In the far west of England, almost to Wales, the medieval spire of St. Alkmund’s parish church reaches high above the old city of Shrewsbury. One “vane” of A.E. Housman’s immortal line: “High the vanes of Shrewsbury gleam islanded in Severn stream.” Although a modern town of 72,000, Shrewsbury still looks very medieval. More than…
Every Christmas in the yard of a house not far from us stands a manger scene. The Christ Child rocks gently in his small white wooden manger; his halo glowing from the spotlight. Instead of Mary and Joseph gazing at their holy infant, or even angels surrounding the yard with praise, an unlikely figure stands…
In Eastcheap, near Fenchurch St. in London, stands the medieval church of St. Margaret Pattens. Founded in 1067 and rebuilt by Christopher Wren after the Great Fire of 1666, it slowly lost its congregation. It was closed as a parish church in 1952—more than 900 years after opening its doors. St. Margaret Pattens still offers…
I remember trick-or-treating when I was small. The night air was crisp and cool (we lived in the northwest at the time). My little sister was batman, my older sister a ballerina, and I a clown. My dad held our hands as we walked through the neighborhood, returning home only when our plastic pumpkins brimmed…
I made the mistake recently of reading Mark Driscoll’s 2008 Crossway book On Church Leadership. For those of you who have forgotten, or just blocked it, Mark Driscoll was the former pastor of the Mars Hill megachurch. He resigned deep in scandal in 2014, but has recovered somewhat and started a new church in Scottsdale,…
I remember this so well. It was 1997–the year I graduated from college, the year I got married, and the year I started graduate school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It was also the year that the world learned about Zondervan’s gender-neutral edition of the NIV (which eventually became known as…