‘Flesh’ Beats ‘Sinful Nature’ for Clarity

Last night our PCC did some Bible study. The aim was to clarify our goals as a congregation, and the subject was the ‘two kinds of people’ identified in Romans 8:5-11 as those who live ‘according to the Spirit’ and those who (in the NIV) live ‘according to the sinful nature’.

The only problem was, one of our PCC wasn’t getting it. Her brow furrowed up as she insisted there must be other kinds of people. After all, there are those who, whilst they admittedly aren’t Christians, can hardly be accused of living ‘according to the sinful nature’.

As she was speaking, I had a sudden thought.

“The word Paul uses here,” I said, “is actually ‘flesh’. Now how long does flesh last?”

After a bit of thought, she replied, “Til you die.”

“And how long does spirit last?”

Again a bit of thought produced the answer, “Forever — for eternity.”

“So,” I said, “Those who live ‘according to the flesh’ are thinking on what timescale — this life, or eternity?”

“This life,” she replied.

“And those who live ‘according to the Spirit’ — are they thinking about just this life, or eternity?”

“Eternity,” she replied.

“And where do most people focus their attention — on this life, or eternity?”

“This life,” she replied.

“So they’re living ‘according to the flesh’, aren’t they?” I went on. “Their goals are all about this life, their interests are material things, they don’t think in terms of eternity. They certainly don’t think about facing judgement like we say in the Creeds, do they?”

The penny dropped. Indeed, when we went on to look at v7, ‘the sinful mind is hostile to God’, she got it straight away and a smile broke out when I asked what happened when we tried to talk to most ordinary people about the things of God.

Altogether, a good meeting!

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Some Thoughts on the (In)adequacy of Pulpit Ministry

(More thoughts on 'Pastoring')

One of the greatest changes in church life in the last forty years has been the improvement in sermons. Gone from many of our pulpits are blessed thoughts based loosely on a single verse — sermons that began, ‘My text for this evening is ...’, followed by the preachers’ own views — and in their place we have exegetical preaching, rooted in a careful study of the biblical text.

Anyone with a high regard for the Bible as ‘God’s Word written’ must rejoice in this development, which in the UK at least owes much to the work of the Proclamation Trust. We are surely right to think that when the Bible is properly expounded, God’s voice is heard. But this renewal of preaching has not been without its dangers — dangers identified in the seventeenth century by Richard Baxter (1615-91) in his The Reformed Pastor:

It is too common for men to think that the work of the ministry is nothing but to preach, and to baptize, and to administer the Lord’s supper, and to visit the sick. [...] It hath oft grieved my heart to observe some eminent able preachers, how little they do for the saving of souls, save only in the pulpit; and to how little purpose much of their labour is, by this neglect.

Proper preparation of a sermon takes time. But the length of time spent preparing a sermon is not necessarily a measure of the effectiveness of one’s ministry. For as Baxter recognized, if the work done in preaching is not matched by efforts elsewhere, then it may ultimately be to little purpose.

The exception to this would be where the congregation is largely composed of literate people, accustomed to learning from ‘lecture’ style input, whether in education or in business. Such a congregation may well thrive on a ‘pulpit centred’ ministry. But we should recognize equally that such a pulpit ministry will tend to attract these people in the first place. Indeed, is this not what we find amongst some of our evangelical churches classed as the most ‘successful’? Often the ministry will be to students or to those who work in our city centres. The congregation may be large, but it will often be ‘eclectic’, drawn from a wide geographical area, and somewhat culturally ‘monochrome’, consisting of a particular type of person.

Now this is not at all to denigrate preaching. On the contrary, preaching must remain a priority, not least because the congregation of God’s people is in part constituted by the act of gathering together under God’s Word. But if we imagine that preaching alone, or even preaching first and foremost, will effectively do the work of pastoring God’s people, we are mistaken.

Think again about the parable of the sower: ‘A sower went out to sow seed ...’. In the parable, the work of the sower certainly depends on the seed, but it is the soils which determine the outcome. The seed is the same in every case, but the results are different depending on where it falls.

