iChaplain

Recently, I was listening to Healing Begins by Tenth Avenue North for the first time in years. It's funny how a song you haven't heard in a long time can suddenly speak into exactly what God has been teaching you. As I listened, I was reminded of a phrase I've heard many times over the years and again in a sermon recently: There is nothing we can do to make God love us more, and there is nothing we can do to make God love us less. He loves us. The older I get, the more I realise how difficult that truth can be to fully believe. Like many people, I've spent much of my life measuring things by performance. Work harder, achieve more, do better. It's easy to carry that same mindset into our relationship with God without even realising it. We can begin to think that God loves us a little more when we're reading our Bible consistently, praying regularly, serving faithfully and generally getting things right. Then there are the other days.  The days when we struggle. ...

Over the past few weeks, I've had a number of conversations around Christianity, what it means to follow Jesus, and why Christians don't always seem to look much like Him. Those conversations got me thinking, so I thought I'd put a few thoughts into writing. If Christianity is about following Jesus, then shouldn't Christians look more like Jesus?  It's a fair question. In fact, it's a question I sometimes ask myself. Jesus was known for His compassion, humility, grace, mercy, truth, and self-giving love. Yet many people looking at Christianity today wonder why it sometimes appears that some Christians are moving in the opposite direction. Sometimes Christians seem more known for arguments than kindness, more defensive than humble, and more eager to point out other people's faults than their own. The uncomfortable truth is that there is often a gap between the teachings of Jesus and the way His followers live them out. Many people carry wounds from experience...

Image provided by StockCake. Many of us struggle to get our heads around the world economy, never mind the UK economy. The news is full of stories about inflation, interest rates, growth, trade and markets, but much of it feels far removed from everyday life. Yet, somehow, all of these things affect us. They affect what we earn, what we spend and what we can afford to put in our shopping baskets each week. The question becomes much more personal when we're spending our own money. Perhaps that's part of the problem. Standing in a supermarket aisle, I sometimes find myself wondering whether choosing the Fairtrade option, or the one with the little frog logo, really makes any difference. Can my spending genuinely help a worker on the other side of the world whom I'll never meet? And what happens when money is tight and the ethical choice is also the more expensive one? Recently, I attended a talk on God and the Economy. It got me thinking about what the Bible says about money,...

Have you ever discovered that something you've believed for years isn't actually true? Not because someone lied to you. Not because you weren't paying attention. Simply because you'd heard it repeated so many times that you assumed it must be true.  That happens with Jesus more than we might realise. Over the years, we've attached all sorts of sayings to Him that sound spiritual, inspirational, and even biblical. Phrases like  "Follow your heart,"  "Believe in yourself,"  "Be true to yourself," "Everything happens for a reason,"  "God helps those who help themselves,"  "Money is the root of all evil," have become part of our cultural vocabulary. Many people assume they came from Jesus or at least from the Bible. The problem is that Jesus never said any of them.  In fact, one of them isn't even an accurate Bible quotation. The Bible doesn't say, "Money is the root of all evil." It says, ...

  The Verse We Reach For When Words Run Out Jeremiah 29:11 appears everywhere. It is printed on mugs, cards and posters, and shared in messages to people who are having a hard time. It is often used as a quick reassurance, a comforting line we offer when someone is struggling and we do not really know what else to say. I have done it, and you probably have too. Sometimes we reach for this verse because we want to offer hope, and it is the first thing that comes to mind. However, Jeremiah 29:11 was not written for people who were about to step into a bright new chapter. It was not a motivational quote for someone starting a new job or waiting for exam results. It was not even a promise of quick rescue. It was spoken to people living far from home, trying to make sense of a life they did not choose. These were people whose world had fallen apart. They were confused, unsettled and unsure what the future held. In many ways, they were experiencing the same kind of uncertainty that many ...

There’s a moment early in John’s Gospel that has always stood out for me. Two curious men begin following Jesus at a distance, unsure what to say, unsure what they’re even looking for. Jesus turns, notices them, and asks the simplest question imaginable: “What do you want?” (John 1:38). They mumble something about where He’s staying. And Jesus replies with three words that have shaped Christian invitation ever since: “Come and see.” (John 1:39) No pressure. No performance. No sales pitch. Just presence, honesty, and an open door. In my previous reflection, Beyond Evangelism: Becoming the Kind of People Who Help Others Find Jesus , I explored how our calling isn’t to “sell” Jesus but to become the kind of people through whom others can encounter Him. If you haven’t read it yet, you can find it here: https://www.ichaplain.uk/2026/07/beyond-evangelism-becoming-kind-of.html That post laid the foundation for this one, because the heart of “come and see” is the heart of becoming those kin...

Four Lives   Before telling these four stories, it’s important to say that they are not based on specific individuals. They are shaped by many individuals whose experiences and insights have echoed through church life.  They reflect the kinds of journeys people often take as they explore faith, lose their footing, return with courage, or quietly slip away. These stories are composites, drawn from shared experiences, questions, and struggles that many carry but rarely speak aloud. They remind us that every person has a story, and every story matters to God. On any given Sunday, people gather with different experiences, different journeys of faith, and different questions. Some feel at home in church. Some are exploring. Some are unsure. Some carry painful or complicated experiences of church life. Yet together they form a community that Christians describe as the body of Christ, a community that takes shape in ways that are both ordinary and full of God’s presence. There is the...