Artificial Intelligence

My wife, our grown-up children and I once discussed which of us would soon find ourselves out of work due to the advance of Artificial Intelligence. As a pastor I was pretty confident that no AI-enabled robot could do my job. My son promptly asked ChatGPT to write a Baptist style sermon on a passage from Paul’s Epistle to the Ephesians. It completed the task in seconds. The sermon took the form of a typical Baptist message and helpfully explained the text. Would have taken me hours to do that. No, I haven’t been tempted to take AI shortcuts in my sermon prep. Honest.

Apparently, many Uni students don’t have such qualms. ChatGPT and other AI platforms are being used to write essays to save budding scholars the bother. Lecturers complain that the attention span of today’s students has been addled by their use of social media. They have difficulty reading the requisite number of books and then deploy AI to write essays on A Tale of Two Cities, or whatever. The trouble is that that AI platforms sometimes make mistakes. No less a journal than the Chicago Sun-Times recently published an AI-authored summer reading list for 2025. The list helpfully included a brief blurb for each title recommended. However, alert readers quickly pointed out that some of the books were fake. Rather embarrassing for the paper.

 AI no doubt has its uses, but it can’t be left to get on with things without our involvement. Just ask the red-faced editor of the Chicago Sun-Times. There is no substitute for human ingenuity in the arts, science, and literature. We cannot delegate ethical decisions to algorithms. Besides, we will always need the human touch. Have you ever tried to sort out a customer service problem using an AI Chat facility? ‘Artificial’, certainly. ‘Intelligence’, not so much. Even exchanges with other people using texts, email, or social media can’t replicate face-to-face communication.

One of the most profound statements in the Bible is found in the opening chapter of the Gospel of John, ‘And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us’. Christians believe that in Jesus God entered our world to speak to us in person. We can read his words as recorded in the Gospel accounts of the New Testament. Jesus did more than speak to us about the love of God. He came to show us God’s love for humanity by laying down his life for our sins upon the cross. The risen Jesus in present in the lives of his people by the power of the Holy Spirit. When the Lord returns his people will see his face and share his glory.

Flaws and glitches notwithstanding, Artificial Intelligence may be able to do things that put our capabilities in the shade. But the most sophisticated computer has nothing on human beings, whom God created in his own image. Like all technological revolutions AI brings with it opportunities as well as threats. Some jobs may well be lost, but new ones will no doubt be developed. Reassuringly, members of my congregation didn't seem too enamoured at the prospect of me being replaced by a cyber-pastor. 

*For various local magazines 

On Time

 

Relax if you are given to tardiness. This isn’t a piece on the importance of punctuality. Rather, I want to reflect on our relationship to time itself. Although it has to be said that time isn’t an easy thing to define. Early Christian thinker Augustine of Hippo puzzled over the question ‘What is time?’ saying,  ‘If no one asks me, I know what it is. If I wish to explain it to him who asks me, I do not know.’ All he could say is that some events lie behind us in the past and some lie ahead of us in the future. If nothing at all existed there would be no present.

 Augustine proposed that God did not make the universe in time, but with time. God is eternal, existing outside of time. He didn’t wait around for ages before creating the world. The clock only started ticking as it were at the beginning of creation. Modern cosmology tends to agree on that point. Anyway, the thing is that we exist in time. Our lives are constantly moving from the past, through the present and into the future.

The trouble is that these days people only seem interested in the present. The past isn’t worth thinking about. People did bad stuff back then. Slavery and that. The future will have to look after itself. In 2010 Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg dismissed the idea of building more nuclear power stations as they wouldn’t be good to go for another ten years. I mean, who cares what happens in the 2020s? Maybe it’s apt that after a career in politics Clegg went to work for Facebook/Meta.

Social media tends to make us focus on the present moment, rather than the past or the future. What’s going on now captivates out attention, no matter how trivial. This is an age of momentary celebrity and throwaway fashion. Why bother with the time-consuming process of saving for major purchases? Much easier to take out instant credit to buy on a whim something that flashed before our eyes in an online ad.

There’s no escaping time, however. We are all products of our past experiences. What we decide in the present will impact on how we fare in the future. But our history need not be our destiny. God entered our world of time and space in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He came to die on the cross that our past sins and failings may be forgiven. He rose from the dead that those who believe in him may have the hope of everlasting life. God gives us time to seek him while he may be found and call upon him while he is near. 

*For various local magazines 

'Time for Judgement: God’s judgement and ours in times of crisis' by Paul Yeulett

Day One Publications, 2024, 432pp, pbk

‘May you live in interesting times’, says the old Chinese curse. Well, we have certainly been living though ‘interesting times’. The coronavirus pandemic engulfed much of the world in 2020-21. Then in 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine. That conflict caused a global spike in utility bills, triggering a cost-of-living crisis. Added to that is a sense that having turned its back upon the Christian faith, much of Western culture is in bondage to idolatrous forces. 

