The View from the Pew

Until I came to Amersham I hadn’t spent much of my ministerial life in the pew – instead I’d be in the ‘pulpit’ most Sundays at most of the services.  That’s changed a little here.  Once a month I have the privilege of listening to our Associate Minister preach and on Sunday evenings I sometimes take the opportunity of sitting in the pew of some central London churches.  That means in the last twelve months it’s been a joy to attend services and listen to sermons at Bloomsbury Central Baptist, Westminster Abbey, St Martin in The Fields and All Souls, Langham Place.

However, over the last few days I’ve sat in pews closer to home.

On Wednesday last, along with about three hundred others, I sat in Chesham’s Broadway Baptist Church listening to the engaging ‘teller of stories’, Cardinal Cormack Murphy O’Conner – the emeritus Archbishop of Westminster.  He told us of his friendship with Pope Francis and the events, in which he took part, at the Vatican just prior to his election in the spring of this year.  You could have heard a pin drop as he spoke because something about his mix of gentle, respectful humour alongside profound spiritual insight caught all our imaginations that night and sent us home with that inner sense that we had been in the presence of God.

Then last Saturday my own church hosted a Bible Teaching Day as we looked at the Gospel of Matthew under the direction of Professor David Catchpole of Exeter University and Sarum College.  Once again it was great to be in the pew – or in this case sitting on a comfortable chair!  David’s extensive New Testament scholarship helped us appreciate many new insights into why Matthew put his gospel together in such a Jewish way and I suspect those of us preaching from Matthew next year will refer to David’s notes often.

And this ‘pew sitting’ of mine goes on -  because come Sunday evening I had the delight of listening to Liz preach at our monthly evening communion.  It’s a regular feature at AFC that we invite one of our seven ‘lay preachers’ to share in the evening services this way. 

On Sunday Liz took ‘pilgrimage’ as her theme and spoke of that ‘inner’ journey we all make with God and each other.  It was a delight to listen to such a well thought through and delivered sermon.

And my last ‘pew’ experience of the week?  Well, actually, it was neither in a pew nor a church but at least I was sitting – this time in front of my computer watching a clip from last Sunday’s Andrew Marr’s show – this clip: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-24511696

In it Malala Yousafzar, the sixteen year old girl from the Swat District of Pakistan, was being interviewed.  She spoke of that day, a year ago this month, when she was shot by the Taliban whilst travelling on the school bus.  This crime was carried out because Malala had ‘blogged’, under a pseudonym on the BBC, speaking out against the Taliban’s opposition to education for girls.  Malala was flown to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham where she recovered from her wounds and this year, as well as addressing The United Nations General Assembly, she was nominated for the South African Children’s Peace Prize by Desmond Tutu.  I was so moved by the grace and eloquence she showed during her interview with Marr and thank God for this young ‘prophetic’ voice to come out of such a bleak situation and episode.

So, even though I have the responsibility and privilege of speaking most Sundays from a pulpit – it’s been an equal privilege over these last few days to sit, listen and learn.

With best wishes,

Ian

Ps I heard on Sunday that my former church in Yeovil has appointed a new minister – my prayers and very best wishes go to Simon and the congregation at South Street as this new partnership in ministry begins.

The Past is Another Country

Being still ‘newly’ arrived in Bucks we continue to be in something of a discovery mode taking opportunities, especially at the weekend, to go out exploring.  Last Saturday was no exception so we made our way over to Hughenden Manor, near High Wycombe, the one time home of Queen Victoria’s favourite Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli.

As we approached this grand, yet intimate National Trust house we were surprised by the number of cars having to use the overflow parking places and the queues at both the entrance reception and tea room.  We soon discovered last Saturday was not a ‘normal’ one for Hughenden but a ‘1940’s’ theme day.   This no doubt reflected its use during WWII as a special operations centre code named ‘Hillside’. 

