary looking character. I have fallen in love with his eclectic arrangement of old and new songs and enjoy watching Puddles on YouTube. When getting in the shower today I selected a Puddles play-list for company, however, the listening experience was missing something. It was then I realised that Puddles, whilst having the most amazing voice, was a visual artist. To enjoy his act one had to watch as well as listen! This sparked a lengthy meditation on faith, that faith isn't about what you read in the Bible or what you do at church, it's about experience! What do I mean by experience? Well an old friend of mine Ron Achterkirch, from Minnesota told me once the Christianity was not about religion, but about a...

Because of the volunteer youth work I used to do and did for nearly a decade between 2000 and 20109, I have had the pleasure of working with dozens of young people who are devoted to their faith. Seen them develop as individuals and make a positive contribution to the church and their community, the world being a much better place with them in it. However, I was puzzled for some time by the behaviour of some of the young women I knew/know and their approach to the world. I'm not going to mention names, but these young women seemed devoted beyond question to their faith, active and committed to the church, with their personal lives seemingly fitting around the expression of their dedication and commitment. I found it quite odd that these young women choose to associate with much older, single or widowed women, rather than there peers. No love interests, no partying, hardly any secular activity at all apart from that required of the faith that they expressed. I guess because of my s...

I heard on the radio today that Sir Roger Bannister, the first person to run a sub-four minute mile, died yesterday, the various presenters referring to this as "sad news." This struck me in a couple of ways, the first being was it sad news for that presenter, were they referring to the probable sadness being experienced by Sir Roger's family, or perhaps they were assuming that all their listeners and perhaps the entire country would be sad because we had lost such an iconic and history making athlete? But what would Sir Roger make of this, he may have pointed to that time in 1954 whilst studying at Oxford, when he reached the pinnacle of his athletic achievement watched by the young Norris McWhirter (the co-author of the Guiness Book of Records) as an exciting an event, but not something that defined his life. Roger received the full benefit of the education afforded by coming from a comfortable-off middle-class family and after studying at Oxford he went on to become a...

.....shame the devil! I heard this phrase in the most unlikely of places; TalkSport Radio. The presenters were discussing the abuse of a teenage referee by the parents of two of the players in an Under-10's match. We don't often hear about the importance of truth in our society; it seems we are intent on saying anything or doing anything to either gain some advantage, to look 'cool', to be seen to be politically correct, or to support the interests of those in our inner circle - partisans aren't limited to military conflicts! Whilst there are a number of claims to the origins of this phrase, it appears in Shakespeare's Henry IV Part 1 when Hotspur exclaims:  "And I can teach thee, coz, to shame the devil By telling truth: tell truth and shame the devil. If thou have power to raise him, bring him hither, And I'll be sworn I have power to shame him hence. O, while you live, tell truth and shame the devil!" Humanist would argue, ...