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Western Christians have been trained to see the world through a materialistic lens. Yes, we believe God exists, that He’s in heaven, and that He upholds the whole universe by His power. But let’s be honest: for many of us, God feels far away — far from our day-to-day experience of the world He made. We don’t instinctively think of God as intimately controlling the weather, or deeply connected to the flora and the fauna around us. In practice, the world looks to many Christians exactly as it would to an atheist: a materialistic world, dead to the Spirit, that merely happens to have been made by God somewhere back at the beginning.

But read the book of Jonah with this question in mind — how alive is the natural world? — and you’ll notice something remarkable.

I love the book of Jonah. It was the first book of the Bible I ever read in the original Hebrew — the final text we worked through in my first-year Hebrew class twenty years ago. So I knew Jonah back to front in Hebrew before I’d studied any other biblical book in its original tongue. Coming back to it now isn’t just a joy; there’s a nostalgia to it. And over the years I’ve noticed things in the Hebrew text that don’t always surface in English translation — details that, again and again, point to how alive the natural world is, because the Creator of the universe inhabits it.

I won’t retell the whole story here — I’ll assume you know it. Instead, let’s trace this one thread through all four chapters.

Chapter 1: Fleeing a Face

The story opens with Jonah refusing God’s call to go to Nineveh, and instead attempting to flee “from the presence of the LORD” (1:3). In Hebrew, “presence” is literally face — the word is built on panim [פָּנִים]. Jonah imagines he can put physical distance between himself and God’s attentive face in this world. He’s not so different from the modern Western Christian who unknowingly assumes that God isn’t really, intimately present in the world He has made.

Of course, that’s Jonah’s folly, and it sets up the whole narrative. The question hangs in the air: is God really present in this world? Verse 4 answers it immediately.

The LORD hurled a great wind upon the sea.

The word for “wind” is ruach [רוּחַ], which can equally mean Spirit — and here the ruach is upon the sea, echoing Genesis 1, where God’s Spirit hovered over the waters of creation. We’re meant to hear that echo. This is a God who still governs the elements He first shaped. This is a God who is still intimately present in His world.

Then comes a smaller, stranger detail. The NIV says the ship “threatened to break up” — a fair translation, but the Hebrew is more vivid still. The verb is hashav [חָשַׁב], “to think, to plan, to reckon.” The ship was thinking about breaking apart. For a moment, a human-made object becomes animate — not because wood and pitch can literally think, but because the ship itself is caught up in expressing the intention of the Creator who guides, and even inhabits, His world. The inanimate becomes animate with the presence and purpose of God.

Jonah realizes what’s happening and tells the sailors to throw him overboard. The storm ceases, and the pagan sailors commit their allegiance to Yahweh, because they’ve watched Him govern the sea with their own eyes. Already, in chapter one, we’ve met a God who controls the weather and animates even inanimate things with purpose.

Chapter 2: A Fish Appointed and Addressed

At the end of chapter 1, “the LORD appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah” (1:17). The verb is manah [מָנָה] — a word also used for numbering, counting, and allotting. It’s the same root behind Psalm 147:4, where God “determines the number of the stars.” The image is of a God who owns all things. He counts and allots the stars. And with the same authority, He allots one particular fish to one particular task.

Jonah starts to catch on. He is beginning to see how God is intimately present, fulfilling His purpose through His creation. From inside the fish, Jonah prays: “all your waves and your breakers have swept over me” (2:3). Your waves. Your breakers. Jonah is recognizing that every momentary wave in the ocean belongs to the Lord, who is good, who is merciful, and who has “brought my life up from the pit.”

Then, at the chapter’s end, “the LORD spoke to the fish, and it vomited Jonah onto dry land” (2:10). The Hebrew verb is amar [אָמַר] — the ordinary, everyday word for said, the same verb used throughout the book whenever people speak to one another. It’s not a technical “command” word; it’s the plain speech of address. God simply talks to the fish, the way He talks to Jonah. And the fish responds, and does what God says — probably because this fish has heard His voice before. We serve a God who speaks to, appoints, and governs the creatures of His world.

Chapter 3: Animals in Sackcloth

When Jonah finally preaches in Nineveh, the king’s decree contains a curious detail: “let people and animals be covered with sackcloth, and let them call urgently on God” (3:8). Some translations try to make it say that only the people should call urgently on God. But that’s not what the Hebrew says. It simply says let them call with strength upon God, with “them” reaching back to the people and animals just named. The implication is startling: the animals of Nineveh are pictured fasting and calling out to God alongside the people.

It’s a small, easy-to-miss moment, but it underlines everything we’ve seen so far. No one can flee God’s presence. Every wave belongs to Him. Every storm belongs to Him. Every fish belongs to Him. And now, every animal belongs to Him too — capable, in this poetic logic, of crying out to its Maker.

Chapter 4: A Plant, a Worm, a Wind

In chapter 4, Jonah sulks outside the city, hoping God will destroy Nineveh after all. Instead, God provides a leafy plant to shade him — and once again, the verb is manah [מָנָה], “appointed” (4:6), the same word used for the fish. Every plant, too, belongs to the Lord; He can appoint one to grow exactly where and when He pleases.

The next day, “God appointed a worm” (4:7) — manah again — to attack the plant and destroy it. And when the sun rises, “God appointed a scorching east wind” (4:8) — manah a third time. Note that here the book comes full circle. It started with God sending his ruach and now He sends his ruach again. Three appointments in three verses: a plant, a worm, a wind. God has intimate, beautiful, purposeful authority over the flora, the insects, and the elements alike. Why? Because His Spirit is still just as present in His world, as it was in the opening verses of our Bibles.

The book closes with God’s question to Jonah:

“You have been concerned about this plant, though you did not tend it or make it grow. It sprang up overnight and died overnight. And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?” (Jonah 4:10-11 NIV)

The final two words of the book are, remarkably, about the animals. This is a God who cares about the whole world He has made. And notice the comparison God draws: He sees the city and the plant in the same light. They both belong to Him. The LORD is the one who animates this world with His presence, and we are guests within it. He calls for our allegiance and our obedience, and He invites us to stop clutching so tightly to our own small grievances when we could instead simply enjoy His presence in this beautiful, animate world.

How alive is the world we live in?

More alive than we know. It’s filled with the presence and purpose of God.

“And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:17–19, NIV)

When the Holy Spirit gives us power in the Christian life, it’s so that we can grasp something. And that something is the love of Christ.

I love how Paul uses spatial imagery here. Jesus looks on you, and He loves you, and His love for you — Christ’s love for you — is wider than you’re aware of, and longer than you’re aware of, and higher than you’re aware of, and deeper than you’re aware of. Why? Because it’s a love that surpasses knowledge. That means you can’t ever fully know it.

My prayer for you is that you’d get a greater sense of this love. But it’s a mystery.

I want to say this firmly: Jesus loves you more than you know. Maybe over time you’ve come to know the love of Jesus more than you had before — like many of us have — and I would still say to you, “Jesus loves you more than you know.” I believe that when you come to the end of your life, someone will still be able to say that to you on your deathbed, “Jesus loves you more than you know.” And in eternity, when we live in perfection with perfected bodies and perfected spirits, I think we’ll still be able to say to each other, “Jesus loves you more than you know.”

Why can I say that? Because it says here: “to know this love that surpasses knowledge.” Paul’s word for surpasses is the Greek ὑπερβάλλουσαν — transliterated hyperballousan. It means “to attain a degree that extraordinarily exceeds a point on a scale of extent, go beyond, surpass, outdo” (BDAG). It comes from root words that mean to throw beyond, to overshoot. Paul isn’t just saying that Christ’s love for us is immense. He’s saying it throws itself beyond the furthest edge of what knowledge can reach. This love of Christ is greater than knowledge. Think about that.

Imagine a circle, and then imagine a bigger circle that the little circle completely fits into. The bigger circle is the love of Christ, and the little circle is all human knowledge — everything that can ever be known.