Now apply that to pulpit ministry. The preacher may spend eight, twelve, perhaps even twenty hours preparing the Word — the seed. But what of the soil? What of the people to whom he will be preaching? How much time does he spend on preparing them?

Once again, an agricultural image may help. In the book of Isaiah, we read of the Lord preparing a vineyard:

My loved one had a vineyard on a fertile hillside. ² He dug it up and cleared it of stones and planted it with the choicest vines. He built a watchtower in it and cut out a winepress as well. Then he looked for a crop of good grapes, but it yielded only bad fruit. (Isaiah 5:1b-2, NIV)

The point being made here is that the vineyard yielded bad grapes despite the work lavished on it. The failure of the enterprise comes as a surprise precisely because the necessary preparatory work was done. So what about in our pulpit ministry? Clearing the stones and digging the soil are essential parts of the farmer’s work. Should we not also, where possible, work on the soil before we scatter the seed of God’s Word?

Of course the outcome ultimately depends on God. As St Paul famously wrote to the Corinthians, ‘I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow’ (1 Cor 3:6, NIV). Nevertheless, there is both planting and watering, sowing and digging to be done. And after that comes the weeding — the identifying and pulling out of those things which are inhibiting growth and choking the word in the life of the individual.

Let us be clear. Sermons are vital. They are the declaration of God’s Word to the gathered congregation. And therefore the sermon should be carefully prepared and prayerfully delivered. But once again we must consider the outcome in assessing what we do as ‘church’. If the outcome of the ministry of God’s Word is to be maturing Christians, we must recognize that the sermon alone is not enough. The foundation of this ministry is not the pulpit but the person — the one who ministers and the ones who are ministered to.

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The Centrality of the Church to Mission

As I set out to demonstrate in an earlier post, the careful pastor understands that the gospel is the foundation of pastoral ministry and that therefore a good grasp of the gospel, and especially an awareness of the nature and importance of conversion, is essential to this work.

But what is the next stage? What is built on the foundation of the gospel? If we turn to the Bible, the answer is not — or certainly not just — the individual. Rather, it is the church. As Paul writes,

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, ²⁰ built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. ²¹ In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. ²² And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (Ephesians 2:19-22, NIV)

Or again, as Peter says,

As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him— ⁵ you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 2:4-5, NIV)

Deliberate pastoral ministry therefore centres on the church. People must be ‘built into’ the church — there are no ‘Lone Ranger’ Christians. And people must be ‘built up’ as the church — the relationships between people in the church will be crucial to their growth in Christ.

Once again, we find this set out in Scripture:

[...] speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. ¹⁶ From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. (Ephesians 4:15-16, NIV)

Another version of the above passage refers to the body of Christ being ‘knit together’, so with that in mind, we will address the life of the church in terms of ‘joining’ and ‘knitting’.

What is the Church?

But first we must answer the question, ‘What is the church?’ and this is obviously a potentially fraught subject. What we have said above, however, provides us with the outline of an answer: the church is where people are gathered, under Christ as their head, to be joined and knit together as a body and built up in love so as to do the priestly service of God.

The problem is, of course, that’s not how church is always understood or experienced! Nevertheless, that is the definition with which we are going to work. The key thing to notice, however, is that this definition focuses primarily on outcomes, whereas church is more typically defined in terms of structures or actions.

Thus for some people, the church is identified by its institutions or offices. They insist that any particular church belongs to the ‘right’ body or grouping, which is then seen as conferring historical or doctrinal legitimacy. In the Church of England, for example, it doesn’t seem to matter much precisely what is believed or taught in the local congregation, but being ‘CofE’ confers a certain air of ‘normality’ on things. In the Church of Rome, on the other hand, it matters very much what is believed, but a congregation with virtually the same beliefs (such as amongst some Anglican ‘Catholics’) would still not be accepted as a ‘true’ church, because it does not fully belong to that organizational body.

For others, the important thing is having the rightly-ordained ministers, or the bishops to ordain them. If those are there, then we can be satisfied that we have a true church no matter what else goes on. For yet others, such as in branches of Presbyterianism, the important thing is that the congregation or the minister affirms the established doctrines and does not depart from them.

