May 12, 2026 | Blog |
A psychologist studying trauma recently said to me that no human relationship is totally safe. Really? So sad.
My mind went to wondering if our God-relationship can be totally safe. I have known some people who as a result of childhood experience of a distant or cruel parent, have great difficulty considering God their Father. Jesus is OK, they say. But that “father” word stands in the way of their relationship.
Calling God Father is especially precious to me because of the incredible spiritual intimacy I have come to experience over the years. Fortunately, I had the gift of a human father I could trust, who I could be confident wanted only the best for me. But not everyone has that experience. Widespread disclosures of child abuse evidence that.
The Good Father
Early in my pastoral ministry I found some survivors of childhood neglect and abuse were helped by thinking of God as the Good Father. This suggestion follows the model of Jesus calling himself the Good Shepherd. His hearers understood the value of this, even though they knew there were bad shepherds who neglected their flock, mistreated or abandoned them.
I’ve noticed a recent return to songs mentioning God’s holiness. What does it mean to say God is holy? The church I was part of in my childhood had a banner over the archway at the front that said, “Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness”. I puzzled over that many a Sunday. Holiness didn’t seem to me beautiful. I wasn’t sure I had much of it, and drawing attention to God’s holiness just seemed to distance me.
Certainly, God is not of the same substance as us, nor would we want a God just like us. However we define deity, God must be other, separate, requiring respect. What is God is both father and holy? When we hear through Jesus that we are invited into a relationship with this divine Other, can we dare to trust this relationship?
The Holy Guarantee
What I have come to realise is that God being holy is our guarantee that the heavenly Father is safe. The holiness itself is the guarantee. So invited into intimacy with this Other will not harm us, will not cause us evil. A holy God can do no wrong, cannot be careless with us. God is challenging perhaps, always expecting the best of us, but this Good Father will not hurt nor exploit us.
An Australian song says: Who else invites me to call Him Father? Only a Holy God.
And Brian Holliday of Dayspring recently reminded us of the reassuring words penned by Teresa of Avila:
God is always there, if you feel wounded.
God kneels
over this earth like
a divine medic,
and God’s love thaws
the holy in
us.
Jennifer Turner
May 4, 2026 | Blog |
One time hiking the Cape-to-Cape track down the coast of Western Australia we sat on a cliff overlooking the well-known lefthanders surf break near Gracetown. We watched the black clad riders below get up and test the waves. And I wondered whether the Creator of oceans enjoys the surf as much as we do.
In the long history of the earth, surfing with boards is a new phenomenon. Yet we are told in Genesis that on the seventh day of creation God enjoyed all that was made. Does that include surfing? It’s hard to imagine. But we know the waves and the swell were there long before we humans discovered the thrill and the fear of riding them.
The Creator shares the natural world with us
Sharing the natural world with us is apparently part of the Creator’s plan for the universe. It is a great benefit of the relationship of love and acceptance God offers to us. Yet, just as in that Genesis beginning, we too can take for granted this connection. We try to domesticate it with our puny thoughts and desires. The Creator, however, always remains Other, beyond and above us. Awe is the gift that reminds us of this.
Awe is that mixture of wonder and fear we associate mostly with the physical world writ large. But when we look for it, we also find awe is prompted by the exquisitely small. Perhaps a delicate flower or the minute building blocks of cells revealed by electron microscope or biochemistry investigation. We can be “awed” in various ways and places and relationships.
Julia Baird recommended in her awe-focused TV program a couple of years ago a daily “awe walk”. Go out of the house or the office with eyes open and heart alert to the natural world around. I would add, even better to do it with others. And with thanks to the God who desires to share closeness with us.
Awe’s mix of wonder and fear
Awe is a gift because its mixture of wonder and fear gets the balance right. It can take us out of our self-focused struggles and connect us to others, including to the One who created all these things. Psychological research shows that the benefit of awe itself is enhanced by sharing it with others. I described in Finding Your Voice how healing in the isolation of the worst Covid-19 year our neighbours found it to watch the sunsets over the Indian Ocean at the end of our street.
