pastoral care
The newly vulnerable
Helen Thorne-Allenson
Date posted: 1 Aug 2020
We’ve mastered a lot of ‘new’ in recent months. Whether that’s new ways of providing services, new ways of engaging in mission, or making the most of new opportunities to train furloughed workers for gospel service, it’s been a steep learning curve for many in the local church.
Quite a few of us might be hoping that there’s not too much more ‘new’ ahead. A return to something more familiar is the longing in many a heart. But let me pose four pastorally-orientated questions and suggest there might still need to be a little more ‘new’.
Taking the High Road
Association of Grace Baptist Churches (SE)
Date posted: 1 Aug 2020
Would you accept a call to pastor a church
of six or seven people?
That
is what David Wilson did back
in 2015. High Road Baptist Church
in
Finchley had reached a low ebb and, when
David was inducted in February 2016, his
mission was to ‘re-establish’ the church.
CiS: thousands hear the gospel online
Christians in Sport
Date posted: 1 Aug 2020
Over 75,000 people took part in online sports quizzes run by Christians in Sport from April to June as most competitive and elite level sport stopped.
Teams would take part in four rounds of creative sports questions and then hear a short gospel talk from either Graham Daniels or Ian Lancaster, with Christian team-mates given follow-up questions to work through with their teams.
news in brief
Azerbaijan: fired
On 10 June, Baku Appeal Court rejected arguments that letters given to a Christian fired from his workplace were illegal.
Former parliamentary staffer Rahim Akhundov said he was fired in December 2018 on secret police orders because he is a Christian. Courts said he could not appeal earlier as Parliament sent the letter nine months late. He will appeal to the Supreme Court when he receives the written appeal rejection.
Nigeria: militants exploiting lockdown
Morning Star News / Barnabas Fund
Date posted: 1 Jul 2020
Fulani militants were seen to be exploiting lockdown as they launched a series of murderous attacks throughout May.
Militants killed at least eight Christians and injured scores of others on 12 May in one of a series of murderous attacks on villages in Nigeria’s Middle Belt. Large numbers of gunmen stormed the villages of Bakin-Kogi, Idanu and Makyali, in the Kajura Local Government Area of Kaduna State, causing families to flee into the bush and to neighbouring communities.
Introverts
Alan Bailyes
Date posted: 1 Jul 2020
Dear en,
Rachel Jones’ article (‘Is this how intro-verts feel when life is normal?’) immediately
caught my eye. May I put in a plea that The
Good Book Company seriously consider a
book on personality types and the implica-tions for how we do church and discipleship?
While the issue is not openly addressed in
Scripture, it is perhaps implicit. Take, for
example, Peter and John and their witness
in Acts 3. All the action centres around Peter
(the extrovert?) while John (the introvert?)
is not reported as saying a word! And if it
is indeed the case that behind the Gospel of
Mark (fast-moving, action-packed) is Peter, then the contrast with John’s more thought-ful,
intimate Gospel
is telling. Squeezing
introverts into an extrovert mould in terms
of worship, fellowship and mission may be
doing the gospel a disservice, so a quiet,
thoughtful, biblical appraisal may be just the
ticket! ; )
Where now for the Anglican Communion?
Vinay Samuel and Chris Sugden
Date posted: 1 Jul 2020
Covid-19 has prompted many thoughts about what life could look like now that we have been forced to abandon, for a while, uninterrupted global travel, foreign holidays, and despite the foreshortened lives and devastated economies, enjoyed with the earth and its airspace a sabbath of sabbaths.
Lambeth 2020 and GAFCON in 2020 postponed gatherings that would have signalled the continuing tear in the fabric of the Anglican Communion. Does this postponement and the pandemic crisis signal a possibility of different opposing groups in the Anglican Communion finding a way of remaining in one Communion both seeking and showing the unity Christ prayed for the church? Seeking the unity of the Church has always been a key commitment of the Anglican tradition. Might there be space for thoughts about what the Global Anglican Communion might look like?
. . . but God meant it for good
A round-up of encouraging news stories during the coronavirus pandemic
Uganda: was I dreaming?
For three days in Uganda, blind Anna and her granddaughter lived on nothing but water and a daily cup of milk, given by a neighbour, which the pair shared between them.
Brazil: deadly
outreach?
The Christian Post
Date posted: 1 Jul 2020
In May, a judge blocked the appointment
of a former Christian missionary and pastor
to head the country’s federal Indigenous
Affairs Agency after concerns were raised
by advocacy groups that oppose evangelical
outreaches to tribes in the Amazon.
Ricardo Lopes Dias had worked with
New Tribes Mission, now called Ethnos260,
for ten years. The group’s missionaries have
engaged
in efforts
to contact unreached
people
groups
and
tribes deep
in
the
Amazonian rainforest.
Mission in Lancashire
The Pais Project
Date posted: 1 Jun 2018
The national Christian organisation Pais
GB brought teams and some of the young
people they work with to Lancashire for a
weekend of mission over the first May bank
holiday weekend.
They organised multiple
fun days and
mission projects, using the opportunity to
train their young people in evangelism and
mission and to advance the Kingdom in the
Northwest.
James Wood 1931 – 2020
Keith Ferdinando
Date posted: 1 May 2020
James Wood, who died on 11 March at the age of 88, had a wide and significant pastoral ministry over many years.
