University Life

There is a strange social dynamic in University two weeks into term. The hype of freshers is definitely a distant memory, and everyone feels fairly well acquainted with each other, but at the same time there are less things distracting us from the fact that nobody around us is a long term friend. Yet.

I regret to inform you that the workload has kicked in and I have been increasingly spending my evenings in the library rather than out with friends. This probably sounds worse than it is though; the library is very cosy and, while the workload is becoming significant, there is definitely sufficient time left over to do other things. Plus I love my subject, so the time spent working is certainly not unpleasant!

In Cambridge, undergraduates have supervisions as well as lectures. For Mathmos this involves a pair of students discussing problems sheets (which have been worked at beforehand) with a fellow of the college. They are more enjoyable and far less intimidating than I assumed they would be, completing the preparatory work for them is where most of the learning takes place.

Luckily all of my supervisors are really nice people, though once you spend time with them you start to realise that they are indeed human. The same, of course, goes for the lecturers  (the gem from today being: "so we have three 90 degree rotations. What is 3 x 90 again?!") but overall they have been very good too. At some point I'll probably do a blog about what I've been studying but probably not until the holidays; I'm doing enough at the moment without having to write about it!

There are so many interesting activities going on all the time in Cambridge. It's tempting to go to dozens during freshers week but once the work kicks in you realise that you only really have a couple of hours a day to dedicate to extra-curricular activities. So you can either focus on one discipline to excel in, or be involved in a few different things in a less committed way.

My initial plan was to get involved with the a church, CU, cycling, running, squash, chess, rowing and some kind of band. Unsurprisingly I am having to rethink; in reality I'll probably just be attending church, CU and a running club, which alone will amount to about 10 hours a week. Of course we also have quite a few compulsory social events, such as pudding and wine with the Master of the college, but these tend to worthwhile enough to justify taking an evening off from work for.

Somehow I have to bear in mind that all of this stuff - including academic work - is secondary to my walk with God. How does that work practically? I guess some things are obvious; going to church and CU meetings takes up quite a significant chunk of time, meaning that attending is showing some level of devotion to God. But we're not supposed to just be Christians in meetings. If anything, Jesus was least "Christian" when he was with the religious! He spent most of his time away from the religious scene: loving, healing and forgiving people. To follow Christ must surely mean to do this also.


"Whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God" - 1 Corinthians 10:31


"Work willingly at whatever you do, as though you were working for the Lord" - Colossians 3:23

These scriptures state that we should glorify God in all we do. That in the same way that we honour God by worshipping Him, we can honour Him by living our lives in a way that points to Him. So when we are working or studying God should be glorified through us. When we socialise God should be glorified in us. Whether we succeed or fail, God should be glorified through us.

So. I may have gone on a bit of a tangent there. Sorry about that. This blog was supposed to be about University life but hey-ho; this'll do. Please do suggest topics for future blogs. The quantity of views that the blog is receiving indicates that people are enjoying them but I really don't have a clue what to write about (as you may have been able to tell) so do inform me.
See you again soon!

The problem of evil

One day in primary school I was asked by a friend: "If God really loves me, why didn't he save my Dad?"
This sounds cliché but it actually happened. I, being nine years old at the time, had no answer. At some point in our lives, most of us will be asked a question along these lines; if God exists, why does evil exist? This will likely be asked by a very vulnerable individual who is at a spiritual cross-roads and the answer you give may well be among the most influential things you ever say on this Earth.

It is for this reason that I write this blog post. I do not wish to belittle the problem, cause upset, or pretend that I have all the answers. I don't. But I would like to explore the issue and believe that we all should.

In order to minimise offence, let us begin with some impersonal philosophy:

(1) Assume: God exists, and is all-good, all-knowing and all-powerful
(2) An all-good being would want to prevent all evils
(3) An all-knowing being would know how to prevent all evils from existing
(4) An all-powerful being could prevent evil from existing
(5) A being who knows how to, has the power to, and wants to prevent all evil will do so
(6) By assumption God exists; evil can not exist
(7) Evil exists. Contradiction; our assumption is false; God does not exist

As a Christian, this is a rather unsettling proof. Before we get too emotionally involved, it is probably a good idea to invalidate the proof. This wont be easy. In fact propositions 1, 3, 4, 6 and 7 seem rather unshakeable. We must, then, set out to disprove propositions 2 or 5, which essentially boil down to a single seemingly self-evident proposition: That the existence of evil is worse than the non-existence of evil.

We have defined God to be all-good, so it makes sense to define evil as separation from God. Why, then. is the existence of realms where God is not present better than a reality in which everything is holy? If evil did not exist then separation from God would not be possible; everything would be entirely good, and holy. Why is this better than a world full of death, poverty and abuse?

The answer that springs to mind is free will; if everything was perfectly holy - as no alternative would exist - then God would really be no better off than if He did not create anything. The trinity is entirely good, infinitely powerful and eternally self-sufficient. Adding to this realm of perfection would perhaps be meaningless. God created humans and placed them within an imperfect system so that we would choose to follow Him.

A perfect universe in which every entity was - by their very existence - entirely holy, spending all of eternity praising God is considered to be an inferior reality in God's sight. Far better is a reality in which God's creations can choose Him by choosing against separation from Him. By allowing dark patches to smear the picture, the whole canvass is more beautiful as a result. Perfection is intensified when contrasted with evil.

One last thing before we move on; is (7) as strong a proposition as we assumed it is? Does evil exist? Evil is absence of God and so in the same way that darkness does not exist, one could argue that there is no such thing as evil. Furthermore, is our notion of "good" and "evil" absolute? If so then there must be some higher power, but if not then we can hardly use the assumption in a disproof of God!