The love of Christ surpasses knowledge, hyperballousan, throwing beyond it in every direction.

Why? Because God is love, and insomuch as God is beyond the comprehension of our minds, so love is beyond the grasping of knowledge. That’s why the love of Christ remains a mystery to us.

But don’t say, “Ah — it’s a mystery, I will never know Christ’s love any more than I do now.” Because that’s also untrue. If that were the case, Paul wouldn’t be praying for you to know Christ’s love. We can know it more. We just can’t know it fully. It’s beyond our grasp, but there’s always more to experience, more to feel, more to think about — more to know. And when we do grasp something more of how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, something changes in us. We are filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. We become full and satisfied human beings, because God is dwelling in us through love.

So what does it look like to live out of a place of being loved?

Think back to Jesus beginning His ministry at about age thirty, being baptised — the moment before He started to preach, cast out demons, and heal the sick. Before He’d done anything to please the Father, before going to the cross, before the wonder of the resurrection, the Father spoke over Him at His baptism:

“This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” (Matthew 3:17)

“This is my Son” — a word about identity. “Whom I love” — a word about relationship. God loved Jesus before He’d started doing anything. “With him I am well pleased” — the Father’s pleasure in the Son before He starts, not after He’s finished.

Jesus started His ministry rooted and established in love. He began from a place of being loved. And everything he did flowed from there.

That’s what Paul means, when he prays for us to be ‘rooted and established in love.’ The Greek for ‘rooted’ is ἐρριζωμένοι — errizōmenoi. It’s a botanical metaphor. It means you’re driving your roots deep down into God’s love.

And ‘established’ in Greek is τεθεμελιωμένοι — tethemeliōmenoi. It’s a construction metaphor. It’s saying that God’s love is the foundation your life is built on.

Two different pictures. Same point.

You are loved.

So often we live as if we need to become lovable to God. But that’s not where the Bible takes us. Rather, by the power of the Spirit, we need to start with the reality that we’re loved by Jesus Christ not because of anything we’ve done, but because of who He is.

The love of Christ is a mystery you’ll never plumb the depths of. But you can spend your life exploring what it means for you.

Our next Zoom call for paid subscribers is next week.

This will be a Q&A call, where we’ll dive into any passage of Scripture you would like to discuss. I’ll share some of the Greek and Hebrew background of the passage, and we’ll enjoy spending time together in God’s Word.

The call will be:

8:00am Thursday 30 July (Sydney time)

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Our next Zoom call for paid subscribers is coming up in two days. This will be a Q&A call, where we’ll dive into any passage of Scripture you would like to discuss. I’ll share some of the Greek and Hebrew backgr…

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Beresheet bara Elohim et hashamayim ve’et ha’aretz. “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

I’ve done it for years, and it still impacts me. There’s something about starting a new year with those words — the same words through which God started everything — that puts everything else in perspective.

But how did God create the heavens and the earth?

Count how many times this phrase appears in Genesis 1: And God said. Verse 3. Verse 6. Verse 9. Verse 11. Verse 14. Verse 20. Verse 24. Verse 26. Verse 28. Verse 29. Ten times. And every single time, something new enters the world. Let there be light — and there was light. God speaks, and things exist.

The Gospel of John opens by pointing directly back to this.

In the beginning was the Word — ὁ Λόγος / ho Logos — and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Through him all things were made.

John wants us to understand that the voice speaking in Genesis 1 is not just a voice. It is a person. The eternal Word, the Logos, the one who would later become flesh and dwell among us. When God speaks the world into being, we are watching the whole Trinity at work — the Father speaks, the Son is the Word through whom all things come into existence, and the Spirit is the ruach, the breath, hovering over the waters.

Logos was already a loaded word in the Greek world. The Stoic philosophers used it to describe the rational principle holding the cosmos together — the divine logic woven into the structure of reality. John takes that word, which his readers would have been very familiar with, and says: this is not an abstract principle. It’s a person. His name is Jesus. And everything that exists was made through him.

What I find so striking about this is what it implies about speech. If God creates by speaking… if the Logos, the eternal Word, is the means through which the universe comes into existence… then words are not just communication. They carry something of the creative nature of God himself.

Proverbs takes this with great seriousness.

The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit (18:21).

That’s a strong claim. The power to bring life or to bring death is found where? In our mouths. Our own speech has a derivative power. As God’s image bearers, we are granted the ability to impact through speech the world he made through speech.

And in Jesus’ own teaching, this connection between speech and creative power becomes explicit. In Mark 11:23, he says:

Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them.

The key word there is says. Not hopes, not thinks — says. Jesus is connecting our speech directly to the creative speech of Genesis 1. When we speak in faith, we’re doing something that reflects how reality is fundamentally structured — a universe made by a God who spoke it into existence.

I want to be careful here. Some Christians think we can just ‘name it and claim it’ as if life is only controlled by what comes from our mouths. It’s not. You can’t name and claim a healthy body or a healthy pay check and then proceed to eat junk food and never work.

But I do think many of us underestimate how much our words form us and the reality around us. The things we say about ourselves, about our children, about our circumstances... They’re either moving toward what God says about us, or away from it.

One thing I’ve done for years when I’m sick is read Psalm 91 aloud.

A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you.

These words aren’t a magic formula, but there is something spiritually significant about taking what God says and speaking it into your own situation out loud. Like the Spirit hovering over the darkness and chaos, and then the word of God speaks light. We are image-bearers of the Logos, the speaking God, and our words do something in the world.

No other creature can do this, by the way. No animal can tell you what happened yesterday or speak hope into tomorrow. Language — real language, story-language, meaning-making language — is one of the most distinctive things about being human. It is part of what it means to be made in the image of a God who spoke and the universe came to be.

So what are you speaking? Over your life, over the people closest to you? It’s worth paying attention to. Because the Word made everything, and you follow in his footsteps.

Beresheet bara Elohim et hashamayim ve’et ha’aretz.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”

The word for created is בָּרָא — bara. And here’s the thing about bara: in the entire Hebrew Bible, it is only ever used with God as the subject. Human artisans build and craft and form and shape, but they never bara. Only God does that. There’s a mode of creating that belongs entirely to him.

It’s an expression of his unrivalled authority over all that exists in the universe.

To really hear how radical that is, you need to know the stories that Genesis was written against. One dominant creation myth of the ancient world was the Babylonian Enuma Elish, and its picture of origins is as far from Genesis as you can get. In Enuma Elish, the universe doesn’t come from one God acting in sovereign authority — it comes from a war. The god Marduk defeats the chaos-goddess Tiamat, splits her body apart, and the heavens and earth are essentially formed from the wreckage. Creation is an accident of conflict. And then human beings are created as an afterthought — their purpose is to be slaves of the gods, to feed them through temple sacrifice. That’s the story the ancient world told about why humans exist. You are here to serve as slaves.

Genesis is a direct, deliberate counter-narrative. One God. No rival. He bara’s everything as the unparalleled source of all existence. And then he says something that would have sounded strange to anyone in the ancient world:

“Let us make humanity in our image, in our likeness” (Genesis 1:26).

The word for image is צֶלֶם — tselem. It means a statue or physical representation of the one depicted. In Egypt, Pharaoh was the tselem of Ra the sun-god. But only Pharaoh. No one else was made in the image of God. It was a claim to divine authority that belonged to one man at the top of the entire social order. The point of calling Pharaoh the image of Ra was to say: he speaks for the god. He represents divine authority in the world. And you must obey him.

Genesis takes that concept and does something extraordinary with it. Male and female, he created them — in the image of God. Not just rulers, kings, tribal chiefs. Everyone. Every human being is a tselem Elohim, a living representation of the God who made everything. Each person carries a kind of divine dignity that no social order can bestow and no one can take away. And with that image comes the very real authority to represent God in this world. God positions his image-bearers to govern and tend the world he has made.

