Think Theology website

Christopher Ash's Christ-centred commentary on Psalms is exceptional. I am now in the fourth volume and it continues to delight my soul on a daily basis. I was slightly apprehensive approaching Psalm 119, which to a careless reader (which I often have been) sounds like it is saying the same thing 176 times, but Ash does a superb job showing how, as Bonhoeffer put it, "the apparent repetitions are in fact always new variations on one theme, the love of God's word." Here he walks through the eight words at the heart of the psalm, explaining the areas of difference and overlap:1. Instruction (torah) is the headline word in 119:1 and the most frequently occurring law word. That it appears only in the singular “suggests that it is a global term for the totality of God’s revelation” (Wenham). 2. Testimony (eduth) appears in the plural. In Exodus 31:18 “the two tablets of the testimony” refers to the covenant Decalogue. The word may have the sense of standing as a “witness” against the people of God (Deut 31:26) and also the sense of bearing witness to the faithfulness of the covenant God. 3. Precept (piqqud) always occurs in the form “your precepts.” This noun derives from the verb “to show concern for, test, visit,” and it conveys the idea of God’s words as deriving from a God who “cares about detail” as he watches over his people (Kidner). 4. Statute (khoq) always appears in the form “your statutes.” This perhaps emphasises the binding force of what God has said. 5. Commandment (mitsvah) usually occurs in the plural. This term simply points to the authority of God to say what ought to be done. 6. Judgment (mishpat) is the most difficult word to translate with consistency. It means the decision of a judge. This decision may be expressed in a law, but it may equally seen in the “judgment” given for or against someone in court. The word “rule” covers the former but not the latter, especially when the ruling is in the plaintiff’s favour, for the divine Judge, as in Luke 18:7, will act to vindicate his elect. 7. Word (dabar) is the most general of the expressions. Usually in Psalm 119 it appears in the form “your word,” where the singular sums up the totality of God’s covenant revelation. 8. Promise (imrah) means “something that is spoken” and is often more or less indistinguishable from dabar. The context often indicates that what is spoken by God has the character of a promise. What unites these words is covenant. The covenant name (“the LORD”) appears twenty-two times, an average of once for each stanza.

It’s a shame that Andrew’s book on happiness isn’t hitting the shelves until the summer: it’s in the winter that many of us particularly need help finding the joy. From ‘blue Monday’ (the third Monday in January and apparently the most miserable day of the year), till now in February with endless rain, we need a mood boost. I’ve read Happiness in pre-publication issue, and it is excellent. I encourage you to buy it when it appears. I’ve also recently re-read Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ classic, Spiritual Depression – a book I first read on honeymoon 32 years ago. Yes, Grace did find that a bit odd. My conviction is that Christians are meant to know joy. God is very happy, so getting close to Him means an encounter with happiness. That means the pursuit of joy should be a central part of our discipleship. There are many ‘joy-suckers’ though, which can rob us of joy. Lloyd-Jones offers an analysis of this which I have found helpful. Here are five things he highlights that we should be alert to if we are not to sink into the doldrums. Personality typeBut while I emphasize, with all my being, the fact that temperament does not make the slightest difference in the matter of our fundamental salvation, I am equally anxious to emphasize the fact that it does make a very great difference in actual experience in the Christian life, and that when you are trying to diagnose a condition such as that of spiritual depression, it is something with which you should start, it is something to put at the very beginning. Salvation is no more dependent on our personality type than our eye colour, but personality does impact how we feel and respond to things. This is why it is important that we know ourselves. Some people are more naturally tiggerish than others, but whatever our personality, the Lord provides pathways along which we can find joy. We need to follow the paths that lead to true happiness and not the false paths that offer comfort but in the end only make us more miserable. If you want to be happy, know yourself. Physical conditionsIs anyone surprised again? Does someone hold the view that as long as you are a Christian it does not matter what the condition of your body is? Well, you will soon be disillusioned if you believe that. Physical conditions play their part in all this. Ill-health can suck joy. The physical and spiritual are deeply intertwined but the reason we are feeling glum might very well be because of physical conditions rather than some spiritual failing. How to overcome in this reality and fight the fight for joy? It is a huge topic but my observation is that it is those who deliberately practice gratitude who overcome illness and pain and find their way to joy. Thankfulness is pain relief. Post-blessing depressionAnother frequent cause of spiritual depression is what we may describe as a reaction—a reaction after a great blessing, a reaction after some unusual and exceptional experience. I hope to call attention sometime to the case of Elijah under the juniper tree. This is a strange one, but I’ve found it to be true – an emotional slump following hot on the heels of a time of special blessing in God. Elijah went from the