It seems that God survives the philosophical "proof".


All this philosophy will, of course, do little to console someone who has recently lost someone close to them. It goes some way to resolve the problem of evil, but does not explain why innocent people suffer; perhaps God wants us to choose between following Him and choosing sinful ways, but how does that reconcile God allowing child fatalities, natural disasters or abuse? For this we will have to look at scripture.

Firstly, there is no such thing as innocent;

"All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" - Romans 3:23
"The heart is wicked and deceitful above all things" - Jeremiah 17:9

At the fall sin permeated every one of our natures and thus we have all distanced ourselves from God. Separation from God is punishable by eternity without Him. We don't deserve to be bullied, to live in poverty, or to be slaughtered; we deserve far far worse. It is ridiculous to claim that any suffering that we endure is more than we deserve.

But isn't that the point of grace? Didn't Jesus die so that we could prosper and be filled with everlasting joy?

Yes. But what do you have in mind when you envision joy and prosperity? Perhaps the physical health of you and those close to you. Perhaps mental and financial stability. A bigger house would be nice too...
The point is that the most joyful people in human history were all far worse off than you in these natural terms. If you have central heating then what you consider to be mere commodities are privileges unimaginable to the kings a few hundred years ago. Clearly joy goes deeper than the natural.

Let us suppose that God did save my friends Dad from dying, purely because to let him die would cause a lot of suffering. Then, in order to be consistent, He would have to prevent all equivalent occurrences causing that amount - or more - of suffering. But why draw the line at precisely that amount of suffering? To "lower the bar" by any amount would clearly have positive repercussions. So we induct and realise that it would be best if God prevented suffering from existing in the first place. This sounds familiar.

But perhaps the logic is not entirely circular. Perhaps we can have sin without some forms of suffering. Although sin inherently causes eternal suffering, as it causes separation from God, we could perhaps eliminate all other forms of suffering which are not directly caused by sin, like earthquakes or miscarriages.

A life without any physical pain sounds appealing but you would all too quickly kill yourself if you were granted this; pain is a safety mechanism to let us know that something is wrong so that we can take action to prevent damage. Spiritual suffering - a lack of satisfaction with anything but God's spirit within us - is a similar blessing which ultimately informs our choice about whether we will serve God or not.


This is quite a lot of content from the Bible here but please don't skim over it. I am not about to make points based on the scripture; the Bible puts it far better than I could hope to do myself!

"No discipline is enjoyable while it is happening—it’s painful! But afterwards there will be a peaceful harvest of right living for those who are trained in this way."  - Hebrews 12:11

 "We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love. 

When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation." - Romans 5:3-9


We may suffer for an hour, a day, or maybe even for decades. But these times and this intensity of suffering are nothing compared to an eternity spent worshipping God! Jesus bore all of our suffering on the cross, and went through more pain than we could ever imagine just so that this option is open to us.

I'll leave you with this passage. It is a good reminder that God ultimately knows what He is doing, and that provided we give our lives to Him, He will not allow our souls to come to any harm.

“For we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose” - Romans 8:28

Freshers' Week

Over the course of last week I packed most of my possessions into two large suitcases, a box and a guitar case - the latter holding my kitchen utensils. On Saturday my parents drove me to Cambridge to drop me off at the University. This day - aside from being packed with matriculation, meeting our college families, a BBQ and a "bop" - represented the start of a new era of my life; intense studying, "discovering who I am", and becoming a responsible adult. I am yet to make a start on any of these endeavours, but I have managed to find Sainsburys, lock myself out of my room, and survive almost entirely on a diet of free Pizza.

While I am yet to do any maths whatsoever, each day here has been packed with extra-curricular activities; between 9am and midnight each day we've only had two or three truly free hours. This both has been a refreshing change from the aimlessness accompanying three month summer holidays, and should  prepare me (albeit rather tenuously) for the intensity of the Cambridge terms.

What have I learnt so far? Firstly, being intelligent has very little bearing on other personality traits. The vast majority of Freshers are nice people who are keen to get involved in conversations and very few will be judgemental or unkind. Most students are nice people, but are (myself included) also quite lazy. Thus the majority of a Cambridge student's friends will end up being from their college; I have met far more second and third years from Jesus than I have Freshers from other colleges!

In my first few days at Jesus, I have had to attend a number of formal occasions. While on the whole I dislike tradition and excessive formality I have found the events neither excessive nor elitist. Perhaps surprisingly, one can usually decline alcohol without any significant social repercussions, and there will always be others around who do not want to get drunk.

In addition to getting lost whenever venturing outside of their accommodation, another duty of the Fresher is to not only sign up to the societies that they think they may enjoy, but also to every other society in sight. I assure you that in this area of Freshers life I have excelled.

Unlike the Cheer-leading and Korfball societies, one of the societies which I actually plan on actively participating in is the Christian Union. On a college level the CU have been great already, organising a "getaway" before term started, and hosting events (usually with free food) where we can pray, study the bible, find churches, encourage each other, and make many Jesus related puns. Did I mention they provide free food?! The inter-collegiate CU seem to be pretty active too, and I really enjoyed being at Kingsgate church on Sunday.

University is a great place to redefine yourself, to make some lifelong friends and to engage in the activities that you've always wanted to try out. It is a place in which you can devote yourself to the nurturing of your brain, to study what you are passionate about, and to meet like-minded people on the same journey. More importantly perhaps, it is an opportunity to strengthen your faith and become more dependant on God.

The next blog will likely come from an incoherent, sleep-deprived, caffeine-addled, deadline-swamped version of myself. Please do not judge me.