Sitemap

Jesus Catches Peter : Text: John 21:1-19 14 April 2013 St. Bene’t’s Church, Cambridge I The 21st chapter of the Gospel of John feels tacked on. In chapter twenty, the resurrected...

SERMON: God builds a kingdom that cannot be shaken : Hebrews 12.18-end 25 August 2013 All Saint's, Cottenham It was AD 79, and the sky was burning. Stones and ash flew into the air. They soared over 20 miles...

Repost: The Adventures of the Post-Relevant Church : I was looking back through the archives and ran across this piece from April 2011. It was written when I was working for a small parish in Toronto, and I...

SERMON: Jesus Gives Simon a New Name : Text: John 1:29-42 Date: 20 January 2013 At: Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge I grew up watching Batman, specifically reruns of Adam West’s 1970’s...

Sermon: God will swallow up death forever : Date: 4 November 2012 At: All Saint's Church, Rampton Texts: Is 65.6-9, John 11.32-44 I In the ancient world, death hung like a malevolent spectre over...

Jesus Multiplies the Offering : Date: 29 July, 2012 At: St. Bene't's Church, Cambridge Text: John 6:1-21 I On top of the mountain, the Twelve focus on Jesus as he sits and teaches, but the...

Living : I recently reread Archbishop Michael Ramsey's, The Anglican Spirit (Cowley, 1991). In one chapter, Ramsey gives a quote about John Keble, and then adds his...

The Long Way to Church : I recently finished a book called 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura Vanderkam. Friends of the blog will know that I care a lot about...

The Life of the Spirit (Baptismal Covenant, part 5) : Q.3 Celebrant Do you believe in God the Holy Spirit? People I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness...

SERMON: God Grows the Kingdom : Date: The 2nd Sunday after Trinity (June 17, 2012) At: All Saints, Rampton Text: Mark 4:26-34 Have you noticed? The zombie movie seems to be making a...

SERMON: Jesus Starts a New Family : Date: The First Sunday After Trinity (June 10, 2012) At: St. Bene't's, Cambridge Text: Mark 3:19-35 I The door to Mary’s house shakes as it is pounded from...

SERMON: Jesus Sends the Spirit : Date: The Feast of Pentecost (May 27, 2012) At: St. Andrew's Soham Text: John15.26-27; 16.4b-15 I am afraid there is something desperately wrong with my...

Home and Household: Thoughts on Pre-Marital Counseling : I will be conducting my first marriage service on the 30th of June and have, as a result, been conducting my first pre-martial counselling sessions. I've...

Retelling Genesis 1-3 : I wondered recently if one could retell the story of Genesis 1-3 compellingly and Christianly by beginning with "Once upon a time." This was the result....

A Portable Narrative (Baptismal Covenant, part 4) : Q.1 Celebrant Do you believe in God the Father? People I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. Q.2 Celebrant Do you believe in...

Holy Saturday : It's Holy Saturday. The church sits empty - desolate. Not even the sign of Christ's presence remains. It is empty, because we remember Christ's death. There...

Do It Tomorrow : Over Indian food on the banks of the Cam, the conversation between myself and the Vicar turned to time management. This caught my attention because as a...

Why Skype helps us understand Christ's Presence at the Table : I struggle to articulate a view of the Sacrament of the Eucharist, particularly about views of Christ's presence. I think the Reformation debates were not...

Your Priest is Pilate and Judas (and so are you) : People get up in arms sometimes about the symbols that we use around the Eucharist. That's fair. If people don't know what's going on, then it makes sense...

God's Good News for the Poor : The House of Bishops of the Episcopal Church is meeting 15-20 September in Quito, Ecuador. Many of the sessions have involved giving on-the-ground...

Christianity, a word among the words? : In the Incarnation, the Word becomes a word among words, or so said David Bentley Hart in his The Beauty of the Infinite. This idea came to mind when I read...

