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Andrew Atherstone’s new publication, “Draw Near With Faith”: Invitations to Holy Communion, is out now with Grove Books. I asked him why we need the booklet, and what questions it is trying to answer. IP: What gave you the original idea for this booklet? AA: Almost all my writing begins as a personal question, on … Continue Reading
Graham Hunter writes: I have spent a good deal of time in recent years reflecting on questions of personality, role and my impact on others in my work as a Vicar in an inner-city east London parish. In my early years in ministry, if anything was going wrong, or was troublesome and challenging, I would … Continue Reading
Ian Silk has written a Grove booklet on the vital subject of encouragement. I interviewed him about it, and include the video below. Here is the start of the chapter of the booklet, to give you a flavour. You can buy from the Grove website here. What is encouragement in common experience, and where is … Continue Reading
Individual instruments playing on their own sound good—but there is nothing quite like the sound of a full orchestra to engage us. The same is true for our life as the church of God. Why would we keep young people in their own groups when we are intended to play together? In this interview, Gareth … Continue Reading
Andy Griffiths has recently written a fascinating Grove booklet on The Hope of Seeing God: The Beatific Vision and Formation. Rather than look at the past of our creation, or the present of the work of the Spirit in effective transformation as disciples of Jesus, is raises the question of whether we should think more … Continue Reading
In 2017, I was invited to a church in Hull to do a morning’s teaching giving an overview of what the Bible said about sex. It was fascinating to have to offer such an overview—not least because it made me realise how important this is, and how rarely it is done. I turned this into … Continue Reading
The latest Grove Biblical booklet is Death and ‘Hell’ by Paul Marston, and addressed the burning question (!) of what happens when we die, and the nature of death and hell. He begins by exploring why this is such an important question, theologically and pastorally. This booklet considers two distinct questions: (i) what happens immediately after … Continue Reading
Sean Cathie has just written an important Grove booklet on The Clergy’s Experience of Pastoral Care in the Grove Pastoral series. I have become acutely aware of the importance of this issue from travelling and speaking to clergy, and from my work on General Synod and the Archbishops’ Council. One of the factors has been the … Continue Reading
I write a quarterly column for Preach magazine, in which I explore a significant word or phrase in the Bible, or a theme or section of Scripture, and the ideas that it expresses. At the end of this piece I list the previous articles I have written for them. Here I explore what Scripture says … Continue Reading
The Sunday lectionary reading for Trinity 14 in this Year B is Mark 7.1–8, 14–15, 21–23 (this reading was taking at Trinity 13 three years ago). We have chewed over the feeding of the 5,000 in John 6, and gathered up every last morsel of the ‘bread of life’ discourse over the last five (five!) … Continue Reading
Where is the world heading? How will it all end? Are we in the ‘end times’? Will there be a ‘secret rapture’? What is the ‘millennium’? These are questions which we find asked often in the modern world, and many claim that we are in unique times when these questions are singularly appropriate. But you … Continue Reading
Ian Paul: theologian, author, speaker, academic consultant. Associate Senior Research Fellow, Kirby Laing Centre for Public Theology; Associate Minister, St Nic's, Nottingham; Managing Editor, Grove Books; member of General Synod and Archbishops' Council. Mac user; chocoholic. Tweets at @psephizo
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Gospel commentary index Lectionary Year A
Andrew Goddard Bible biblical interpretation Biblical literacy biblical theology Christmas Church of England culture discipleship discussion doctrine eschatology evangelism gay General Synod Grove guest Hermeneutics History hope interpretation James Blandford Baker Jesus John's gospel Justin Welby leadership lectionary Luke Luke's gospel Matthew ministry mission New Testament Paul politics power preaching Revelation same sex unions sexuality Teaching theology video Year B Year C