triumph of Mount Carmel to suicidal ideation within a matter of hours. If we experience times like this we shouldn’t be surprised but recognise it as a blip, not the prevailing reality. Joy has to be pushed into, not assumed. The devilIn a sense, and in the last analysis, that is the one and only cause of spiritual depression— it is the devil, the adversary of our souls. It is just Satan who, though he cannot rob us of our salvation, can definitely rob us of our joy. His great concern is to prevent anyone becoming a Christian, but when that fails, his one object then is to make them miserable Christians. We have an enemy, a discourager, an accuser of the brethren, and must not ignore the spiritual dynamic at play. God is very happy but the devil is very miserable and he wants to make God’s people miserable too. When that happens to us it is a problem personally, but it is also a problem missionally. If Christians are as miserable as everyone else what do we have to offer the world? The gospel is good news! That must mean it brings us to joy – and that means we must resist the devil. UnbeliefHave you realized that most of your unhappiness in life is due to the fact that you are listening to yourself instead of talking to yourself? All of us experience doubts; the real problem is when doubt hardens into unbelief. That can happen when the narrative in our heads is negative, discouraging, and lying. It is very easy to listen to this negative voice and allow unbelief to grow. Instead of that, we need to preach to ourselves, declaring the truth and power of the gospel and commanding the negative inner-voice to silence. Earlier today there were a few minutes of brightness. Now the rain is sheeting down again. It’s a grim time of year. But in the Lord there is joy, now, forever and even in February (Ps 16:11)!  

Luke Simmons has fast become one of my favourite people to follow online. We have only met once, but his content reflects an unusual combination of theological clarity, personal warmth and practical leadership knowhow, which I find really compelling. (The other day he ran a free online training session on "Building a Culture of Generosity," introducing it with the phrase, "the worst time to try to build a culture of generosity is when you need money." If you know, you know.) Here he gives twenty-five lessons on the subject of money and church leadership. You probably won't agree with them all, but they are all worth thinking about:1. Generosity begins in the heart of the pastor. If you don’t give generously, why should your people? 2. Money is both a thermometer and a thermostat for the heart. 3. When you teach about money, don’t apologize. Money is one of the biggest competitors with God, and helping people live in line with God’s financial principles is a huge gift. Better to say, “If you’re a guest, you couldn’t have picked a better Sunday to be here.” 4. Keep track of and thank first-time givers. It’s a big step of involvement in a local church (bigger than attending the first time), so treat it accordingly. 5. It’s not necessarily good to say, “I don’t know what anybody gives.” Set up a system where, as the Lead Pastor, you can find out what people give if you have a good reason. If you’re mature enough to know what everyone gives, fine. 6. People typically start giving months after they start attending and stop giving months before they stop attending. 7. There are five “pockets” that people give from. Wise churches provide opportunities over the year for people to give out of all five: (1) General fund — they like supporting the pastors and basics; (2) Building — they want the church to have good facilities; (3) Directed Designated — special projects that you identify; (4) Benevolence — helping the needy; (5) Missions & Church Planting — taking the gospel. 8. You need to disciple high-capacity givers. To whom much is given, much is expected — and they need help stewarding what God has entrusted them. If you don’t know how to help them, find some other higher-capacity financial people and do it together. 9. People do not give first to vision. They give to success. 10. Beware of assuming you have a right to people’s money. Everything they give is a gift. 11. It takes just as much work to do a 3-year initiative as a 2-year, but you typically get 25% more money. 12. Giving begets giving and generosity begets generosity. Don’t fear that giving to a big project or initiative will hurt the general fund. It will usually help it. 13. Create doable classes and pathways for people to get help with learning the nuts and bolts of getting out of debt and managing their money. Then you can say, with integrity, “This is not about what we want from you — it’s about what we want for you.” 14. In your first few hires, make sure they are in positions that will eventually pay for themselves — either by freeing you up to be much more effective or by being in key-growth areas. 15. People respond to being challenged (in general) — it’s true for money too. Don’t be afraid of doing a 90-Day Tithe Challenge. 16. Make the basics of your church’s financial situation visible regularly to the people, either through your bulletin or weekly email. They need to regularly know how the church is doing financially. 17. Every year, talk publicly on a Sunday through the basics of your financial situation. What you budgeted last year, how much was given, what the plan is for that year, etc. Shouldn’t be a sermon; more like an extended vision-casting announcement. 18. Do not outsource preaching on money to somebody else. The church needs to hear it from you and you need to build up your confidence. 19. Set next year’s budget based off of this year’s actual giving. This way you aren’t presuming upon growth. 