I am a Bible teacher from England; and I have led the team at Useful Bible since it began in 2010.
From 1991 to 2004, I worked in education. An important part of my work was to write and to prepare courses for distance learning students. This experience was valuable in showing me the needs of adult students who study privately, without a teacher present. It also allowed me to develop my skills in writing study books, and in checking them for publication.
From 2005 to 2010, I was the leader of the EasyEnglish Bible Commentaries team at Wycliffe Associates UK, which is now called MissionAssist. Here, I learned to use the EasyEnglish system, a subset of English using restricted grammar and limited vocabulary. This was developed especially for people who had learned English as a second language; however, most of its users today simply appreciate the clearer language that the method provides. I also began to write books that were about the Bible, under the supervision of theological and linguistic checkers. The EasyEnglish Bible Commentaries include a simple Bible translation with short explanations of each verse or short passage. Originally, the plan was to help native language translators as they translate the Bible into their own languages. However, the availability of the Internet showed the need for these simple and clear explanations of the Bible for a much wider audience.
The Commentaries were designed to be suitable for pastors, ministers and church leaders, or for those who lead Bible study groups. However, it became clear that many people, who were not leaders in their church, also desired these simpler explanations. It became clear to me, therefore, that there was a need for teaching articles and not merely for brief commentaries. The leadership of Wycliffe Associates UK (now MissionAssist) encouraged me to form a separate organisation, as they did not consider it their purpose to teach the Bible. However, they were pleased to allow me the use of the EasyEnglish system, and to arrange for people in their teams to work with me.
So, in 2010, I established Useful Bible, where I continue to work to the present day. I write all our articles; other team members help to check and to prepare them. We write all our articles for study purposes; they are for anyone who wishes to understand the Bible better and more clearly. We arrange our articles by Bible Book – so people often describe these, too, as commentaries. However, we prefer to think of these as teaching articles. Each article often teaches much more than the meaning of a single Bible verse. Our articles include explanations of matters of history, geography and language – and how the passage fits into the Bible as a whole.
My special subjects of interest are to give direction for my personal study; and they develop into articles, talks and courses. At the Useful Bible Study Centre, we do not organise students’ courses, because each person is free to choose his own subjects of interest. However, my own personal study and research interests lead to the choice of subjects available for study in our articles.
The Books of the Bible that people usually describe as poetry are Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and the Song of Solomon. In ancient Israel, the people considered these books to be much more than collections of poems. They believed that these books contained important wisdom for life. For them, lessons in true wisdom were a study of what God was teaching to them, whether directly, or from the natural world. As this wisdom comes from God, it is already present in the world. We can learn it in love (Song of Solomon) or when we suffer (Job). We can learn it from our parents (Proverbs) or in our relationship with God himself (Psalms). We should think seriously about the weakness of our lives and our wealth, and the reality of death (Ecclesiastes). Then we will see how important it is to trust and to obey God for our whole lives.
This was the first of my study and research interests. For the EasyEnglish project, I prepared Commentaries on Proverbs (2003), Job (2004) and Song of Solomon (2006), all published in 2006. I then undertook in 2012 a series of verse-by-verse study articles on Ecclesiastes for the Useful Bible Study Centre. I completed the series in 2023-2025, with a series of Podcast talks covering the complete book of Psalms, verse by verse. The first 50 of these Psalms talks are available as mp3 recordings (with transcripts) from the SermonIndex website. Usually, SermonIndex does not include recordings by living speakers, so it is a great honour for them to be here. They accepted my talks because the clear explanations will help listeners to gain a knowledge of the language of the King James Version of the Bible. I continued the series after that, and the full set of 171 talks is available from podcast platforms worldwide, including Spotify and Apple podcasts. This podcast is called “Understand the KJV Bible”.
In the land that God had promised to them, many of Israel’s people did not remain loyal to the true God. For a long time, all the nations round them opposed them fiercely. However, God gave them leaders, called Judges, to direct the men in war. After several centuries, they demanded a king, so God gave them Saul (about the year 1000 B.C.). However, David was the king that God had chosen for them. After the rule of David’s son, Solomon, the country divided into two nations. Each of these nations had a series of kings; some kings in the southern part (Judah) were loyal to God – but none of the kings of the northern part remained loyal to God. When the kings turned away from God, so did most of the people. However, God still cared about them, because he is always loyal to his promises.