That’s why the verse goes on:

Then God said, “Let us make humanity in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” (Genesis 1:26)

Image-bearing means ruling. It means representing the God who bara’s everything — the God who is the source of all that exists — and ruling, on his behalf, in the world that he has made. You weren’t created to be a slave. You weren’t created to serve Pharaoh. You were created to rule.

This must change the way we live.

Passivity — waiting around to see what happens in one’s life — that doesn’t really fit anymore, does it? You are a tselem, a representative, placed in the world to carry something of God’s creative authority into it.

One of the biggest problems with sin is that we lose this sense of authority. And then we stop taking responsibility for our lives. After eating from the forbidden fruit, Adam blames Eve for his own decisions, and Eve blames the serpent for hers.

The image-bearers who were made to act, to govern, to take authority over their own lives... they immediately start pointing elsewhere, blaming others for their own problems.

And that pattern is old and deep in all of us. It’s so much easier to locate the source of our problems in our circumstances, or other people, or bad luck, than to ask honestly: what is my role in this? What has God put in my hands that I’ve been pretending someone else is responsible for?

You are a tselem Elohim — an image of God. The God who made you by bara-ing the universe with unparalleled authority — He didn’t create you to be a bystander in your own story.

He acts unilaterally, with unrivalled authority over all creation. And then he invites you to represent him.

It’s an invitation to step up and take responsibility for your own life.

Here’s Genesis 1:2: Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

That word “hovering” is merachefet (מְרַחֶפֶת) in Hebrew. It appears only a few times in the entire Old Testament. In Deuteronomy 32:11, Moses uses the word to describe an eagle that hovers above its nest. The image is specific and physical: a great bird suspended in the air, wings beating, body still, watching intently over something beneath it. It’s a fierce, sustained attention.

And then notice what the Spirit is hovering over — the waters. These are the primeval waters of creation. The verse also calls it תְּהוֹם — tehom — the deep. This is one of those words that carries a lot of ancient freight. It’s not just water. For the people who first read Genesis, tehom meant disorder, darkness, the threatening void underneath everything. It meant chaos. Scholars have long pointed out that tehom shares a root with Tiamat — the chaos-goddess at the centre of the Babylonian creation myth called Enuma Elish. In that story, the universe is born from a violent battle between gods, and Tiamat is the chaos that has to be defeated and dismembered before anything good can exist. Creation, in that telling, comes through destruction.

Genesis tells a completely different story. There’s no real battle here. The tehom isn’t something to be destroyed — it’s something to be hovered over. The Spirit of God broods over the dark waters like a mother eagle over her nest. The word ‘Spirit’ — רוּחַ (ruach), is feminine in gender, which is why ‘mother eagle’ is the most fitting image. And then, out of that sustained, patient, hovering presence — something happens. Light breaks. The world begins.

What strikes me most about this image is what the Spirit doesn’t do. There’s no turning away from the darkness. There’s no impatience with the chaos. It’s as if creativity, real biblical creativity, involves staying with the chaos, looking deeply into it, until life starts to emerge.

I think about the Graeme Clark story when I read this. Clark is the Australian scientist who invented the cochlear implant — the device that has given millions of deaf people the ability to hear. His father had gone progressively deaf during his childhood, and Graeme watched his father’s growing frustration with his condition. As a child, he made himself a promise. “I’m going to fix ears.” He then spent his whole career — decade after decade, through dead ends and failures — hovering over the problem of deafness. Graeme is a Christian and he has spoken about how prayer sustained him during those difficult times. One afternoon on a beach at Minnamurra on the NSW south coast, he was playing with a blade of grass and a curved shell, and an insight came to him: if a device could follow the spiral of the inner ear the way that blade of grass followed the contours of the shell, it might work. The first successful surgery was in 1978.

That is what merachefet looks like in human experience. A long, patient, hovering over the chaos in this world. A willingness to stay with the darkest problems in one’s life long enough for light to emerge.

I find this deeply encouraging, because most of us have something in our lives that is tehom. Something formless and unresolved. Something dark and chaotic. An ache that pushes us towards creativity. A deep awareness that something is broken and needs fixing. And the temptation — I feel it myself — is to pull back from it. To stay at a safe distance and turn our attention away from it rather than towards it.

But this is how the Spirit works from the first breath of creation. Like a mother eagle, the Spirit hovers over the chaos, right over the darkness, sustaining attention, refusing to be overwhelmed. And the Spirit who hovered over the waters of creation is the same Spirit who descends like a dove on the Lord Jesus at his baptism. And this is the same Spirit who lives in those who follow Him. Which means that hovering — that patient, present, life-giving attention — is something we are invited into, not just something we read about.

The writer of Genesis wants us to understand something through this image: true creativity is chaos plus hope. We are invited to hover, to stay present with the problems in our lives, looking intently at them, staring them down and we are to do so, not with fear but with hope. Our God is a creative God. The Spirit of God is hovering over the waters. And we join in this creative work — focused on the darkness and chaos but fiercely breathing the breath of life. And then, suddenly, inspiration comes. Let there be light. And there was light.

What’s the chaos you’ve been avoiding? Where is the Spirit inviting you into the beautiful struggle of biblical creativity? Where can you step forward, armed with hope, and begin to hover?

Start school again, with everything you know now. Start your career again. Start that relationship again. If only you could go back, things would be different.

In Minecraft — the most successful video game of all time, with over 350 million copies sold — if you die, you just respawn where you went to sleep the night before. If everything goes wrong, you start again.

Wouldn’t it be nice if life was like that?

In Luke 19, we meet a man who probably knew that feeling. And his story is one of the most surprising in the Gospels.

Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way. (Luke 19:1–4, NIV)

You know the story of Zacchaeus. But do you know what his name means?

There’s a beautiful original language insight hidden in it. His name comes from the Hebrew זַכָּה — zakkah — meaning pure, clean, or innocent. His parents would have given him that name because that’s what they hoped for him. That’s what his name declared over his life.

But his actions said something else entirely.

Israel in the time of Jesus was under Roman occupation. The Romans needed locals to collect taxes from their own people — to know the neighbours, to know who had what. It was a betrayal. Most people wouldn’t be caught dead doing it. But in any population there are those willing to compromise on their morals, to betray their community and get rich at the expense of others. And Zacchaeus hadn’t just signed up — he’d climbed the ranks. He was a chief tax collector. More of a traitor, not less. Filthy rich.

So here he is, waking up in his nice house, putting on his nice clothes, trying to ignore the fact that outside his walls everybody hates him. He has wealth and power. And he has nothing else.

Maybe sometimes, in quieter moments, he thought about his name. Zakkah. Pure. Clean. Innocent. And how far he was from all of that.

Then Jesus comes to Jericho. And something stirs in Zacchaeus. He’s heard about this rabbi. Maybe the miracles, maybe the teaching, maybe that Jesus receives all sorts of people — even people like him. Whatever it is, he wants to see Jesus.

But the crowd won’t let him through. He’s too short to see, and too hated to be helped.

So he does two things that a man of his standing simply did not do.

He runs. Men of status in those days did not run. It was seen as lowering yourself in the eyes of others. Shameful.

And he climbs a tree. Climbing trees was something children did. For a wealthy adult it was humiliating.

But Zacchaeus doesn’t care. The time has come to throw his pride in the dirt. The crowd is probably laughing at him as he climbs. He doesn’t care about that either. He just wants to see Jesus.

This image is meant to stick with us. A grown man in nice clothes, completely exposed, up in a tree. His nice clothes highlight the things he likes about himself. His needing to climb a tree highlights the things he doesn’t. But the main thing is that he shows up — completely as himself, vulnerable and waiting, wondering what will happen when he sees Jesus.

And then Jesus arrives.

When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. (Luke 19:5–6, NIV)

I love how Jesus’ eyes are open to see who needs him most. He’s not looking for the most religious person in the crowd. And while Jesus has a special ministry among the poor, he’s not always looking for the poorest person either. At this moment, he looks up and finds a rich man in a tree.

And he knows his name.

