Tag: Family

The Theologian Drawing Daisies

Last Sunday, our church met together with ten of our sister churches for a combined service. Individually, our churches are small and spread out in local communities across two counties, but once every two years we all come together and it’s glorious. The singing. The shared fellowship, and vision. The friends we haven’t seen in a long time. It’s good to remember that we’re in this together. 

One of the illustrations in the sermon was about how, in Christ, God’s children don’t need to wonder about his love for us, like someone pulling petals from a daisy saying, “he loves me, he loves me not”. In Christ, we are secure, and every petal is, “he loves me”. Isn’t that wonderful? As I listened, I noticed a friend of mine a couple rows up doing something I’ve never seen him do before. Kevin is a leader in his local church, and a careful theologian. He teaches for our local Bible college, and is currently finishing up his doctoral thesis on the work of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. Yet there he was, drawing daisies on a sheet of paper. Petals, leaves, stems—and big, happy smiles. 

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If God Meant Everybody, why did he say Neighbour?

In Leviticus 19:18, God commands his people to “love your neighbour as yourself”. Jesus called this the second greatest commandment, after loving God himself (Mark 12:28-31). When a religious leader asked him to clarify, “who is my neighbour?” Jesus used the parable of the Good Samaritan to illustrate that your “neighbour” could be anybody—even strangers, foreigners, and natural enemies.

This raises a question: if God meant for us to love everyone, why didn’t he say that in the first place? He could have commanded us to “love everyone as you love yourself”, which would seem clearer and more to the point. Doesn’t the word “neighbour” lend itself to definitions that are narrower than God intended? In fact, we have Biblical proof of just such a misunderstanding in Matthew 5:43, where Jesus refers to a saying that seems to have been popular at the time, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’” Jesus rejects this saying and turns it around, commanding us to “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 4:44-45). That’s a good correction, but couldn’t the confusion have been avoided if God had simply said “everybody” in the first place?

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A Puddle of Pure Joy

It was a hot day in the High Tetras of Slovakia, last summer. We were on holiday in a town with a water park, so we decided to cool off there. As we walked in, we were impressed with the extent of the place—the large indoor pools came first, then multiple outdoor pools, a lazy river, creative water features, and slides of all sizes twisting off in all directions. Someone had obviously put a lot of thought and effort into collecting and channelling water in the most delightful ways possible. It worked. We had a great day. And out of all the slides and waterfalls and all the fun we had and saw others having, there was one moment that stands out as the purest, most transparent joy I saw that day.

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You’re a Popsicle (a poem)

This one goes out to my wife, Jessica

You’re a popsicle in the summer
you’re a water bottle for a runner
you’re the golden hour and the
April shower that grows the flowers in May

You’re the leafy tree that I run to for shelter
and I’m laughing too much—
you’re the words I can’t say

The invisible prism that
doubles the rainbow is you
the key to my door you’re my fire, my home
and my favourite place in this marvellous world

is just you

A Personal Update

This is the time of year when we all have to get used to writing 2026 on things instead of 2025. In doing so, we’re reminded again of the passing of time. It’s a funny thing, time—it can feel so different from different angles, like trying to read a book through a glass of water when it’s all distorted and warped, too condensed in some places and too drawn out in others. It seems to me that time is usually moving too fast, and too slowly, all at once. 

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Learning by Experience

The moment I met our first child, everything changed. It happened as quickly as a heart can beat, with a force that took my breath away—my eyes and my heart were suddenly opened to understand love in an entirely new way. I had heard about the love of parents for their children. I had experienced it from the other end, as the child of truly wonderful parents. But none of this prepared me for how it feels when your hearts bursts with absolute, unconditional, unfathomable love for a human you don’t even know, who can’t respond, and whose needs never seem to end—and none of that matters at all. 

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Some Of Our Favourite Teen Fiction Books

A friend asked our family recently for recommendations for their teenage daughter, who’s an avid reader. She knew that our children are voracious readers, as well. The trouble with teenage bookworms is how quickly they devour books, and the trouble with the modern world is that so many of the books currently being written and marketed for teens are rubbish. As we compiled a list of some of our family favourites to share with our friends, we thought there might be other families that could benefit, as well. Our teens are still moving through books fast, so we’d love to hear any recommendations you have—if you leave them in the comments, we’d be grateful!

I’ve posted previously about some of our favourite children’s picture books, as well as some recommendations for older children.

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The Never-Ending Novelty Of Staying With The Same Person

Love songs will never go out of fashion. But have you noticed that most love songs are limited to the very first stages of love? They’re almost always about two specific topics: either the excitement of meeting someone new, or the sadness of breaking up. It’s rare to hear love songs that focus on love in the decades after the “I do’s”. They’re out there, certainly, but they don’t make the top twenty lists.

It makes sense—by sheer numbers, there are a lot more relationships that start and end than relationships that go the distance. Perhaps the excitement of meeting someone new seems more interesting than the settled daily living of established relationships. There’s an appearance of novelty to it, except that when every song on the radio is about the same kind of novelty it doesn’t quite feel as novel anymore, does it?

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