More frequently, perhaps, (though often in conjunction with the above) church is defined by what is done on the occasions when the congregation meets. Indeed, this is the official approach we find in Anglicanism, where Article XIX of the Thirty-Nine Articles states,

The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in the which the pure Word of God is preached, and the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same.

Where there is proper preaching and the right administration of the “two Sacraments ordained of Christ our Lord in the Gospel” (Article XXV), there we have the visible church. (The Articles do also require that the preaching and administration of the sacraments be done only by those “lawfully called and sent” to do so [Article XXIII], which in Anglican terms means ordained by a bishop, but that is a matter of church order, not the church’s essence.)

Now we would be the first to agree that the Word of God, administered through preaching and the sacraments, is of primary importance. But it seems curious (to say the least) that most definitions of ‘church’ pay no attention to outcomes, whereas in Scripture this is primary. Indeed I would go further and suggest that this is a fundamental weakness in our theology.

If we define church in terms of what is done in the congregation, for example, we will be satisfied if certain things have taken place, no matter what other outcomes might not have been achieved. Provided we can ‘tick the boxes’ — songs were sung, prayers prayed, the Bible read, the sermon preached — we can dismiss the congregation and go home satisfied in the belief that some good must have been done, even if we’re not sure what it was.

The ‘deliberate’ pastor must set out to address this weakness.

Joining

The first step, naturally enough, is ‘joining’. With new converts, for example, we must make it clear that becoming a Christian means becoming part of the church. You cannot be a Christian and not go to church.

This was probably easier to convey to people in the days when coming to faith and coming to baptism went together. It is interesting that few if any modern presentations of the gospel would naturally lead anyone to ask, as the Ethiopian eunuch asked of Philip, “Here is water. Why shouldn’t I be baptized?” Partly, of course, this is because it is still the case that many people have been baptized as infants. Unfortunately, it is sometimes also the case that people really don’t think it matters that much. We take too far Paul’s words, “Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel” (1 Cor 1:17), forgetting that Paul nevertheless did baptize (vv 14-16) and expected every Christian to have received baptism.

The point about baptism is that it is mark of membership (as well as a sign of the gospel to be received by faith). Those being prepared to receive baptism should be made aware they are being baptized into Christ’s body, and therefore into fellowship with others who are members of that same body:

You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, ²⁷ for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. ²⁸ There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Galatians 3:26-28, NIV)

In the same way, however, everyone who comes to faith, whether baptized already or not, should have it clearly put to them: being joined with Christ means joining the church. (Of course, if they are not baptized, then baptism, and the preparation involved, will also spell this out to them.)

But this should not just be a matter between the new believer and the evangelist or the pastor. On the contrary, it must be spelled out deliberately and clearly to the whole existing congregation that we are in the business of adding new people to the body of Christ, which therefore means adding new people to our assemblies and meetings. And this brings us onto the subject of ‘knitting’.

Knitting

As we have noted already, the Bible’s definition of church includes outcomes, one of which is the body being ‘knit together’ for ‘the building up of itself in love’ (Eph 4:16, ASV). This ‘knitting’ will be a key focus of the time and efforts of the deliberate pastor and the first place to address this is the regular (typically Sunday) meeting of the congregation.

This is where the life of the whole congregation together will generally be expressed. This will also be where the enquirer or fringe member experiments tests out the quality of the congregational life. This will be where new converts are brought to begin their growth towards mature membership of the body. This will also be where all the congregation sit together under the same preaching and teaching of God’s Word, and share the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper with one another.

All this means, however, that the frequency of congregational meetings is fundamentally important.

In some settings, for example in Anglican rural parishes, the ratio of clergy to congregations means that some only meet on a few Sundays of the year. One common approach in the so-called ‘multi-parish benefice’, for example, is for the congregation to ‘rotate’ around villages and buildings. The service may be at the same time, but it is only occasionally in the same place. There are some who swear by this approach as the best way to ensure a gathering of a reasonable size.

