There is all the difference in the world between the nonviolence that the ordinary Christian should embrace and the duty of civic authorities to police their communities. The end of Romans 12 is quite clear about the first; the start of Romans 13 is quite clear about the second.

Easter is about Jesus: the Jesus who announced God's saving, sovereign kingdom.

True worship is open to God, adoring God, waiting for God, trusting God even in the dark.

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.

It's very easy for a church just to slide along from week to week, taking it for granted that we do our services like this and that, and we celebrate the sacraments like this and that.

I'm not a universalist, and the way I talk about final loss is this: People worship idols - money, whatever. Their humanness gets reshaped around the idol - you become like what you worship. That's one of the basic spiritual laws.

Again and again the Sermon on the Mount calls and challenges us to a life of radical discipleship. Note: when Jesus says 'Blessed are the . . . . merciful, peacmakers', and so on, he doesn't just mean that they themselves are blessed. He means that the blessing of God's kingdom works precisely through those people into the wider world. That is how God's kingdom comes. That's one thing to hear afresh.