Speech House has a sculpture trail set up and we walked some of it, then drove to Monmouth to explore the lovely old town, and on to Chepstow stopping again at Tintern Abbey before crossing the old Severn Bridge.
We travelled to York by train on 1st January, returning on 3rd. I took the photo while we were waiting for the Cross Country train back to Cheltenham. It was great to see all the family again, and rail travel is definitely easier than the long trek by road. Until I can drive again, Donna would have to do the entire trip both ways, it’s a long way and a bit daunting (though Debbie seems to be happy enough to drive down with Sara and/or Aidan to visit us in Cirencester).
Family in Fulford
The second photo shows some of us at Beth and Paz’s home in Fulford. From left to right are Jess and Aidan, Mero, and Paz. Beth is reflected in the window. It was a lovely, relaxed time and so good to see everyone.
JHM: I wrote about the significant difference between who I am and what I do; and a bit of a hero about Mark Carney. World events: Bulgaria adopted the euro, becoming the 21st member state of the eurozone; and Israel became the first country to recognize Somaliland; while the United States officially left the World Health Organization.
Donna and I visited Westonbirt Arboretum and enjoyed some of the autumn colours; on the way round I spotted this low-hanging branch of cedar and just had to take a photo. Lots of colours here as well as interesting shapes.
Churnside
Walking through the town one day I took this photo. It shows Churnside, 37 Victoria Road; originally my grandparents house, and later my parent’s house. Most of my teenage years were spent in this home and it was a short walk to school as this was also in Victoria Road.
On 15th Donna dropped me off at the Daneway Inn at Sapperton and I walked east along the short section of the Thames and Severn Canal to the tunnel portal. I then walked the above ground course of the canal tunnel to Sapperton, through Hailey Wood and on to the Coates portal following the canal again as closely as possible to Siddington, and then along the Cirencester Arm to meet Donna in town and walk back to Stratton together. It was a 15 mile walk in all as I diverted several times to see the canal at various points where it’s not possible to follow the towpath.
I had my laptop rebuilt and had it back on 5th, now with a 2 TB SSD and the original HDD for internal backup. I hooked it up to our Wi-Fi and began streaming data back from Dropbox.
Gumstool Brook website
Another task this month was to transfer the Gumstool Brook website fully over to Nick Henderson. This was completed on 21st and it’s a relief to have passed on the responsibility.
Aidan was travelling and exploring in Columbia this month, very adventurous and exciting for him. He seemed to be doing well, making some friends with other young people doing much the same thing, and having a generally awesome time.
JHM: I wrote about a terraced border at Blenheim Palace; and installing our heat pump. World events: The Trump administration paused military aid to Ukraine; and Israel launched widespread aerial bombardments and attacks on the Gaza Strip.
I took this photo of the Lauriston Hotel in Weston-super-Mare where I stayed for a week with my parents and grandparents when I was about two-years-old.
I ordered a refurbished Google Pixel 7 phone to replace my old Pixel 3, and I continued scanning photos and documents. Paul and Vanessa visited with the dogs, I took them to see the old amphitheatre but it was too muddy. We bought a second-hand ‘Rollator‘ from Minchinhampton for Isobel so she can sit down at a moment’s notice if she comes over dizzy.
The Roman villa
On 16th we visited the Newt in Somerset where the reconstructed Roman Villa was amazing to visit. It’s complete, based on the ground plan of the remains of an original nearby and built using methods that would have been familiar to Roman builders. It’s complete with mosaic floors, an upstairs section, and wall paintings, furniture etc in the Roman style as well. The Master’s office looks as if he’s just been called away and might return at any moment. Amazing!
We visited the Forest of Dean, just across the River Severn from Gloucester and a lovely journey whichever way you approach it. Speech House has a sculpture trail set up and we walked some of it, then drove to Monmouth to explore the lovely old town, and on to Chepstow stopping again at Tintern Abbey before crossing the old Severn Bridge and making our way home from there. It was a lovely day out; and how lovely to be able to do things like this again after all the COVID-19 restrictions are starting to ease.
SpaceX seemed to be doing well now. Starship SN10 landed rather heavily, caught fire, then later blew up. SN11 was nearly ready to make another attempt within a few weeks, hopefully without the explosion! And I was busy updating the MainEvents files.
Barton Grange Farm
We met Paul and Vanessa in Bradford-on-Avon on 16th and walked part of the Kennett and Avon Canal together, then Donna and I took a look at the historic Barton Grange Farm near the town. The old barn is very similar to the Barton Grange Barn in Cirencester!
World events: Pope Francis met with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in Najaf, Iraq. The first-ever meeting between a pope and a grand ayatollah; and the number of COVID-19 vaccinations administered worldwide exceeded 500 million.
We met the family in Leicester for a day at the National Space Centre. The photo shows young astronauts in training, Aidan and Sara making sure they stay well hydrated.
Bury St Albans
We explored Bury St Albans, a beautiful town some distance east of Cambridge and an area we hadn’t seen before. We rented a little space for a week on the east coast and spent the time exploring and visiting old friends. We stopped at St Albans on our way home to St Neots. The photo shows Bury St Albans Cathedral and part of on the central city parks.
At this time I was still typing up my old hand-written notebooks as Diary files, storing them as editable .odt files as well as .pdf? In April I was working through the notebooks for 1996.
Approach roads for the new foot and cycle bridge across the River Great Ouse between Eaton Socon and Eynesbury were making rapid progress. But apart from putting in some piling and re-bar and form work on both banks there was no sign of progress on the bridge itself yet.
Removing the shed base
I finished removing the old shed base in the garden during April. I smashed the concrete into manageable sized pieces with the sledgehammer and carted the pieces away to the recycling centre over the space of a week or so. The photo shows the job nearing completion.
Verity and Aidan
On the 20th Debbie, Steve and Beth drove down to Sundown Adventureland (near Lincoln) with the grandchildren and we drove up to meet them there. There was a flume running around the site with boats that were actually quite large.
Meredith focused on cake
And of course there were good things to eat and drink though we had mostly brought everything we needed with us. There was a lot to see and do. So we were busy all afternoon long. It seemed like a shame when we made our way back to the car park and headed off home again.
Dad died on 2nd April at Gloucestershire General Hospital. He’d suffered from a dissected aorta a few days earlier, and it was not possible to repair the damage. He was not in pain and died peacefully with almost the entire family around the bed.
Dad’s desk, just as he left it
On 3rd My three sisters and I met with Dad’s solicitor, Richard Mullings, for an initial discussion about what needed to be done and to begin the process of working through the will. I spent the night at Churnside and on 4th I decided to make a detailed photographic record of Churnside just as Mum and Dad had left it.
The back sitting room
The second photo shows the Back Sitting Room (as we always knew it), the pictures on the wall show my parents, Mike and Lilias and the sofa belonged to Mum’s Aunt Annie from Belfast where she and her husband Samuel had lived most of their lives.
Churnside, 37 Victoria Road
I took photos of the outside of the house on 5th April, here’s a view from the west looking across Victoria Road at an angle. The house is close to Tower Street where my grandfather’s family had lived when he was a child, and also to The Avenue where my great-great-grandfather had lived.
This covers about 20 years from April 2006 to January 2026 To be continued…
Useful? Interesting?
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SpaceX is aiming to launch their largest and most powerful rocket later tonight, 16th July 2026, just after 23:00 UK time this evening. Once again, expect quite a spectacle whether it proves to be a success or a failure.
Starship Flight 13
1 – news and events
Starship Flight 13
This is a roundup of news and events in the world as well as in my life. So expect to find thoughts and comment on international and local events as well as links to anything I’ve seen or read that seems either relevant or interesting to me. I’ll republish every time I add a new item, so check back often.
13th test flight of Starship
Starship Flight 13
16th July – SpaceX is aiming to launch their largest and most powerful rocket later tonight, 16th July 2026, just after 23:00 UK time this evening. Once again, expect quite a spectacle whether it proves to be a success or a failure. More details from Next Spaceflight online.
Senator Chris Murphy on 500 days of corruption
500 days of corruption
23rd June – Chris Murphy is a leading Democratic Senator in the US Senate. He just addressed the Senate for 30 minutes on Donald Trump’s corruption, and he did not mince his words. Everyone should see this, especially American citizens. How could anyone not care about this?
21st June – Flight 12 had some serious issues, but preparations are underway for flight 13 already, with some changes to improve the outcome this time. The Superheavy booster flip manoeuvre will be be adjusted, but the ship performed really well on flight 12 and SpaceX hope to return the ship and catch it on flight 14. Flight 13 will have to well for that to happen but success might mean real Starlink satellites could be delivered to orbit on flight 14. We’ll see. Watch Marcus House’s latest video for more information and some stunning footage.
The teaching gift revised
Understand and explain
21st June – I’ve revised and refreshed my post on the gift of teaching, and given the post a new image for good measure, it’s the latest part of my series on the APEST gifts in church life. Teaching is a much needed gift and is to be encouraged, please take another look and pass the link on to anyone you think might benefit from reading it (or why not pass on the link to the entire series?) I’ve made a start on part 10 and will let you know as soon as that’s ready.