My own view, however, is that whilst this may work for the dedicated regulars, it is potentially less accessible to newcomers or enquirers, who will not have the commitment (or perhaps even the information) to be in the right place every week. Establishing a regular and frequent congregational meeting is thus critical, but this also means building up a team of leaders — something which raises its own challenges.

Even when you are holding some kind of ‘service’, however, the thing to remember is that church is not over when the last song is sung or the last prayer prayed. On the contrary, this is only half the work. Indeed, if that is all that happens, then much of the opportunity of meeting together has been wasted. Consider the words of Hebrews:

And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. ²⁵ Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (Hebrews 10:24-25, NIV)

Certainly the writer is keen that people should come to church — ‘Let us not give up meeting together,’ he says. But he does not stop there. We are not to give up meeting together because we are to go on encouraging one another, spurring one another on to love and good deeds as we see the Day of the Lord approaching. Yet is that what happens in many of our congregations? People arrive, they watch, listen, sing and pray, and then they go home. But of how many can we be sure they have been effectively spurred on? And how many have taking any part in encouraging the others? The answer, in both cases, will typically be ‘very few’. And a key reason is that so little of what we do is ‘deliberate’ in its approach to these outcomes.

In general, our approach to church is often weak, even where the building might be full or the concept my be highly esteemed. We rarely make full use of church pastorally. Indeed, sometimes the congregation is peripheral in our theology of mission. Yet in the plans and purposes of God, church is central:

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Pastoring and the Importance of Conversion

The basis of the Church is the gospel, and this means that pastoring must always have in mind the call to conversion. People can only move on with God when they stand in a right relationship with him. Thus the Apostle Paul writes,

... the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. ⁸ Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God. ⁹ You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ. (Romans 8:7-9, NIV)

There is no spiritual progress without spiritual life and there is no spiritual life without the Spirit of God. But the Spirit of God comes only by hearing and believing the gospel message. As Paul writes elsewhere,

You foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified. ² I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? (Galatians 3:1-2, NIV)

The churches in the area of Galatia were being infiltrated by people preaching a ‘Gospel-plus’ message — that believing in Jesus was good, but not good enough. Paul’s riposte is that it was enough for them to receive the Holy Spirit! But the lesson we can also take from this is that it is also necessary to receive the Holy Spirit. Without faith in the gospel, there is no Holy Spirit in the life of the individual. And so no matter how dedicated they may be to church or how keen they may be on religion, there is no way they can please God.

So pastoral ministry is a converting ministry. But why is this so important? Why does the very presence of the Holy Spirit depend on it? The answer lies in the way our acceptance of the gospel affects our relationship with God.

The gospel is the proclamation of God to the whole universe that Jesus is the Christ who came into the world with the express purpose of saving us from our sins by dying for us on the cross. Now when God proclaims something, what is the right response? The answer is obvious: you must accept and believe it.

So when God proclaims you are a sinner, how do you respond? Being told you’re a sinner is not a nice thing, especially if you’ve got a good opinion of yourself. Your first response is likely to be to deny or downplay the suggestion — unless you’re already well aware of your sinfulness, which is why Jesus observed that the tax-collectors and prostitutes going into the kingdom ahead of the chief priest and elders (cf Matt 21:31). The former knew they had a problem, whereas the latter denied it.

But the person who accepts and believes God’s proclamation that they are a sinner stands in a right relationship with God — the relationship of a sinner with nothing to offer in mitigation. That is why Jesus told this parable:

“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

¹³ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

¹⁴ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:10-14, NIV)

Notice how Jesus says the tax-collector was ‘justified’. He stood in a right relationship with God, which is a key sense of the word ‘justification’. To be ‘justified’ is to be put ‘rightwise’ with God. By contrast, the Pharisee was not ‘justified’ because, despite all his good works — or actually, because of them — he did not see himself as a sinner before God in need of mercy.

The gospel, however, does not stop at being a sinner. The gospel is salvation from sin. And so the person who hears the gospel and believes it will also believe in their forgiveness. The trouble is, too many people today believe in God’s forgiveness! Like Heinrich Heine (1797-1856) is alleged to have said on his death bed, they take the view, ‘Of course [God] will forgive me. That’s his business.’