20. Most people are 3S Givers (Spontaneous, Sporadic, Sparingly). Challenge them to be 3P Givers (Priority, Percentage, Progressive). 21. Sometimes you have not because you ask not. God can prompt people to give without you asking. He is also more likely to prompt people to give if you ask. 22. You will not do the church staff any favors by setting your salary artificially low. Develop a system to set your salary and staff salaries fairly without it having to be a huge ordeal. 23. Figure out your average per capita giving ($/attender/week). Use this as a way to plan for future hires — how much you have to grow to be able to afford them. 24. Churches that are in portable facilities need to have the discipline to save cash (of equivalent leasing payments) so that they have the money to move on something when the time comes. 25. More money rarely leads to more creativity — usually the opposite is true. Remember the “Apollo 13 table.” This is what we have—make it work.

Over on The Gospel Coalition Seth Troutt posts about three things he’s learnt from Brazilian jiu-jitsu that can be applied to discipleship: humility, hierarchy and grit.Like Seth, I started training in BJJ a few months back, like him after several years of CrossFit, and resonate strongly with his experience. I’m 20 years older than him though, so my progress is most likely even slower, and more painful. Like him, I’ve become very familiar with very quickly being put in my place by more experienced practitioners. I’m the oldest guy at our gym, but that means nothing in terms of seniority. And every training session provokes the question of whether I really want to be doing this, or if I should give up and choose an easier option. BJJ might not immediately seem an obvious place to learn discipleship lessons but, as Seth observes, Seventy-five percent of people who start BJJ quit before they get a blue belt. Ninety-five percent never make it to black belt. A black belt is just a white belt who never quit. Likewise, a wise, holy, Christian man is just a new convert who never quit. I’m too old to have any realistic hope of a black belt but, muscles and joints allowing, I hope to persevere longer than the 75 percent. And I definitely want to persevere into wisdom and holiness. While I’m doing so, there are some other discipleship lessons I can see in BJJ. The need for physical contact BJJ is a very up close and personal sport: sparring consists of rolling around on the mats for five minute rounds trying to submit one’s opponent. BJJ not only allows physical contact, it demands it. It is challenging for anyone with intimacy issues. Many men both crave and fear physical intimacy – and not just of the sexual kind. In fact, one of our most significant problems is how we have confused sexual intimacy, which should be strictly contained and delineated, with the physical intimacy that should be much more part of daily life. Modern life tends to keep us physically separated from one another and there are many barriers to men, especially, expressing physical closeness. Contemporary concerns around safeguarding and appropriate behaviour can make men nervous about any kind of physical contact with others. More people than ever before live alone and might go days, if not weeks, without any kind of physical contact with another human being. This is not healthy. Humans are made for touch and a lack of it can exacerbate anxiety, depression and other health issues. This was a significant problem during the covid lockdowns especially, but it is symptomatic of modern society generally. Being married, having a family, two dogs, and being in a church, mean I benefit from more physical touch than many people. Hugs, handshakes and fist bumps are all very much part of my daily experience. BJJ provides a much more intense and confrontational version of that and I suspect it is one of the things that draws men to the sport. Most people won’t choose to find the answer to a lack of physical contact by taking up BJJ but contact is still needed. Scripture exhorts us to, “Greet one another with a holy kiss”. Week by week we are meant to lay our hands on the sacrament, taking hold of the body and blood of Christ. Modern people can feel squeamish about these things but we need them.  The need for challenge Seth says that, “Men hate suffering but love having suffered. War stories, talking about how hard the workout was, and “back-in-my-day” sentimentality are all rooted in the desire to be someone who overcame something.” Many of us feel this intuitively but the world we inhabit has been designed to minimise hardship as far as possible. We have abundant food, heating and hot water, comfortable clothes. Relative to previous generations, certainly, our lives are remarkably struggle free. Of course, it is not only BJJ that provides an outlet for the challenge our sedentary lives lack. Whether it is parkrun, cold water swimming, or any of the other numerous physical tests so many now engage in, we – men especially – have a need for challenge. Christian discipleship doesn’t require working up a physical sweat but it does challenge our bodies. Learning to pray will often require learning the discipline of getting up earlier than we might naturally choose in order to ensure time with the Lord. Fasting is physically hard work as well as spiritually. Acts of service demand time and energy. Christian discipleship should challenge us in these kinds of areas. As Seth says, Do you want to overcome yourself, walk the path of self-conquest, and discover the type of humility that comes from God himself? Repent and believe. Grace is a gift, yes, but you have to lose your life to find it. And it might just be, for some of us at least, that BJJ can help bring that into focus.  