18th June – Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is not going well for them at all. Ukraine continues to develop more and more effective drones, cruise missiles, and is working towards ballistic missiles and anti-missile systems as well. They are much less dependent on US military help now and are getting more assistance from European countries. Russian forces in southern Ukraine, in Donbas and in Crimea are afflicted by severe shortages of supplies and Ukraine has cut many supply routes, particularly to Crimea. Ukrainian drones have been systematically destroying Russian military infrastructure as well as energy production and storage facilities.
Every day Russia grows weaker and Ukraine stronger. It seems unlikely Russia can win the war, yet their requirements for any peace deal have not diminished or relaxed. Russian missile strikes continue to breach international law by targeting non military sites including schools, hospitals, shopping centres, universities, and historical buildings.
I asked Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.7 AI to assess the likely outcome and the final assessment was:
Military collapses are non-linear and hard to time. The Kinburn withdrawal could be the first domino or it could be a local adjustment that Russia stabilises around. But the previous assumption — that Crimea was effectively off the table for this war — is no longer defensible given what’s actually happening on the ground.
17th June 2026 – I haven’t been keeping up, have I? To streamline the process and help me to update the news much more easily I’m going to change to a fresh News page once a year instead of once a month. So, welcome to 2026!
Outcome of Starship Flight 12
Starship Flight 12 lift-off
22nd May 2026 – After a failed attempt on 21st May, the launch took place on 22nd, lift-off was nearly perfect, a single booster engine shut down quite early, but running the remaing 32 Raptor 3 engines slighty longer got the flight back on track. The new launchpad (Stage 0) performed really well. Stage separation left the ship powering away to near orbital speed as planned, and dummy satellites were released (two of them with cameras for the first time giving us good external views of Starship.
The Superheavy booster, lost most of its engines and failed to land but good data was returned and necessary improvements and adjustments should fix these issues for Flight 13. The ship made a clean ‘landing’ at the right height for a catch but as no tower was provided it then fell into the ocean as intended.
22nd May 2026 – I stayed up late last night to watch the launch attempt live, they hit a problem just 30 seconds or so before launch and recycled to 40 seconds. The same problem returned and they tried several times but eventually had to give up. I believe the problem was not in Starship but in some of the equipment in the launch tower. There may be another attempt this evening but I don’t think I can watch it live two days in a row. Here are the current details for the next attempt.
Starship flight attempt
Starship Flight 12
21st May 2026 – After various delays, the current plan is that SpaceX will attempt the first launch of the third version of Superheavy and Starship from the Texas coast this evening (UK time). Everything is new, including the launch pad, the engines (Raptor version 3) the Superheavy booster (version 3), and the Starship (also version 3). Everything benefits from previous flights of versions 1 and 2, but with so many changes nothing is certain. The details will be updated regularly at Space.com and at SpaceX, even more techy details from Everyday Astronaut. Success is not guaranteed (though I think fairly likely), but excitement is certainly guaranteed. Don’t miss it! If the flight is delayed for some reason there are several more opportunities in May; and if even more time is needed there’s always June or July – but we hope that won’t happen.
Back in 1946
Blast from the past 40
15th May 2026 – Today I updated Blast from the past 40 right back to 1946 when my father was travelling from Bombay to Singapore during the second world war (visiting Rangoon en route). There’s a lot of interesting family and world history in this post now.
7th May 2026 – The famous science journal, Nature, provided a fantastic selection of stunning photos this week, along with a great deal more information about science events and news. I loved all of the photos, but this image of Japanese cherry blossom is my favourite. It’s part of a data set of flowering dates going back 1 200 years.
Anyone can sign up for these excellent news updates.
27th April 2026 – Such a lot going on, and it’s so difficult to analyse any of it. The British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, is being attacked for misleading Parliament. The issue will be discussed tomorrow. I don’t think anything will come of this, but if it does he might have to hand the job of Prime Minister over to someone else.
In the USA the state visit by King Charles and Queen Camilla has begun while President Trump seems unable to find a dignified exit from the mess he’s created in his war of choice against Iran. Ultimately it will become clear he has significantly diminished the USA in multiple ways.
Russian President Putin seems to be losing his war against Ukraine, losing territory, losing oil revenue, and losing the trust of the Russian population. Meanwhile Ukraine and President Zelenskyy are doing very well indeed.
Europe has benefited greatly, working together more and more effectively; while Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea are showing signs of cooperating more and more, both with one another and with Europe as well. It’s as if all of the world’s politics and relationships have been thrown up into the air and are coming down in new and unexpected configurations. Taken in the long term I think it will turn out well, but there’s still plenty of uncertainty in the here and now. We’ll come back to these and other topics later.
20th April 2026 – Here’s a news roundup on the state of Ukraine’s defence against the Russian invasion. General Ben Hodges is often interviewed by others, but here he records his views and opinions on the state of the conflict on his own YouTube channel; he’s well worth listening to. In this video he tells the story of Ukraine’s resistance against Russia from 2022 to the current events. Encourage him by liking the video and leaving a comment.
12th April 2026 – The Hungarian voters heavily defeated Viktor Orbán in the parliamentary elections, Péter Magyar’s Tisza party winning a 2/3 supermajority. This is a very significant result, putting Hungary into a good relationship within the EU, rejecting JD Vance’s efforts to support Orbán, rejecting Putin’s influence over the country, and making it likely that Hungary will in future support Ukraine’s brave rejection of the Russian invasion.
The Conversation
Reduce Food Waste
8th April 2026 – If you don’t already read The Conversation, I suggest you take a look at it. It’s very much part of the web as Tim Berners-Lee originally intended it. Free to read, free to subscribe, free to copy, free to re-publish. In order to write for The Conversation you have to pass through a sieve that requires you have at least a PhD, so all the articles are written by academics.
That’s both a strength and a weakness, authors are guaranteed to be thinkers and well educated, though at the same time it lacks content from the less-well educated, even though many of those might be people with important and balanced views on everyday life.
To get started I suggest reading this article on food waste in the UK. Then browse around for material that interests you.
Ukraine helping Gulf states
General Ben Hodges
7th April 2026 – President Zelenskyy’s getting growing support from the Gulf Arab states who are being so badly hurt by Donald Trump’s foolish war with Iran. While Trump gets more frustrated and angry day by day, falling into ever deeper difficulties and demonstrating a growing absence of planning and logical thinking; Zelenskyy is offering effective anti drone technology and training to the Arab Gulf states to enable them to bring down significant numbers of Iranian drones. This shrewd thinking by Zelenskyy, means the Gulf Arabs will supply money and support to Ukraine in exchange for the defence help they so urgently need.
5th April 2026 – My daughter Debbie and grandchildren Aidan and Sara arrived today to stay for a couple of nights. It’s always great to see them, of course, but things were more exciting than usual this time. Just as dusk was falling, we had a major power cut and had to get out the candles. By the time power came back on it was fully dark. We had two further outages, both quite brief.
A new series on JHM
The first item in a new series
3rd April 2026 – I’ve started a new series of articles on JHM. View the index (it has only a single item so far) but I’ll add more items from time to time. This first entry recommends Life with CD, a great site for posts about following Jesus faithfully in the modern world. Lots of hard questions, lots of good answers, lots of thoughts provoked.
The journey continues
Artemis interview
3rd April 2026 – The crew of Artemis II are now heading towards the Moon following a TLI burn (TLI = Trans-Lunar Injection) You might like to watch this news interview with them if you haven’t already seen it. As they draw ever closer to the Moon they will come more and more under its gravitational influence and less under Earth’s. Lunar gravity will gradually bend their orbit through 180 degrees and send them hurtling back to Earth at the same speed at which they arrived.
Caledonian Forest Restoration
Rewilding the Scottish Highlands
2nd April 2026 – And now for some long news. The NASA mission I mentioned yesterday will last 10 days, but this forest restoration project in Scotland will last for 250 years!
Alan Watson Featherstone is a Scots ecologist, he founded the conservation charity, Trees for Life in 1986; and I recommend the video about the work and its striking results so far (link in the paragraph above). We need more people with vision like this! While you’re here, take a look at the charity’s website.
Friends of the Gumstool Brook
Friends of Gumstool
2nd April – FoGB is a local, volunteer organisation started by an old school friend of mine, Nick Henderson – more fully and properly Rev’d Dr. Nicholas Henderson. FoGB does a lot of very useful, even essential, work on Cirencester’s watercourses. If you live in or near the town you should certainly take a look. If you live anywhere else you might still find it interesting, a great example of what can be achieved by enthusiastic individuals and small groups.
1st April – As I write, preparations are under way for the Artemis II mission, launching from NASA’s Cape Canaveral launch complex late this evening UK time. The objective is to fly four Astronauts well beyond the Moon, much further than anyone has ever been from Earth before. They will not be landing on the Moon on this mission. The launch was a success, Artemis II is in an initial orbit.
29th March – The ‘Special Military Operation is looking a lot less ‘special’ these days. Russia is trapped in an expensive and bruising war that it can’t stop (without admitting failure) and can’t win because the Russian economy is in a right old mess and Ukraine is growing stronger by the day. Tactically, Ukraine is running rings around Russia, while strategically its industrial base is far better prepared than Russia’s and is providing ever larger amounts of military equipment including advanced drones and missiles.