For a good part of this period the reviewer was preaching though the Book of Jeremiah. The prophet’s warning of the Lord’s judgements upon Israel and the nations seemed uncannily up-to-date. Jeremiah spoke repeatedly of, ‘pestilence, sword, famine and captivity’ (Jermiah 15:2). But is it appropriate to apply the words of Old Testament prophets to the church and wider world today?

We are certainly not in the same position as Jeremiah whose writings were inspired by Spirit. He could say, ‘Thus says the Lord… I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon.’ (Jeremiah 20:4).  We need to be a little more circumspect as we seek to pronounce on what the Lord is doing in our day. None the less, God has given us the Holy Scriptures which bear witness to the judgements of the Lord in history. Mindful of that, Paul Yeulett helps us to understand recent upheavals in the light of God’s Word.  

Like the men of Issachar, we need to be people who have ‘understanding of the times, to know what Israel ought to do’ (2 Chronicles 12:32). The writer’s analysis of the period through which we are living may not command the reader’s agreement in every respect, but his work helps us discern the hand of the Lord in contemporary events. He also endeavours to show how the church should respond to the challenges of the hour. In an age of ‘pestilence, sword, famine and captivity’ we are called to authentic godly living and passionate gospel preaching. 

Love so amazing

 

The crucifixion of Jesus was the supreme manifestation of human malice and hatred. Those who plotted his demise knew he hadn’t done anything to deserve being executed upon a cross. Jesus proclaimed a message of love and showed that love in action by healing the sick and feeding the hungry. The ordinary people flocked to hear Jesus’ preaching. That was the problem. The Jewish religious establishment were afraid that if this Jesus movement took off, they would lose their position in society. Innocent though he was, Jesus had to go.

 

There was only room for one king in the Roman Empire. It was on that basis the religious leaders manipulated the governor of Judea, Pontus Pilate into having Jesus put to death. “If you release this man, you are not Caesar's friend.” They cried, “Everyone who makes himself a king opposes Caesar.” Sure enough, Pilate handed over Jesus to be crucified. It was customary to attach a charge sheet to the cross of a crucified man. Jesus’ read, ‘The King of the Jews’.

 

We could see this simply as one of countless miscarriages of justice that have happened over the course of history to this day. What makes the crucifixion of Jesus unique is that this condemned man was the Son of God. The miracles he performed were signposts to his divine power. Why did Christ not use the power by which he healed the sick and raised the dead to extricate himself from being crucified? Jesus described his God-given mission to his followers in these words: “Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

 

Jesus died for our sins that we may be forgiven and be put right with God. Yes, the cross of Jesus was an act of vile hatred on the part of his enemies. But more profoundly, it was a stunning revelation of the love of God. Paul could reflect, “I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.”

 

Isaac Watts’s hymn When I survey the wondrous cross is often sung in church services at Eastertime. The hymn concludes on a note of wonder at the love of Jesus for his people:

 

Love so amazing, so divine,

demands my soul, my life, my all.

*For Easter edition of various local parish magazines  

 

Snowdrops

Snowdrops, Mells 

A galanthophile is a person who loves snowdrops. Apparently, there are around 500 different varieties of delicate white petalled plant. A true galanthophile will be able to tell a ‘Ding Dong’ from a ‘Heffalump’. Don’t ask me, though. I just like the things. It’s always a joy to see multitudes of them in bloom along the banks of the B3098 on the way to West Lavington. 

A favourite winter walk for the wife and me is through the Somerset village of Mells. You can pick up a path alongside the Mells Stream that will take you past the ruins of Fussell’s Iron Works. Around this time of year, you will find snowdrops a-plenty springing up in front of the old furnaces that loom high over the path.

Snowdrops are an early promise that the arid deadness of winter will pass. Soon there will be daffodils and tulips. Spring will have sprung. In the meantime, the humble snowdrop is a little reminder of the beauty of creation. We don’t simply live in a world that provides us with the bare necessities of life (as Baloo might put it), but a world that fills us with delight. After all, you can’t eat snowdrops, which are poisonous to human beings. But who would be without them?

The Christian faith teaches us that God created our world to display his wisdom, power and goodness. The snowdrop is a wonderful example of his handywork. Yes, we live in a fallen world that is twisted and broken, but there is still much that is beautiful for us to behold. The purity of the snowdrop stands in contrast with the grubbiness of human greed, hatred and cruelty. 

None of us is free from the taint of sin. The goodness of God hinted at in Ding Dongs and Heffalumps is revealed most wonderfully in that he sent his Son, Jesus Christ to die in our place to cleanse us from sin. As Isaiah the prophet almost said,

“Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord:

though your sins are like scarlet,

    they shall be as white as [a] snow[drop]."

