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Reviews

Books I Have Read: The Etymologicon

I like words and I like books about words; I’ll even read dictionaries for fun. However, though The Etymologicon: A Circular Stroll through the Hidden Connections of the English Language is a book about words (and a former number one on the Sunday Times best seller list) I didn’t really enjoy it very much. On one level, […]

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Do Not Use

Scenes From a Trip to Nigeria

There is nothing profound about this blog post at all. Just a few photos of things that took my interest while I was in Nigeria recently. After all, it isn’t every day that you get to play cricket with W.G. Grace.   When visiting a language project, I was impressed with the way one of […]

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Mission Theology

What do We Mean by The Mission of God?

A while ago, I wrote a post entitled Missiology is Meaningless which suggested that missiology was too broad a term to be used without qualification. Terms like missiological reflection and missiologically informed are tossed around, but they can mean very different things to different people, depending on their starting point. Lately, I’ve noticed the same thing […]

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Church: World

Fault Lines

I am beginning to fear that the greatest fault line in the Church today lies between those in the West who feel that their theological and exegetical heritage is the only valid one for the church and those in the developing world who are developing their own indigenous theologies as they read the Scriptures faced […]

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Do Not Use

Books I’ve Read: The Life of Pi

You know what? I probably wouldn’t bother with this. I know it’s a famous book and has been made into a movie and all, but I just didn’t get it. The book broadly breaks down into three sections. The first is a rather crude advert for a certain wishy-washy variety of Hinduism. Yes, I know […]

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Do Not Use

Jos

Yesterday was a long day. I flew out overnight from Heathrow to Abuja and then we drove up to Jos where I'll be based, more or less, for the next few days. The overnight flight to Abuja was exactly the wrong length – just over six hours. It meant getting on the plane really late […]

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Bible Translation

Bible Translation and Hope

Bible translation is a theological act  par exellence. As a (re)enactment of God’s self-revelation and in synergy with it, it can and should be thus ventured in faith, obedience and hope of God’s promise that He wills to continually reveal Himself to all the nations. Thus a translator acts in hope: in hope that is not seeing – there […]

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Observations

Why I’m Not Quoting John 3:16

Over the last few days, I’ve noticed that lots of people have posted the words of John 3:16 on Twitter or on Facebook. Without wishing to sound heretical, I do find myself wondering what the point of this is. I’m more than happy to acknowledge that John 3:16 is a wonderful verse of Scripture and […]

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Bible & Mission

How To Study Bible and Mission

Over the last three years I’ve been involved in helping to develop and teach a module on the Bible and Mission MA at Redcliffe College. With this in mind, I was interested in this quote from the excellent Comprehending Mission by Skreslet. Indeed, to study the Bible in mission is to be concerned about the scholarly and social […]

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Africa Reviews

Books I have Read: Adventures in Music and Culture

I have to start with a disclaimer. Not only was I given a free copy of this book to read and review, it was also signed by the author and I even get a mention on the acknowledgements page. I’ve known the author, Rob Baker, since he was a short term missionary in Ivory Coast, […]