That would have surprised Zacchaeus. How does Jesus know my name? He knows your name too, by the way. He knows who you are, what you’ve done, and why you’re here.

The crowd mutters: “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.” They’ve missed something that’s already obvious — Jesus is a friend of sinners (Luke 7:34). Not just a helper of sinners, not merely a forgiver — a friend. Think about that.

A friend is someone who enjoys being with you, who loves you. And Jesus is a friend of sinners. He wants to be around people who are broken and hurting and making all kinds of mistakes with their lives. He’s a friend to people like you and me.

Zacchaeus is overwhelmed by this friendship. And he changes instantly.

“Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” (Luke 19:8, NIV)

The thing he liked most about himself — his wealth and power — he gives it away. Half to the poor immediately. Fourfold repayment to anyone he’s defrauded. He’ll end up with less than half of his assets. But he doesn’t care. He’s found something far more valuable. He’s found Jesus.

Then Jesus says something remarkable:

“Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” (Luke 19:9–10, NIV)

Here’s another original language insight. The word for salvation in Aramaic — the everyday language Jesus spoke — is yeshua.

So when Jesus says salvation has come to this house, he was saying Yeshua has come to this house. In other words: I have come to this house. Jesus is salvation. When he shows up in your life, salvation shows up in your life.

Zacchaeus didn’t live up to his name — זַכָּה, zakkah, pure, clean, innocent.

But Jesus always lives up to his.

This story is all about names and identity. Look at what happens to Zacchaeus’s sense of identity. The things he liked about himself — his wealth and power — he doesn’t need them in the same way anymore. They get repurposed in the service of others. And the things he didn’t like about himself — his shortness, the rejection of the crowd, the limitations that drove him up a tree — those turn out to be the very things that led him to Jesus. You can imagine him telling the story years later with a smile on his face, no longer embarrassed about his limitations, loving the way they played a role in bringing him to Jesus.

His scars had become signposts, pointing him to Yeshua.

Zacchaeus may have wanted to go back and start again. What he got was something far better — a new life right where he was.

He became, in an instant, all that his name meant. Because of Jesus, Zacchaeus became pure, clean, innocent — a friend of God.

Why?

When we don’t live up to our own God-given identity, Jesus always lives up to his.

And the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.

Not hell in the cartoon sense — fire, pitchforks, devils with pointy tails. Hell in the ancient sense: Hadēs (ᾅδης), the underworld, the realm of all the dead. The place where the spirits of the departed had gathered since the beginning of human history.

Jesus died on the cross on Friday. His body went into the tomb. And his spirit — his pneuma (πνεῦμα) — went down.

The question we ended with was: what did he do there?

Jesus himself gave us a window into the geography of the underworld in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke 16:19-31). It’s worth reading carefully, because he describes something surprising: the underworld has two parts.

When the beggar Lazarus dies, the angels carry him to “Abraham’s side” — a place of comfort. When the rich man dies, he ends up in Hades, in torment. Crucially, these two regions can see each other. The rich man looks across and sees Abraham and Lazarus. He calls out. But Abraham tells him there is a “great chasm” fixed between them — chasma mega (χάσμα μέγα) in the Greek — that cannot be crossed.

So the underworld, in Jesus’ own teaching, is not one uniform place. There is a place of torment and a place of rest. A bad side and a good side. And a vast, uncrossable gulf between them.

Into this world Jesus descends on Good Friday.

He would have arrived on the good side — with the righteous dead, with Abraham, with all who had trusted God throughout Israel’s long history. But the whole of the underworld, both sides of that great chasm, would have stirred at his arrival.

Think about what that arrival would have looked like. The Son of God. The King of kings. The Saviour of the world. The one the prophets had pointed toward. Walking into the realm of the dead — not as a victim, but as the victor over sin and death.

We don’t have to speculate entirely about what happened next. Peter tells us.

“For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit. After being made alive, he went and made proclamation to the imprisoned spirits.” (1 Peter 3:18-19 NIV)

Dead in body. Alive in spirit. He went, he journeyed, he travelled — and he made proclamation.

The word for “made proclamation” is ekēryksen (ἐκήρυξεν), from kēryssō (κηρύσσω) — to herald, to announce, to preach. It’s the word used for a royal herald making an official announcement on behalf of a king. This wasn’t a quiet conversation with Abraham. It was a declaration to all the inhabitants of the underworld.

Jesus preached a sermon in hell.

What did he say?

Peter doesn’t give us the transcript. But I think it’s almost certain that it was the same thing he had just said, moments before he died, on the cross.

“It is finished.”

Tetelestai (τετέλεσται) — it is accomplished, completed, paid in full. This single Greek word was used in the ancient world on commercial receipts to mean a debt had been settled. Paid. Done. Nothing more owed.

When Jesus said tetelestai on the cross, he was declaring that the price of human sin had been fully paid. That the reign of death had been broken. Hell does not own humanity any longer. That the chains had been cut. And then he descended into the realm of death itself — and announced it there too.

The gates of hell heard it from the inside.

This is where one of the most dramatic and undersung stories in Christian theology comes in: the Harrowing of Hell.

The word “harrowing” is an old agricultural term — to harrow is to break up, to tear through, to disturb the ground. The Harrowing of Hell is the breaking open of the underworld. The great rescue. The exodus from the realm of the dead.

The tradition holds that after his proclamation, Christ led the righteous dead — everyone who had trusted God from Abel onwards — up and out of the underworld and into the presence of God in heaven. The gates were blown open from the inside.

Psalm 24 has been read through this lens for centuries:

Lift up your heads, you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, the LORD mighty in battle.

Picture it. The underworld’s ancient gates confronted by the King of glory. Not a soul arriving in defeat, as every other soul had arrived. But a king arriving in triumph, demanding that the gates be raised.

And then Ephesians 4:8-9 pulls it together, quoting Psalm 68: “When he ascended on high, he took many captives.” He descended to the lower regions. He ascended. And when he ascended, he wasn’t alone.

So what happened when Jesus died on the cross?

He paid the price for the forgiveness of sin — tetelestai, paid in full. He broke the power of sin and death. He descended into the realm of the dead, preached his victory, and led the righteous out of the underworld and into the presence of God.

And the result — for us, now — is this: when we die, when we give up our pneuma, our spirit doesn’t go down to the realm of the dead. The gates of hell have been broken open from the inside. The way has been made. Those who trust in Jesus go up, not down. Into the presence of the one who has done what we could never do. Let that good news wash over your soul.

It is finished.

I did this when my father died. We had a private viewing at the funeral home, and I remember walking in and seeing his body. It was cold. Lifeless. And I realised immediately — my dad wasn’t there. He had gone. Something had left.

I had my four-year-old son Elijah with me. He used to call his grandpa “Bucka” — couldn’t manage “grandpa” as a toddler, so “Bucka” it was, and it stuck. As we stood together looking at the body, Elijah said something that has stayed with me ever since.

“Bucka is gone. His body is here but his name has gone.”

His name has gone.

What a thing for a four-year-old to say. He was reaching for language he didn’t quite have — trying to express that something important was no longer present. We might call it the spirit. The soul. The life. He called it the name.

This is exactly how John describes the death of Jesus.

“When he had received the drink, Jesus said, “It is finished.” With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.” (John 19:30 NIV)

He gave up his spirit. The old King James renders it “gave up the ghost” — which has become a bit of a cliché in English, but the original is striking. In the Greek, the word is pneuma (πνεῦμα) — spirit, breath, life. Jesus paredōken to pneuma (παρέδωκεν τὸ πνεῦμα) — he handed over his spirit. He gave it up. His body remained on the cross. His spirit departed.

But here is the question that the Gospels raise and that Christians have puzzled over ever since.

Where did his spirit go?

If you’ve ever recited the Apostles’ Creed, you’ll have said something that probably passed by without much notice:

“He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried; he descended into hell.”

He descended into hell.