* For various local parish magazines

‘Emmanuel: God with us’

Joseph, a carpenter from Nazareth was considering breaking off his engagement to Mary. She was pregnant. And he wasn’t the father. According to Matthew’s Gospel, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream to convince him to go through with the marriage. The heavenly visitor told the carpenter, ‘do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.’ As the Lord had spoken by Isaiah the prophet, “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel.” The name given to Jesus by ancient prophecy tells us something about his unique identity and mission.

 

God with us

Matthew explains that Emmanuel means, ‘God with us’. Christians believe that the baby boy who was born in Bethlehem and laid in a manger was God in human form. Now, that’s an awesome claim. We might perhaps expect that God would do God-like stuff, like create the universe to display his wisdom, power and goodness. But would the Creator of heaven and earth stoop to enter our world as man? The New Testament insists that he did. Jesus is the Son of God, fully divine in every way. Yet he became human. He is Emmanuel, God with us as one of us.

 

God for us

The angel of the Lord also instructed Jospeh that Mary’s son was to be named Jesus. Once more, a word of explanation is given, “for he will save his people from their sins”. Jesus is the Greek version of the Hebrew name Joshua, which means ‘the Lord saves’. That is the reason why God became man, to rescue us from sin and death. Christ, who was without sin, died in our place on the cross that we may be forgiven. As Paul affirms, ‘God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’

 

God in us

Matthew concludes his Gospel by telling us that Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to his disciples. The final words of the risen Lord to his followers in Mathew’s account are, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’ Jesus ascended to heaven, having completed the work of salvation. He then poured out the Holy Spirit upon the church on the Day of Pentecost. Christ dwells in his people by the power of the Spirit. His presence in the lives of his followers now is the pledge of greater things to come, ‘Christ in you, the hope of glory’. Jesus became Emmanuel, God with us so that those who believe in him may be with God for ever. 

See here for Providence Baptist Church Christmas Services 

* Article for various local parish mags 

Shared Life The Trinity and the Fellowship of God’s People, by Donald Macleod

Christian Focus, 2024, 30^th anniversary edition, 129pp, hbk 

The doctrine of the Trinity can sometimes seem just that, a doctrine we are called to believe and defend, and that’s about it. Nothing can be further from the truth, as is demonstrated by the author in these pages. Of course, he discusses the biblical evidence for the claim that the one God eternally exists in three persons; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The theologian also covers what the first Christian thinkers made of the Bible’s teaching, as set out at the Council of Nicea. Macleod’s handling of matters biblical and historical is admirably clear and concise. But that is just the beginning.

The doctrine of the Trinity is of deep practical relevance. It speaks to us of the God we have been called to understand, worship and serve. The fact that the God who made is ‘in his image’ exists in three Persons tells us something very important about human equality and our need for community. Macleod cautions, however, that Bible’s teaching on male headship should not lead us to think that the Son’s relation to the Father is one of eternal submission to his authority.

Father, Son and Holy Spirit indwell each other in the fullness of the divine being.  Jesus prayed that his people may share in the fellowship of the persons of the Trinity (John 17:21). With that in mind, the unity of the church is not a drab uniformity, but unity in diversity. The doctrine of the Trinity has profound implications for the Christian life. We have become children of the Father though his Son and by the Spirit of Adoption. The indwelling presence of the Triune God secures our final salvation. In our evangelism we have been commissioned to ‘make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit’ (Matthew 28:19).

Shared Life is an ideal introduction to the Trinity for believers wishing to read up on the subject. It will also be of help to pastors in equipping them to tease out the practical implications of this most glorious of doctrines. 

Losing our virtue

Matthew Syed is one of the most insightful columnists writing today. A couple of his recent articles in The Sunday Times really made me think. In one he argued, ‘All the policy in the world won’t save us if we can’t rediscover patience’. Easy access to money has ‘taken the waiting out of wanting’. Both governments and individuals prefer to borrow to spend now, rather than save up and purchase goods more cheaply. Government debt is unsustainably high, at 100% of GDP and those Klarna bills soon mount up. We need to learn once more that patience is a priceless virtue.

In another piece Syed reflected on a key lesson from the Grenfell Tower inquiry, namely, ‘Today’s disasters aren’t caused by lack of regulation, but simple dishonesty’. Governments can pass as many new regulations as they wish, but if building contractors dishonestly subvert health and safety rules, more disasters are likely to happen. As with patience, fidelity to truth pays economic dividends. Countries where people are more likely to be honest are typically wealthier than lands where lies and corruption are the order of the day.