The Response of Faith (Baptismal Covenant, part 3) : (continued from here) The Book of Common Prayer talks about Covenant as well. The story of Abram and the firepot puts our biblical understanding of covenant...

The Baptismal Covenant, Part 2 : Photo by Billy Alexander Several weeks ago, I started a series on the Baptismal Covenant, found starting on p. 304 of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. Today...

I help people talk to God : Photo by Steve Todey "What do you do?" "Uhhh…." Notice that when people ask you what you do, they are asking about an action, not an identity statement. We...

SERMON: Jesus Keeps His Promise, A Sermon for Pentecost : Date: June 12, 2011 Text: Acts 2:1-21 Note: This was the last sermon I preached at St. Matthew's Anglican Church, Riverdale. St. Matthew's was full of...

Welcome to Contra Factum : King's College Chapel, Cambridge photo by Monique Ingalls If you're visiting Contra Factum after reading my interview in the July 31 edition of The Living...

A Spiritual Exegesis of the Baptismal Covenant, Part 1 : The Baptismal Covenant. Let's talk about it. If you've seen the comments sections on Anglican blogs, you'll likely have noticed a basic trend when people...

SERMON: Jesus the Cornerstone : Date: May 22, 2010 Text: 1 Peter 2:2-10 When I was young, my uncle introduced me to quartz crystal. In our backyard, he pointed out some rocks, took us over...

Reserving the Sacrament : In my church we reserve the Sacrament. For those of you unfamiliar with the practice, reserving the Sacrament means that we set aside the consecrated bread...

Sermonic Metagaming : Since a friend of mine dropped the core rulebook on my bed in my second year of undergrad, I have, off and on, run campaigns in the Star Wars Roleplaying...

The Adventures of the Post-Relevant Church : My wife, Dr. Monique, and I have great conversations. One day recently, as we discussed my recent Contra Factum post on collared evangelism, she said...

SERMON: Jesus Delays : Date: April 10, 2011 Text: John 11:1-45 [Introduction] I have a confession to make: I hate my alarm clock. Now, there are some specific features that I...

Spiritual Malpractice : It's been one of the joys of working in Toronto to have spent time with people on the edges of the church's life. A common thread in their stories is that...

SERMON: Living Water : Date: March 27, 2011 Sermon Text: John 4:5-42 Photo by Willam Mittelsteadt [Introduction] I've heard my whole life that I should get 8-10 glasses of water...

Collared Evangelism : from Clergy Shirt USA I think every clergyperson who owns a collar should give 'collared evangelism' a shot. Here's my story. The church I work at is small....

New Video for Change Anything : A few weeks ago, I posted an early review of Change Anything by the VitalSmarts team. Here's a new video that really brings the appeal of the book home.

Clergy as Superheroes? Questions about Ontological Change : photo by Elvis Santana It's been said that when someone is ordained, they receive an indelible character; that is, their soul is somehow changed to allow or...

Post-Liberal Catholic Anglicanism? : It's been said that Anglicanism has three major parties: the Evangelical, the Anglo-Catholic, and the Liberal. There have been overlaps among these parties....

Our Churches as Self-Obsessed Teenagers : My wife Dr. Monique and I recently had a conversation. The topic: the North American church. Monique's earth-shaking observation: Our churches act like...

Change Anything : I just finished reading an advance copy of Change Anything: The New Science of Personal Success by the team at VitalSmarts. They're the ones who brought us...

SERMON: God Loves His Enemies : Date: February 20, 2011 Sermon Text: Matthew 5:38-48 [Introduction] When I was growing up, Gary Larson created the comic strip The Far Side. In the strip...

Synod for Communion Partner–ACNA Reconciliation : On the Covenant blog, Phillip Anderas has posted a sermon entitled "And None But Thee." Intriguingly, the sermon has this enigmatic explanatory note...