God had provided priests to lead them in their public acts of prayer. However, the people often appointed their own priests, and chose to serve false gods. As time passed, the people’s evil deeds increased. God sent prophets – holy men – to warn them and to urge them to turn back to him. Some of them did turn back to God; but very many did not. In the end, Assyria destroyed the northern nation; and about a century later, Babylon destroyed the southern part (about 600 B.C.). That was not the end of God’s plans for Israel, because God had promised the return of Israel’s people to their own land. God would send them his future perfect king, called the Messiah, and he will complete all his promises to them.
In this subject, therefore, I have been studying of the Books of the Bible that record the history of these centuries. However, my purpose is not merely or mainly to study history. Rather, we are looking at a series of people and whether, in difficulties or success, they chose to serve the true God. Some showed great faith (trust in God) in extraordinary difficulties. Others were not loyal to God, although they were wealthy and successful. Their decisions, both good and bad, brought about serious and important results for their nations.
I began to study this subject in 2014, and prepared a series of articles about each verse in the Book of 1 Samuel. I returned to the study of the subject in 2023, with articles covering 2 Samuel, 1 Kings and 2 Kings. I also undertook a study of the prophet Jonah in 2024.
At the present time, I am working on the Books of Judges and Ruth, which come from the same period of history. My articles on these books will appear on the Useful Bible website when complete.
In this subject, I study what the Bible teaches about Jesus. In particular, as we study the Gospels, we always need to think about both of these descriptions of Jesus. He is the suffering servant (a reference to Isaiah chapter 53), and we see that particularly in his death on the cross. He died to suffer the punishment for the wrong and evil deeds of everyone who turns from that wrong behaviour to put their trust in him. However, the Gospels also constantly describe him as the Christ, which means God’s Messiah – in other words, God’s perfect king. We will not see that fully until the present age is complete. Then, at the future time that God has chosen, Jesus will rule as King of kings. Even then, we will not forget how he lived and died as the suffering servant. That is the only reason why people will live with him in the beauty of that future age. They are the people whom God forgave because of Jesus’ death for them.
I actually began to study this subject when I was still at school. The Latin teacher offered to teach me New Testament Greek; and afterwards, he encouraged me to make my own translation of Mark’s Gospel. I have not published that translation, but many years later in 2010, I gave verse-by-verse advice to the team who were working on the EasyEnglish translation of Mark’s Gospel. That translation was then published by the Bible Society. At the same time, I prepared a very simple commentary on Mark’s Gospel using the EasyEnglish (1200 word vocabulary) system.
In 2015, I published a complete set of articles on the Book of Revelation. There is much that teachers argue about in this book, especially about future events. So, I wanted to show what this book clearly teaches, particularly in its constant references to other parts of the Bible. Through its many difficulties, the Book of Revelation gives a clear promise of hope for the future. There will be many troubles, but in the end, God will bring about the perfect rule of Jesus, his Messiah. Then the pain of our present age will end, as he rules always as King of kings and Lord of lords.
Another current project is the Gospel of John, which I started to work on just a few months ago. When complete, I hope to publish these articles. However, we want to check them fully before we publish them.
When a person becomes a true Christian, that person does not usually go to heaven at once. Rather, God has placed that person in this world – and that person is here for a purpose, to do God’s work in his own situation and circumstances.
While that Christian is in this world, he has wrong desires, difficult situations, and many troubles. He is so weak – but God is working in him and through him. Without God, he would not even be able to stand as a Christian. With God – and only by God’s power – that Christian overcomes the forces that are against him. If he tries to oppose those forces in his own strength, he fails. Often, God has to correct him many times – but God’s plan is still to change him completely, and to finish the work that God has began in his life.
The epistles, or letters, of the New Testament constantly discuss these matters – and especially, the letters of Paul. That is why, in the Useful Bible Study Centre, I have published articles on almost all of Paul’s letters. This is probably the largest area of study that I have provided at Useful Bible.
I began with the Book of Hebrews, which was originally published in 2012. The books that followed (dates when published) were: 1 Corinthians (2013), 2 Corinthians (2016) and Romans (2018). Romans was a particularly long and important subject for study for me, and took two years to complete. Colossians, Ephesians and Philippians followed in 2019-2020. There is also a simple Commentary on Galatians which I wrote back in 2010.