So we wandered through a field of brown tents erected on the front lawn full of war time memorabilia, bumped into ‘Red Cross’ nurses, Wing Commanders, Chaplains, humble Corporals and swanky American Marines in full uniform.  I half expected Captain Mainwaring, from the Eastgate Home Guard,  to come round the corner ordering us to take up our places at the Novelty Rock Emporium ready for the invasion with our one machine gun!

Well we did the tour and that was fascinating and we wondered around the grounds and that was beautiful – and we lingered by the 1940’s fashion show and had tea sitting near a ‘General’ wearing his Home Staff red lapels and that was just plain bazaar!

I suppose we got a ‘feel’ of the 1940s – especially when we heard the gun practice starting on the south lawn – but it was fleeting and momentary – soon we were back in the car returning from the world of yesterday to the present.

None of us can go back – even if we’d like to.

I sometimes think I would – and if granted those imaginary three wishes I’d at least use one of them spending a day meeting my relatives of a hundred years ago and another travelling a hundred years into the future!

Perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of our life is the deliberate valuing of today rather than longing for yesterday or hoping for tomorrow.  There may be very good reasons for the later two yearnings but we don’t do today justice if we over romanticise the past and place unreasonable confidence in the future.  Spiritual writers call it ‘the sacrament of the present moment’ – the idea that here and now – today – God is present – offering us love, life and hope.  Being consciously aware of that reality comes close, for me, of what it means to pray.

Last weekend I enjoyed Hughenden and the colliding worlds of Disraeli and Churchill – but today beckons. For as L.P.Hartley said in his novel The Go-Between: The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.

With best wishes,

 

Ian

Life, Faith and Monopoly

With the autumn leaves beginning to fall here in Amersham our church’s housegroups (which we call Life and Faith Groups) have begun to reassemble for a new term.  Each group develops its own theme and even comes up with its own study material.  They are a great addition to our life together and it’s been a joy this week attending two of them.

The first one is revisiting the Lectionary passages we use on a Sunday morning – so having preached the sermon I thought it would be interesting to attend a group discussing it!  But I was in for something of a surprise for this group is one that likes to do things differently.  It’s led by folk who have super gifts of creativity – so one member told me as I left ‘every week we meet we do it differently’. So yesterday morning we played Monopoly!  We did so after reading the passage from Luke about the Dishonest Manager – a tricky passage which challenges our attitudes to money and its management.  Soon after we settled into the game it became apparent that our leader had doctored the Chance and Community Chest cards so that every time they came our way we had a financial/moral dilemma to discuss.  What ensued was great fun – gentle participants turned into unlikely capitalists, competitive players suffered early and swift bankruptcy whilst others with an open heart stayed in character throughout the game responding to any dilemma with exemplary generosity of spirit.  And amid the laughter there was much profound discussion about personal, national and international finance and the relation of faith to wealth. 

Now if the learning style of yesterday morning’s group was Kinesthetic – that is ‘by doing’, the group I attended in the evening was more Auditory – that is ‘by listening and conversation’.  This night time gathering have taken as their theme this term ‘Jesus The Jew’ and their sessions are based on a Bible Society booklet – yesterday we looked at Jesus and The Law – especially how it related in his day to divorce and wealth.  Once again we were ably led by folk who had done excellent preparation.  Although neither of these issues is easy the group batted around ideas and teased out the issues with each contribution being respectfully received and then developed.  I came away glad to have been in their company – sharing in this honest struggle for truth and insight.

Call them what you may: Housegroups, Study Groups, Life and Faith Groups, Fellowship Groups, Cell Groups or Bible Study Groups – they have the same characteristics of meeting together with a smallish number, often in homes so with a greater informality, to be led but also to participate and contribute and...and...to develop friendship as we have time over coffee to talk of those inconsequential things which actually mean the world to us.

So this week I thank God for Life, Faith and Monopoly!