But here again, the gospel makes a challenging difference. We are not forgiven simply because it is God’s business to forgive, but because Christ died for our sins. Now for some people (sadly including some in the church), this idea is unacceptable. But it is what God says. It is central to the gospel proclamation: we are sinners, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures — and ‘according to the Scriptures’ means ‘as a sacrifice to take away sin and bring about reconciliation with God’. As we read in the Law of Moses, God says,

... I will set my face against that person who eats blood and will cut him off from his people. ¹¹ For the life of a creature is in the blood, and I have given it to you to make atonement for yourselves on the altar; it is the blood that makes atonement for one’s life. (Leviticus 17:10-11, NIV)

The law of atonement is ‘life for life’. And it is with this in mind that we read the words of Paul to the Romans:

Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! ¹⁰ For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! (Romans 5:9-10, NIV)

So an essential part of conversion is not just believing that we are sinners, but believing that the death of Jesus is the answer to our sins. Both these beliefs are essential to being put ‘rightwise’ with God. By contrast, if we deny them — if we say we have no sin (cf 1 John 1:10), or reject the need for Jesus’ death in order for us to have eternal life (cf John 6:53) — we make God out to be in the wrong. And we obviously cannot be standing in a right relationship with him, or have a right view of ourselves, when we do that.

The deliberate pastor will therefore always be asking, particularly in a new situation or with new arrivals in the congregation, ‘Am I dealing with the converted?’ And this will mean checking to see whether people have understood things like sin, grace, the cross and so on.

Some people object that this is asking more than is required by the New Testament — that we are thereby erecting ‘hurdles’ for people to jump, or making judgements we are not qualified to impose. They think that the principles of Galatians 2:12, where Peter withdrew from eating with Gentile believers because they were not circumcised, mean we must accept uncritically the genuineness of faith in anyone who is baptized and prepared to say ‘Jesus is Lord’.

But St Paul was really not so sanguine about people’s standing with God. In 1 Corinthians 10, he points out to his hearers that the people of the Old Testament also had their equivalent of baptism and the Lord’s supper:

They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. ³ They all ate the same spiritual food ⁴ and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. (1 Corinthians 10:2-4)

Nevertheless, as he points out ‘God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered over the desert’ (1 Cor 10:5). And he draws this conclusion:

These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the fulfilment of the ages has come. ¹² So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall! (1 Corinthians 10:11-12, NIV)

It is thus important for the pastor to be on the alert, listening and checking to see that those under his care actually have ‘received Christ Jesus’ (Col 2:6), that they have ‘come to know Christ’ (Eph 4:20), and that they have ‘first believed’ in him (Rom 13:11). This is not to cast aspersions on fellow believers, but to ensure that the sure foundation has been laid on which a suitable building may be constructed.

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Clergy Leadership and Lay Autonomy

(An extract from something I'm working on at the moment.)

Clergy in overall leadership need to retain responsibility for the overall life of the church, even when others are in leadership roles. This is not a matter of adopting a ‘managerial’ approach to ministry, but rather of maintaining a proper approach to pastoral care. Within a given congregation, those who have leadership entrusted to them will often be untrained volunteer members of the laity. It is grossly unfair and irresponsible simply to abandon them once they have taken on this responsibility. Indeed, the work of Malphurs and Mancini would identify it as a form of ‘Abdication’. The overall leader must go on providing pastoral care and support and must maintain an awareness of what is being done, even in areas which have been delegated to others.

All this talk about developing leaders, however, faces one danger, namely that of failing to deploy them. In some situations, people are educated in the faith, they may even go on courses, but they are never really allowed to do anything. Remember how Malphurs and Mancini identify leadership as involving both responsibility and authority. Too often, the local pastor acts like the Anglican bishop, handing over responsibility, but retaining authority. And in some cases they don’t even hand over responsibility.