SERMON: Christ the King : The Three Crosses by Pieter Pauwel Rubens (1620) Date: November 21, 2010 Sermon Texts: Jeremiah 23:1-6; Colossians 1:11-20; Luke 23:33-43 Let us pray. May...

George Bailey is Trapped : On Wednesday nights, I host a movie discussion group at Grace Church-on-the-Hill. The current five-week series focuses on the question, "What is the meaning...

SERMON: God, Faith, Service : A mulberry tree Date: October 3, 2010Sermon Text: Luke 17:5-10 Let us pray. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in...

Sermon: The Cup of Discipleship : Date: September 5, 2010 Sermon Text: Luke 14:25-33 Let us pray. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our hearts be acceptable in your sight...

Tim Jones+: A Chink in the Curtains : My friend Tim Jones+ recently posted this at his blog, Life-Changing Prayer and has given permission for its reposting here. Where do you find the chinks? A...

Contra Factum - out of retirement : It's been long, too long, since I've posted here at Contra Factum. I intend to rectify that as I clean up the remnants of old blogs around the web. Soon...

Sermon: The Good Samaritan : This is the first sermon I preached at my new parish home, St. Matthew's Riverdale. Date: July 11, 2010 Sermon Text: Luke 10:25-37 It wasn’t too long ago...

Sermon: Jesus Makes Space at His Feet : Date: July 18, 2010 Sermon Text: Luke 10:38-42 Last week, the Gospel passage ended with Jesus’ command, “Go and do likewise.” In the parable of the Good...

Sermon on the Feast Day of St. Mary the Virgin : Date: August 15, 2010 Sermon Texts: Isaiah 7:10-15; Galatians 4:4-7; Luke 1:46-55 Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all our...

What’s Wrong with Theology: A Short Case Study : Over at Mode of Expression, Jeff Reimer recently posted What’s Wrong with Theology: A Short Case Study in which he describes his interaction with a recent...

New Review Up : Over at the Princeton Seminary Library page, a new book review from yours truly is up: Joe Mangina's Karl Barth: Theologian of Christian Witness. Enjoy!

Sermon: Jesus Sends Doubters : Last weekend, I was in New Jersey and preached at Montgomery Evangelical Free Church, the church where Monique and I attended and I worked during seminary....

Per Caritatem: Paul and Slavery : The Per Caritatem blog has just started a series called "Paul and Slavery: Submit, Subvert, or Something in Between?" The first post is very engaging, and...

Auctioning Virginity : This is from IvyJungle.org: Graduate Student Auctions Off Virginity: In a new low for morals and capitalism, a 22 year old graduate student at Sacramento...

Getting mentioned... : Because of the recent work I've been doing with Matt Jenson's The Gravity of Sin, I've gotten some exposure at the T&T Clark blog here and here. Enjoy!

N. T. Wright on the Ascension : I've been reading N. T. Wright's Surprised by Hope. Here are a couple of fantastic paragraphs on the ascension (112-113). What happens when you downplay or...

"At the Name of Jesus" : This is a lyric of a song we sing at St. Bartholomew's from time to time. The words were penned by Caroline Maria Noel in 1870, and the hymn tune we use was...

The same mistake : In other words, liberalism is, simply, the desire to be taken seriously by the academy and the willingness to find an apologetic that is relevant to the...

10 Days to Faster Reading : I finished this little book while we were on vacation, and I'd say this. If you want to read more quickly than you already do, then buy this book. I've...

New review up! : Before we left on our trip, I wrote a review of Matt Jenson's The Gravity of Sin for the Center for Barth Studies at Princeton Theological Seminary. The revi

Back from the Northwest : Monique and I are just back from a celebratory trip to the Pacific Northwest. We celebrated Monique's completed Ph.D. with ten days in Washington, Oregon...

Bad, Bad Windows : As I've written, Monique and I just returned recently from a fantastic 10-day vacation to the Pacific Northwest. On the trip, we visited Victoria, British...