That line tends to produce one of two reactions. Either people skip over it without thinking, or they find it vaguely troubling — as though Jesus took a wrong turn somewhere between the cross and the resurrection. Did Jesus suffer in torment?

No. The word “hell” here is doing something quite specific, and once you understand it, the whole phrase opens up.

The English word “hell” in this creed is translating a Greek word: κατώτατα (katōtata) — literally “the lowest places,” the uttermost depths. This is derived from Ephesians 4:9, where Paul writes that Jesus “descended into the lower parts of the earth” — katōtera tēs gēs (κατώτερα τῆς γῆς). This is the underworld. The realm of the dead.

In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word is Sheol (שְׁאוֹל) — a word used over sixty times to describe the place where the dead go. Not a place of punishment specifically. Simply the underworld. The realm of shadows. Every dead person, righteous or wicked, ends up in Sheol. In the New Testament, the Greek equivalent is Hadēs (ᾅδης) — the same concept, just in Greek clothing. And when the early English-speaking church went looking for a word to translate both Sheol and Hades, they chose their own underworld word: hell.

So the creed isn’t saying Jesus went to the place of eternal punishment. It’s saying something far more interesting.

Jesus died — and his spirit went to the realm of the dead.

Between Friday and Sunday, Jesus wasn’t just lying in a tomb. His body was there, yes — wrapped in linen, sealed behind a stone. But his spirit? His pneuma? That had gone somewhere.

I think of it like a tree in winter. When I was young, I once agreed with a friend that a tree in his backyard was dead. It looked dead — no leaves, bare branches, bleak. His mother set us straight: “That tree is very much alive. It just doesn’t have any leaves because it’s winter.”

The shedding of leaves wasn’t the sign of death. It was the mechanism for life.

And so with Jesus. The cross looked like defeat. The tomb looked like an ending. But something was happening below the surface.

Jesus had gone down.

And if you know anything about Jesus, you know that when he shows up somewhere, things do not stay the same.

So what did Jesus do in the realm of the dead between Friday and Sunday?

That’s where it gets extraordinary — and that’s where we’ll pick up in Part 2.

There’s a passage in 1 Peter that describes Jesus, dead in body but alive in spirit, going to what it calls a “spiritual prison” and making a proclamation there. There’s a psalm that Christians have historically read as depicting a cosmic scene at the gates of the underworld. And there’s an ancient tradition called the Harrowing of Hell that is one of the most dramatic and under-appreciated stories in Christian theology.

If you’ve never heard of it, you’re in for something.

Part 2 drops tomorrow. Subscribe so you don’t miss it.

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Have you ever tried to grow something that just wouldn’t grow?

It’s frustrating. You plant it. You water it. You do what you think you’re meant to do and nothing happens.

When I was in the 5th grade, I had to do a science experiment for a science fair. I didn’t know what to do, but somewhere I read that you could grow birdseed in the dark. If you did it properly, it would sprout in a cupboard.

So I gave it a go.

The instructions said to place the birdseed on top of wet cotton wool. But that didn’t make sense to me. Surely you had to bury the seed. That’s how planting works.

So I buried it.

I had these plastic cups with a bit of water at the bottom, birdseed at the bottom of the cup, and wet cotton wool on top. I put them in the dark and waited.

Nothing happened.

Days went by. The science fair was getting closer. Still nothing.

Except for one small shoot—a single blade of grass. Why did this seed sprout and grow when all the others didn’t?

And then it dawned on me. One seed had accidentally fallen on top of the cotton wool, exactly where it was meant to be.

That one grew.

I didn’t realise it at the time, but that was actually a great experiment. I had learned something. I could have explained it. I could have written it up on that big cardboard display like everyone else.

But I was too embarrassed. So I scrapped it and threw something together the day before.

All that to say: if you want something to grow, you have to follow the instructions.

There are people who know how growth works.

In John 15, Jesus gives what is probably his clearest teaching on spiritual growth.

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener.”

Then he says something surprising:

“Every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, so that it will be even more fruitful.”

If you belong to Jesus, you are a branch. And your life is meant to bear fruit.

But here’s the key insight.

The Greek word Jesus uses for “prune” is kathairō.

And it doesn’t just mean “prune.” It means clean. It’s the same word.

We don’t connect those ideas. No one says they’re “cleaning” a tree when they cut off branches.

But Jesus does.

That’s why in the very next verse he says:

“You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you.”

So here’s how spiritual growth works:

God grows you by cleaning you.

He cuts away what isn’t helping; sin, distraction, empty pursuits… the things that drain your life but produce no fruit.

God does this to make you more alive.

This raises a confronting question:

What in my life isn’t actually producing fruit? What am I spending time on that isn’t leading anywhere good? What parts of my life are just draining sap?

When I lived in Siberia, most of my friends were ex-heroin addicts.

Heroin addiction is the definition of a fruitless life. Your time, your money, your energy, everything is consumed with getting the next hit.

I asked some of them what it was like to descend into addiction. They said, “None of us thought we’d become those people — the ones you see on the street. We thought we could control it.”

But eventually, everything gets stripped away. You sell what you have. Then you steal. And your entire life narrows to one goal. There’s no fruit there. Nothing life-giving. Nothing good for you or anyone else.

But when they came to Jesus, something changed. They became part of the vine. And God began to prune.

The same energy that once went into addiction was redirected. The same time, the same money, the same focus—it was all still there. But now it had somewhere else to go.

They became hardworking. They built families. They served others. They preached the gospel. The sap of life was still flowing — but now it was producing fruit.

Now, that’s an extreme case but it shows you the principle that applies equally in our lives as well: God frees us from unhelpful pursuits so that our life can be redirected to something that bears fruit.

This even works at the level of our thoughts.

Some thought patterns are simply unfruitful. They don’t lead to life. They don’t produce anything good.

And if you invite God into that space, often alongside wise help from others, he begins to clean. To gently remove what doesn’t belong. To reshape the inner life so that even your thinking becomes fruitful.

God is a good gardener.

He is committed to your growth.

And that means he is committed to pruning, to cleaning, to cutting away what doesn’t lead to life.

Not harshly. But carefully. Intentionally. Lovingly.

So here’s the question:

Where in your life is the sap flowing into something that isn’t bearing fruit?

What might God be wanting to gently cut away?

Bring that to him.

Because this is how growth happens — by letting the gardener do his work.

I thought there were “essentials” to Christian living: going to church, reading your Bible, doing the right thing, believing in Jesus…

But when it came to giving, I assumed it was optional. I’m guessing that’s because whenever the offering plate would go around, the minister would tell us that there is no obligation to give.

He was right, but I got the wrong message.

Giving is at the heart of the Christian life.

My favourite summary of Christian discipleship is the words of Jesus, “freely you’ve received; freely give” (Matthew 10:8).

The Greek word for “freely” here is δωρεάν (doreán). It means “pertaining to being freely given, as a gift, without payment, gratis” (BDAG).

In Jesus, we “freely receive” our new, eternal, Gospel life, and so our response is to “freely give.”

I’ve often reflected on Paul’s powerful words in Philippians 4:18. Here’s the NIV:

“I have received full payment and have more than enough. I am amply supplied, now that I have received from Epaphroditus the gifts you sent. They are a fragrant offering, an acceptable sacrifice, pleasing to God.”

When we send money to a missionary, or offer food to the hungry, or support a cause in another country, we might think that our gift moves horizontally — from one human to another.

But Paul says something far more spiritual is happening.

Your gift rises vertically. It becomes “a fragrant offering.”

The Greek phrase is ὀσμὴν εὐωδίας (osmēn euōdías). The word ὀσμή (osmē) means “smell” or “aroma.” And εὐωδία (euōdía) literally means “good fragrance” — a sweet smell.

Paul is deliberately borrowing Old Testament temple language. In the Greek translation of the Old Testament, that exact phrase appears again and again in Leviticus and Numbers to describe sacrifices that are “a pleasing aroma to the LORD”.

In other words, when you’re generous in God’s kingdom, it’s the equivalent of a burnt offering in the temple.

