Where’s the Scottish Church?
Andy Hunter investigates the causes of spectacular spiritual decline north of the border
Christian identification in Scotland has now fallen below that in England.
Lerwick: northern lights
The most northerly church of the FIEC is Garthspool Evangelical Church in the Shetland Isles. It is situated 100 miles north of the Scottish mainland.
It was founded in 1914 as an outreach to the fishing community around Lerwick harbour and it will celebrate its centenary this autumn. Over the years it has been a centre of gospel witness on the island to locals, workers and holiday-makers alike.
Teaching - the NT fellowship breaker
As has been commented recently in EN, there are ‘a whole cluster of fault lines which run through broad evangelicalism’, not to mention the wider church scene.
Evangelical Christians are finding themselves ever more stretched in having to accommodate views and pronouncements at odds with historically held evangelical doctrines. However, the New Testament suggests that such stretching needs to have a limit — there comes a stage when a breaking point must be faced.