I started this blog whilst working as a youth minister. I was regularly being asked brilliant, insightful and challenging questions by the young people I was working with. Over time, it became a bit of a passion project - an outlet for my own theological musings, misunderstandings and mental-meanderings. Today it is a collection of my current thoughts and an archive of my journey towards them. It remains, as ever, a depository of the theological questions that I am faithfully seeking to wrestle with. I humbly invite you into the conversation. As you read and ponder, I hope you offer your own thoughts, so that together we may learn and grow in faith, hope and love.

Michael Wadsworth

The Journey So Far…

I’ve always been a bit of a Bible geek…

Since my youngest days growing up in Church I found I had a great memory when it came to biblical facts and figures. This meant that Biblical Studies became my highest scoring subject at school. And, as is often the case when people discover something they are ‘good at’ as a child, being a bit of a Bible-basher became part of my identity.

Fast forward a number of years and, without having the language to describe it, I began to go through a bit of a faith deconstruction. Some of what I’d been told to believe just didn’t seem to make sense or ‘work’ in the real world. Some of the black and white answers I’d been given didn’t seem to cut it. And some of what I read in the Bible and heard from others about God, faith and theology was, frankly, distressing!

Thankfully, I was blessed to have some excellent youth workers growing up who encouraged us to ask questions, to wrestle, to think, to read broadly and deeply, to expect the Bible to make us uncomfortable, to anticipate there being different ways of interpreting it, and to recognise that our curiosity wasn’t an act of rebellion but an act of worship. As I began to work in youth ministry myself I sought to offer the same kind of questioning space and foster the same inquisitive mindset with the young people I worked with.

Over the last decade, my passion for the Bible and helping others read it in order to understand and wrestle out their faith has taken a number of unexpected turns. I’ve worked as a Teaching Pastor, a Theology and Biblical Studies Lecturer, I’ve helped write and develop various accredited and unaccredited courses, and now support the development of Biblical Literacy across a large denomination. I have also sought to ground my enthusiasm and thinking by completing an MA in Theology and hope to one day undertake a PhD should the opportunity present itself.

All my writing, thinking and theologising seeks to be grounded in practical questions of life, faith, discipleship and ministry. Ultimately all our God-talk can and must lead us to an understanding of what it means to be human, in relationship with God, the world and one another. And so it is my hope and prayer that as you read this blog, you might find it encouraging, challenging, provoking, and nurturing for your own life, faith and discipleship.

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