God calls it a pleasing aroma to Him.

That’s not how I used to think about money.

When I was a young Bible College student, preparing for missionary work, I’ll be honest — I sometimes looked sideways at wealthy Christian friends. They had chosen careers. I had chosen ministry. They were earning good salaries. I was raising support.

It was easy, in those early years, to engage in a kind of hidden judgment.

Until the day one of those “wealthy” friends came up to me and said, almost casually, “We’ve decided to support you $5,000 a year for three years. And if you ever get stuck when you’re serving God in Siberia, call me.”

The conversation lasted less than a minute. But something shifted in me.

I realised that while I thought I was making sacrifices for God by becoming a missionary, many others were making sacrifices too. I just couldn’t see them.

That’s because Jesus said:

“So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets… Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing.” (Matthew 6:2–3 NIV)

That phrase — “do not let your left hand know” — is a vivid hyperbole. Jesus is teaching his disciples about the importance of keeping your generosity secret.

He’s saying “even your other body parts shouldn’t know when your right hand is giving to those in need.”

Christian giving is meant to be hidden. And this means we are largely blind to the sacrificial generosity happening around us.

Think about it this way. All around you, believers are making quiet, costly sacrifices — and you will never know. That is exactly how Jesus intended it.

But why?

Why is giving meant to be in secret?

It’s probably because we’re tempted to think large financial gifts are more important than small ones.

In Luke 21, Jesus watched a poor widow give two small copper coins to God. The leptos (λεπτός) was one 128th of a denarius. A denarius was an average day’s wage. For an average worker, this widow’s offering was a negligible amount of money (less than 10 minutes’ wages). But Jesus said “this poor widow has put in more than all the others.”

Why? Because she put in “all she had to live on” (v4).

I love the way the original Greek sounds at this point. Panta ton bion hon eichen ebalen (πάντα τὸν βίον ὃν εἶχεν ἔβαλεν) — “the whole life, which she had, she threw in!”

The point of giving is to give our whole lives to God. In fact, that’s the essence of the Christian life. We simply, wholly and fully offer up our lives to God as a fragrant offering.

Did you know that simplicity and generosity are the same word in the Greek New Testament?

“Because of the service by which you have proved yourselves, others will praise God… for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone else.” (2 Corinthians 9:13, NIV).

The Greek word for generosity here is ἁπλότης (haplótēs).

Its primary meaning is “simplicity” or “sincerity” -- a kind of “what you see is what you get” attitude. But it also refers to generosity and that’s what it means here.

Generosity is simplicity. Generosity is simply allowing the love of God to flow deeply from who we are. It’s the deepest expression of love. I have something good but I see that you need it, and so I give it to you.

This leads me to my favourite Hebrew insight about generosity.

There’s a hidden Hebrew phrase for stinginess — and it’s all about your eyes.

Proverbs 28:22 says, “The stingy are eager to get rich.”

The Hebrew for “stingy” is “a person with a bad eye” (אִישׁ רַ֣ע עָ֑יִן — ʾîsh raʿ ʿáyin).

In Hebrew thought, a “bad eye” can’t see properly. If I have a “bad eye”, I can’t see the goodness God has given me, and I can’t see the needs of others, which God is showing me. In contrast, a “good eye” sees fully and gives simply.

That’s why Jesus taught that “the eye is the lamp of the body” in the middle of a message about money (Matthew 6:22).

Generosity begins with what we choose to see.

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Jesus says it at dinner.
Not in public.
Not to enemies.
But to friends — while bread is still on the table.

“Very truly I tell you, one of you is going to betray me.” (John 13:21 NIV)

‘Betray’ in Greek is παραδίδωμι (paradidōmi). It’s a compound word meaning ‘hand over, give (over), deliver, entrust’ (BDAG).

In this case, it refers to Judas handing Jesus over to the authorities who are trying to kill him.

But to truly understand Judas’ betrayal, you need to back up a little.

At the start of the chapter, John frames the whole Upper Room scene like this:

“Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.” (John 13:1 NIV)

Jesus already loves them. They belong to him. But now that love intensifies. It reaches its fullest expression — through Jesus washing his disciples’ feet.

And then, at their moment of greatest intimacy, Jesus speaks about betrayal.

That timing matters. Because betrayal can only exist where loyalty is assumed.

You can’t betray a stranger.
You can’t betray someone who expects nothing of you.

Betrayal only happens where trust, allegiance, and devotion already exist.

That’s why the best time to talk about betrayal is immediately after washing his disciples’ feet.

Betrayal at the table

In verse 18, Jesus explains what’s unfolding:

“I am not referring to all of you; I know those I have chosen. But this is to fulfill this passage of Scripture: ‘He who shared my bread has turned against me.’” (John 13:18 NIV)

He’s quoting Psalm 41:9 — a verse about the betrayal of a close friend.

In the ancient world, sharing bread wasn’t casual. To eat together was to declare solidarity. It said: I’m with you. I honour you. I agree with you.

That’s why John’s language is so stark. The one who shared bread has “turned against” him. The original Greek here paints a more violent picture.

The Greek is ἐπῆρεν ἐπ’ ἐμὲ τὴν πτέρναν αὐτοῦ (epēren ep’ eme tēn pternan autou) — “he lifted up his heel against me.” BDAG, the best Greek lexicon, understands this to mean to “raise one’s heel against someone for a malicious kick”. It’s the language of sudden violence from someone close to you.

This is intimate treachery.

And it explains why John tells us what Jesus is feeling:

“After he had said this, Jesus was troubled in spirit…” (John 13:21 NIV)

The word “troubled” is ταράσσω (tarásso). It means to stir up, to agitate, to shake deeply — like water churned by a storm.

Jesus is shaken.

It’s the same word used of Jesus’ emotions at the grave of Lazarus, his friend.

It probably speaks of a combination of grief, turmoil and even confusion.

Love makes betrayal possible. And love makes it hurt.

The disciples don’t seem to know how to respond. Peter doesn’t even speak up but rather motions to John to ask Jesus what he’s talking about.

This is all a beautiful picture of the humanity of Jesus. Fully God and fully man, he experiences waves of human emotion as he tastes betrayal at the hand of a friend.

A final act of love

When John quietly asks who the betrayer is, Jesus answers with a sign:

“It is the one to whom I will give this piece of bread when I have dipped it in the dish.” (John 13:26 NIV)

And then he gives it to Judas.

In that culture, the host offering bread was an act of honour. This is one last gesture of friendship.

Jesus loves Judas to the end.

But Judas receives the bread without receiving the love of Jesus.

“As soon as Judas took the bread, Satan entered into him.” (John 13:27 NIV)

John doesn’t explain how that works. He simply tells us it does.

Our inner lives are contested space. Where the love of God is resisted, something else moves in.

And then Judas leaves.

“And it was night.” (John 13:30 NIV)

We can read this both as physical reality and spiritual truth.

Judas has walked away from the Last Supper.

He has abandoned the love of Jesus expressed among friends.

He has left the circle that would become the Church of Christ.

He has fled from the light and chosen the night.

Glory, not bitterness

Imagine how you would feel, if you were Jesus?

Where would you focus your heart at this moment?

Once Judas is gone, Jesus lifts his eyes beyond the betrayal:

“Now the Son of Man is glorified and God is glorified in him.” (John 13:31 NIV)

This is astonishing.

Jesus doesn’t centre on his pain. He centres on God’s glory.

The new commandment

Then Jesus gathers it all into one command:

“A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” (John 13:34 NIV)

What’s new isn’t the command to love — it’s the measure.

“As I have loved you.”

Feet-washing love.
Betrayal-enduring love.
Bread-offering love.
Going-to-the-cross love.

The disciples have seen the love of Jesus.

They’ve felt it as water on their feet.

They’ll taste it as bread and wine in their mouths.

They’ve watched it as kindness to a traitor.

And they’ll know it as nails on a cross.