With best wishes,

Ian

The Sound of Silence

Well it may be one of my favourite Simon and Garfunkel tracts but this week as I reflect on the phrase ‘The Sound of Silence’ I’m not thinking of this 1964 classic, written in the aftermath of the Kennedy assassination, but of a comment made to me at the serving hatch of our church hall one day this week. It was the day we received a number of welcome visitors from the Tuesday group at Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church.  Instead of meeting in their church hall for lunch we were their final summer outing destination for 2013 so they joined us for lunch in ours.  One of their number said to me just how much he was enjoying the lack of background noise in Amersham compared to central London.  He said it was refreshing to hear the sound of silence!

After lunch that experience became even more intense as we gathered in The Sanctuary for a talk by Alison MacTier, Director of The Retreat Association, who actually concluded her time with us by leading a short – and silent – meditation.

We often long for silence when our lives are crowded and noisy. Whether we know what to do with it is another matter.

I, like many people, have tinnitus which means silent retreats are never totally so because there is always a high pitched ringing in my ears.  I remember being diagnosed and the rather down to earth consultant, after examining me, said ‘Well looks like you’ve got tinnitus, I’ve got it, my wife’s got it and now you’ve got it  – none of us can do anything about it so you’ve just got to live with it’.  I actually found that rather helpful!

The point of meditation in the Christian tradition isn’t just to find the silence.  That very process often brings lots of other thoughts and worries into our minds and maybe these are the current issues that we need to be addressing prayerfully.  To that end retreat leaders, when settling a group down for say half an hour of quiet or silent prayer, actively encourage retreatants to listen to the noises coming in from outside the building or the thoughts filling the empty space we’re trying to clear in our minds.  The idea is that slowly, and with a consciousness of God that can be all too absent from our usual rushed routine, we linger with these thoughts and tease out what they may be saying to us about our journey through faith and life.

Over the years retreats, quiet days and silent prayer have given me tools to hone down what I believe to be the really important things in life.  They have been the tools I’ve often used to separate the dross from the gold and begin to see with a greater clarity what matters.  They are, I believe, effective tools in our pilgrimage with Christ – giving him the space to speak into the silence.

A lady I once knew, now in God’s nearer presence, called Phyllis used to come along to Thursday Morning Prayers every week without fail.  She was a very, very quiet lady whose main ‘ministry’ was, I think, essentially that of praying for our church.  One morning after the prayer group the only ones left were Phyllis, myself and another lady and we got on to the subject of favourite hymns.  I was touched when she suddenly, and I thought uncharacteristically, burst into song singing with a lovely sweet voice her favourite hymn.  All the words she knew by heart and the middle verse went like this:

Ev’ry day, ev’ry hour, ev’ry moment
have been blessed by the strength of God’s love.
At the turn of each tide he is there by my side,
and his touch is as gentle as silence.

Now that, I reckon, is as good as any Simon and Garfunkel number!

With best wishes,

 

Ian

Buildings that Speak

The new Bishop Edward King Chapel at Cuddesdon Theological College

I don’t entirely buy into the idea that Church isn’t a building.  Of course I understand the point that’s being made – that essentially the Body of Christ is a community – but to those ‘outside’ such a community the church building is often their first contact.  So what our buildings feel like and the message they convey is, in effect, an extension of us and of our limited understanding of God.  In my view church buildings are important signposts.

This year’s Royal Institute of British Architecture’s Stirling Prize (the Building Community’s equivalent of Literature’s Booker prize) has the new Bishop Edward King Chapel at Ripon College, Cuddesdon on its shortlist – hurray!  (The BBC website featured it this week at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24045643 )

This new chapel costing over £2m has been made possible because the Anglican Sisters of Begbrook in Oxford have recently sold their property and moved into Ripon College.  This small religious community of nuns brought with them the finances that have made this architectural masterpiece possible. 