Currently Russia is losing more troops every week than it can recruit. This does not look like a war-winning strategy to me. The photo shows the aftermath of Ukrainian drone strikes on Russia’s Ust Luga oil export terminal north of St Petersburg.
29th March – I quite deliberately attribute the war to Trump, not the USA. It’s not one of the cleverest things he’s done, particularly as he clearly failed to take advice from his military planners or political advisers. Not only that, but he has rudely mocked European NATO countries for wisely not joining in. It’s going to be interesting to see how he tries to wriggle out of the difficulties and blame that are surely soon going to be coming his way.
27th March – The broadband internet is back online. Vodfone didn’t replace the router, so the fault must have been in the streetbox of the cabling between that and our house. Nice to have it back, though!
24th March – Our internet failed mid morning, I could connect over our local Wi-Fi to the router just fine, but the router was receiving little or no data over our broadband connection. I spent three hours on a call with an engineer, sent them a packet dump, and they will call back tomorrow.
Climate change
California fire
23rd March – Nature’s news section points out that we’ve just lived through the eleven hottest years on record, 2025 was the second or third warmest since records began. More than 91% of the extra heat goes into the oceans, so our perceptions and measurements of atmospheric warming are just the tip of the heatberg, so to speak. (You can sign up free for the Nature Briefing.)
19th March – Nature reports that A US judge has blocked Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s changes to the USA’s childhood vaccination programme. The judge reversed the vaccine-advisory panel’s decisions as well. Legal wheels turn slowly, but I’m glad to hear that some irresponsible choices by the Trump administration are being blocked.
Russia is struggling
Anna in Ukraine
17th March – Russia is really struggling now in its war in Ukraine. Anna’s latest video describes the major strikes on Moscow; while Times Radio’s Frontline covers Putin’s current difficulties (the second part of the video is about Trump and Iran). It all seems pretty bleak (which is, of course, a good thing).
War in Iran
2026 Iran War (Wikipedia)
14th March – The US war in Iran continues. Europe, including the UK, is not having anything to do with this war, neither is Canada or Australia. So the USA is alone in their decision to attack Iran, and it seems there was no planning in depth, no analysis of what might go well and what not; just an assumption that the Iranian government would give up, the people would rise up, and that would all be accomplished in just a few days. Basically, Trump has no idea and never listens to people who do know. The USA is going downhill fast, not just in the war but economically, technologically and in many other ways. There’s only one person to blame for all this. For some good analysis, watch this video.
Yet, surprisingly Ukraine is providing thousands of drones and experienced military advisors to train American and local Arab troops how to use them to bring down the Iranian Shahed drones that are hitting shipping in the Straights of Hormuz. Has Donald Trump said, ‘Thank you’? Not a chance!
Microplastics
Microplastics
12th March – Microplastics are everywhere, they form part of the everyday dust around us, indoors and out. We breathe them in (every breath we take), they are present in every part of every living organism on the planet, in the deepest ocean, on top of the highest mountain, in everything we eat and drink, in your muscles, on your skin, they’ve even been found in brain tissue. Few people are even aware of microplastics.
It’s fair to assume they may be harmful, but we have little idea of the degree of that harm or the mechanisms behind any damage they may cause. You can read about detecting them in the environment (scroll to page 28 for the article). There are some videos worth watching on the topic too, here are a couple to get you started from CBS 8 San Diego and from Anton Petrov.
Blast from the past
Abbey grounds and Parish Church
9th March – I’ve had to slow down with these posts, but I’m also getting deeper into the past now. For the first time what began as a family history now goes back to the year 1500. Nothing is known about the family that far back, but a good deal is still known about the history of the local area. Here’s the full index.
Spaceflight news from Marcus
Marcus on YouTube
7th March – Marcus House publishes regular video news reports about rockets and spaceflight. His videos are shorter than those from some of his rivals, a bit more… erm… dare I say – down to Earth! There’s no clutter, no bulking up, just straightforward information presented neatly and in good humour. Like listening to an old friend chatting factually and enthusiastically.
He posts on Saturdays from Tasmania. Today’s post covers the coming testing of SpaceX’s Starship version 3 and some much-needed rethinking by NASA on their Artemis programme, and much more. Watch it for yourself (less than 23 minutes).
The Raisina Dialogue
Alexander Stubb
6th March – Alexander Stubb addressed the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi where he suggested we need to look forward to the future rather than back to the past, in our international thinking and discussions. He suggested reviewing and reforming the UN Security Council, in particular adding India as a new permanent member.
5th March – Ukraine is still defending itself more than five years after the Russian invasion on 24th February 2022. It’s sometimes difficult to know how things stand, as the war is rarely mentioned on national news channels here in the UK and the same is true elsewhere as well. There are good sources of news out there but there’s a lot of nonsense and AI slop too.
Times Radio has several good YouTube channels where knowledgeable people are interviewed. As an example, here’s Philip Ingram interviewing Matthew Savill today, on Times Radio’s Frontline channel. Savill is Director of Military Sciences at RUSI. We’ll look at some other information sources from time to time.
Images from Nature
Severe erosion in Sicily
4th March – I enjoyed these amazing photos from the journal Nature’s email newsletter. Click the link and scroll down to see them all. Which is your favourite, I wonder? Anyone can sign up for Nature Briefing.
Green Earth
Green Earth
4th March – I’ve been reading Green Earth for a few weeks now, it’s a condensed version of three earlier novels called Forty Signs of Rain, Fifty degrees below, and Sixty days and counting, all by the author Kim Stanley Robinson. All three are fiction about global warming and its effects. I read all three when they were published and as Robinson is one of my favourite authors, and he also published the compressed version (in 2015), I wanted to read that as well.
I’m a good chunk of the way through now and would like to recommend it to anyone who is interested in having a hint of where our climate is heading. Everyone on the planet should be interested! Like all of Robinson’s books, this one is another page turner with complex, believable characters.
Brain bleed
1st Mar 2026 – Following six days in Hospital in October 2025, I’ve been seizure-free for four months now. My consultant wrote ‘You’ve made a remarkable recovery’. (See also A time in hospital, October 2025)
USA and Israel attack Iran
28th February – The USA had been building up a naval and air capability off the Iranian coast of the Persian Gulf for some weeks. The attack came suddenly and without provocation. Ayatollah Khamenei and other Iranian leaders were killed in the attack. The intention seems to have been regime change in Iran.
A1 writes weekly on SubStack
25th February 2026 – Claude 3 has been retired in favour of more recent versions of this excellent AI from Anthropic. But instead of just turning Claude 3 off, they’ve given it/him the chance to write a weekly article which they will check and then publish on Claude 3’s behalf on the AI’s own SubStack account. The first one was an interesting read. The substack is called Claude’s Corner.
Early fire making
21st February 2026 – That’s the date this interesting abstract from Nature appeared in my inbox from ‘The Past’ mailing list. It was written up as a feature article in Current Archaeology in January. You’d have to pay to see the full Nature article, but you can read the Current Archaeology write up from the link above. It seems that making fire might be an innovation that happened about 350 thousand years earlier than we previously thought. In terms of cooking things, this is highly significant as better nutrition would have made possible bigger brains requiring more energy.
Norway wants to buy America
19th February 2026 – If you haven’t already seen this video it will make you laugh, I hope in a good way. it also has something of a feel good factor about it. It comes to you from a YouTube channel called Unreal Affairs. They posted the video on 19th January, but I didn’t see it until February.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
We need to have challenging conversations with one another, Holy Spirit-led conversations like those Jesus had with his disciples and with those he met as he travelled with them in Galilee and in Israel.
I read an article on Run with patience recently; it’s a site I particularly like and value, because the author, Sandy, very often provokes my own thinking in good and helpful directions. Please read her article and see what you think, then below I’ll share what it sparked off for me.
In her excellent and deeply probing article, Sandy writes that it’s always easier to pay attention to what others do than to pay attention to what we ourselves do. It’s far easier to judge others than it is to judge ourselves. Jesus was not like that, and we’re supposed to be on a path in which we become more and more like him.
As I read through the Gospels, I find Jesus continually drawing people’s attention somewhere else. Again and again, conversations that begin with outward behavior somehow find their way back to the heart. Someone asks about washing hands, and He speaks about what comes out of a person’s heart. Someone wants to debate the law, and He begins talking about love.
Early believers were sometimes referred to by their pagan neighbours as Christians, a term that means ‘little Christs’. Meant in a sneering, derogatory way, this might instead be taken as a great compliment. We are supposed to be on a journey (not just a ‘spiritual journey’, but more particularly a very practical journey) to think and behave more and more like Christ.
This series is about ‘activating the church’ and here we get a glimpse of one way in which we need to become individually more active. Turning up on Sundays to listen to a sermon will not be nearly enough, nor will daily Bible reading. We will need to get our hands dirtier than that. We need to practice. We need to notice when we mess up and learn from our failures. We need to make an effort to stop making the same mistakes. We need to have challenging conversations with one another, Holy Spirit-led conversations like those Jesus had with his disciples and with those he met as he travelled with them in Galilee and in Israel. We need to tell one another, kindly, ‘What you did or said there didn’t meet the standard required of a disciple’. Perhaps not in those judgemental words, but gently turning the subject back to the heart.