Sometimes this is out of personal insecurity. Some pastors feel threatened by others taking the initiative, whilst others are not sure they could handle any problems that might develop. More often it is probably because of a failure to think things through. People go on courses because they want to know or do more, but there are no openings created for them in the local setting. Indeed, in many congregations, the opportunities for formal leadership are actually quite few. There may be a scheme of elders or a church council. There may be positions of formal ministry, such as an Anglican Reader. Apart from these roles, and home or Bible study groups, however, most ‘leadership’ is identified with ordination. Anyone who shows serious initiative may find themselves being encouraged in that direction, whether for full-time or part-time ministry. And that being the case, they are often lost to the local congregation.

However, it is the idea of ‘initiative’ that may provide us with a helpful answer to what to do with our leaders.

I [John] have often observed that university Christian Unions provide a model of how church could be, superior in many respects to the way churches often are.. In the CU, there are no ordained clergy, no paid leaders, but there is often a highly effective approach to mission. And much of this is arguably due to the fact that the members are not inhibited from taking initiatives. On the contrary, the average CU member feels they have both the responsibility and the authority to take direction action in the furtherance of the ethos of the institution. And in that sense, they are, of course, acting like leaders even though they are not technically ‘leading’ anything, since authority and responsibility are the essence of leadership.

It is this attitude of ‘initiative taking’ which we need to inculcate in the members of our congregations. Too often, leadership is thought of in terms of being ‘in charge’ of something. So we train up leaders to ‘do a job’. But the outworking of the gospel comes in daily life, and daily life is not a ‘job’ you give someone to do. Rather, it is a series of events in which one is involved and to which one must respond. It is here that initiative-taking can be so vital, and so although the people we are pastoring may not technically be ‘leaders’, giving them ‘leadership skills’ — the ability and conviction to act on their own authority and to take local responsibility — will potentially pay dividends.

What people need is to understand and share to overall ethos of the organization — ‘this is who we are and this is what we do’ — and then to be empowered to ‘take the lead’ in putting that into effect as opportunity arises. To use a word employed by the psychologist Abraham Maslow, such people show ‘autonomy’ — they don’t wait to be told or given permission, or rather in the church context, they have already been told and given permission in general terms and are now applying that as situations arise.

The instructions to believers in the New Testament epistles actually presume a very high level of autonomy. People are not expected to wait for their local pastor to order or cajole them into living as they have been instructed, but to act on the basis of what the apostles have said and their own inner capability in the power of the Spirit. Again, Paul’s letters call directly for the exercise of autonomy: He writes to the Romans,

For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. ⁴ Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, ⁵ so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. ⁶ We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying, let him use it in proportion to his faith. ⁷ If it is serving, let him serve; if it is teaching, let him teach; ⁸ if it is encouraging, let him encourage; if it is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously; if it is leadership, let him govern diligently; if it is showing mercy, let him do it cheerfully. (Romans 12:3-8, NIV)

And to the Galatians he writes,

Each one should test his own actions. Then he can take pride in himself, without comparing himself to somebody else, ⁵ for each one should carry his own load. (Galatians 6:4-5, NIV)

Imagine a congregation under effective leadership but with a high degree of autonomy. Instead of having to push people along, the pastor would be responding to the opportunities they created, instead of having to keep the plates spinning, the pastor would be able to devote time to nurturing new believers or exploiting other opportunities.

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Confident and Equipped. The 3rd Junior Anglican Evangelical Conference, 9-11 September 2013

Exploring ordination? Ordinand? Curate? Early years of incumbency? This is for you!


Confident & Equipped

Our task of proclaiming the gospel to our nation faces serious challenges and calls for a renewed Church. This conference will help prepare us to meet those challenges and shape the future of the denomination as confident and equipped Anglican Evangelicals.

In the Programme:
Bible Readings - ‘Do Not Be Ashamed’ from Lee Gatiss
Simon Austen on Staying in the Church of England
Ben Cooper on Positive Complementarianism
Sam Allberry on Human Sexuality

Workshops on Selection, Curacies, Rural Ministry, Non-Evangelical Parishes, Guarding Your Heart, Engaging in Deanery and Diocese, Urban Ministry, Building Ministry Teams

King's Park Conference Centre, Northamptonshire, Monday 9th-Wednesday 11th September 2013. Full cost £130. Day rates available on enquiry.

