Dr Paul Allen

Very few people could tell you offhand why the name of Grozny is so potent in understanding the modern world, and specifically the Ukraine conflict. Here is a crude attempt to explain why that name matters so very much, why it is so often mentioned in Kyiv today, and why every Western policymaker needs to know it. The story begins with the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, with the fragmentation of many territories in the North Caucasus. Out of this came the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, a mainly Islamic land that declared independence from the Russian Federation. The Chechen capital was Grozny, which in 1990 had a population of around 400,000.  In 1994, Boris Yeltsin began a war to reconquer Chechnya, which resulted in horrendous Russian losses, and rock-bottom morale. The Russians won some important victories, including the very bloody 1996 First Battle of Grozny, which inflicted disastrous damage on the city. Even so, Yeltsin was forced to agree to a ceasefire. In 1997, the C...

One reason so many Christians suffer from spiritual malnutrition is that they live on a diet of junk food , as far as building spiritual character is concerned. Peter is well aware of this and that’s why he says:  “Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit , hypocrisy , envy , and all evil speaking” (1 Pet. 2:1).  The Greek word used for “laying aside” actually means to “strip off your clothes.” The same idea is expressed in Hebrews 12:1 where we are told to  “lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us.”  Peter talks about five specifics that we should strip out of our lives: malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander. Malice was the general word for wickedness . In Peter’s day it meant “heathen evil”—the characteristic evil of the world surrounding the young Christian church . Peter doesn’t advise laying aside some of it; he demands all of it to go. Today’s Christians are no different from those in the first century. M...