It is difficult to gainsay the points made by the columnist. Theologian David Wells spotted the trend he highlights more than two decades ago. In Losing our Virtue he suggested that where populations widely adopt civic virtues like honesty and consideration for others, governments can give people a considerable amount of freedom to live their lives. Where such virtues are scarce, the State is forced to try and  maintain order by regulating its citizens' conduct ever more tightly. As Wells put it, “What was once an open space between law and freedom, one governed by character and truth, is now deserted, so law must now do what character has abandoned.” And so Community Protection Notices are being used to force unruly members of the community to behave in a neighbourly manner. 

But as the writer’s point about Grenfell shows, more government regulation isn’t necessarily the answer. Especially when the State has lost its moral authority. The idea that our political leaders can form us into more virtuous citizens is laughable. The last lot never recovered from ‘Partygate’. Sir Keir Starmer pledged to lead a ‘government of service’. A noble sentiment, but to many it seems more like a ‘government of scroungers’. The PM and some of his senior ministers have faced a barrage of criticism for accepting hordes of freebies; from expensive clothing to pricey concert tickets.

Syed has certainly diagnosed the cause of many of our ills today, but he prescribes no cure. How may we regain our virtue? It is increasingly recognised that the ‘Christian Revolution’ had a transformative effect on the moral and spiritual climate of the ancient world. This was not a top-down imposition of morality by regulation, but a matter of personal regeneration. As Paul wrote, ‘if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.’ In the New Testament believers are frequently urged to shun their old vices and display the virtues of truth, self-control and hard work. So, Vive la Christian Revolution!

Vicious cycles

I am an ex-cyclist. I quit when it was me calling for my children to wait up, rather than the other way around. They were mid-teens at that point, I think. Now they're late twenties. When I finally dispensed with my unloved and neglected bike, I didn't even accord it the dignity of flogging it on Ebay. The lime green Raleigh roadster was deposited without ceremony at Warminster recycling centre. Destined for a new life in India, apparently.

I wasn’t much of a cyclist anyway. I don't think I've ever knowingly worn Lycra. My top speed was probably achieved as a paper boy. A dog I regularly encountered in Tredegar Street, Rhidwerin would snap at my pedals until the road went downhill on entering my home village of Bassaleg near Newport. Eat your heart out, Geraint Thomas.

With apologies to Orwell's Animal Farm, for me, it's a case of "two legs good, two wheels bad." Cyclists may object. Oh, well. For their sakes, my wife and I must repeatedly stop holding hands to let them whizz past when we're strolling along the Kennet & Avon towpath.

And my point is? Oddly, that freedom is a precious thing. Cyclists are free to get on their bikes, while I'm free never to get in the saddle again. Old married couples and two wheelers may groan at the sight of each other on the K&A, but neither party owns the towpath. We just have to give each other a bit of space to do our own thing.

Now, freedom has limits. I'm not at liberty to push cyclists into the canal as they pedal past. Cyclists aren't free to run into us if we’re a bit tardy getting out of the way. Similarly, the law does not give us liberty to incite violence against others. As keyboard warriors who made incendiary comments during the summer riots have found to their cost.

But with all the necessary qualifications in place, in a democratic society, we need to be able to say stuff that other people may find objectionable or even offensive. Christians shouldn't have a problem with that, as we don't believe people can be coerced into the kingdom of God. We demand no aid from the state when it comes to advancing or defending our beliefs. Our God requires no blasphemy laws to protect the honour of his name.

The truth is best served by making space for an honest and forthright exchange of views, even when some of those views are despised by fashionable opinion. Otherwise, you end up with a vicious cycle of intolerance and repression. Freedom withers, truth is sacrificed. As Jesus himself once said, 'You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.'

 * For various local mags 

Deadlines

 

"Depend upon it, sir", wrote Dr Johnson, "when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully." The editor of this publication has not threatened to hang me, yet. But she does set strict deadlines.           

They have the effect of concentrating this writer's mind wonderfully. Especially when nothing has thus far entered his mind as a topic for the next edition of the magazine. There's a deadline to meet. A blank Word document to fill up. Better get on with it, then.

From the grandest columnist for The Times newspaper to the humble contributor to your local parish mag, scribblers live and die by editorial time limits. In fact, there's a deadline looming over us all. The day will come when we are called to give an account of our lives to our Maker and Judge.

That thought should certainly concentrate our minds. For who of us can say that the copy book of their life is without blot or blemish? The good news is that God has done everything necessary for us to be prepared to meet him.

He sent his Son, the Lord Jesus to die on the cross that the record of our sins may be wiped clean. The Holy Spirit has been poured out to give us new life. A grand invitation is made for us to ‘seek the Lord while he may be found and call upon him while he is near’. 

Well, if you’re reading this, it means I was ready in time for the deadline. Always important, that and not just for writers.

*For various local rags & mags