Author Description

'the following pages will challenge you, stimulate you, and bring you hope.' Steve Chalke Hope, in Christian theology, has profound meaning. But can theology comfort those whose personal world has fallen apart at some point? Nick Baines draws on his experiences of working for GCHQ and as a pastor to address this important issue. This timely book, on aspects of hope, is from a writer grounded in life’s practical experiences. EXTRACT For four years I worked as a linguist at GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) in Cheltenham. Whilst there I had to explore and understand the politics of a complicated world and know what was going on in that world. This means that I have lived for some time with difficult questions about God’s involvement in the world. Such experiences have made me impatient with simplistic Christian world-views, jargon-filled explanations of neat theology which sometimes have little connection with the real world. The second impetus for writing this book has been my pastoral experience with individuals who have suffered enormous tragedies. There are times in the life of a pastor when one has to be silent in the face of suffering, simply holding the hand of those who suffer and weeping with them. It is not always appropriate to hand out neatly-rounded rational explanations of God’s work when someone’s world has just fallen apart. It is my hope that this book will be of some help at some point in such people’s experience. I hope that it will lead some who despair to find genuine hope in the God who is there.