In Depth:  Jonathan Stephen

Back in 2007, one of our then PhD students, Sungho Choi, was helping out at a large international prayer meeting for revival being held not far from Carmarthen in South West Wales.

To his astonishment he found himself sitting next to a woman whose face he instantly recognised from the Korean media. Sungjoo Kim had gained celebrity status as a businesswoman who had succeeded spectacularly against all the odds in a fiercely male-dominated society.

From the beginning of April, the Evangelical Theological College of Wales becomes Wales Evangelical School of Theology. The new Principal, Jonathan Stephen, puts EN in the picture…

EN: Can you explain the reasoning behind the name change?

What amazes me is not that Jimmy Carter still holds to the same, tired, truthless ecumenical agenda that one had hoped had passed with the old century, but that the Evangelical Alliance should have printed his views without casting a single doubt upon them. Worse, the editor of Idea appears to endorse them. In his notes, he describes Carter as ‘a strong evangelical leader who pulls no punches in his comments on diversity and unity’. He goes on to say, ‘We’re proud to feature his only UK print interview this year on our pages. We also heartily recommend his new book…’

If the Evangelical Alliance actually believes that true Christian and church unity lies down a route that treats the clear teaching of Scripture with such superficial disdain, then they will rapidly lose all credibility among those determined to remain Bible-centred. Here is just another indication of how the professing evangelical constituency is pulling itself apart. What liberal evangelicals need to understand is that a truly radical evangelicalism must be utterly faithful to scriptural imperatives and principles.

Nearly a decade ago, a book was published called The Coming Evangelical Crisis (Moody Press).

It spoke of ‘disturbing theological emphases’ and ‘dark clouds’ were ‘forming on the horizon’. Well, now these ‘dark clouds’ are breaking over our heads, which is why we must speak of ‘The Current Evangelical Crisis’.

Ian Stillman was released from prison in India last December following conviction on false charges. For many years Ian, deaf and disabled himself, has worked among the deaf in India. This interview is continued from last month.

JS: After Terry Waite was released from his terrible ordeal, he spoke of having received a postcard picturing John Bunyan in gaol and of how this had inspired him to carry on. Was there anything in particular that you received from a Christian source that gave you special encouragement?

Ian Stillman, deaf and disabled himself, has a Christian ministry among the deaf in India. He spent two years in prison there on false charges of drug-smuggling. He was released and came back to the UK in December 2002 after a vigorous campaign for his release.

JS: Most Christians want to know how you managed to cope spiritually during your long term of imprisonment.

Thank you for the opportunity of replying to Stuart Olyott's response to our three articles, and we are grateful for his gracious comments.

There are only two areas that we think it necessary to take up.

In his now almost legendary address at the opening of a 'National Assembly of Evangelicals' held in October 1966, Martyn Lloyd-Jones urged that evangelicals must stand apart from false ecumenism and 'stand together as churches, constantly together, working together'.1 It has been all too easy for commentators of every doctrinal hue to draw simplistic and unjustifiable conclusions from what was said that night. The fact is that the preacher had no clear blue-print for the future in his mind.

A sectarian spirit is nothing new within nonconformity. For example, The Minutes of The First Independent Church at Bedford 1656-17661 (John Bunyan's church) reveal that members were not permitted to hear the preaching of even a godly Church of England minister. Attendance at the local Moravian assembly became an excommunicable offence, while the transfer of members to strict Presbyterian churches, or even to Baptist churches, where immersion was a stipulation of membership,2 was generally refused.

The major reason for the multiplication of denominational groups was the insistence of almost total agreement at every point. Despairing of this continual fragmentation at the church level, evangelicals eventually sought to express their essential spiritual unity in para-church movements and associations.

The first article in a three-part look at a serious hindrance to evangelical unity . . .

Earlier this year, a booklet was issued with the title Bible Churches Together - A Plea for True Ecumenism(1). It had three related aims: to clarify the position of the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches with regard to the ecumenical movement, to provide some background information about the new network called Essentially Evangelical and to urge greater co-operation between all churches that were genuinely submissive to the authority of the Bible.

We live in a postmodern age. I do not think this is a myth or a sociological invention. So many of the tendencies in evangelicalism today are explicable when seen against the background of this cultural megashift.

Postmodernism

One of the primary marks of postmodernism is that human reason is no longer assumed to be able to answer every question and solve every problem. Classic humanism and modernism believed reason replaced God. You just wait long enough and have clever enough people and ultimately everything will be answered. Increasingly, we are not living in that age. Now rationalism, having failed, is giving way to irrationalism.

A transcript of part of Question Time at the FIEC conference this Spring - on the eternal Sonship of Christ.

Jonathan Stephen:

John, a lot of people think you are a bit of a heretic, quietly(!) and what I really want to talk to you about first of all, is this whole thing about 'Eternal Sonship'.

It is high time we gave up the comparatively recent habit of dividing the evangelical constituency into two camps: 'charismatic' and 'reformed'. It is surely neither sensible nor helpful.

It is not sensible because these terms are not true alternatives (unlike charismatic/non-charismatic or Reformed/Arminian). Taken together, they are neither sufficiently exclusive, many evangelicals claiming to be both, nor sufficiently inclusive, many evangelicals claiming to be neither. It is not helpful because most evangelicals tend to be happier to categorise others in this way than to be categorised themselves.

'Christian men are wimps!' The charge is often to be heard on the lips of non-Christian men and Christian women. What is the true meaning of masculinity?

Previous generations of schoolchildren were stirred by the words of Hugh Latimer to his fellow-bishop Nicholas Ridley, as they were burned at the stake during the reign of Queen Mary: 'Be of good comfort, Master Ridley, and play the man. We shall this day light such a candle by God's grace in England, as, I trust, shall never be put out.'