Two recent sermons : Here is a link to two recent sermons I preached at Montgomery Evangelical Free Church in Belle Mead, NJ. The first is "Christ Conquered our Suffering," on...

Indiana Jones in Twilight : The very few reviews I have read try to treat Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull as a stand-alone story and then complain about its lack of...

'Context happens' : [Disclaimer: You are about to read a polemic] I've been thinking some about missions lately, and the idea of 'context' has come up repeatedly. Some say we...

Spotting 'Human Flourishing' : As I prepare for this December's Following Christ conference, I keep spotting its theme of human flourishing in many and varied places. See if you can spot...

Part III: Why I no longer use the word 'incarnational.' : Index: Part I Part II Part III Part IV (not yet published) I've been angling slowly towards making this point: the current use of the word "incarnational"...

Part II: Why I no longer use the word 'incarnational.' : Index: Part I Part II Part III Part IV (not yet published) So far, I've described three layers of how I've seen the modifier "incarnational" used. The first...

Why I no longer use the word "incarnational" (and why I don't think you should use it either); Part I : I've heard a lot since college about this adjective, "incarnational." Well, actually, I haven't heard a lot about it. I've heard it used, repeatedly, to...

Christian Heroism : "It is Christian heroism--a rarity, to be sure--to venture wholly to become oneself, an individual human being, this specific individual human being, alone...

Saturday Day Trip : Last Saturday, Monique and I took a day trip to East Tennessee. I spent the first part of the day at a small conference in Monteagle, TN at the Dubose...

Ken Myers: Reflection on the Incarnation : I'm a new subscriber to the Mars Hill Audio Journal, and I received a letter from host Ken Myers recently that reflected on the Christian doctrine of the...

Some GCF pictures : TableTalk: a biweekly theology discussion we sponsor. We've been talking about the Nicene Creed this semester.

Be ready to save your neighbor's proposition : A quote from St. Ignatius of Loyola: Let it be presupposed that every good Christian is to be more ready to save his neighbor's proposition than to condemn...

Religious Nuts : After a long posting hiatus, I'm here to post a joke I got in the mail today. More posting will come soon. Religious Nuts There were four country churches...

A Year of Getting Things Done : A year ago, I posted a review of David Allen's Getting Things Done. In the last year, I've stuck pretty closely to Allen's recommendations in that book, and...

New Perspective on Paul? : At the recommendation of a friend, I located and read this article at Christianity Today online. Written by Simon Gathercole (senior lecturer at Aberdeen...

Gamemastering and Theological Language : Some of you know that I'm an avid fan of Star Wars and play the Star Wars Role-Playing Game. Well, I should be more precise. I don't play the Star Wars RPG....

Faith AND Obedience : I've been struck recently how polemics have upset a tendentious balance in our rhetoric about belief and practice. These polemics see an overuse of a term...

Listening to the Mundane : In the Daily Office readings yesterday, I came across the story of Naaman the Syrian coming to Elisha for healing of his leprosy. I was astonished how...

That word... : I've been reading Richard Rohr recently and find myself repeating Inigo Montoya's famous line: "That word, you keep using it. I don't think it means what...

The Search to Belong: Rethinking Intimacy, Community, and Small Groups, by Joseph R. Myers : I just finished reading Joseph R. Myer's The Search to Belong (at the suggestion of Dixon Kinser), and I have to say that I found this book extremely...

Following Christ 2008 : Mark your calendars. InterVarsity's triennial Graduate and Faculty Ministries conference, Following Christ, has been announced for Dec 27-31, 2008. The...

Evangelism and Service: The Alpha Course : InterVarsity and the Vanderbilt Graduate Christian Fellowship are committed to evangelism and service. We believe that people who are being spiritually...

InterVarsity Press "Box-o-Guilt" : Every quarter, InterVarsity Press graces IV staffworkers with what I like to call the "box-o-guilt," the "bog" for short. The bog contains new, free books...