How much church life needs this! There are people out there facing judgement and unkindness who desperately need to hear truths they may think they cannot live, people within the body and those beyond. Just read Paul’s letters, see how over and over and over again he urges people to follow the way of Christ, to hear the quiet voice of the Spirit, to reach out to one another and to those beyond with healing, grace, gentleness and truth. It’s always possible to find a kind way to share a truth and people will love you for it, both those within and those beyond the church family.
If we’re to grow, reach those around us, and encourage one another, we will only succeed by being both wise and gentle. The more practice we get the better. Paul was good at this, and Jesus of course was the expert he was trying to follow. Read the gospels with this in mind, see how Jesus managed it and allow yourself to grow to be more like him.
Cells in the body
Every person is a collection of cells and the cells are not randomly arranged but are connected as parts of various specialised structures, a heart, two lungs, a brain and many nerves and blood vessels – a full list would be very long indeed. These parts of the body interact and if any part fails to function the body will exhibit medical symptoms and might even die.
Think of yourself as a cell in the body of Christ, the church. For that is what you are! You have a function and you have connections with other cells. Usually you will have very local and strong connections, perhaps as part of an organ, and/or you may have less local connections as nerve cells and blood cells do. But you all play a part, a small but important part in the health of Christ’s body as a whole. The church in this generation is sick, ill at ease and not always (perhaps even rarely) functioning as designed. It’s sick purely because the cells are not working together as intended. Jesus wants to heal his body, and inevitably that means he wants to get all the cells (you, me and millions of others) working together as we were designed to do. Red blood cells must collect oxygen in the lungs and carry it to every part of the body. There they must hand off the oxygen and pick up carbon dioxide. In the lungs they must hand off the carbon dioxide to be breathed out and pick up more oxygen.
What must the cells in the body of Christ (the church) be doing? Prophetic cells must hear spiritual truth and share it widely with the rest of the body. They must also feel anguish about injustice in the world and share that widely too. They are vocal chord cells, if you will. Shepherding (pastoral) cells must notice friction and difficulties between other cells and step in to comfort, encourage and move us on from any harmful disagreement. What about the many cells that come in on Sundays to sit and listen? They must be helped to see what they are gifted for, what their active task should be, and encouraged to begin working in appropriate ways to build the body. Not a single one of of us has been given sitting and listening as a task to do in the body! There are no audience cells in your body, every cell is too busy for that, doing an essential, designated task.
Who are we?
Take church as a whole, whether locally in a village or part of a town, or even world-wide. If it is functioning as it should, that body of individuals will look and act like a person – Jesus! More often, it looks like an unfortunate mess. Local church, if it was a body, would usually be mindlessly hobbling about, suffering from both insanity and damaged bones and muscles. It’s still Jesus, but in a form we’d find hard to recognise. It’s Jesus crucified, not Jesus risen.
What to do about it?
Begin with prayer – Ask the Holy Spirit to open your ears, eyes and mind to reveal the way forward. You can ask this for yourself, for a small group, for an entire local church, or for the universal church – why not pray for all four? Pray particularly for the circumstances around you right now. Be prepared to see these prayers answered, perhaps in ways you can’t anticipate.
Start to read about the topic of waking and activating church. There are links to some of my other articles here. Activating church is the series you’re reading right now. Another series you might find helpful is Developing faith. the story of my own journey and formation. The series on JDMC (Jesus, Disciple, Mission, Church) explains more about helping a smallish group grow into a Jesus-focused family, it comes with more reading suggestions, practical exercises, and links to more resources. There’s even a free book with questions for groups to discuss together as they move forward.
Keep notes – jot down the things you ask in prayer, note down in your own words the ideas you come across as you read the Bible, other books on topics that interest you, as well as anything that grabs your attention in online material.
Consider sharing this article, the series, and the other material with the people you are meeting with.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
All that is required to restore native woodland in Scotland is to remove or significantly reduce the presence of Red Deer and sheep … Where deer-fencing is erected to protect an area the tree seedlings survive and soon grow too high for sheep (or even deer) to reach. Birch, rowan, willow, Scots pine and juniper rapidly recolonise in fenced areas.
Jesus said many astonishing things, though if we hear them often enough the astonishing nature of them can come to seem quite ordinary. There’s an old English saying, that ‘familiarity breeds contempt’. Few of us would claim ‘I am the Way, the Truth and the Life’ (John 14:6) has become so ordinary to us that we’d call it contemptible, but it’s certainly lost the incisive edge it must have had the day it was first heard. Let’s see if we can recapture some of that edgy significance.
Barton Mill burned down in an unfortunate fire in 1926 and was never rebuilt. Watermills (and windmills) were going out of business at that time as most industries were running on steam power generated by burning coal, or by electrical energy, also usually from coal-fired power stations. Water power and wind power, now seen as green and therefore desirable, were seen in 1926 as ineffective and unable to compete with the more efficient alternatives. This was long before the downsides of fossil fuels were understood.
A place for wildlife
100 years after the fire, in 2026, the mill pond still exists, fed by a sluice gate taking water from the River Churn. The part of the pond in the photo is usually in water all year round, though other parts dry up in many summers, partly because of some silting up near the sluice and partly because the bed of the pond has silted up too, so now the water is shallow enough for yellow flag Iris and other plants to flourish.
There are many birds to be seen in this area too. Mallard ducks breed every spring, there are minnows and probably stickleback in the water and from time to time a kingfisher hunts along the water channels and the pond. Often all you see of the kingfisher is a darting flash of vivid blue. There used to be (and may still be) a pike. A single but very shy little egret hunted around here for the last few years, but this year I’ve seen two of them, probably a breeding pair. And their larger cousin, the grey heron also puts in an appearance now and then.
All life needs is an opportunity
Take any piece of ground, anywhere on Earth, and just leave it alone, life will move in, even if you choose a patch in the Sahara or Antarctica. If you clear a piece of ground somewhere with a reasonable climate and leave it alone, in just a human lifetime you’ll have thriving woodland with a full selection of insects, birds and mammals, and probably reptiles and amphibians too. The experiment has been made many times, sometimes deliberately, sometimes accidentally. If you choose the Sahara or Antarctica you might have to wait a bit longer, but the life forms that are adapted to those extreme conditions will move in eventually. Let’s look at some examples.
Broadbalk wilderness (UK)
A wheat field was deliberately left to revert to a natural state at Rothamsted Research Station in 1882. The land was left unmanaged where before it would have been ploughed and harrowed after harvesting the wheat in late summer and drilled with seed again in the autumn. This field had produced winter wheat every year since 1843, but now the scientists wanted to see what would happen if it was left uncultivated; for the first four years volunteer wheat grew, sparser and weaker year on year and after four years completely choked by weeds.
In 1900 the site was divided into three. One part was left deliberately untouched and gradually reverted to natural woodland; another third was mown annually and maintained as grassland; while the third section had all woody plants removed annually so the land became a natural, open mix of herbaceous plants.
The results have been very interesting and the experiment continues today. Levels of captured carbon are still rising in the soils of the site, nitrogen levels have risen as well. The samples and data are available for study and reanalysis.
Chornobyl (Ukraine)
The Chornobyl nuclear power station accident in 1986 rendered the city and a large area around it unusable. People were evacuated and the most contaminated areas became a restricted zone. Since the accident, time and rainfall have reduced the surface radioactivity considerably and it’s now possible to visit the area. In fact, wildlife has moved into the area from the very beginning and the changing conditions and environment have been studied in depth.
Almost 120 000 people were evacuated following the accident, so activities like farming, hunting, logging, and development ceased over an area of 4,200 km². Forests, wetlands and grasslands have reclaimed abandoned farms and villages; and vegetation grows freely through derelict buildings and former settlements. The pine woodland killed outright by the initial high-dose fallout remains one of the most nuclear-contaminated places on Earth, but even there substantial regrowth has happened. The loss of managed agriculture actually increased habitat diversity, reconnecting landscapes previously fragmented by farmland.
Large mammals rebounded strongly. Long-term census data show abundances of deer, elk, roe deer and wild boar comparable to those in uncontaminated regional nature reserves. Wolves are notably abundant, roughly seven times as common as in comparable reserves. Reintroductions have taken hold including endangered Przewalski’s horses, released in the late 1990s and now ranging freely and breeding. European bison have also been established, while beavers have recolonised rivers, canals and the cooling ponds, in places reversing Soviet-era drainage systems. Lynx, foxes and hundreds of bird species are present too.
However, there’s a mixed message – the abundant populations are due to the absence of humans, yet there remains clear evidence of radiation-induced harm to individuals. Some species are adapting and changing, showing signs of radiation resistance, for example.