The secret of betrayal is that it’s inevitable in this world. But the powerful message of the Gospel is that betrayal doesn’t have the last word. Love does.

So if you’ve been betrayed, hear this: Jesus understands your experience even if no one else does.

And for all of us, know that the command to love is not peripheral. It’s the essence of discipleship.

This is Christianity — grasping and growing in the love of Jesus.

The command to love like Jesus is always “a new commandment.”

Because we need to hear it anew each and every day.

That’s a surprisingly hard question to answer. Because to answer it honestly, you’d need to know how often you forget things you should have remembered. And most of the time, when you forget something, you don’t even know you’ve forgotten it. That’s the problem.

You only realise later — when someone else says, “Oh… you didn’t forget, did you?”

I have a street I regularly forget to turn down.

Most mornings I drive the same route to church. But when we’re heading to the gym, I need to turn left a bit earlier. And more often than I’d like to admit, I stay on autopilot and sail straight past it.

My wife and daughter laugh.

“Dad, you always forget to turn there.”
“No I don’t. It’s like ten percent of the time.”
“It’s fifty percent, Dad.”
“No — here you’re the forgetful one. You only remember when I get it wrong.”

So now, whenever I do turn correctly, I announce it out loud.

“Notice this. I’m turning here. Not forgetting.”

But they’re right. Sometimes I am on autopilot. Many of us are.

And spiritually, the same thing happens.

We cruise through life on spiritual autopilot. And without meaning to, we forget the goodness of God — not because it isn’t there, but because we stop paying attention.

That’s exactly the problem Psalm 103 addresses.

“Praise the LORD, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the LORD, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits.”
(Psalm 103:1–2 NIV)

That phrase — “forget not all his benefits” — is the heartbeat of the psalm.

The Hebrew verb translated “forget” is שָׁכַח (shakhákh). It doesn’t just mean losing information. It often describes neglect — allowing something important to slip into the background.

This isn’t about a bad memory. It’s about spiritual autopilot.

So David speaks to his own soul.

Don’t forget.
Remember.
Wake up.

And then he begins to name the benefits. I can count twelve key benefits that comes through our relationship with God throughout this psalm. Spend some time reflecting on them now, and if you think someone else might need to hear this — forward it to them.

The First Benefit: Forgiveness

“Who forgives all your sins.” (v.3)

Forgiveness comes first because sin is our deepest problem.

The Hebrew verb סָלַח (sāláḥ) is used almost exclusively of God. Forgiveness means to release a debt — to cancel what is owed. Biblical forgiveness is not pretending wrong didn’t happen. It is powerfully wiping the slate clean.

We all know the pull of sin — captured in the line, “I feel something so right doing the wrong thing.” Sin promises life and delivers decay. And the greatest need in any relationship — human or divine — is forgiveness.

This is the first benefit: God forgives.

Not because we earned it. But because Christ bore our sin and cancelled our debt at the cross.

The Second Benefit: Healing

“Who heals all your diseases.” (v.3)

Forgiveness heals the soul. Healing restores the body.

God is the architect of your immune system. He’s the giver of medical knowledge to every doctor, nurse, paramedic and health-worker. And sometimes, He’s the one who answers prayer in supernatural ways.

All healing is His healing.

And yet — some are not healed.

Which is why David moves immediately to the next benefit.

The Third Benefit: Redemption

“Who redeems your life from the pit.” (v.4)

The “pit” — שַׁחַת (shacháth) — is the realm of death, the place you cannot escape on your own.

God rescues us from danger now. How many times could you have died but you didn’t? We can’t even know. Every day is a gift. And even when death finally comes, redemption still has the final word. Jesus defeated death through his own resurrection, and he will raise us up with him.

The Fourth Benefit: Favour

“Who crowns you with love and compassion.” (v.4)

To be crowned is to be dignified. Elevated. Honoured.

God’s love (חֶסֶד — ḥésed) and compassion (רַחֲמִים — raḥamím) are covenant actions. They mean God claims you as his own and treats you accordingly.

This is favour.

You wear this crown whether you feel it or not. If you belong to Christ, you are highly favoured.

The Fifth Benefit: Enjoyment

“Who satisfies your desires with good things.” (v.5)

The word translated “desires” is עֶדְיֵךְ (ʿed-yékh). It usually means ornaments or jewellery — something beautiful, delightful, even luxurious.

Sometimes, as Christians, we feel guilty for enjoying the good things God has given us. I don’t even know why.

But you cannot thank God for what you refuse to enjoy. If God has brought good things into your life, enjoy them. And then thank Him for them.

Enjoyment is the beginning of gratitude.

The Sixth Benefit: Renewal

“So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” (v.5)

This is inward renewal. David is speaking to his own soul throughout the psalm. That’s the “you” in each phrase. Here, the soul becoming younger, freer, stronger — even as the body ages.

Paul echoes the same truth:

“Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.”
(2 Corinthians 4:16 NIV)

Time wrinkles the body. Time with God renews the soul.

The Seventh Benefit: Justice

“The LORD works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed.” (v.6)

God is not a neutral observer in this world. He sides with the vulnerable.

He actively works on behalf of those who are abused, exploited, and downtrodden. Justice is deep within the character of God.

The Eighth Benefit: Revelation

“He made his ways known to Moses.” (v.7)

God is not secretive.

People love to say, “The Lord works in mysterious ways.” But Scripture more often shows the opposite. God reveals his ways. He wants to be known.

This psalm itself is an act of revelation — showing us how God works in our lives through forgiveness, healing, redemption, favour, enjoyment, renewal, and justice.

The Ninth Benefit: Love

“He does not treat us as our sins deserve.” (v.10)

This dismantles entitlement. Entitlement is when you think you deserve better than you’re getting.

Here we’re told the opposite.

If we truly grasp what we deserve — judgment for sin — then entitlement must go. And what replaces it? Gratitude.

Gratitude grows naturally when entitlement dies.

This is love: God treating us far better than we deserve.

The Tenth Benefit: Accommodation

“For he knows how we are formed,
he remembers that we are dust.” (v.14)

God accommodates our weakness.

Sometimes we feel so weak and useless that we start to become self-critical. “I should be able to get through this.”

But God sees your weaknesses, limitations and frailty — and He cares for you.

He knows how you are formed. He remembers that you are dust.

In other words, He knows your limits and He loves you no matter what.

The Eleventh Benefit: Eternity

“From everlasting to everlasting the LORD’s love is with those who fear him.” (v.17)

Our lives are brief. His love is not.

So build your life upon His love.

The Twelfth Benefit: Dominion

“The LORD has established his throne in heaven,
and his kingdom rules over all.” (v.19)

This God — forgiving, healing, redeeming, crowning, satisfying, renewing — reigns.

Which means these benefits are not fragile. They’re not here today and gone tomorrow.

In fact, they cannot be revoked. They cannot be stolen.

If this good and gracious God does in fact reign over heaven and earth, then nothing can separate us from His love.

“Praise the LORD, my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
Praise the LORD, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits.”
(Psalm 103:1–2 NIV)

Less than a month ago, I had the privilege of being part of our Community Christmas Carols — an event our church hosts each year as a gift to the wider community. About 2,500 people gathered in a local park in Sydney, Australia. There were picnic rugs, kids playing, food trucks, market stalls selling candles and earrings and Christmas gifts. It was a joyful night — a night that felt peaceful, celebrating the good news of Jesus’ birth.

But this year was different.

During the carols, a church member came up to me and showed me the news. Shots had been fired at Bondi Beach — just across our city. A Jewish community gathering to celebrate the first night of Hanukkah had been attacked. Innocent people — women, children, rabbis, seniors — were murdered simply for gathering to celebrate a religious festival.

Fifteen lives lost. It’s hard to comprehend.

Antisemitism is a heinous evil that has caused immense destruction throughout history. And moments like this confront us again with a sobering truth: our world desperately needs peace.

We need peace in our communities, in our city, in our nation, and in our world.