Glen Scrivener is a bit of a genius. This is a wonderful critique of progress without Scripture, and a superb example of how to do cultural apologetics (and short videos!)

Good things come to those who wait. The recordings of last summer's conference on Isaiah are finally available; apologies for the delay. (You can also listen to them through the King's Church London podcast if that's easier.) Enjoy!King's Church London · THINK 2025  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 2  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 3  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 4  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 5  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 6  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 7  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 8  King's Church London · THINK 2025 | ISAIAH | Session 8

Is your church stable in numbers, shrinking, or growing? What is the average age in your congregation? What is the ethnic make-up? How many under 18s are there? And how many over 70s? On current trends what will your congregation look like in ten years’ time? And what does that suggest about how your church should be thinking about mission and discipleship? These questions really matter, but I’m not sure enough church leaders are really engaging with them.The evidence – statistical and anecdotal – suggests that what looked like the terminal decline of the church in the UK is finally flattening out. Yes, there are still plenty of emptying and dying churches, but there are plenty of growing ones too. At the local level, and in meeting with church leaders nationally, the story I hear is that healthy churches are growing – often rapidly. An honest assessment of the numbers indicates that a lot of that growth is being driven by immigration rather than conversion. If your church is in a town where there is a hospital or a university it is not difficult to add significant numbers of students and workers from overseas to our congregations. In addition, many churches have benefitted from the influx of Hong Kong Chinese relocating to the UK, and then there are the considerable number of Iranians here as refugees and converting to Christianity. This is beautiful! It means increasing numbers of local churches now look more as things will be at the culmination of the ages (Rev. 7:9). The danger though is that growing churches can kid themselves about how well they are doing: if you’re near a hospital or university you haven’t really had to do anything! This immigration driven growth can disguise some deeper demographic issues. A total fertility rate (the number of babies each woman has) of 2.1 is required to maintain a stable population. In my birth year, 1970, the UK TFR was 2.5; in 2025 it was 1.5. In 1970 the median age in the UK was 33; in 2025 it was 40. In 1970 life expectancy was 72; in 2025 it was 82. There are now a million more over 60s in England than there are under 20s. For the first time in our national history, there are now more unmarried than married adults in the UK. These changing demographics are globally typical. I first posted about these issues on Think 13 years ago. Back then the TFR in the USA was a stable 2.1; last year it had fallen to 1.6. The most famous example is South Korea, with a TFR of 0.8. South Korea may have already reached a demographic tipping point from which it is impossible to recover. All this has significant societal implications, which is why shrinking birth rates are, belatedly, occupying the thoughts of governments around the world. Inverted population pyramids are economically, even existentially, troubling. The UK state pension might just still be in existence when I reach retirement age, it almost certainly won’t be for my children. Property prices in the UK are currently artificially high as demand exceeds supply. In 30 years’ time it is more likely that supply will exceed demand, and all those flats now being thrown up in our towns and cities will be standing empty, and increasingly worthless. In that timeframe lots of schools will have been mothballed as there will not be enough children to fill them. Within the next century South Korea may effectively cease to exist as a nation. I’m used to churches which are relatively youthful and in which celebrating weddings and births is more normal than taking funerals. That is likely to change over the next couple of decades. This means there are questions we should be asking, and scenarios for which we should be