Stephen Hackney Podcast

We all need liberation - the ability to be free! In this episode we explore how the cry for freedom always captures the heart of God. We see this in the deliverance of the children of Israel from Egypt and most clearly through the death and resurrection of Jesus. Here we trace the message of liberation in four key areas: the sense of unknowing; the fear of dying; the grip of evil and the power of sin and conclude it's in knowing what we believe and how we act that so often determines the level of freedom we experience. 

How would you describe God's love? Even the suggestion is to make several assumptions. In this episode we look at Psalm 107 which starts with the amazing declaration: 'Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures for ever.' The enduring love of God goes to heart of the Christian story: it both defines and determines how we receive and share that story with others. This Psalm provides a fascinating insight as to how enduring God's love is and how in his paternal love for creation, never gives up on us. This has to be good news!

If ever there was a time for courage, it is now. The singer, Robbie Williams said, 'You may not have confidence to face the future, but you do need courage.' How true. Many of us lack confidence in all sorts of areas but what we need is courage. Courage is the response we make to fear. Fear brings disconnection and discouragement - and courage helps us overcome. This is our second talk on the subject and that is because there is so much to learn about how we grow in this area of life. As the philosopher Soreen Kierkegaard said, 'And now Lord by your grace I shall become myself.' Well one thing is for sure without courage we will never achieve that goal.

Pentecost opens the door to the era of the Church and along with it the coming of the Spirit. But who is the Holy Spirit? How does he work in the world - and, what does it mean for you and me to walk in the new way of the Spirit today? In this episode we look at Paul's letter to the Ephesians and see how he views living in the Spirit around the themes of: security, revelation, dwelling, strengthening, living and infilling. 

We all need courage - but where does it come from? Are we left to ourselves to discover it or is there a source, a place we can go to in order to find it? In this session I build on an earlier talk given at our Hope Online Service (you can view these on our Facebook page @hopechurchnottingham or our You Tube channel) to talk about how God's compassion leads to comfort that releases courage. I trust you find it helpful.  

After David leaves his friend Jonathan he has to face his fears alone. His journey takes him to places where he encounters betrayal under the hand of a man called Doeg - Saul's chief shepherd, who listens into a conversation between David and the High Priest. Information is power in certain hands; but David is now holding the sword of Goliath - here's a story of how our past victories can equip us for our future battles.

David is given more space in the OT than any other character and this should tell us something about the importance of this person. Not only this, but we also have great insight into his strengths and weaknesses which is an area from where we can learn the most. Over next few episodes we will jump into David's life and look at it from the perspective of the Psalms asking how and why he wrote as he did. We will then take some of those lessons and ask how we can apply them to our own life. This introduction sets the tone for what will follow as we understand David as a man being sought out because of someone else's jealousy.

What we search for reveals something of who we are… Each year Google produces a video looking into some of the trends in what people searched for in the last 12 months. It’s become a tradition at Hope that at the start of each year we watch the video together and talk about its contents. This is my reflection for the past year. The theme was Heroes - I hope you enjoy it!

There are many ways to enter the Christmas story, approaches we can take to draw value from its message: from considering prophecy to looking at history to embracing the characters which bring it to life. Christmas is the great story of inclusion - that God came in human flesh is at the heart of this mystery. To know that we belong is the message it carries and the Gospel writers go to great lengths to show how true this is. If ever there was a message of hope for the world - it's found here, in the birth of the Christ Child. 

What do you do when you are feeling troubled? Where do you turn when your heart is not a ease? These are real questions which we all face. In this session I look at the words of Jesus: 'Do not let your heart be troubled,' and with a combination of both historical context and practical application take a look at three responses we can make to help manage our troubles by - guarding, gauging and giving our heart.  

The Bible is an amazing but not always easy book - or library of books and there are several ways you can approach it. In this episode we look at the Bible as a story - a meta narrative, or big story into which our own stories can find meaning, purpose and perspective. Looking at the Scriptures, we will see the Holy Book as containing a story that resonates, illuminates, translates, and elevates - as its compelling message speaks to greatness and what it means to be truly human from the perspective of the divine. 

Our words have power to build up or tear down. They carry authority to change relationships, families, teams, churches and communities for better or worse. Proverbs 18:21 says, 'The tongue has the power of life and death...' So how we speak and what we say really does matter. If we want to flourish in life then we need to learn how to speak well - how to talk in a way that honors other people and situations. We need both honesty and humility if we are to live and speak with integrity and so in the this session we will look at the power of words from the perspective of: creation, consideration, compassion, consistency and confession. 

When life is robbed of joy it usually means we are void of peace, hope and personal contentment. Joy is an indicator of tranquility; a measure of how we are navigating the world. When life throws us off course through suffering, doubt, fear, an existential or faith crisis, we usually discover we are losing our joy. When we search for joy and can't find it - maybe we are looking in the wrong places. In this episode we look at what joy is - where it comes from and how, rather than being a nice tag on to a charmed life, it is actually an essential part of being human. 

In this second session on Self Care we look at building on the foundation of Christ whilst considering the importance of the environments that shape us; attitudes that contain us; and rhythms that sustain us. We finish by talking about the value of building margin, creating stamina and developing resilience as keys to maintaining rhythms that enable us to flourish in life. 

A lot is spoken today about self care and the importance of looking after ourselves. In this episode we look at that place of self care as part of a balanced life and importance of finding value in who you are as the first step in this area of life. We then look at 4 steps to consider in taking care of self as an foundation to being a support to other people.

Recent research suggests we are becoming a generation of anxious people. Much of this is borne out of uncertainty in our ever changing world along with an explosion of social anxiety caused by our addictions to social media. In this episode we look at how all this creeps up on us and take a look at some of the things we can put into place to cope with change and flourish in life. 

Jealousy is an emotion that can get the better of all of us. Yet if we are to thrive we need to recognise that we can be both the giver and receiver of jealousy. To live above it we first have to see it - to deal with it we have to choose a different pathway. In this episode we ask the question: What does that mean?

If we don't pay attention to personal development we restirct out ability to grow. By developing our skills in self awareness we position our life for greater fruitfullneess. This is a talk I gave at Hope which I feel has value in offering insight into the area of this topic. 

Continuing our series at Hope about forgiveness, I sat down to talk with Clive Roberts about his experience of forgiveness and how that jounrey affected both his life and his faith. Thank you Clive for agreeing to share this with us. 

I sat down with Jason White to ask him about his own journey of life and forgiveness as part of the Hope series called 'The Forgiveness Project'. Here's what he had to say about his journey so far... Thank you Jason for agreeing to share it with us.