What’s the point of this blog?

Oh, look, another blog.

There’s already a lot of Christian online content out there, from the meaty theological stuff to the depressingly vacuous; from large editorials to individual blogs like this one.

So why add another voice to the clamour?

The answer is for the same reason that anyone starts anything – I had an idea that wouldn’t leave. I saw a bit of a gap in the Christian online blog-o-sphere, and I’m hoping that just maybe, I can fill it.

I used to work for a Christian organisation that commented on and sought to influence some of the ‘harder’ social issues –  the topics commonly avoided in everyday conversation. During this time, I became convinced of the importance of Christians engaging with culture.

After I left that job, for a while I thought maybe it was time to lay those issues to rest. It was too exhausting and nobody seemed to care anyway. Let other people talk about the hard stuff.

But that was exactly the problem. Other people weren’t talking about it. At least, not people my own age. And here I was with all this information, and I didn’t know what to do with it.

Jesus was very interested in the culture around him and had something to say about it. And as Jesus-followers, we’re called to extend God’s Kingdom into every sphere of culture. We’re called to bring Kingdom solutions to a broken society looking for answers. I think we can do that much better if we seek to understand the issues at hand as best as we can.

But it can be hard to know what to make of some of these prevailing cultural trends, and Christian commentary on weightier social issues often seems left to the reputable theologians, authors and pastors (with a few notable exceptions). Though this is all right and good and proper, it’s not always very accessible.

If your heart burns for something, it’s usually because God put that passion there. So my caring about these unpopular issues is not just an inconvenience that I’ll have to carry around for the rest of my life. It’s one of the reasons I was put on the earth.

So I started this blog with the intention of sharing what I know. Rather than thinking ‘who am I to talk about these things’, I’m starting to think, ‘who am I not to?’

I can’t guarantee straightforward, black and white answers, because I won’t always have them, and those kinds of answers don’t always exist. But I’ll grapple with the issue, turn it over, and try to make sense of it in a way that is rooted in truth but doesn’t remove love from the equation.

I hope every word on this blog will come from a place of love. But I absolutely will not promise that nothing on this blog will offend you.

And don’t just take my word as gospel – I’ll also try and include recommendations for where to find out more about the topics at hand.

I will also consider guest posting – if you have a burning desire to share your thoughts on a particular topic, contact me and we’ll talk about it!

Please don’t hesitate to comment on my posts and tell me your thoughts – I like feedback and I like to learn. If you can teach me something new, please do.

Happy reading and don’t forget to click the ‘Follow’ button.