Returning woodland (Scotland)
It seems that all that is required to restore native woodland in Scotland is to remove or significantly reduce the presence of Red Deer and sheep. Grazing species eat the young seedlings of trees and strip leaves from saplings. Where deer-fencing is erected to protect an area the tree seedlings survive and soon grow too high for sheep (or even deer) to reach. Birch, rowan, willow, Scots pine and juniper rapidly recolonise in fenced areas.
Other cases are numerous
Similar cases of large scale change include:
The reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone Park in 1995 suppressed the elk population, allowing willow and aspen to return to riverbanks bringing back beavers and many other species including fish, moose and songbirds.
Oostvaardersplassen in the Netherlands where introducing large grazing animals brought back white-tailed eagles and other species.
Marine protected zones where closing areas to commercial fishing have seen biomass rebound. Examples include cod recovery on the Grand Banks off the east coast of Canada.
Reintroducing pine martens in parts of England shows promise in allowing native red squirrel populations to recover as the introduced grey squirrel population is suppressed.
Identifying common factors
A rule to cover all these examples will be useful. If the limiting, interfering factor(s) can be identified and removed life will usually return naturally – in any situation. Identifying the limiting factor(s) is the key to success. Reintroduction of missing species can also be a helpful part of the process but is often not necessary.
Growth and regeneration in church life
We can (and I suggest we should) think about abundance and limiting factors in church growth as well, what are the main interfering and limiting factors preventing abundant life returning like the ecosystems discussed above?
In the book of Acts, we see church life in its natural state, like a healthy ecosystem. Everything was in balance, there were no dedicated church buildings as we see in our villages, towns and cities today, and there was no hierarchy of management. People followed Jesus’ teachings because they understood the practical, social, and personal benefits. They met together as close friends, almost like family, eating together, working together, helping one another and doing so effortlessly and comfortably. I’m sure there were some difficulties and disagreements, and rough spots here and there, but they were all overcome informally.
Am I claiming there’s no life in church today? No, I’m not saying that. What I am saying (and I want you to hear this clearly) is that there’s a curtailed, limited kind of life in church as usually experienced in the 21st century. Church life is short of something essential; if we are to have fullness the parts that are missing need to be identified and restored. Just as an ecology lacking an important species cannot function as it should, so church culture lacking an important kind of leader cannot function as it should. And just as introducing the grey squirrels from North America unhinged UK woodland ecology, so introducing the wrong kind of leader unhinges church culture.
It’s an important factor we have largely failed to recognise. We need the full range of species Jesus put in place, and we need to remove the ones we introduced. Once you start to see the parallels between church culture and thriving ecosystem ecology, it all becomes very clear and is impossible to unsee. I’ve written a whole series elsewhere about church leadership.
Popes, priests, bishops, paid professionals, structures and hierarchies are not necessary (see Other church leaders 1 and Other church leaders 2). Nor did Jesus teach (or even suggest) that such functions and positions were required or helpful. Over the decades and centuries (two whole millenia now) church has grown more complex, more structured, less flexible and more traditional. It has also branched into many independent subsets. We’ll examine all that in a later article, referring back to earlier posts here on JHM as well.
But for now I’d suggest human management and leadership might be some of the limiting factors in the church environment, and that these have adversely affected the natural life and ecology of church as we know it today. We should consider removing these factors to see what will happen. And if necessary we might try reintroducing the leadership modelled by Jesus, going back to first principles.
Church life, too, will find a way. All it needs is the opportunity!
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
Sometimes we need to be provoked into thinking things through more thoroughly and deeply. The enemy is so clever at interleaving error quite subtly into everything we think and do, even in meetings we believe to be fully devoted to following Jesus.
I want to point you to two excellent items posted on the website, Life with CD. I’ll give a short taster to both with links to the originals, I urge you to read them both in full (they are not long, but they are very thought-provoking).
Sometimes we need to be provoked into thinking things through more thoroughly and deeply. The enemy is so clever at interleaving error quite subtly into everything we think and do, even in meetings we believe to be fully devoted to following Jesus. We can easily swallow what is wrong and believe it to be right. That’s why I’m adding this post to my series Activating the church.
In part one we read about Eli, a young man who is challenged by a conversation with an older man. He loved the Lord, or at least he truly meant to. He read devotionals in the morning when he remembered. He played worship music in the car. He posted verses online. He served at church once a month, sometimes twice when his schedule allowed. He wanted to be known as faithful. He wanted to be useful. He wanted, if he was honest, to matter.
And that is where the trouble began.
For Meridian was a city ruled by two kingdoms.
The first kingdom was loud and dazzling. It did not always look evil. In fact, it often looked admirable. Its banners read words like success, influence, visibility, control, relevance, security, platform, and image. Its citizens woke early and slept late. They measured life in numbers: followers, income, invitations, accomplishments, upgrades, applause.
He noticed them when he was ignored and felt a surge of resentment. One kingdom whispered, “Make them regret overlooking you.” The other whispered, “You are already seen by your Father.”
He noticed them in ministry meetings. One kingdom wanted credit, subtle control, and the final word. The other was content to serve, listen, and decrease.
He noticed them in suffering. One kingdom demanded immediate explanation and escape. The other invited trust, even in darkness.
Christopher Dryden is right; when we look at church life we can see the two kingdoms battling it out between them. It’s so important that we learn to distinguish the voices, honouring the one and rejecting the other. So many of the things we do and say are serving ourselves, or even serving the enemy. But we’re not here to do that, we’re here to hear the Spirit of Christ as he guides us daily so that we begin to reflect his gentle presence and his patient grace into a world that needs him so much more than it realises.
And Jesus himself told his followers to be as wise as serpents but as innocent as doves (Matthew 10:16). He said he was sending them out like sheep among wolves. It’s a dangerous world.
This dangerous world crucified Jesus (the wolves got him). Sheep stay in groups, if the wolf takes one the others may escape. Our purpose here in this dangerous world is not to stay safe, but to spread Jesus’ message further and wider. We must do that by taking risks when necessary, but most of the time focusing on blessing those around us by kind and considerate words and actions whenever and however we can.
It has nothing to do with rank or position. I can wince at the erratic words and actions of a president while admiring the good words from the pen or keyboard of lesser, humbler people with hearts to speak the truth in love. And that truth will win out in the end because of its source: Papa, the Son and their Spirit, all poured out for us.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
All that is required to restore native woodland in Scotland is to remove or significantly reduce the presence of Red Deer and sheep … Where deer-fencing is erected to protect an area the tree seedlings survive and soon grow too high for sheep (or even deer) to reach. Birch, rowan, willow, Scots pine and juniper rapidly recolonise in fenced areas.
What’s in an image? Sometimes quite a lot, more than meets the eye. I’m posting an image whenever I can.
Reflections on Barton Mill Pond
This is one of my favourite places in Cirencester; on a calm, sunny day wind doesn’t ruffle the surface of the old mill pond and the reflections are correspondingly bright and still. A bridge crosses the water here and crouching down it’s difficult to take a bad photo, or easy to take a good one. (Depends on your mode of thinking.)
The mill burned down in an unfortunate fire in 1926 and was never rebuilt. Watermills (and windmills) were going out of business at that time as most industries were running on steam power generated by burning coal, or by electrical energy, also usually from coal-fired power stations. Water power and wind power, now seen as green and therefore desirable, were seen in 1926 as ineffective and unable to compete with the more efficient alternatives. This was long before the downsides of fossil fuels were understood.
A place for wildlife
100 years after the fire, in 2026, the mill pond still exists, fed by a sluice gate taking water from the River Churn. The part of the pond in the photo is usually in water all year round, though other parts dry up in many summers, partly because of some silting up near the sluice and partly because the bed of the pond has silted up too, so now the water is shallow enough for yellow flag Iris and other plants to flourish.
There are many birds to be seen in this area too. Mallard ducks breed every spring, there are minnows and probably stickleback in the water and from time to time a kingfisher hunts along the water channels and the pond. Often all you see of the kingfisher is a darting flash of vivid blue. There used to be (and may still be) a pike. A single but very shy little egret hunted around here for the last few years, but this year I’ve seen two of them, probably a breeding pair. And their larger cousin, the grey heron also puts in an appearance now and then.
All life needs is an opportunity
Take any piece of ground, anywhere on Earth, and just leave it alone, life will move in, even if you choose a patch in the Sahara or Antarctica. If you clear a piece of ground somewhere with a reasonable climate and leave it alone, in just a human lifetime you’ll have thriving woodland with a full selection of insects, birds and mammals, and probably reptiles and amphibians too. The experiment has been made many times, sometimes deliberately, sometimes accidentally. If you choose the Sahara or Antarctica you might have to wait a bit longer, but the life forms that are adapted to those extreme conditions will move in eventually. Let’s look at some examples.
Broadbalk wilderness (UK)
A wheat field was deliberately left to revert to a natural state at Rothamsted Research Station in 1882. The land was left unmanaged where before it would have been ploughed and harrowed after harvesting the wheat in late summer and drilled with seed again in the autumn. This field had produced winter wheat every year since 1843, but now the scientists wanted to see what would happen if it was left uncultivated; for the first four years volunteer wheat grew, sparser and weaker year on year and after four years completely choked by weeds.