That’s why Isaiah’s words matter so much. The Messiah who comes — the one we know as Jesus — is called Sar Shalom, the Prince of Peace.

In Hebrew, sar means ruler or leader. It’s a political and military term. Shalom means peace. The idea is simple but profound: the Messiah is the leader who brings peace.

We often look to political leaders to do exactly that — to bring peace to society. And rightly so. But we also know that human leaders will always fall short. The Christian hope is that there is one leader who will never fail us: Jesus, the Prince of Peace.

So what does peace actually mean?

Shalom is more than the absence of conflict. It means wholeness, completeness, intactness. A debt that has been repaid is shalom. A building project that has been finished is shalom. A season of mourning that has come to its end is shalom. It describes a state where nothing more needs to be done.

That’s why shalom can also mean prosperity, wellbeing, even salvation. It’s the state we all long for — whether we realise it or not.

And the Bible’s claim is that Jesus brings that peace.

But how? How does Jesus bring peace in a world marked by hatred, violence, and suffering?

Isaiah answers that question in Isaiah 53. The Messiah would be “pierced for our transgressions” and “crushed for our iniquities.” The punishment that brought us shalom was laid on him.

This is the heart of the Christian gospel. All of us have sinned. All of us stand guilty before a holy God. And yet God sent his Son to take our guilt upon himself. Jesus died as our substitute. He bore what we deserved.

Isaiah says it plainly: “The punishment that brought us peace was on him.”

That word peace is shalom. Jesus repaid our debt. He completed what needed to be completed. On the cross, everything that needed to be shalomed was shalomed.

That’s why Paul can say in Romans 5:1, “Since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

This peace with God is foundational. Through faith in Jesus our relationship with God is whole, complete, intact. We are forgiven, welcomed, adopted.

And that peace doesn’t stay abstract. It reshapes our lives in very practical ways.

First, God’s peace guards our hearts.

Paul writes that “the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:7).

This peace doesn’t remove all trouble from the world around us. It does something different. It stands guard at the door of our hearts, keeping fear and anxiety from having the final word. We experience that peace as we learn to pray about everything — not just the big things, but the ordinary details of life.

Second, God’s peace acts as an umpire in our decisions.

In Colossians 3:15, Paul says, “Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.” The Greek word translated “rule” (brabeueto) originally referred to an umpire making a decision in a contest. Allow the peace of Christ, the Prince of Peace, to influence your decisions.

As we pray, seek wisdom, and think things through, one helpful question is this: Where do I sense the peace of Christ? God’s peace can guide us — not replacing Scripture or wisdom or the advice of others, but helping show us the way forward.

And finally, God’s peace becomes our plan in relationships.

Paul writes in Romans 12:18, “If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.” Not everything depends on us — but some things do.

In a time of polarisation, heightened emotion, and strong opinions, Christians are called to be people of peace. That doesn’t mean silence or passivity. It means speaking truth in ways that genuinely seek peace. Forgiving. Listening. Choosing words that heal rather than inflame.

Proverbs says, “Those who promote peace have joy.” Peace is not accidental. It’s planned. It’s pursued. It’s built conversation by conversation.

Jeremiah 29:7 captures this beautifully: “Seek the peace of the city… for in its peace you will find your peace.” When we seek shalom for those around us — our families, workplaces, communities — we find shalom ourselves.

We need the Prince of Peace because he has made peace with God possible. And as we learn to walk in his ways, that peace flows into our hearts, our decisions, and our relationships. It can even change the world.

All because Jesus is our Sar Shalom — our Prince of Peace.

The word for “meditate” in Hebrew is hagah. It means to make a murmuring sound. In the ancient world, people didn’t read silently (like you’re doing right now). They always read aloud or at least under their breath. This word hagah refers to that under-the-breath style of reading.

This teaches us that biblical meditation is not emptying the mind. It’s filling it — with God’s word. And we fill our minds with God’s word because we delight in God’s word.

So how are you going to do that in 2026?

My encouragement is to try reading through the whole Bible in a year. That’s something I’ve done at least a dozen times and it has boosted my faith and strengthened my walk with God more than anything else.

Sadly for many Christians, their Bible intake is a sermon every second Sunday, or maybe a verse-of-the-day that pops up on their phone. I don’t know about you, but for me, that’s never been enough. I need a whole lot of God’s word to face the challenges of each day. I need it to grow in my knowledge of God, to keep learning who He is, and how to live as a follower of Jesus. And I’ve found that the more I read God’s word, the better my mental health, the more loving I am, and the more focused I become on God’s priorities for my life. In short, reading God’s word is, I believe, the most transformational practice you can have in 2026.

Here are a few options:

1. If the whole Bible is too much right now, you could read one chapter of the New Testament each weekday. That will take you through the whole New Testament in a year.

2. If you’re game to try the whole thing, there are plenty of plans available online. You might choose one of the simple plans available here.

3. If you would benefit from a guided plan with extra resources, here are a few options.

   1. Nicky and Pippa Gumbel from the Alpha Course have an excellent Bible in a Year program here.

   2. Chad Bird is a Hebrew scholar whom I know personally. He has a similar vibe to what you’ve seen in my content. He has a Bible in a Year program here.

   3. The Bible Project is an amazing resource on YouTube. They have a Bible in a Year program here.

   4. Or maybe you’re too creative and free to be pinned down by a reading plan. My wife Jo is like that. She enjoys following a plan where you put seven bookmarks in your Bible and each day of the week you can read as much or as little as you like from where that day’s bookmark is located. More info here.

There are so many options but I chose these to give you a good feel for what’s out there. The main thing is to get reading. Find a plan that suits you. If you’d like more help, message me via Substack or Instagram and I’ll tailor my advice just for you. I think it’s the best investment of my time right now. If I can get you reading, wow. That’s kingdom fruit for years to come.

Remember Psalm 1:2 says “who meditates on his law day and night.” That’s the goal. We want to be people who read and meditate on God’s word so much that it permeates our lives. And we do that not out of duty, but out of delight.

God bless you and happy reading.

As the year draws to a close, I want to share a little more of my story — and make an invitation as we look toward the year ahead.

I began writing on Threads just over a year ago because I felt God leading me to share more widely what I’d been learning from reading the Bible in its original languages. I had no idea what might come of it. Since then, tens of thousands of people have joined me on Threads, and several thousand have subscribed to this newsletter here on Substack. I’m deeply grateful.

It also feels right, at this point, to let you know a little more about the life behind the words.

My family and I spent almost a decade serving as missionaries in Russia, based in Novosibirsk, the capital of Siberia. Our work centred on a discipleship centre that trained young leaders — Russian, Kazakh, Uzbek, Tatar and Tuvan — and sent them out across the former Soviet Union to plant churches and share the good news of Jesus. Alongside this, we helped pioneer Bible translation work among unreached people groups in Siberia.

That chapter ended abruptly in February 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine. Out of fear for our safety, we had 48 hours to leave our home, our friends, our ministry — and our dog. We returned to Sydney, Australia with little more than suitcases and a very uncertain future.

Today, I serve as a pastor and my wife Jo serves as an aged care chaplain. Alongside that, I continue to write — here and on Threads — out of a love for Scripture and a desire to help others encounter Jesus through the biblical text.

As we continue rebuilding our lives after forced displacement and an unexpectedly sudden return home, I’m asking whether you might consider supporting this work in the year ahead.

The simplest way to do that is by becoming a paid subscriber here on Substack. At present, only a small number of readers are paid supporters. If even a modest percentage of regular readers chose to do so, it would make a significant difference for our family and allow me to continue offering most of my writing freely.

Subscribe now

A paid subscription costs US$6 per month. In return you get more access to me and my writing and you’re helping sustain my work that remains open and accessible to many.

If you’re not in a position to support financially, please don’t feel any pressure. I write first and foremost out of a love for God’s word, and that won’t change.

Thank you for reading, for your kindness, and for walking with me this year.

Grace and peace,
Tim