When it became clear that in fact my father was saying, "It will be interesting to see what you want to do when you grow up," I realized that there was no pressure on that front. And I remember huge relief: Hey, I can go and do what I really know I have to do!

We cannot worship the suffering God today and ignore him tomorrow. We cannot eat and drink the body and blood of the passionate and compassionate God today, and then refuse to live passionately and compassionately tomorrow. If we say or sing, as we so often do, 'Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit', we thereby commit ourselves, in love, to the work of making his love known to the world that still stands so sorely in need of it. This is not the god the world wants. This is the God the world needs.

True worship doesn't put on a show or make a fuss; true worship isn't forced, isn't half-hearted, doesn't keep looking at its watch, doesn't worry what the person in the next pew is doing. True worship is open to God, adoring God, waiting for God, trusting God even in the dark.

In the United States at present the 'culture wars' of the last thirty years have now produced a horrid stand-off which compels you all into a binary either/or with all kinds of spin-offs. This is deeply unhealthy. The trouble is that the way the system is set up in order to get in and try to change it you have to be (a) a millionaire, (b) someone who can work inside the system long-term, (c) someone prepared to make deals and compromises... Which does rule out the vast majority of committed Christians.

You become like what you worship

One of the reasons we do history, in fact, is because it acts as a brake, a control, on our otherwise unbridled enthusiasm for our own ideas.

The New Testament picks up from the Old the theme that God intends, in the end, to put the whole creation to rights.