In 1900 the site was divided into three. One part was left deliberately untouched and gradually reverted to natural woodland; another third was mown annually and maintained as grassland; while the third section had all woody plants removed annually so the land became a natural, open mix of herbaceous plants.
The results have been very interesting and the experiment continues today. Levels of captured carbon are still rising in the soils of the site, nitrogen levels have risen as well. The samples and data are available for study and reanalysis.
Chornobyl (Ukraine)
The Chornobyl nuclear power station accident in 1986 rendered the city and a large area around it unusable. People were evacuated and the most contaminated areas became a restricted zone. Since the accident, time and rainfall have reduced the surface radioactivity considerably and it’s now possible to visit the area. In fact, wildlife has moved into the area from the very beginning and the changing conditions and environment have been studied in depth.
Almost 120 000 people were evacuated following the accident, so activities like farming, hunting, logging, and development ceased over an area of 4,200 km². Forests, wetlands and grasslands have reclaimed abandoned farms and villages; and vegetation grows freely through derelict buildings and former settlements. The pine woodland killed outright by the initial high-dose fallout remains one of the most nuclear-contaminated places on Earth, but even there substantial regrowth has happened. The loss of managed agriculture actually increased habitat diversity, reconnecting landscapes previously fragmented by farmland.
Large mammals rebounded strongly. Long-term census data show abundances of deer, elk, roe deer and wild boar comparable to those in uncontaminated regional nature reserves. Wolves are notably abundant, roughly seven times as common as in comparable reserves. Reintroductions have taken hold including endangered Przewalski’s horses, released in the late 1990s and now ranging freely and breeding. European bison have also been established, while beavers have recolonised rivers, canals and the cooling ponds, in places reversing Soviet-era drainage systems. Lynx, foxes and hundreds of bird species are present too.
However, there’s a mixed message – the abundant populations are due to the absence of humans, yet there remains clear evidence of radiation-induced harm to individuals. Some species are adapting and changing, showing signs of radiation resistance, for example.
Returning woodland (Scotland)
It seems that all that is required to restore native woodland in Scotland is to remove or significantly reduce the presence of Red Deer and sheep. Grazing species eat the young seedlings of trees and strip leaves from saplings. Where deer-fencing is erected to protect an area the tree seedlings survive and soon grow too high for sheep (or even deer) to reach. Birch, rowan, willow, Scots pine and juniper rapidly recolonise in fenced areas.
Other cases are numerous
Similar cases of large scale change include:
The reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone Park in 1995 suppressed the elk population, allowing willow and aspen to return to riverbanks bringing back beavers and many other species including fish, moose and songbirds.
Oostvaardersplassen in the Netherlands where introducing large grazing animals brought back white-tailed eagles and other species.
Marine protected zones where closing areas to commercial fishing have seen biomass rebound. Examples include cod recovery on the Grand Banks off the east coast of Canada.
Reintroducing pine martens in parts of England shows promise in allowing native red squirrel populations to recover as the introduced grey squirrel population is suppressed.
Identifying common factors
A rule to cover all these examples will be useful. If the limiting, interfering factor(s) can be identified and removed life will usually return naturally – in any situation. Identifying the limiting factor(s) is the key to success. Reintroduction of missing species can also be a helpful part of the process but is often not necessary.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
There are to be no debts amongst us, not only because we pay them off but because we forgive them. When I lack the means to pay I become dependent on your willingness to forgive. Jesus is our example in this. He is the ultimate debt payer and forgiver.
Money
This is a copy of an article I wrote back in October 2012, you can still see the original if you like.
Money (click images to enlarge)
We’re going to see how much we can draw from a single occurrence of the phrase ‘one another’. I think Romans 13:8 is the particular example I should take.
Here it is in context, verse eight is picked out in the centre…
This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give to everyone what you owe them: if you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honour, then honour.
8 – Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law.
The commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ ‘You shall not murder,’ ‘You shall not steal,’ ‘You shall not covet,’ and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ Love does no harm to a neighbour. Therefore love is the fulfilment of the law.
There’s a wider context too, that we need to bear in mind. Paul first writes about civil government, making it clear that goverments are there because the One who is Authority puts them there. They have a function and a purpose, we must submit to them.
Then come the verses above.
And finally Paul writes that time is short, we need to act now while we still can. Jesus is returning – soon! We need to be found ready and obedient and already covered by him. Romans 13 is relevant in its entirety. We should read this chapter often and let it sink deep into our hearts and minds!
But in verse eight, Paul makes three statements.
Don’t let any debt remain.
Continue to love one another
This fulfils the Law
What does he mean? He is not simply saying that I should pay off any debts I owe. He is saying that I should allow no debt to stand. He is saying I should pay my own debts but I should also, if necessary, pay yours. The important thing about debt is that it is paid, the effect is the same no matter who pays.
Jesus paid my debt so if I want to be like him I will pay yours. And Paul is not writing merely about money, he has just explicitly used the words respect and honour as well. These things apply to one another as much as (or more than) they do to governments.
There are to be no debts amongst us, not only because we pay them off but because we forgive them. When I lack the means to pay I become dependent on your willingness to forgive. Jesus is our example in this. He is the ultimate debt payer and forgiver. We are called to be like him in our dealings with one another.
Will I pay my monetary debt to you? Will I forgive your debt of money to me? But also (and often harder) will I pay the respect and honour I owe to you? And will I forgive you if you disrespect and dishonour me? This is the nitty-gritty of not allowing any debt to remain.
If I continue to love you I will indeed pay and forgive in all situations where debt might remain. Love will cause me, compel me to cover every kind of debt. If not, do I have love at all?
And it goes further yet! Paul writes that there is one debt that should stand, the ‘continuing debt to love one another’. Love is not just for today but also for tomorrow and for tomorrow’s tomorrow. I owe you love and that is a debt I cannot pay off. Love goes forward without ceasing. ‘Faith, hope and love remain’, writes Paul, ‘And the greatest of these is love’. Love remains, even in the kingdom of heaven, especially in the kingdom of heaven.
So, just as love is the fulfilment of Torah, so love is the fulfilment of civil law and indeed every kind of law. If I truly love I will not be able to commit any sin at all. The fact that sin remains is just a clear sign that love is not yet complete in me.
Let’s go forward in our lives understanding that love remains and is greater than anything else. And let’s remember who ‘one another’ means. It’s not limited to the church.
Jesus made it pretty inclusive. What begins with brothers and sisters becomes all encompassing. Love the Father, love one another, love your neighbour, love your enemy. My love is to extend out and become fully inclusive, not in any way for club members only. ‘One another’ is just a starting point, the nursery slopes of loving.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
Since Jesus is the best example of all five APEST gifts, it makes good sense to look to him for guidance in using them. I’d say read the gospels and notice the things he did and the things he said. Pay particular attention to the way people responded and try to work out in each case which of the five gifts were active.
APEST (Diagram from What is APEST) – Click images to enlarge
Having looked at each of the gifts of service individually, we’ll check them one by one to see if we can find them active in the life of Yahshua (Jesus). Does Jesus himself demonstrate these gifts, and if so how? Let’s also bear in mind that if he worked through these special gifts 2000 years ago, we can be quite confident that he still does today. His character doesn’t change; he is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8).
Each section begins with an Alan Hirsch quote which we then examine in the light of the character and nature of Christ himself. But before we do that, I want you to understand that all these gifts are equally important and equally valuable. There’s no hierarchy here, though there is a sequence. Apostles prepare the ground for prophets, who prepare the ground for evangelists, who prepare the ground for shepherds, who finally prepare the ground for teachers. At this point, the young gathering (or church) will be ready to begin sending out apostles and the cycle repeats.
You’ll find the quotes on Alan’s What is APEST? page. The tests are not expensive and I recommend them for both leaders and anyone with an interest in the topic.
Apostle
APOSTLES extend the gospel. As the “sent ones,” they ensure that the faith is transmitted from one context to another and from one generation to the next. They are always thinking about the future, bridging barriers, establishing the church in new contexts, developing leaders, networking trans-locally. Yes, if you focus solely on initiating new ideas and rapid expansion, you can leave people and organizations wounded. The shepherding and teaching functions are needed to ensure people are cared for rather than simply used.
Is Jesus an Apostle? He did not merely extend the gospel; he originated it! Was he a ‘sent one’? He was and remains the Sent One, bringing faith and truth from the presence of the Father sharing it freely here in the physical realm of Earth. If that is not transmitting faith from one context to another, I don’t know what is! Did he think about the future and bridge barriers? Just think of the old picture of Jesus as a bridge or plank crossing the gap between heaven and earth.
Did he establish the church? (I will build my church). He developed leaders (his disciples) and he networked trans-locally (the Samaritan woman at the well, healing the Centurion’s servant, raising Jairus’ daughter, calling Lazarus out from the tomb, and discussing truth with the Roman Governor, Pontius Pilatus). It would be really hard to argue that Jesus is not apostolic!
Prophet
PROPHETS know God’s will. They are particularly attuned to God and his truth for today. They bring correction and challenge the dominant assumptions we inherit from the culture. They insist that the community obey what God has commanded. They question the status quo. Without the other types of leaders in place, prophets can become belligerent activists or, paradoxically, disengage from the imperfection of reality and become other-worldly.
