20schemes exists to build healthy, gospel-centred churches in Scotland’s poorest communities—the housing schemes—but we’re also seeing an increasing number of churches and individuals burdened for the deprived communities on their doorstep in other parts of the world. On Saturday 6th February 2016, Hamilton Road Baptist Church hosted our first Church In Hard Places Workshop in […]

Well, the title seems innocuous enough. It has some nice things said by (semi) influential/important people on the back. One of whom can’t wait to read it with his grandchildren, apparently! According to the blurb, this is a children’s book about thankfulness. After careful reading, I think there are some other issues going on underneath […]

We must do a lot of hard work in explaining true, biblical repentance when working with the poor (or anybody for that matter). Being sorry and repenting for sins are two completely different acts that produce two very different long-term fruits in people’s lives. Sin is grievous to God, separating us from him. Repentance is […]

Thankfully, the gospel message doesn’t end with the goodness of God and the sinfulness of man. That wouldn’t be good news. But, in fact, God has done something about our awful condition. God sent his Son to live for us and die for us and rise again for us. Now there is a way for […]

Have you ever been with a person whose toddler is running riot around the house? He is shouting and screaming and lighting the cat on fire when suddenly the frazzled mother turns to you apologetically and mumbles something about poor Jonny “being tired.” Whatever. What we both know that Jonny is an ill-mannered brat, even […]

Let me tell you about Lachie. He is in his late 30s and has no experience of Christianity in the home. He grew up in the local authority care system and is the product of a couple of decades of unsuccessful institutional reform. He was weaned on a diet of daytime TV chat shows, History […]

Between my time church planting in Brazil and my work now in Edinburgh in one of Scotland’s most deprived housing schemes—a mixture of social housing and low-income homeowners—I have been on the receiving end of a lot of short-term missions teams. And while I appreciate the help, I have noticed over the years that a […]

Politics is a costly business. The run for President in the USA costs billions of dollars, and the world waits with baited-breath to see if Donald Trump is going to go the distance. Not long ago in Scotland, there was a massive momentum shift to the SNP, despite the country’s rejection for independence from the […]

I have been listening to Tyson Fury and the responses to him from Christian and non-Christian camps with detached bemusement and not so little amusement. Recently, that has begun to turn into a little fury of my own as ‘evangelicals’ of the middle-class persuasion have taken to distancing themselves from what he has to say […]

The following six facts will be universally true about our churches. Someone has had a problem in our church this week. We have everything we need in the gospel to help that person with that problem (2 Peter 1:3). People seek help from family members, friends, and pastors before they go to healthcare professionals about […]