Sizing up the Square Mile

NM: Could you sum up the purposes of The Square Mile project and how you would like to see them expressed in action?

KK: Our hope is that The Square Mile resource equips and encourages churches to better demonstrate and proclaim the gospel. I long to see churches with a clearer vision for their role in the community and helping Christians connect their everyday lives with God’s work in the world — through mercy (demonstrating God's compassion to the poor), influence (being salt and light in the public life of the community), life-discipleship (equipping Christians for missional living as workers and neighbours) and evangelism (faithful and relevant communication of the gospel).

The Square Mile resource looks at all four of those areas through Bible study for small groups and expert input on the DVD from well respected theologians such as Tim Keller (from Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York), whose church is a great role model demonstrating how these four dimensions of mission work best when they are integrated together. The DVD also shows some powerful stories from UK churches that are putting the Scripture into practice in their neighbourhoods. The feedback we are getting is that it is inspiring Christians to pray for their communities, support each other in workplace ministry and engage creatively in mission in their square mile.

NM: Do you think evangelical churches and Christians are not doing enough already by way of social action?

KK: Evangelical churches are doing some great work in their communities and The Square Mile DVD contains some excellent examples of how Christians are already serving their neighbourhoods across the UK.

Two of these stories show how people are making a significant difference against issues such as growing gun crime and an increasing fascination with Halloween and our hope is that these stories will inspire others to get involved too. Even in the most active churches, it is often only a handful of people who are working very hard while others spectate. This resource aims to draw people together to help the whole church get on board. I have been encouraged to see The Square Mile material prompt churches to take a more active role, for example in providing clothes for the poor and relief for cancer patients. As churches reach out in these ways they are finding many opportunities to share the gospel as they go.

NM: In the DVD guide, Tom Wright refers to the actions of Peter and John in healing the lame man in Acts 3 as an example of people coming to hear the good news after seeing good deeds. Do you think we always have to earn the right to present the gospel by our actions?

KK: I don’t think there is only one model of evangelism. Sometimes Jesus preached without healings, sometimes he performed healings without preaching. When Jesus simply invites himself round to dinner at Zacchaeus’s house, just that act of kindness prompts Zacchaeus to pursue redistributive economics, which led Jesus to comment that salvation had entered his house.

John Stott has often said evangelism and social justice need to go hand in hand wherever possible. Writing about the Great Commission in Matthew 28.18-20, he stated: ‘I now see more clearly that not only the consequences of the commission but the actual commission itself must be understood to include social as well as evangelistic responsibility, unless we are to be guilty of distorting the words of Jesus’.

In other words, our preaching should proclaim the gospel and our actions should demonstrate the gospel and the two work best together. Tim Keller’s book Ministries of Mercies is a helpful exposition of this theme, as is Tim Chester’s Good News to the Poor. Perhaps, too, I could point to the Lausanne Covenant which states: ‘Although reconciliation with other people is not reconciliation with God, nor is social action evangelism, nor is political liberation salvation, nevertheless we affirm that evangelism and socio-political involvement are both part of our Christian duty. For both are necessary expressions of our doctrines of God and man, our love for our neighbour and our obedience to Jesus Christ.’

NM: On The Square Mile website the sermon there uses no fewer than seven Bible passages to try to substantiate The Square Mile approach. Frankly, I felt that most of the time the speaker was mishandling the Scripture. For example, on Acts 6, he says, when the early church chose some people to manage the social care programme they chose some men full of the Holy Spirit… Surely this was not a general social care programme, but specifically and only to address the needs of Hebraic Jewish widows among them in the church (Acts 6.1). What do you think about this example and the use of the other six passages of Scripture to base the principles underpinning The Square Mile?

KK: Often in a thematic sermon a preacher will use more than one passage to try and give a snapshot of what the whole Bible says about something. In the sermon you are referring to, David Westlake, Tearfund’s Integral Mission Director, explores the missionary practice of Jesus and the early church. David concludes that both Jesus and the early church ministered to people’s spiritual and physical needs. We have included David’s sermon as a free download bonus extra on our website. The website also includes ideas of how to use The Square Mile as a four-week preaching course, links to agencies and downloadable material.

We have been extremely careful in the primary resources for churches — The Square Mile handbook and DVD — to be as faithful as we can to Scripture. The Evangelical Alliance is committed to raising the bar in the faithful handling of the Bible and so for the last 18 months we have been working with Bible champions such as David Jackman, Steve Brady, Terry Virgo, Vaughan Roberts, Simon Steer, and many others as we prepare for the national commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the King James version of the Bible in 2011. The Biblefresh initiative will see over 40 agencies, such as Keswick, Scripture Union, Wycliffe Bible Translators and the Bible Society, working together with churches across denominational boundaries and ethnic groups to equip the church to better engage with God’s living word. We’d love to see Evangelicals Now and its readers partnering in this initiative with us.

NM: How does The Square Mile teaching fit with Galatians 6.10, which encourages us to do good to all people but especially to those who belong to the family of believers? Hasn’t The Square Mile got this upside down?

KK: I appreciate your challenge to use Scripture well, and so I must return the compliment and encourage you to read Galatians 6.10 in light of the whole sweep of the Bible which emphasises God’s missionary vision for his people.

One could start with the Genesis calling of Abraham to be a blessing to all nations, run through God’s command in Jeremiah 29 for the Jews to seek the welfare of the pagan cities they were exiled to, and follow that with Jesus’s command to love our neighbours and our enemies. We must take seriously Jesus’s challenge in the form of an illustration of a non-believing Samaritan showing up the religious myopia of the Jewish religious elites who limited love to their own communities. Therefore Paul’s injunction in Galatians 6.10 cannot possibly mean that Christians are to restrict their love but allow our love for one another to overflow into our communities.

NM: What would you say to those who conclude from The Square Mile that Evangelical Alliance is downplaying gospel declaration for social action and is therefore moving even further away from its traditional evangelical moorings?

KK: The Square Mile looks at four dimensions of church-based mission using the acronym MILE (Mercy, Influence, Life-Discipleship and Evangelism). The reason evangelism comes last is partly because it fits the acronym, but definitely not because we think it is least important. Even God saved the best until last when he created human beings on the sixth day!

I believe that churches that are active in serving their communities will have the most opportunities for evangelism. The Evangelical Alliance is wholeheartedly committed to bring evangelicals together to obey Jesus’s command to be salt and light in this world. The only way this is possible is through both the preaching of the gospel and the corporate witness of the church as we ‘live such good lives among the pagans that they may see our good deeds and praise our Father in heaven’. Standing in the tradition of evangelicals such as Wilberforce, Shaftesbury, Billy Graham, John Stott, John Piper and Tim Keller, the Evangelical Alliance is passionate about the gospel, both in words and in actions.

The Square Mile DVD and Handbook are designed for house groups to explore what mission in your local community might mean. See http://www.eauk.org/squaremile

Sizing up the Square Mile

Dr. Neil McKenzie interviews Krish Kandiah about a new initiative from Evangelical Alliance

Neil McKenzie

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