Bookstall by '10 of Those'.

JAEC began as an initiative in 2010 to encourage the development of a new generation of denominational leaders. That is why it focuses on those exploring full-time ministry or in the early years. It welcomes Anglican Evangelicals who are committed to the principles of the proclamation of the gospel of Christ for the salvation of the nation and the transformation of the Church of England to be an effective vehicle for that proclamation.

For further information please contact emailJAEC@gmail.com

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Kisses for the Kingdom — Vision and Vision Statements

Church vision statements are popular, and not without merit. A church without a vision is going nowhere, no matter how successful it may be at the present time. And a vision should be something that can be expressed succinctly — in a statement, for example.

But I detect two common problems with vision statements. The first is that they are cumbersome. Here are some quotes from some genuine examples:

... to become a Biblically rooted and culturally sensitive church which equips and enables men and women to communicate Christ through significant relationships ...

... to proclaim the Gospel in its fullness beyond the immediate sphere of activity of the local church ...

To see the members of the church be so passionate about God’s heart for the lost that they have become proficient in ministry skills and are pro-actively involved in strategic outreach ministries ...

These are fine thoughts and worthy goals. But imagine Mr Smith and Mrs Jones, if you will, reading them on the notice-sheet and then looking round at empty pews. Are they going to say to themselves, ‘What we need here is to be more pro-actively involved in strategic outreach’? I think not.

I hate to say it, but our own vision statement is a classic example of such verbal overkill — a single sentence of sixty-one words!

The truth about church vision statements, in any case, is that too often they are not the actual ‘vision’ held by the people in the church. What matters ultimately is not a statement on paper, but the ‘ethos’ in the group — the sense of ‘who we are, what we do and what we stand for’ that may be unspoken but is deeply felt. That is the actual ‘vision’.

The ethos can perhaps be measured by asking yourself what it is most easy to make happen in the congregation. Is it social events, is it coffee mornings, is it Bible studies? All these things and more can have their place, but which ones need to be pushed hardest to make them work, which ones do people naturally respond to and support? That will tell you a lot about the vision people actually have in their heads and their hearts.

So we need to do a reality check. Is the vision statement the vision? And if not, why not?

Of course we need the right vision, but again it seems to me this is where churches go wrong. Instead of vision statements, they write creeds, and we’ve already got a couple of them. One popular writer on leadership says this, “if you can’t communicate the vision to someone in five minutes or less and get a reaction that signifies both understanding and interest” you aren’t done with shaping your vision.

And then once the vision has been established, it needs constantly to be repeated and emphasized until everyone we expect to be involved in achieving it (which is surely almost everyone in the church) knows it, understands it and is working towards it.

So here is my sample vision and vision statement which I hope to be applying in the future. Remember the word ‘kisses’. The vision is the bit in bold, the rest is explanatory notes:

K — Knowing God. The knowledge of God is important negatively and positively. The world does not have the knowledge of God (Rom 1:28-32) and its present ills and future judgement are the result. We have the initial knowledge of God and should be constantly growing in that knowledge (Eph 4:13; Phil 1:9, etc).

S — Supporting one another. The congregation is the basis for keeping ourselves in the faith and reaching others. Therefore we need to be committed to it and to one another, strengthening and supporting one another spiritually and practically. (Gal 6:1-2; 1 Jn 3:16-18, etc).

S — Seeking the lost. This was why Jesus came into the world (Mk 10:45), this is the task with which we have been entrusted by God (2 Cor 5:18-20).

S — Serving our neighbours. We are called to love those around us as well as those in the church (Rom 12:17-21). By acts of service we live out the gospel and proclaim the kindness of God.

I reckon that is a good set of goals and I hope it is sufficiently memorable for people to be able to understand it and take it on board — 11 words. Over the next few months we’ll be seeing how we get on with making that not just our vision statement but our collective ethos.

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