A regular Friday round-up of articles which I have found interesting / thought-provoking / challenging / amusing during the week, pointing you in the direction of some stuff you might have otherwise missed.

This week featuring Jeremy Vine on Tony Blair, Lord Sacks, the Bible, mission, theology and joy.

The Guardian: Jeremy Vine: ‘I’ve been tailgating the greats’

I interviewed Tony Blair five or six times, but it’s off-air conversations that matter. Once, on the bus, he said: “I like tea” and I said: “I like tea, too” and then he said something like: “I hear you’re a Christian, Jeremy” and I said: “I’m just struggling, you know” and he said: “It’s the most important thing in my life.” And then I said: “Don’t you feel that actually the big stuff like what you’re going to do when you get into power is much less important than the small stuff, which is how you treat your next-door neighbour?” I realised that was a bad analogy because his neighbour was Gordon Brown. But he said: “I completely agree.” read more

Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks: Credo: Looking closely at the road less travelled

So when everyone is going in one direction, it’s worth taking the opposite route, the contrarian option, the “road less travelled.” Here is my recommendation for the next few years. While everyone else is thinking about economics and politics, executive salaries and the future of the Euro, do the opposite, even if it’s hard. Invest in the spirit. Focus on the mind and the soul. Read. Study. Enrol in a course of lectures. Pray. Become a member of a religious congregation. Study the Bible or other ancient works of wisdom. Find people not to envy but to admire. Do not the profitable but the admirable deed. Live by ideals. read more

Red Letter Christians: God Did Not Write the Bible

I have heard many Christians proclaim emphatically that the Scripture needs no interpretation, that it speaks for itself. As humans, however, there is no such thing as reading anything (the newspaper, the Bible, this blog . . .) without applying our own interpretation to that reading. We all read through the eyes and ears of our own education and experience. Most of us developed our own interpretations from those of our spiritual leaders past and present (pastors, teachers, parents, spouse . . .), although we may be totally unaware of their influence. All of us interpret, but not always responsibly. read more

The Ugley Vicar: Local mission and the Christian Union model

But then with the clergy in charge we are back to the earlier problem — churches which are passive and ineffective, dominated by ‘passengers’ rather than ‘crew’. We avoid the problems of personalities and cults, but we fail to reach our neighbours in evangelistic mission.

This, I think, is a genuine dilemma. But there are, I suggest, a number of clues from the Christian Union world that we would do well to think about and perhaps apply. read more

cybersoul: Discussing theology online is crucial

Twitter expresses exactly where our attention spans are at. We prefer bite sized chunks of information. We are wanting to think in short statements.

Most people no longer want to hear lengthy speeches. We need it to be short and snappy. Hence the popularity of TED talks – reducing long presentations to a snappy 18 minutes. The age of 1.0 presentations where people speak for hours, seems to be over for most people’s minds. The mediums we have chosen for ourselves today consist of short status updates, punchy blog posts, TED talks and 140 tweets. read more

Steve May: That Your Joy May Be Full

Are you enjoying life? Basking in the beauty of God’s creation? Bursting into laughter with friends? Giving way to merriment every now and then? If not, take a moment today to lighten up. Let your joy be full. read more