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How to be human in a cost of living crisis
Today, with yet another crisis flooding our newsfeeds, as inflation soars and the cost of living ever-increases, we are once again seeing the poor disproportionately affected. Many of us are feeling the squeeze, reigning in our spending, forgoing luxuries and thinking twice about a longer car…
Jo Frost
Talking Jesus: The growing number of Christians of colour
The sample of over 900 practicing Christians is a microcosm which reflects the national picture and reflects patterns found in other research too. In 2012, almost half of all the worshippers in inner London were black, at 48 per cent. In 2017, non-white churchgoers formed a quarter, 26 per cent, of…
Rev Dr Israel Oluwole Olofinjana
Dance Fever and the freedom fallacy
The meanings of Florence’s songs on the album are hard to pin down, allowing her to explore freedom and death without being pinned down to one meaning. But there is a popular and enduring cultural idea underpinning her body of work: freedom is living your fullest life of self-expression,…
Helen Locke
Time to leave the culture wars behind
Context Fifty years ago, the US Supreme Court in Roe v Wade interpreted the constitution so as to introduce a right to abortion by extending the right to privacy. Last week, a majority opinion in a case called Dobbs v Jackson led to Roe being overturned. The result means that responsibility for…
Dawn McAvoy
Intercession is not complicated
So often we can be praying for something without really believing that the Lord can change the circumstances dramatically. We can easily give up praying because we feel weary, believe it’s never going to happen or even stop caring. Moody loved his friends so much that he kept on praying again and…
Gavin Calver
Why I'm celebrating International Friendship Day
Have you ever wondered what makes friendship so wonderful? The power of friendship is atomic. We were created to connect, crafted for community, designed with unity in mind. When God created the cosmos and its custodians, eight times He declared that “it is good.” The first thing that He finds to…
Phil Knox
Five ways to befriend people beyond your church walls
This was brand new territory for me. I didn’t know anyone and I couldn’t see how to quickly build friendships. A few other things happened that caused the little time I did have to get squeezed, to the point where building meaningful friendships, though desirable, seemed impossible. Whenever I did…
Mark Greenwood
Five ways to help young people deepen their faith
Young people are in a season of life where they are in more places and with more people of diverse thinking and opinions than ever before, which also means that they are more likely to engage with Christians and Christian groups. That means that young people are influenced by us – what we do…
Bethan Newman
The voice of tomorrow’s church today
Here, Jesus-followers of all ethnicities don’t have to ‘fit in’ and leave their heritage at the door. This is a space where they know they are “no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people” (Ephesians 2:19). They are accepted as equals (Galatians 3:28). In such worship,…
Ian Collinge
“COL”: now a universal acronym
UK inflation rates have hit levels we haven’t seen in 30 years, eye watering energy prices are predicted to rise again, and Northern Ireland tops the list of areas in the UK where the percentage of households is predicted to fall into fuel poverty by a whopping 76.3% by January 2023. The…
Danielle McElhinney
How could employment law changes affect your church?
On 20 July, the supreme court reached a verdict that fundamentally changes the way part-year and zero hour employees receive holidays. Holiday pay for people who don’t work a set pattern has often been a tricky issue. Most employers have used a method called the ‘conformity principle’, which is…
Rob and Nicci Birley
Book a Talking Jesus workshop
Have you read the Talking Jesus report yet? It’s part of a six-way partnership aiming to map the UK landscape in terms of evangelism by finding out: non-Christians’ perceptions of both the church and Christians; how Christians feel about sharing faith; and how effectively the church is making Jesus…
Equipped to live for Jesus at work
Living for Jesus at work, a new resource suite from the Evangelical Alliance and the Lawyers’ Christian Fellowship, seeks to equip Christians in this task. From factory workers to corporate lawyers, from paramedics to pharmacists, Christians have opportunities to speak Jesus into their world of…
Danny Webster
Joy comes in the morning
At another time, we prayed for the British royal family in their time of sorrow and mourning, asking that God might strengthen them. Rich or poor, influential or unknown, part of our human existence is that we all face mourning and sorrow. Nobody escapes tears, pain and a deep sense of loss. When I…
I’m a child of God
I’m fortunate enough to say that so far in my life I’ve never had a serious run in with poor mental health, but low level, bubbling anxiety has been a fairly familiar companion since I was a teenager, along with occasional visits from panic attacks and what I call “sad days”. After a few trickier…
Jo Evans