Many of the biblical psalms give us words for enjoying and sharing this gift of awe: “The whole earth is filled with awe at your wonders; where morning dawns, where evening fades, you call forth songs of joy.” (Ps 65) And their context brings together what prayer also offers – both awe and intimacy in our God-relationship: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?” (Ps 8)
We dare not presume on this relationship our Father God offers us. Nor on what we can offer to each other as we work together. All we can do is say thank you and enter wholeheartedly into these great sharing opportunities.
Jennifer Turner
May 2, 2026 | Blog |
Someone has said: Sitting at a piano does not create a masterpiece, but you had better be sitting at one when the creative impetus arrives!
After dedicating twelve months to writing my latest book, I’ve been reflecting on the creative process. This time I am not just sharing my story of finding my voice. The words and concepts are more theological. I’ve been reflecting on God’s love and what Scripture tells us about it. So I feel I have had to struggle with the big ideas and how to express them in everyday language. They didn’t just flow.
I always want to find words that connect with people who didn’t grow up with the King James English Bible as I did. People who never have time to think deeply about the things on an ordinary day. And who always feel less than perfect in the presence of a high holy God. Or whose experience of their own father stands in the way of feeling safe with the one Jesus called Father.
When I was younger, I could write non-stop for a three-hour exam about something I knew or had studied. And I still don’t have trouble with a flow of words when I speak. But in this book I passionately long for readers to find the incredible intimacy available with our Good Father. But the words haven’t come readily.
I found some funny quirks when I got to the proof-reading stage. Several times I had quoted a verse of Scripture and given it an NIV or other recent translation reference. But I had actually been using the ancient expressions of the1604 King James version I had learnt in my youth. I’m grateful now for that memorising in the past, because today it is not as easy to remember the lyrics of songs, let alone poetry or Bible verses.
Enjoying The Work
But the big question behind a writing project is always: How does the creative impulse come? Can I do anything to prompt it? Is it up to me anyway when I know this is what I am called to do in this season of my life?
For most of us creativity isn’t automatic. Certainly, writing is work; it is just hard yakka! It requires routines and disciplines. At least, it does for me. Though I have a general outline of where I want a book to go, each chapter takes at least a month to build its content and be satisfied with a first draft. Then it is revising, moving parts around, always being disappointed that it is not like CS Lewis’ or Tim Keller’s writing and searching, searching, searching for better words until it is, not perfect, but enough.
I have been reading and listening to other writers describe their writing practice. A thousand spontaneous words before breakfast in the first light of dawn, one says of their method. Others hide away in a café to get the project underway. (I can’t do that, I like watching people too much to be productive in a cafe.) Some go to a retreat setting and write continuously for a month or a week or a weekend. But I like the home feel of my study and library, and the routines with my husband of a morning swim and an afternoon walk along the coast.
Last year I tried at first spending the mornings writing, and giving the other half of the day to mentoring and teaching prep. But I found my mind wandering in the mornings into what I was anticipating in the afternoon. It worked better when I devoted the afternoons to writing on days I had them free. Then it was sheer luxury to be able to turn to the book with no more commitments that day.
Where Does Creativity Come From?
And the creativity? Well, it does come when you sit down at the computer (or desk or piano), though from where is a marvel. It is not just stored knowledge or an algorithm. It is human capability; a person made in the image of the Creator God to be creative. Hurrah for humans! In this age of AI, cherishing our humanity is doubly important, whether we acknowledge the divine impetus or not.
Sometimes, creative ideas or solutions come for me through prayer, on a walk, in the shower or sitting at the desk. Sometimes, being in relationship with a loving and knowing God, I know it is the Holy Spirit gifting inspiration within the ordinary human journey. Dallas Willard calls our body the “power pack” of the spirit. Perhaps that could also be “Spirit” with a capital S. Certainly, it is a partnership between body and spirit/Spirit. And not just for a writer, but in every area of life.
The Genesis origin story tells us that after the acts of creation, God rested and enjoyed all that was made. As a lesser creative, I am enjoying that my book – about being at home with a Good Father in an incredible growing intimacy – is at the publishers. And I have learned a lot more about the creative process under the loving hand of God.
Jennifer Turner
