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On 10th April 1912 Father Robert Browne boarded the RMS Titanic for her maiden voyage. He had been gifted a ticket by his uncle to sail from Southampton to Queenstown* in Ireland, her last stop before the transatlantic crossing. But while at sea he made friends with a wealthy American couple who so enjoyed his company they offered to pay for him to travel all the way to New York. He needed permission from his superior to do so but the reply to his telegraph was unambiguous – ‘Get off that ship’. He did so and his obedience saved his life. The message of Jesus is surprisingly similar. In Mark’s Gospel his first recorded words include a command for us to repent, which might just as well be translated ‘Get off that ship!’ Most of us are living lives our own way and perhaps, like Browne, are tempted to pursue a course that looks to be filled with pleasure and luxury. But Jesus’ invitation to repent is a call to turn our lives around and instead of facing away from God to walk towards him and embrace the f

Clearing up other people’s waste is extremely costly. Across Britain today there are hundreds of sites containing tonnes of waste, and eleven have now been labelled ‘supersites’ with more than 20,000 tonnes each. The cost of the clear up is unknown but will run into millions of pounds with one site alone costing more than £9m. The problem is some people don’t want to have to pay to get rid of their waste. They would rather dump it on others and let them pay the cost. But how fair is that? In life too our selfish hearts accumulate all kinds of waste which we don’t know what to do with. Sometimes we try burying it but generally it spills over and others end up paying the price. How often have we thought, said or done something that we wish we hadn’t? The overflow of waste, the effect of our falling short of God’s standards, the collateral damage caused by sin. If only there were someone who could clear up the mess; someone willing to pay the price. Well, there is. His name is Jesus and 2,000 years ago

The TV series Sort Your Life Out features families overwhelmed by the number of possessions and the amount of clutter that is filling their homes. They simply don’t know where to begin. The first step involves removing everything and laying it all out in a huge warehouse. Next, they are guided through the process of deciding what to keep and what to give up. It’s astonishing to see quite how much one family can accumulate, from thousands of toys to dozens of pairs of shoes and, in one case, 521 odd socks. It strikes me that we might think of Lent as an opportunity to sort our lives out but in a different way. Over the course of time our lives fill up with clutter – bad habits, resentments, grievances, losses, and despair. If we’re not careful we may find ourselves feeling overwhelmed. Used rightly Lent is a season for self-examination, an opportunity to lay everything out before God and seek his help to sort through the clutter. In the TV series Stacey Solomon is the kindest of guides through what can be a

In 1943 Anna Jarvis campaigned to have Mother’s Day cancelled in America. This might not have been anything to note had she not been the person who had done so much to promote it in the first place. On 10thMay 1908 she held a memorial ceremony to celebrate motherhood in her church at Grafton, West Virginia, and by 1914 it had become established as a national holiday.  But over the years it became an opportunity to make money selling cards, flowers and chocolates and it was this that Anna railed against. She complained that ‘a printed card means nothing except that you are too lazy to write to the woman who has done more for you than anyone in the world. And candy! You take a box to mother and then eat most of it yourself’.  Anna wanted children to think deeply about their mother’s sacrificial love. Perhaps in this she was inspired by her Christian faith and her belief in a God who had shown her so much sacrificial love. A God who sent his only son to die on a cross. In her eyes her mother’s lo

On 10th March 1876 Alexander Graham Bell uttered the immortal words, ‘Mr Watson – come here – I want to see you’. It was the first telephone call ever made. This was cutting edge technology that would change the world forever. It was the Victorian age when human progress seemed unstoppable, and people were dreaming dreams about what the future might look like. Hard on the heels of the telephone came dreams of the telectroscope, a device that could send both sound and pictures across vast distances. It would be decades before it became reality, but the dream was there. In a similar way the Bible encourages us to dream dreams about a future world that seems fantastical. In the Old Testament Isaiah prophesies, ‘No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no human mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him’. The last book of the Bible fills in some of the blanks, describing this new world as one without death, mourning, crying or pain.  To us, such a future might seem as incredible