planning. How can we go from simply welcoming immigrants to genuinely including them, with the consequent changes required in our leadership structures, worship styles, and so on? How do we do that while also reaching the ‘90%’ – the non-immigrant population of the UK? How are we going to ensure sufficient young leaders continue to emerge in our churches? How should our ministries be reorganised to recognise the realities of an aging population? How can we celebrate and encourage marriage, and having children, while also honouring and including those who are unmarried? In my church, like many others, we are blessed with a high proportion of children and young people. This is a sign of hope for the future. Yet as I look around at the congregation I am aware that it is likely I will be conducting more funerals in the last third of my ministry than I have in the first two-thirds. This means pastors are going to have to learn, or rediscover, gifts of visiting the elderly, preparing people for death, and conducting funerals which we may not have much previously exercised. Are we ready for that? In my 30 years of ministry I’ve observed that each decade passes shockingly fast. Thinking carefully and honestly about what shifting demographics will mean for the UK church in the next decade is something we cannot afford to avoid.    

One of the things that makes Paul such a compelling thinker, and such a wise pastor, is that he always sees the big picture. When challenging sin, it is surprisingly easy to zoom in on the specifics of the behaviour and surprisingly difficult to zoom out and see the whole spiritual, historical and cosmological canvas on which it is painted. This ability to zoom out is critical in our generation, when so many people are, like the Corinthians, challenging biblical teaching on sex and sexuality. I don’t know how you would challenge a church that had accepted incest among its members, or which passages of Scripture you would appeal to. My guess is that I would have zoomed in on a specific instruction, like “Do not have sexual relations with your father’s wife; that would dishonour your father” (Leviticus 18:8), and left it at that. But in 1 Corinthians 5, as he so often does, Paul zooms out. He starts not with Leviticus but with Exodus. He begins with gospel rather than with law. He heads for the defining event of the Old Testament Scriptures—the escape from Egypt by means of the Passover—and uses it to show why the church must not be compromised and defiled by unrepented immorality in its midst. (I say “unrepented” because it is important to remember that the problem here is not just the sin but the fact that everyone has responded to it with pride rather than grief. If this man, after having sex with his stepmother, was to repent of it and change his ways, Paul would be commending him rather than expelling him, and urging the church to welcome him back. This is exactly what happens in a different situation in 2 Corinthians 2:5-11.) On the night that they escaped from Egypt, Paul explains, Israel ate unleavened bread. It was free from the fungus (yeast) which otherwise spreads throughout the dough and affects the whole loaf (1 Corinthians 5:6). At the very beginning of their journey to freedom, God gave Israel a meal to teach them that they were to be distinct from the world around them, and free from things that might otherwise infect God’s holy people and spread throughout the whole nation. Well: the same is true of you, Paul says. Since most of us don’t think of yeast as a pollutant and quite enjoy bread with yeast in it, we might get a better sense of Paul’s picture if we paraphrased it as “a little mould spreads throughout the whole cheese”. Tolerating the mould, or the yeast, jeopardises the whole batch. The only way to save the cheese is to get rid of the mould. And that, Paul is saying to the Corinthians, is what you must do with this incestuous man. You are a Passover people. You are called to be pure, undefiled, unleavened, and holy, and this is in fact what you already are. Christ himself has been sacrificed for you as a Passover lamb, pure and without blemish (v 7). So when you celebrate the “festival”—which I take to be the Lord’s Supper here—you must not be “leavened” with malice or evil, but be pure and “unleavened” with sincerity and truth (v 8). Otherwise the sin of this man, and your acceptance of it, will spread throughout the whole church like yeast through a loaf or like mould through a cheese, and you will be destroyed from the inside out.