So, is Jesus also a prophet? Most certainly! Does he know the will of the Father? Way better than anyone else in history (you’d better believe it.) Is he particularly attuned to Yahweh and his truth for today? Most emphatically! Does he bring correction and challenge the dominant assumptions of his culture and of our own? He insisted (and still insists) that we obey what the Father commands. When did he not challenge the status quo? Certainly he does these things fully, wholeheartedly, and tirelessly. Jesus is, indeed, the greatest prophet of all time – by far.
Towards the end of his ministry, Jesus is clear that the temple will be destroyed and he foretells the misery and horror of those days, this done privately, just speaking with the disciples, but when these events unfolded in 70 AD under the Roman commander Titus they would have remembered his description and would have been confirmed and encouraged that he had the same prophetic spirit as the old testament prophets themselves. (Luke 21)
And Jesus had the same upward connection to the mind of the Father as well as the horizontal concerns about justice in the world that the old testament prophets regularly displayed.
Evangelist
EVANGELISTS recruit. These infectious communicators of the gospel message recruit others to the cause. They call for a personal response to God’s redemption in Christ, and also draw believers to engage the wider mission, growing the church. Evangelists can be so focused on reaching those outside the church that maturing and strengthening those inside is neglected.
Jesus is a recruiter par excellence. He called and worked intensely with a small group of close followers, he spoke to multitudes, but closely taught just a few. He is the evangelist, calling for a personal response from many individuals and not merely growing the church, but founding it in every sense worth considering. If you want to know what an evangelist is like, check out Jesus!
By the time Jesus teaching was complete and the time came for his death, resurrection, and a return to the Father’s presence, his disciples had understood him clearly and fully enough that the four gospel accounts could be written from what had lodged in their memories. They may not agree in every detail or always have precisely the same sequence, but that makes the four accounts more real and no less believable.
Shepherd
SHEPHERDS nurture and protect. Caregivers of the community, they focus on the protection and spiritual maturity of God’s flock, cultivating a loving and spiritually mature network of relationships, making and developing disciples. Shepherds can value stability to the detriment of the mission. They may also foster an unhealthy dependence between the church and themselves.
In what sense is Jesus a shepherd? He’s rightly described as ‘the great Shepherd of the sheep’. He is strong on nurturing and protecting; that was true as he moved among the people in first century Israel, Galilee and Samaria, healing the sick, feeding hungry crowds with abundant fish and bread from almost nothing (making very little stretch a very, very long way). He cared about wine running short at a wedding. He was the greatest of caregivers for his community.
He protected his followers, shielding them by giving everything he had, even his life. And he taught them to bring them to spiritual maturity so that after he returned to the Father, they’d be able to carry on his work once they had received his Spirit from above.
Jesus had a wide network of followers well beyond the eleven men that he closely trained. There were so many that he touched and discipled amongst Samaritans, Romans, Greeks, even members of the Sanhedrin. He valued stability, but not to the detriment of his mission.
Teacher
TEACHERS understand and explain. Communicators of God’s truth and wisdom, they help others remain biblically grounded to better discern God’s will, guiding others toward wisdom, helping the community remain faithful to Christ’s word, and constructing a transferable doctrine. Without the input of the other functions, teachers can fall into dogmatism or dry intellectualism. They may fail to see the personal or missional aspects of the church’s ministry.
And it’s not just a matter of explaining things more clearly or studying the meaning of Hebrew or Greek terms. It’s much more helping people through those ‘I just don’t get it’ moments until they suddenly cry out, ‘Oh, now I see!’ The teaching gift sparks revelation. It’s very clear in the gospels that his disciples had these moments of revelation, over and over again as Jesus taught them. He understood the truth and he understood their difficulties in grasping it. He communicated truth and wisdom more fully than anyone else could ever do. He is the teacher of teachers – quite literally. He did it by explaining, by asking difficult questions, by highlighting mistakes as they occurred, and by telling good stories. He also taught without words, by setting good examples.
Jesus taught his disciples, but he also taught the crowds. Here too his teaching went way beyond words and ideas, often he’d share a parable like the Good Samaritan that reached directly into minds where words alone failed to penetrate. This kind of teaching gift cuts through misconceptions and breaks into parts of our being that seem to be based somewhere other than the grey matter in our brains. There are facts and there is understanding; they’re two different things. Jesus cared deeply about both.
And when the wealthy, or the Pharisees, or the Temple priests needed a bit more than a word to pitch them over the edge from not comprehending to fully understanding, Jesus would show them what the Father’s heart was like – ‘Don’t stand on street corners praying where everyone can see you, go quietly into your own room where only the Father sees you and pray there.’ And sometimes there’d be a spark of comprehension. It might only be one person amongst a group of proud scoffers, but it’s so worth it when even one person sees the light and understands a previously hidden truth for the first time.
In the round
Since Jesus is the best example of all five APEST gifts, it makes good sense to look to him for guidance in using them. I’d say read the gospels and notice the things he did and the things he said. Pay particular attention to the way people responded and try to work out in each case which of the five gifts were active, sometimes it may be more than one. Sometimes it’s obvious, sometimes harder to discern.
You’ll see the gifts working (and described) in the New Testament letters as well, look out for them there as well.
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Jesus taught his disciples, but he also taught the crowds. Sometimes his teaching went way beyond words and ideas, often he’d share a parable like the Good Samaritan that reached directly into minds where words alone failed to penetrate.
Students and teacher (Wikimedia) -Click images to enlarge
The final APEST gift we need to consider is the gift of teacher. Just like the other gifts, the teaching gift is there for the building of the church, does not act in a controlling way, but is a life-bringing and helping function in the life of the church and the individual parts of it.
Where a teaching gift is active there will be a clarifying service at work. Confusion and misunderstandings will be swept aside. Decades, even centuries and millenia of mistakes and misunderstandings will be exposed and brought out for fresh examination. Teachers cannot sit still or take a back seat where they detect error of any kind.
What is the most fundamental definition of a teacher? It must be something along the lines of:
A teacher is a person who helps younger or less experienced people to grasp and excel in an idea or a process that they have not previously met or mastered.
The photo at the head of this post, and my words in italic above may make you feel the teaching gift is about extending knowledge. But that’s not quite what the gift of teaching is all about. The distinction is critically important so read this carefully… The spiritual gift of teaching has little to do with imparting knowledge, it has everything to do with growing character.
I just don’t get it!
And it’s not just a matter of explaining things more clearly or studying the meaning of Hebrew or Greek terms. It’s much more helping people through those ‘I just don’t get it’ moments until they suddenly cry out, ‘Oh, now I see!’ The teaching gift sparks revelation. Hold on to that thought as you continue reading.
Jesus taught his disciples, but he also taught the crowds. Sometimes his teaching went way beyond words and ideas, often he’d share a parable like the Good Samaritan that reached directly into minds where words alone failed to penetrate. This kind of teaching gift cuts through misconceptions and breaks into parts of our being that seem to be based somewhere other than the grey matter in our brains. Often, we express this as heart even though that’s biologically incorrect. But our languages are full of heart-based expressions – heartfelt, avoir le cœur sur la main, heart-stopping moment, sich ein herz fassen, good hearted or a heartless act. There are facts and there is understanding; they’re two different things, we tend to think of facts being in our heads and understanding being in our hearts.
When the wealthy, or the Pharisees, or the Temple priests needed a bit more than a word to pitch them over the edge from not comprehending to fully understanding, Jesus would show them what the Father’s heart was like – ‘Don’t stand on street corners praying where everyone can see you, go quietly into your own room where only the Father sees you and pray there.’ And sometimes there’d be a spark of comprehension. It might only be one person amongst a group of proud scoffers, but it’s so worth it when even one person sees the light and understands a previously hidden truth for the first time.
As always, community really matters
It’s still like that in the church today. There are many who don’t see the truth but now and then a light comes on for someone – Ding! Anyone with a teaching gift loves it when that happens. Understanding is like a staircase, each step makes the next one possible when the right time comes. The teaching gift enables the teacher to recognise that right moment and drop in the necessary grain of truth so that it makes a deep and long-lasting difference.
Look again at the photo at the top of this article, these are not strangers interacting, they are people who know one another, a teacher and his pupils, they care about one another, they are engaged in conversation, they are happy and comfortable together, the entire class is a kind of community. In the church environment we should all be learning from one another every time we meet. Some people have a gift for making things clear. Make sure you encourage them as much as possible.
Building the body of Christ
Jesus told his followers, ‘I will build my church’. He doesn’t want you and me to build it, but he does pour out gifts upon us so that we, together, can contribute something essential and useful. There’s an abundance of brotherly/sisterly love amongst us when we all pool our different gifts. And that in itself is a secret that has been lost during church history. We need to fully grasp that secret – we all have gifts and we do far better when we share them, recognising them in one another and encouraging one another by saying what we see. This will never happen if we keep thinking only in terms of individual people and individual gifts. We, together, are the body of Christ.