In a recent interview the British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer, declared, ‘one of the core principles in our system is that everybody is equal under the law and nobody is above the law’. This means that regardless of your status in society the law applies to you and no one is at liberty to disregard it. The problem, of course, is that some people do see them themselves as being above the law. They hope that the power and influence they yield will make them immune from accountability; and, sadly, many do get away with crimes for which they should be held to account. But we need not despair. On all these counts the Bible has good news. Firstly, St Paul tells us that ‘all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God’. We are all under God’s law and we have all broken it. Secondly, no one gets away with anything, the writer of the Book of Hebrews telling us that we die once and after that comes judgement. Thirdly, and most importantly, in Jesus we have a Saviour who on the cross paid the price for all our

British figure skaters Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson came agonisingly close to winning the first Olympic Gold medal since Torvill and Dean in 1994. Years of sacrifice, dedication and endless hours on the ice have seen them rise up the rankings, winning silvers and bronze in recent European championships.  They started their routine flawlessly with a complex lift, but in the second element Fear wobbled. It was a tiny mistake, and the rest of the dance went without a hitch. It was beautiful to watch. But it wasn’t perfect and in that moment they knew that gold had slipped away yet again. I’m reminded of something the Bible says in the book of James. ‘Whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it’1 We may think that we lead lives that are good enough to earn us a place in heaven, but this verse tells us that perfection is required. On that basis none of us has, or ever will, perform well enough to win the big prize. The good news is that in Jesus we

William Golding was a Royal Navy Lieutenant who took part in the D-Day landings. His experience of that conflict and the Cold War that followed, inspired him to write his first novel Lord of the Flies. In the book a party of school children are stranded on a desert island. Initially rejoicing that no adults have survived they attempt to build their own society with just three rules – to have fun, survive and keep hoping for rescue. But their dreams of utopia quickly unravel as the desire for power leads to division and a swift descent into savagery. By the end of the book one of the boys is seconds away from being murdered until he runs headlong into an adult – a sailor who has been drawn to the island by a fire the boys have started. The rescue they had longed for has finally arrived and order is restored. While the book is fiction, the point of the story is that without proper accountability human society tends to decay. We need an adult in the room! Good to know then that in Jesus, the king of kings

Forty days on and Christmas is a distant memory. The bright lights that lit up our homes are back in the box, and we’ve long since eaten the last of the turkey curry leftovers. Now we’re just holding on through the storms of winter for the first signs of spring. But hold on a minute, what’s this? In the midst of the winter gloom followers of Jesus are not quite done with Christmas. The 2nd of February marked the celebration of Candlemass, remembering the time that the infant Jesus was dedicated in the Temple at Jerusalem. How fitting that in the depths of winter a candle should be lit, a light shining in the darkness. On that occasion an old man called Simeon met Jesus and his parents in the Temple and declared, ‘Sovereign Lord, my eyes have seen your salvation1’. It may be that today you long for a light to shine in the darkness of your current circumstances. Well, the message of Candlemass is that it can. Jesus came as a light to the world that would never be extinguished, and he promises peace and

In a few weeks’ time Artemis II will blast off taking people back to the moon for the first time in over 50 years. While they won’t land on this occasion, they will be paving the way for others in years to come.  It was John F Kennedy who announced to Congress on 25th May 1961 that America would have men on the moon before the end of that decade. The following year he visited NASA for the first time and noticing a cleaner carrying a broom asked what he was doing. The cleaner replied ‘I’m helping put a man on the moon.’  Too often in life we can resent those who seem to have greater prominence that we do. But this man understood that while his job might have seemed insignificant his role was vital if the goal was to be achieved. I’m reminded of a poor woman Jesus noticed putting her only penny into the Temple treasury in Jerusalem. She didn’t have much but understood her tiny offering was supporting a vast enterprise – a place where people could draw near to God. So, no matter what you