Book Note: Small Group Leadership as Spiritual Direction by Heather Webb : As GCF gets ready for the Fall Semester, I've been thinking a lot about small group ministry. GCF is committed to asking the tough questions about the...

Sermon for July 1, 2007, "Follow Me" : Text: Luke 9:51-62 I preached this sermon the second Sunday of my New Jersey trip I mentioned in my last post. I've included its full text here. The audio...

Sermon for June 24, 2007: "The Christ of God" : I've been in New Jersey the last week attending a conference and raising money for my work with InterVarsity. While in town, I was given the opportunity to...

Clearing the way for a theology of relevance : This post is a follow up to the previous post along with its resulting comments. I'm very happy that such a lively discussion developed, and I need to clear...

Relevance begins with you : Several weeks ago, I posted about two types of relativism, one that I consider truly humble and the other I consider to only have the appearance of...

TableTalk (an experience in fine theology) : For this week's update, I want to share about TableTalk, a monthly, summertime group we're doing with Graduate Christian Fellowship. The idea for the group...

Christian "stuff" : Having grown up in the heyday of American evangelicalism, I know all about Christian "stuff." You know what I'm talking about: the bookmarks and key chains...

Humility and the Appearance of Humility : I was doing some musing the other day about two types of 'relativism' in relationship to truth claims, one which is humble and one which merely has the...

Shrek the Third : On Friday, a small group of GCF'ers went out to see Shrek the Third. This is the first in our summer GCF Trip to the Movies series. Other movies we're...

Wrapping up the semester : The semester is over, and the summer is beginning. I wanted to share the photos of our GCF End of the Year Party. We're getting ready for the summer...more...

Profile: Matthew McMahon : Matthew graduated from Vanderbilt in 2006. 1. Tell us about your life. Are you married? Where did you grow up? I was born and raised in the Hartford, CT...

Would you like to host a dessert? : As I've already shared with you, I'm currently raising support for the 2007-2008 academic year. GCF's projected budget is $70,300. Currently, we've...

An action-packed week : Graduate Christian Fellowship and I were really busy this past week! It went something like this: Monday night: Graduate Christian Fellowship Fundraising...

On Conspiracies : Today, I spent some time watching a movie (posted here) that explains how 9/11 was not ultimately planned and executed by Islamic fundamentalist terrorists...

2007-2008 Program Budget : Tonight, I'm hosting a fundraising dessert for the Graduate Christian Fellowship at Vanderbilt University. I'll be sharing with them GCF's program budget...

Graduate Christian Fellowship on Facebook : If you use Facebook, take a minute to visit our new Graduate Christian Fellowship Facebook group page. We're already starting to get members, and I'm...

The Fall into Prada : This Saturday, GCF hosted a movie night in which we watched The Devil Wears Prada and discussed it in relationship to the Bible's Fall-into-Sin narrative....

Mundelein! : I'm in Mundelein, IL right now, at St. Mary of the Lake Seminary, attending Grad and Faculty Ministry's annual staff conference. We're having a blast, but...

Can a divorcee get remarried? Divorce and Remarriage in the Church, by David Instone-Brewer : Divorce And Remarriage in the Church: Biblical Solutions for Pastoral Realities Can a divorcee get remarried? David Instone-Brewer says "yes," so long as...

Conversations with Barth on Preaching : As I mentioned in earlier posts, I've read this book, Conversations with Barth on Preaching by William Willimon, and have written a review of it for...

Student Profile: Chris Pino : 1. Tell us about your life. Are you married? Where did you grow up? I was born in 1980 in Buffalo, NY. My father was the head of the mental health division...

Myth of a Christian Nation Review : A while ago I mentioned I was writing a book review of Gregory Boyd's Myth of a Christian Nation. Let it be known that the full review is now posted at the...

Simply Christian, by N. T. Wright : An excellent introduction to historical Christianity, Bishop N. T. Wright delivers a non-apologetic apologetic. Starting with the echoes of a voice that we...