Friendship is underrated in the modern West. Here's my message on it last Sunday from Proverbs 27, drawing from Lewis, Tolkien, Keller, and the good people of Lewisham:

I've just started writing for Christianity Today's books newsletter, which comes out weekly with short reviews of three titles. Here's my first one; the next one will be out in a couple of weeks and cover a new theology of authority from Christa McKirland, Charles Murray's apologetic for Christianity, and Chesterton's Orthodoxy.Alan J. Thompson, A Basic Guide to Biblical Theology: Nine Themes That Unite the Old and New Testaments (Baker Academic, 2025) Fitting the whole Bible together can be challenging. Many readers are familiar with some of the most dramatic stories and most famous wisdom verses but would struggle to put them all in sequence—let alone assemble them into an overarching story that makes theological and narrative sense. That is why basic introductions to biblical theology can be so helpful. Summarizing the story of Scripture, showing people what to look for as they read it, and helping them visualize how it all hangs together can help readers find their feet in God’s Word and can give them tools to make sense of it. Sydney Missionary and Bible College New Testament scholar Alan Thompson does this thematically. Nine biblical themes receive a chapter each—Creation and Fall, covenant, Exodus and tabernacle, Law and wisdom, sacrifice, kingship, prophetic hope, kingdom of God, and Holy City—topped and tailed by discussions of how to put the Bible together as a whole. The clarity and simplicity of these themes is a strength of the book, as is the frequent use of diagrams to illustrate them. Thompson’s tone is also helpful. His hermeneutic is unapologetically Baptist, but he gives his reasons and highlights areas where people disagree, explaining differing positions fairly. In places, the book is not as basic as its title suggests, with less storytelling and more jargon (and mentions of the millennium) than we might expect. But this is a short, clear, fair, lucid, and well-researched introduction to biblical theology will serve plenty of students and serious laypeople well. Timothy Keller, What Is Wrong with the World? The Surprising, Hopeful Answer to the Question We Cannot Avoid (Zondervan, 2025) It is not easy to write a compelling, heartwarming, devotional book on sin. The subject lends itself to treatments that either breathe fire or water things down, depending on the audience. It’s hard to get to the heart of human sinfulness in a way that both exposes and explains, confronting the sin while comforting the sinner. The fact that Tim Keller has done both in What Is Wrong with the World? is testimony to his remarkable preaching ministry and to the skill with which his wife, Kathy, has posthumously presented it. Keller’s approach is to show us seven ways in which the Scriptures picture sin, each rooted in a different biblical narrative. In the story of Cain, sin is a predator crouching at the door. In the story of Saul, it shows a frightening capacity for self-deception. In Jesus’ parables, sin is leaven, quietly but inevitably spreading until it is rooted out. To Jeremiah, sin is mistrust; with Jonah, self-righteousness; with Naaman, leprosy; with the Israelites in the wilderness, slavery. Each picture receives a chapter full of biblical wisdom, psychological insight, practical illustration, and gospel hope, and each impressively reads like a book chapter rather than a transcribed sermon, which makes it a refreshing joy to read (also impressive, given the topic). The book concludes with two chapters on true repentance drawing from Psalm 51. Highly recommended. Blaise Pascal, Pensées (1670) Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) was a genius. He gave his name to a philosophical dilemma, a unit of pressure, and a mathematical triangle—and he only lived to the age of 39. But he was also a deeply thoughtful Jansenist theologian whose blend of biblical observation, cultural analysis, apologetic wit, and charismatic experience makes him fascinating to read on nearly any topic. Many of his theological arguments have extraordinary sticking power. The Pensées (literally, “thoughts”) are an eclectic assembly of them, in the form of aphorisms, one-liners, paragraphs, short essays, and personal testimonies. Yet they still sparkle nearly four centuries later. Some have become familiar. Many readers will have come across his wager about betting on God’s existence or his quip that the sole cause of humanity’s unhappiness is that people does not know how to stay quietly in their room. (For Pascal, the reason for leaving his room is that if he stays there quietly, then he thinks about death, so he fills his life with diversions instead.) His evangelistic method has also been highly influential: Since people despise religion and are afraid it might be true, we have to first show that religion is worthy of respect, then make good people want it to be true. Only then do we show that it is. But the book also fizzes with humor, penetrating apologetics, and biblical insight. (I will never read the Joseph story the same way again.) Most of all, Pensées displays a deep love for Jesus.