In James Cameron’s film Titanic, Bruce Ismay, the Managing Director of the White Star Line declares, ‘This ship can’t sink!’ With a line that sends shivers down the spine the ship’s architect replies, ‘She’s made of iron Sir, I assure you she can’.  I’m reminded of this episode as yet another luminary of the Christian world turns out not be as perfect as we had hoped. For decades Philip Yancy inspired millions of Christians around the world. His book What’s so amazing about grace? sold 15 million copies. But then suddenly came his recent confession. An eight-year affair with a married woman. Pain, hurt, and disillusionment have followed. But like Titanic there is no such thing as a perfect, unsinkable human being. Titanic was made of iron, and humans have a corrupt heart, an accident waiting to happen. The prophet Jeremiah once declared, ‘The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure’. If someone like Yancy can be deceived by his heart, then all of us should beware. Ismay was so confident

I wonder what you long for in life and how you cope with disappointments when dreams don’t come true? This week Timothy Chalamet finally won a Golden Globe on his fifth nomination. How did he deal with the disappointment of walking away empty-handed so many times? Well, his father taught him always to be grateful for what he had rather than what he didn’t. It was great advice. A life focussed on what we don’t have will be one of disappointment and frustration. But one focussed on what we do will bring peace and contentment. In the Bible St Paul writes of having discovered a similar secret to living a life of fulfilment. Like Chalamet he was using the gifts that he had been given to work towards a prize and doing so with a heart full of thanksgiving. But unlike Chalamet there was no possibility of disappointment because the prize had already been won. Paul’s prize was the gift of eternal life made possible through the death and resurrection of Jesus. No wonder he was thankful. No wonder he was content. How

I moved home on 2nd January. This seemed like a good idea back in September. But as the weeks rolled by and the busyness of preparing for Christmas picked up, I became less sure. You see the issue was not just that I was moving but that I was downsizing from a three-bedroomed house with a large loft to a two-bed flat with limited storage space. I simply couldn’t take everything with me and after fifteen years there was an enormous amount to sort through. I was shocked by how much s I had accumulated that I didn’t need and never used. The effort of sorting through it all was exhausting but ultimately liberating. I’ve arrived in my new home lighter and freer. So, perhaps moving on 2nd January was a good idea after all. It’s that time when we make our new year resolutions and decide to leave some things behind. I’m encouraged by some words of St Paul who urged Christians in Colosse to rid themselves of bad habits and old practices, and put on instead more godly characteristics of kindness, compassio

In these days of polarisation and division we would do well to remember the origins of the American festival of Thanksgiving. It was the spring of 1621 and only half of the Pilgrims who had arrived aboard the Mayflower were still alive. Their chances of survival seemed slim, but providence was on their side. Seemingly […] The post Thanksgiving appeared first on Turn the Page.

Once again evolutionary scientists are scratching their heads trying to find the reason behind one of our most common behaviours – kissing. We’ve been doing it for a very long time, and not just humans but animals as well including wolves, prairie dogs, polar bears and even albatrosses. To be fair the scientist’s definition of […] The post Kissing appeared first on Turn the Page.

Near the main entrance of Westminster Abbey lies The Tomb of the Unknown Warrior. Brought from the battlefield of the Western Front and buried ‘amongst the kings’ this unknown soldier represents the countless thousands who gave their lives in the First World War. His body was laid to rest on 11th November 1920 in the presence […] The post We will remember appeared first on Turn the Page.

As he nears the end of his life Anthony Hopkins has made this candid assessment about the prospect of dying: ‘We are all going to die eventually, aren’t we? And now my thing is, screw it. Who cares. Nobody really cares. We all think we do. It’s all a dream within a dream. So, I […] The post The Big Secret appeared first on Turn the Page.

In a world of spin doctors, fake news and social media driven conspiracy theories it’s getting harder to know what is true and what isn’t. The danger is that we doubt everything and trust no one and, as we are seeing across the free world, that leads to increasing fragmentation and division. Having a truth […] The post Finding the truth appeared first on Turn the Page.

After two long years the hostages taken by Hamas have finally been returned. For the families left behind it has been two years of longing, waiting and hoping. No wonder there has been such an outpouring of joy and celebration as those who have survived have been reunited with their loved ones. The emotions have […] The post Homecoming appeared first on Turn the Page.

I remember once sitting with the parents of a four-year-old who had tragically died. A bright and bubbly little boy he had complained one day of a headache and within 48 hours had died from viral meningitis. It was a catastrophe and there were no words to say. We sat for a while in silence […] The post No words to say appeared first on Turn the Page.