Mark Barnes's Blog

The Jews reckon there are 613 different laws in the first five books of the Bible, almost all of them in Exodus to Deuteronomy. I haven’t counted, but if they’re right, that’s nearly five in each chapter. If you’ve ever read Leviticus, Numbers or Deuteronomy, you might even think that’s an underestimate!

So how should we read the books of the Law? Law number 238 says we shouldn’t wear cloth of wool and linen mixed together (Deut. 22:11). Instinctively, almost all Christians would say that doesn’...

Acts chapter two is one of the most exciting chapters in the Bible. Think about it from the apostles’ perspective. Seven weeks earlier, their hopes and dreams of the redemption of Israel had been utterly crushed. Jesus had been brutally slaughtered by the combined forces of the secular and religious authorities. Peter, and perhaps the others, had thought he was the Messiah, but how could the Messiah be so wholly defeated?

Three days later, they were plunged into absolute confusion. Early that...

This Easter, I started a new phase of ministry – working for the international Christian disaster relief organisation, Samaritan’s Purse, which is run by Billy Graham’s son, Franklin. The pandemic made it a strange time to start a new ministry. Three months on, I still haven’t met any of my new colleagues in person, but I have received an insight into the way Christians are responding to Coronavirus all around the world.

On 17 March, while airlines around the world were cancelling flights, Sa...

As I write this, the coronavirus is coming. By the time you read it, the virus will be well and truly here.

Right now, the pandemic still seems distant. I don’t know anyone who’s died from COVID-19 or anyone who’s been bereaved. I don’t even know anyone who’s being diagnosed with it. But by the time we read this article, the virus will almost certainly be a lot closer. We might be grieving a loved one. We might be seriously unwell.

There’s a danger that amid increasing turmoil, we forget t...

Like thousands of churches all over the world, last Sunday we took our services online only. Here’s what we learned:

Church is more than listening to a sermon. Rather than live-stream using YouTube, we used Zoom. That allowed the whole congregation to see one another and chat together. For many people, especially those who had been self-isolating, this was one of the highlights of the meeting. As a smaller church, this worked well for us (we had about 40 people from arou...

Can you picture the scene? Jesus shares the Last Supper with his disciples. He walks with them through the Kidron Valley, up the Mount of Olives and into the Garden of Gethsemane. He says to his disciples: ‘My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death. Stay here and watch with Me.’ He goes a little further, this time alone, and falls on his face. ‘O My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as You will.’ An angel comes to him from heaven, streng...

A few years ago, I wanted to improve my fitness. Rather than pay a fortune for a gym membership, I decided to take up running. There was a problem, though. While some of my friends were running triathlons and marathons, I was struggling to run to the end of the street. I knew what my friends could do, but I couldn’t do it myself.

I’ve met lots of Christians who have the same dilemma with prayer. They want to pray, and they listen to enough prayers in church to...

Say the word ‘Bethlehem’ to almost any Christian, and they’ll immediately think happy thoughts of shepherds, a manger, and the birth of Jesus Christ. But Bethlehem wasn’t chosen by God as the location of Jesus’ birth merely on a whim – the town has a rich and tragic Old Testament history which makes it the perfect place for the Saviour to be born.

Bethlehem’s first appearance in the Bible comes as early as Genesis 35:16. There it is associated not with...

We associate the Mount of Olives with Jesus. It’s where, immediately after the last supper, in the Garden of Gethsemane, he prayed to his Father and was later arrested. He went there regularly with his disciples, and often spent the night there (John 18:2; Luke 21:37). But why the Mount of Olives? It wasn’t just because it was conveniently located a few hundred metres east of Jerusalem. Jesus knew its history, and he knew the lessons it taught.

One thousand years before his...

Geography was one of my least favourite subjects in school, but I’ve found that having a Bible atlas open when you read the Bible can make the biblical stories come to life.

Around the 9th century BC, the prophet Elisha was a frequent visitor to the home of a prosperous couple who lived in Shunem. Their home was on the lower slopes of Mount Moreh, and just a mile or two from the International Coastal Highway – a major trade route that stretched from Egypt to Damascus and...