At Urbana '06! : Monique and I arrived today in St. Louis for Urbana '06, InterVarsity's triennial student missions conference. Check out www.urbana.org for more information...

Student Profile: Roger Jackson : GCF Profile - Roger Jackson, 12/21/06 1. Tell us about your life. Are you married? Where did you grow up? I was born in Mt. Clemens, Michigan at 11:57PM on...

Help in Prayer : I've often struggled to put into words how Christian liturgy has helped me in my spiritual life. I'm usually talking to people who are suspcious of anything...

Christmas Party! : The day before Advent started, GCF got together for its annual Christmas party. This year, we had lots of food, fellowship, lessons, and carols. As I grow...

Aaron Simmons--Profile : [This is the first of a regular series in the blog: profiles of people who have been or are involved in Graduate Christian Fellowship at Vanderbilt...

Amazon Associate : If you’ve scrolled down the sidebar recently, you’ve noticed a new feature of the Currently Reading pane: Amazon pop-ups. Last week I signed up for the...

Friday Night Bowling : Last Friday night we took a group of six to Hilldale Strike and Spare, a bowling alley west of campus. This was one of our social events that helps us...

Partnering with Local Churches : One of InterVarsity's core commitments is to the local church, and I hold strongly to this commitment myself. If a student were forced, I would by all means...

Doctors without Borders : Last weekend, Monique and I went to Centennial Park near downtown Nashville to the Cultural Fair and went to the Doctors without Borders exhibit there. The...

Getting Things Done, by David Allen : The book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress Free Productivity, was suggested to me by my supervisor on Thursday of last week. The way he talked about...

Driving, Driving, Driving, Flying, and a Proposal : I've returned from my InterVarsity GFM fund-development trip. In my last post, I wrote out the tentative itinerary and promised a report with pictures....

Fund-Development Trip and Upcoming Attractions : FUND DEVELOPMENT TRIP: I'm leaving Sunday for a 9 day fund-development trip through AR, OK, and TX. I'll be speaking at 2 dessert/coffee socials and meeting...

Minigolfing is fun! : This weekend saw our first social event for the year: minigolfing. We had about 10 people show up, and despite the little bit of rain, we had a great time....

Public Displays of Devotion : This is an interesting post on Touchstone's Mere Comments blog about a Jewish man who was escorted off a plane for praying. If you read the article to which...

"Tolerance" in the Classical Sense : [Under the tag "Comment" I will, well, comment on things I've found interesting. I hope you'll find it interesting, too] Since Monique and I live about ten...

Ministry Schedule : I had my first meeting with the student volunteer leaders yesterday: Chris, Roger, Mary, and Kami. Over lunch we talked about the new semester and decided...

The Myth of a Christian Nation, by Gregory Boyd : Gregory Boyd's The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church is the latest book in the "Currently Reading"...

A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, by Eugene Peterson : I must be on a roll because I just finished another book from the "Currently Reading" pane: A Long Obedience in the Same Direction: Discipleship in an...

Proverbs for the Present : Since my last post on Proverbs, I have been reflecting on the amount of "love thy enemies" that seeped up into that chapter (Prov. 24). Today, I'll be...

The Fires of Heaven, by Robert Jordan : I just finished the first book that had been in the "Currently Reading" side-bar. It was Robert Jordan's fifth book in the Wheel of Time series: The Fires...

New Student Outreach 2006 : If you have any experience with InterVarsity, you know it is famous for its acronyms. For example, I work for IVCF's GFM. Inside GFM are other groups: PSM...

Proverbs for the Present : While reading in the 24th chapter of Proverbs today, I ran across some interesting ones that I thought would be good to share. This might develop into a...

God's Beautiful 'Nevertheless' : Andrea, a friend of mine from New Jersey, raised an interesting question to me in an email the other day. She was reading Acts and wanted to know how Acts...

Sitemap

Pages

More Articles