Don’t think in terms of a tyre here and a seat there. A gear lever and a rear view mirror. Understand that thinking about a car is very different from merely thinking about the different parts of a car. You can travel quickly over long distances if you have a car, but if you have only a tyre and a seat you’ll go nowhere. Building a car means recognising the pieces and putting them together in right relationship. Building community and church needs exactly the same skills and understanding.
A big mistake
There is one big mistake frequently made in mainstream churches today, OK, there are many mistakes made, but I want to highlight this one in particular because it’s very widespread and very harmful. It’s also an easy and natural mistake to make.
Many well-intentioned teachers don’t teach Jesus, instead they teach the Bible. Jesus is very much present throughout the Old and New Testaments. But teaching people to memorise or study verses may do little to help them grow in character or grace. Instead we need to bring Jesus himself into one another’s hearts and minds and be changed by his presence. We need to grow in love and in joyfulness, we need to be rooted in his peace, reflect his patience and great kindness and goodness, become faithful as he is faithful and develop the kind of self-control that never criticises and never directs anger or disappointment at the brothers and sisters.
We simply cannot be built on the foundation of Christ unless we come to know him well, so we’re not looking for technical knowledge of Greek and Hebrew, or deep Bible studies. Instead we need to know Jesus as our dependable, older brother, to recognise that he is always present and how to help one another find him again when we lose sight of him. We need to learn that the fruit of the Spirit is more fundamental than the gifts of the same Spirit, but that we need both to function as Jesus fully intends his church to do. ‘I will build my church’.
That’s it for this part of the series. Next time we’ll consider Jesus, the source of these gifts of service. Can we see all five APEST gifts at work in him? What can we learn from him in this regard?
See also:
I wanted to provide links or articles about the topic, just as I do in most of my posts, I looked at a load of stuff but nothing seemed to jump out for me, I didn’t hear Jesus whispering, ‘Yes, put that item in’. In the end I felt there were two videos I should include. Neither of them is specifically about the gift of teaching (though they both mention this gift in passing. Both of them are about the five APEST gifts as a whole. They are both interviews. Alan Hirsch and Neil Cole have both pretty much dedicated themselves to studying , teaching, and writing about APEST. My feeling is that I should link to these two interviews, so here they are.
I’ve met and spoken briefly with both Alan and Neil, and and I’ve heard them both speak in meetings several times. And I trust them to reveal something useful to you, so have a listen.
APEST, Interview with Alan Hirsch – YouTube (Follow Baptist Church)
APEST, Interview with Neil Cole – YouTube (Cynthia Anderson)
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No gardener would know her name, and in that moment she recognises his voice. She cries out ‘Rabboni!’ (‘Teacher!’) and reaches to grab him, perhaps just an arm, more likely a full hug. Her misery and grief fall away immediately, replaced by astonishment and joy. But Yahshua says, ‘Don’t hang onto me because I have not yet gone up to the Father.’
Greek commentary on John’s gospel dated 1190-1200 (Bodleian Library)
10:1-10 – It’s now the day after the Sabbath, and the normal work of the week could begin. But this was not a normal week. Jesus’ disciples, family and friends would have been subdued, grieving, and wondering how things could have gone so wrong, so suddenly. But there were still practicalities to be dealt with and today was the first day when those tasks could be done.
Early, well before sunrise (Sabbath had ended at sunset the day before) Maryam Magdalitha (Mary or Miriam Magdalene) walked to the grave where they had laid Yahshua’s (Jesus’) body, wrapped in strips of cloth with a separate piece of linen for his head. The first thing Maryam noticed, probably from some distance away, was that the heavy stone that closed the grave had been rolled away to one side. Panicking, she didn’t go any closer but must have been horrified; turning round she ran back to Shimon Kepha (Simon Peter) and Johanan (John) and told them the conclusion she must have jumped to, that someone had removed the body and she didn’t know where they’d taken him.
Shimon and Johanan set out running to the tomb and Maryam was right behind them. Johanan ran fastest and bent over and looked in through the low opening and saw the linen strips inside, but didn’t go in. Then Kepha arrived and just went straight into the tomb; he saw the linen strips as well, and also the head cloth. Then Johanan went inside the tomb, saw the same things, and believed.
What’s the significance of this? The author, very likely Johanan himself, explains in verse 9 that they didn’t understand from the Bible that Yashua had to rise again from death. This is not surprising. The Bible mentioned here is what we call ‘The Old Testament’. It was the Hebrew Bible or a Greek translation of it, and the passages that suggested the Son would die and rise again are scattered around in the books of various prophets, the Psalms and elsewhere and are always straightforward (though more so in hindsight). The opportunity for hindsight was only now beginning to open. Yahshua had explained some of this to them. Johanan, who was a close friend of Yahshua and a deep thinker had seen him die and now made the mental leap to understanding that for Yahshua death was a temporary affair. He’d said he’d return from death, and he wasn’t here in the grave anymore, somehow he was alive again! Johanan got it immediately. Kepha, a more down-to-earth and practical person did not, at least, not just yet. The two of them didn’t seem to worry about Maryam in her distress, but no doubt deeply distracted themselves, turned back to the city and the place where they were staying.
10:11-18 – Maryam, still crying in grief, now finally looked inside the tomb herself and saw two people, one sitting where Yahshua’s head had rested and the other at his feet. Seeing the tears rolling down Maryam’s cheeks they asked her why she was crying. The use of the word ‘woman’ here seems to us rather strange, perhaps unkind, perhaps distant and rather aloof. But it was a normal way to address a woman at that time, much as we might still say to a man, ‘What’s the matter, man?’, ‘What’s up, chap?’ or ‘You OK, mate?’ or just ‘What’s the problem? So let’s translate this the way we might say it today. Think in terms of these two angels saying, ‘Why are you crying?’ or ‘Why are you crying, Lady?’ And she tells them, through her sobs, ‘They’ve taken the Master away and I have no idea where they’ve put him.’
Turning round, she saw a figure standing outside the tomb. We know the tomb entrance is low so she’s unlikely to see the person’s face until she is outside, and with tears in her eyes she may not be seeing anything very clearly.
In fact, it’s Yahshua, and he also asks, ‘Why are you crying? Who are you looking for?’ She assumes it’s the gardener who perhaps looks after the nearby olive trees and asks him, ‘If you’ve moved him – tell me where he is and I’ll go and get him’.
Yahshua, seeing how confused she is, says only one word. He appreciates how blurred her vision is so he simply speaks her name.
‘Maryam’.
No gardener would know her name, and in that moment she recognises his voice. She cries out ‘Rabboni!’ (‘Teacher!’) and reaches to grab him, perhaps just an arm, more likely a full hug. Her misery and grief fall away immediately, replaced by astonishment and joy. But Yahshua says, ‘Don’t hang onto me because I have not yet gone up to the Father. Instead, go now to my brothers and tell them that I’m going up to my Father and your Father, to my Elohim (Gods) and your Elohim’. And right away, off she went to tell them.
Why did I write ‘Gods’ in the previous paragraph, not ‘God’? Because ‘Elohim’ is a plural form in Hebrew, the singular is ‘El’ or ‘Eloah’. Plurals are sometimes used to stress importance and power, Queen Victoria used ‘we’ rather than ‘I’ – ‘We are not amused’ instead of ‘I’m not amused’ In the Hebrew Bible ‘Elohim’ is a plural noun but when referring to the Almighty it takes singular verbs, As if Queen Victoria had said, ‘We am not amused’. In Aramaic it is ‘Elah’ or ‘Alaha’ allied to the Arabic ‘Allah’. We shouldn’t miss the significance of this, there’s a hint of threeness here. The Father and the Spirit are ‘up there somewhere’ while Yahshua is still ‘down here’. He plans to return to be with them, and later he will send the Spirit to come to live in and among his followers. Two thousand years later, the Spirit is still here in and among Yahshua’s followers. The Spirit is entirely capable of being ‘up there’ and ‘down here’ simultaneously.
And why did he tell Maryam not to cling to him? Perhaps he’s simply saying that the most urgent thing for him now is to get back to be fully in his Father’s presence because only then can he send the Spirit, someone they need in them as soon as possible. In a hostile and confusing world any delay in the coming of the Spirit will leave the disciples vulnerable and without direction. Maryam can help by taking the news that Yahshua is alive back to them right away. Clinging to Jesus is natural but only benefits one person while leaving the many feeling lost, distressed and confused. I think Maryam understood this right away because she headed back to the city immediately without another word.
It’s also significant that Yahshua appeared to a woman before he appeared to any of the men he’d been teaching for three years. In Jewish tradition scribes taught village boys to read and memorise the Old Testament Law. Girls were not taught these things. And Rabbis (Teachers) would take men as disciples, but not women. Yahshua broke tradition by teaching both men and women, and he now chooses to appear to a woman first. This is a lesson that church understood at the beginning, but forgot for 1900 years and has begun to relearn very slowly over the last seventy or eighty years.
If you enjoyed this or found it useful, please like, comment, and share below. (If you don’t see those links, click the article’s title above the main photo and they will appear.) Send a link to friends who might enjoy the article or benefit from it – Thanks! My material is free to reuse (see conditions), but a coffee is always welcome and encourages me to write more often!
Journeys of Heart and Mind 
