Paul's Podcast

In this study of Finishing Our Obstacle Course, we have left behind obstacle 1 in chapter 1 (fear/shame) and are now sizing up obstacle 2: being useful. We are going to hang our study of chapter 2 on this phrase: …meet for the master’s use, and prepared unto every good work (2 Timothy 2:21b). That is what we want to be: useful to the Lord. It is amazing that we can be that; we only have a short ti...

Today we get the final piece of the puzzle we need to overcome our first obstacle of fear and shame. We have seen that we're fully equipped, we have seen that we need to be involved on His terms, today we will see that we need to keep going. Why would Timothy keep going in his context? And why should we keep going in ours? Take a listen to find out ... Find out more about us here - crossroads...

Giving is the practical basis of every love relationship. Giving is a doctrine that nearly every culture gets wrong. Giving is the foundation of all worship. ...so pretty important we get this one right! What does biblical giving look like? Let's find out ... Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

Being scared of spiders, heights, needles or whatever, may or may not have that great of an impact on our life. We could probably be scared of one of these things and go on to live a pretty happy and "successful" life. But, what if the thing that scared us was the very reason we were put on earth? What if the thing that we were afraid of was God’s plan for our life? And worse still, what...

Two people were crucified on that day with Jesus, but only one thing was different about them. What was it? And what does it mean for us today? Take a listen & find out ... Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

My wife has many gifts, but one of my favourites is her supernatural ability to create a delicious meal out of nothing. A couple of days before the next Tesco delivery, I’m looking in the kitchen thinking “we are going to starve; there’s not food.” Emma looks in the kitchen, grabs a bunch of ingredients, and pretty soon after, we have a delicious meal on the table. I look in the cupboards and see...

In Matthew 13, there are 7 parables that reveal what the Kingdom of Heaven will be like. What will it be like? Why is this important to my faith? What does this mean for the mission of the church?  Let's jump in and find out ... Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

We often think of as life as a race, which is appropriate as that is how the Apostle Paul describes it. But, more specifically, I would propose we can think of life as an obstacle race. We think and maybe hope it will run smoothly, but in reality, we face many different and difficult challenges along the way. We do want to follow Jesus and serve God, but then life seems to throw something at us th...

What is the storyline of the Bible? This week, we get into more detail about the story of God's kingdom. Crucially, we'll see how it is divided up into two concepts: the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven. Which is which? And why is this important? Find out here ... Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

Huz? Buz? Kemuel? And don't get me started on Chesed, Hazo and Pildesh... Today we’re closing out our study of Genesis 22 with the final reality of worship: a life of worship leads to a life building the church. We will see that, though life presents many options, a life building the church is the only way we can produce fruit that actually remains. Find out more about us here - crossroadslon...

What is the storyline of the Bible?  As much as we would like it to be about us, it is not. The storyline of the Bible is a story about a kingdom... Welcome to our special mini - series on the Kingdom of Heaven & the Kingdom of God . Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

For our message today, you can imagine eating a sandwich. There is a filling on offer, but, as with every sandwich, it has to start and end with the slice of bread. The bread in our sandwich today is Abraham’s obedience; the filling, i.e. what happens in the middle, is the reward of Abraham’s obedience. How is his act of worship rewarded? How might we expect to be blessed as we live a life of obed...

We’ve got trust issues people.  I once bit into what I thought was mint chocolate bar in school, aged 5, and it turned our to be not full of chocolate but full of raisins. Took me a long time to get over that. More seriously, as believers  we have trust issues, maybe even more so than unbelievers, here’s why: - As Christians, we know we can’t trust ourselves. We know the human heart is deceitful,...

Apparently our noses have 400 scent receptors and can detect trillions of different smells. What happens when we smell is we inhale molecules, which send signals to the brain, to create physical responses from our body... some smells we love, some we don't! Why all this talk about smells? The truth we’re going to see today is that the ordinary, flawed, weak, foolish, etc, etc believer is able...

Last week we drew our first reality of worship from Genesis 22 (we have to understand the test) and this week we are going to draw out our second (we have to go and do what God has said). And it is going to be so helpful for us because we are going to see how grand ol’ father Abraham goes and does what God told him to. If we want to 'obtain a good report' like Abraham did, here are 3 way...

Last week we looked at Isaac and saw the picture of the Cross: this provided us with the reason for worship. This week we're looking at Abraham, seeing how he responds to God’s call in his life: this is going to give us some realities of worship. And reality no.1 is this: Our Faith Will Be Tested. While "tell me something I don't know!" and "that sounds terrible!" mig...

Last week we saw how we don’t want to be left behind with the ass, we want to go yonder & worship. Vital to us doing that (i.e. worshipping God) is understanding WHY we should worship him. Today we'll see that our reason for worship is caught up in what happened on that hill, all those years ago... Find out more about us here - crossroadslondon.org

The Old Testament and the New Testament conclude the same: ultimately, in the end, everyone is going to bow down and worship Jesus. The question is ‘who am I going to bow down to in the meantime?’ Genesis 22 is going to instruct us in the Reason for Worship and the Realities of Worship. This intro sets the scene for the next couple of months, and reminds us not to be left behind with the ass... Fi...

Colossians 1: 9 For this cause we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding; 10 That ye might walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God; 11 Strengthened with all might, according to his gloriou...

As we have seen over the last few months, Paul has been instructing and exhorting Timothy to ‘war a good warfare’ and to ‘Fight the Good Fight of Faith’. What is different about this war? It is unique compared to any other battle that has been, or will ever be, fought because it is a spiritual battle. As the battle is unique, it stands to reason that the type of soldier required to fight in it is...

Final two verses of 1 Timothy... what does Paul have to say to his spiritual son, his young soldier in Christ, before he signs off his letter and the fight continues? He says: ‘O Timothy’! An exclamation of feeling and concern and exhortation. When we get into the details today we will understand this as: -O Timothy: fight, don’t fail.  -O Timothy: keep going, don’t quit. See, failure was not an o...

There is an old fairy tale about a character called Rumplestiltskin; a made-up creature who had the ability to spin straw into gold. He was able to take something of relatively low value, and turn it into something of extremely high value. That is the lesson that comes out of today's passage – we can be modern-day, real-life Rumplestiltskins. Here we will see that if we don't trust our u...

Have you ever run out of petrol in the car? It has happened to me. It’s kind of silly because we can see that the vehicle is running low, but - for some reason - we don’t fill up, we just wait, thinking we might just make it to the next destination. What about spiritually speaking? Have you ever run out of that kind of petrol?  Would you like to hear about a source of fuel that is free, that is un...

One Christmas Day challenge most kids probably remember is opening a present and being excited about it, but it doesn’t have the batteries included, so you have to wait until your parents find some batteries (and a tiny screwdriver) and put them in.  Until then, you have this amazing gift in a box, and you can look at it and think about it but you can’t actually do anything with it. Often times, u...

I attended some football training with a good friend of mine way back in my late teens. After a few years not playing, this was to be my glorious come back. Not long into the session, I received the ball in the middle of the pitch, perfect control, I turned and caressed the ball straight into the back of the net: goal. It was the wrong goal. I’d got nervous, turned around the wrong way, tried to p...