We live in a society which is obsessed with the notion of ‘human rights’. In this world, it’s almost inconceivable that someone would actually choose to forego their rights — but that is exactly what Paul does in this passage. Why dud Paul find it necessary to give up his rights, and what does that teach us about how we should live as Christians today?
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Is the Christian life primarily about knowing information? The Corinthians seemed to make a lot of “knowledge,” but they hadn’t realised the most important thing. Knowledge, without love, means nothing. It needed to make a difference to the way they treated those they considered to be without knowledge — and everyone else.
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I’ve written a new song, this time on the theme of spiritual growth – how God calls us to grow to maturity.
After my previous song, I was thinking and praying about where to go next, and God gave me the idea of a song about spiritual growth. I did what any self-respecting pastor would do and searched the Bible for all instances of the word ‘maturity’, and discovered that there were a few verses where it was mentioned directly. From that I took the following points:
I basically put these four points into the four verses of the song, added a chorus, and there you have it!
If you’d like to download a high-quality audio version of the song, head on over to Bandcamp where you can download a copy for a small fee.
God calls each of us to maturity,
to grow in him each passing day,
that we may attain to the fullness of Christ,
and become united in faith.
Lord, help us grow to maturity,
to take a step forward each day.
As we read your Word and serve you,
We long to walk more in your ways.
We gain wisdom reading the Scriptures,
as you plant your word in our hearts.
Help us to revere every page of your Word,
and not just our favourite parts.
As we grow we learn to distinguish
between what is evil and good.
If our minds are filled up with your righteous ways,
we will not give way to falsehood.
Maturity does not come easily,
we have to pursue it each day.
As we persevere through fiery trials,
complete your work in us, we pray.
My intention for every song I write is that the sheet music should be freely available. You can download the piano score (with guitar chords) as a PDF here. If you play the song, or even record it, please let me know (you’ll probably do a better version than me!)
A majority of young people still desire marriage as a ‘life goal’ — according to a 2022 YouGov survey, 60% of 18-34 year olds desire to get married. But is it right to desire marriage? Does marriage conflict with serving God? How should Christians think rightly about relationships? This passage from 1 Corinthians helps us to explore all these questions and more.
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In this passage, Paul teaches the Corinthians how to deal with questions of marriage and sexuality with godly wisdom. This is a message we need to hear today in a world where we face the same kind of issues. What does it mean to be godly and wise and face questions such as sexual temptation, divorce, and unbelieving husbands or wives?
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About 18 months ago, I decided to start recording songs for Church with UTB. Since then I have recorded nearly 70 songs, which are all available on a separate YouTube channel.
The problem which I was addressing at the time was the lack of good-quality recordings on YouTube of songs which could be sung congregationally. However, I have also discovered that there are very few modern songs which deal with the topic of obedience in the Christian life. It’s been more and more difficult to find good new songs which deal with the kind of issues I want to talk about on UTB. It seems that many churches simply do not deal with these issues, which is a large part of why I felt the need to write my book in the first place.
A few weeks ago, I decided to try writing a song, and here’s the result!
In summary, the song is based on the theme that we are unable to love others in our power and that we need to ask God to give us the love we need to help us every day.
You could say that it takes the themes from my book and puts them into a song!
If you’d like to download a high-quality audio version of the song, head on over to Bandcamp where you can download a copy for a small fee.
Verse 1:
The only thing you ask of us, which fulfils your every Law:
To love our friend and neighbour and love you even more.
But sin has made our hearts grow cold, we’ve thrown your love aside;
Instead of loving others we feed our selfish pride.
Chorus:
Lord, give the love you ask of us, we can’t do it alone.
We need your Holy Spirit to change our hearts of stone.
By nature we are dead in sin and desire to serve the flesh.
Please fill us with the Spirit’s power, we ask, each day afresh.
Verse 2:
If all we do is follow rules we will stay away in fear;
Love does not wrong a neighbour but calls us to draw near.
We prove our faith is genuine, and Jesus lives in us,
In acts of love for others and putting their needs first.
Verse 3:
We show the world Jesus is real when they see our love is true,
For love is supernatural; it only comes from you.
We’re sorry we neglect to pray and then from you draw back.
Teach us how much we need you and give us what we lack.
My intention for every song I write is that the sheet music should be freely available. You can download the piano score (with guitar chords) as a PDF here. If you play the song, or even record it, please let me know (you’ll probably do a better version than me!)
The sexual revolution of the 1960s promised freedom from the old, oppressive rules of Christianity. However, looking back over the last 60 years, it seems that freedom is the last thing that it has brought us. How should Christians think about the body and what it means to live rightly in this world?
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Sometimes we can learn as much by looking at the wrong way of doing things as we can from studying the right way. This is the case with the Corinthians: they had been dealing with sin in the church in completely the wrong way. We saw that last week, but this week we’re focussing on a particular case study in how they managed to get things wrong…
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Have you ever known anyone expelled from a church because of immoral behaviour? Perhaps that is because most churches simply gloss over Paul’s teaching here about how important it is to purify the church. If we don’t take this teaching seriously, then God will.
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One of the most off-putting things about people is hypocrisy: we hate it when people say they believe one thing, but then do something completely different. This is doubly the case for Christians, where our lives should reflect God. What does that mean for us, and how can we avoid hypocrisy?
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