Born in Bolton in 1931, he was saved as a boy and sensed God’s call to ministry in his teens. He served for a while at Capernwray Hall with Major Ian Thomas, and intended to train for the Anglican ministry at Tyndale Hall in Bristol following national service (1950–52).
CiS: ‘stay committed’
Christians in Sport
Date posted: 1 May 2020
As the world gets to grips with the impact of the coronavirus outbreak, sportspeople all over the world are also seeing their lives change – particularly those in top-level sport, as their careers are on indefinite hold with serious financial implications.
In April, Christians in Sport (CiS) launched a new campaign calling on Christian sportspeople all over the world to reach out and keep investing in the lives of their sports friends even though sport has been cancelled. In the midst of all the uncertainty, the call to Christian sportspersons remains the same: reach the world of sport for Christ.
A new church in Liverpool
FIEC
Date posted: 1 May 2020
Plans are underway for a new church plant in a deprived area of Liverpool.
The Cornerstone Collective – a group of FIEC and Acts 29 churches on Merseyside – will, God willing, plant into the Kensington area of the city in January 2021.
news in brief
Australia: mission again
Christian Witness to Israel will restart its mission work in Australia, it was reported in March, nearly 50 years after its first missionaries shared Jesus with Jewish people in that country.
Mark and Rahel Landrum are based in Sydney in New South Wales, where there is a thriving Jewish community of around 50,000 people. In total, Australia’s Jewish population numbers around 120,000, and includes many Holocaust survivors who arrived during and after the Second World War.
A planner’s dream and a church’s vision
Association of Grace Baptist Churches (SE)
Date posted: 1 May 2020
Thamesmead was
the brainchild of
the
Greater London Council’s city planners:
a new town on the south bank of the
Thames estuary. Building on marshland
east of Woolwich, developers
initially
experimented in the new urban architecture
of
the 1960s before returning
to more
conventional Barrett housing in the 1980s.
When phase
two was built, Titmuss
Avenue Baptist Church was planted, with
a new building overlooked by high-rise
homes and aerial walkways. The initial team
under Michael Toogood established a small
fellowship
that
then
received wonderful
pastoral
care
through
the ministries of
Derek French in the later 1980s and Robin
Dowling
in the 1990s. In the 2000s the
church struggled
for direction as Sunday
attendance (paradoxically) increased.
Somalia: Al-Shabaab terrorists delight in Covid-19
Barnabas Fund
Date posted: 1 Jun 2020
A spokesman
for
the Al-Shabaab
terror
group active in Somalia declared coronavirus
as a ‘punishment visited by Allah upon the
disbelievers’ in an audio message reported
on 27 April.
As the number of confirmed coronavirus
cases in Mogadishu began to climb, the militant,
known as Ali Dhere, called on Muslims to gloat
about the ‘painful torment’ inflicted on any
non-Muslims who contract Covid-19.
Africa and Asia-Pacific: combatting Covid-19
Gary Clayton
Date posted: 1 Jun 2020
As an unprecedented virus disrupts the planet, MAF’s planes and people are helping to prevent the spread of coronavirus in some of the world’s poorest places.
Implementing every precaution possible to protect its personnel and the isolated areas MAF serves, the organisation has been quick to offer support wherever possible.
Church future is not Zoom
The Christian Institute / Open Doors / en staff
Date posted: 1 Jun 2020
Six leaders of the Early Rain Covenant Church were removed from their homes and detained by Chinese authorities whilst watching an online service on Easter Sunday. Taking place via Zoom, it was interrupted as police raided members’ homes. Someone watching the service said: ‘I thought it was the network connection issue at first, but I soon heard a quarrel erupt.’
The electricity was disconnected in one of the homes and others received phone calls warning them that the police were coming. All six leaders were later released.
The Red Carpet
A tale of two trees?
Alex Duke
Date posted: 1 Apr 2020
1917 begins and ends at a tree. In the middle is war and death and hell; in the middle is also heroism and sacrifice and courage. Which wins? The latter one, the victorious one, the one that speaks of hope and a future.
But as one character says near the end: ‘Hope is a dangerous thing.’
UCCF: introducing students to Jesus
Kate Duncan
Date posted: 1 Apr 2020
Manchester CU students woke up on the final day of Home, their February mission week, to a Facebook review that was painful to read. A student, who had attended events during the week, had written: ‘I can’t fault the friendliness of those helping with the week … but Home has put me off Christianity more than any other engagement I’ve had with faith.’
An estimated 50,000 students will have attended a Christian Union (CU) mission over these past few weeks. Across the country, CUs have sought to give every student an opportunity to hear and respond to the gospel through high-profile, focused weeks of engaging, persuasive and creative evangelism. As the Parable of the Sower tells us, the response will be mixed. This Manchester review was a sobering reminder that, despite all the CU’s efforts to bring people to Christ, some seed falls on the path and is immediately snatched away.
Last Word: farewell!
‘Money can’t buy life’ (Bob Marley). ‘We are beggars – this is true’ (Martin Luther). ‘Happy…’ (Raphael). ‘Now God be with you, my dear children; I have breakfasted with you, and shall sup with my Lord Jesus Christ this night’ (Robert Bruce).
As the regular writer of this column, I believe that last words are important. Although I confess both a foolishness and a propensity to go over my word count, I disagree with Karl Marx, who on his deathbed apparently barked: ‘Go on, get out! Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough.’