I became interested in this story because about three years ago the Baptist Union Retreat Group stayed at Begbrook with the sisters and they were just beginning to contemplate a different future having put their extensive Priory up for sale – so it was fascinating to catch up with this stage of their journey.

So what, I wonder, have the five church buildings I’ve had the privilege of working in had to say to both worshippers and passersby? 

Fuller Baptist in Kettering where I began is an imposing Victorian non-conformist ‘preaching station’ able to seat a thousand.  It has a ten foot high pulpit which means the preacher is at eye level with folks sitting in the gallery.  In many ways it’s a challenging Sanctuary today simply because it is so vast and was built for a different time.  I wish the congregation all the best as they apply for the necessary permission to re-fashion parts of the worship space to suit a more contemporary style.

 

Walsworth Road Baptist Church in Hitchin just had the most wonderful location. It grew out of a
Railway Mission Chapel into an imposing neo-gothic building situated at a cross-roads just off the centre of the town.  With its beautifully kept garden I always thought it made a very positive statement to the town – enhanced by the recent addition of an imaginative vestibule connecting church and hall.

Possibly the most beautiful church I’ve served in has been Malvern Baptist in Worcestershire.
It was built in a liturgical crucifix form once again in the neo-gothic style.  With its timber roof and stained glass I always felt ‘enveloped’ whenever I entered it – there is a very special atmosphere at Malvern.  However, this beautiful church building had one great disadvantage – Lady Foley, the lady of the manor and a staunch Anglican, agreed for it to be built as long as it was constructed up a long drive away from the road – it’s almost as if she wanted it hidden! Her Christian generosity only went so far!


 

Yeovil Baptist couldn’t have been more different, occupying as it does a central position in the town for over three hundred and fifty years.
Ten years ago it was completely rebuilt.  However, its ‘Listed’ status meant the Georgian roof and Victorian frontage had to stay in place.  What resulted is something of an architectural curiosity in that one side of the church is nineteenth century and the other is twenty first century – when I was there none of us had really worked out what was the front and what was the back!  Yet it works and I well remember talking to one of our Boys’ Brigade fathers from the community one Wednesday evening and he said to me he thought our church was the most spectacular building in town – praise indeed!

 

And now it’s Amersham Free Church – a building that owes a great deal to The Revd Neville Clark’s ministry – a pastor/theologian who wanted this building, constructed in 1962 at the height of the Free Church Liturgical Renewal Movement, to say something about what we believe.The soaring beams in the Sanctuary pointing upwards, the splendid space around the communion table dedicated to the celebration of The Lord’s Supper, the gold band on the floor that encircles table, baptistery and font – emphasising the Sacraments of the Church, and the pulpit and prayer desk still in use every Sunday fifty one years after the opening .  Along with our newly refurbished church hall this is a building that ‘lives’ and ‘speaks’ of welcome and worship.

So ‘well done’ to the architects and sponsors of Bishop Edward King Chapel at Cuddesdon – not just for being shortlisted for the Stirling Prize but for continuing that worthy tradition of striving to fashion space we might dare to call sacred.

With best wishes,

Ian

 

Church in The Market Place

George Carey didn’t get much of a good press during his time as Archbishop of Canterbury but he did, in my book, have one advantage over some others who have held that office in that he had actually served as the minister of a local church before his ‘elevation’.  In particular he pastored St Nicholas’ Parish Church in the centre of Durham in the 1970’s.  These became significant years for this congregation – years of growth with a developing sense of identity in being a ‘Church in The Market Place’.  George Carey even published a book under that title detailing something of their journey together.

Some rather exclusive theologies have historically advocated that The Church should be separate from ‘The World’.  Although I would understand that in terms of having a different agenda and set of core values – I’m more and more convinced that the only way we can live out our calling to be ‘salt’ and ‘light’ is if we fully accept the concept of being a ‘Church in The Market Place.

Last Sunday Amersham held its Town Show on the King George V field opposite the civic offices.  From what I saw it was a success.  On stage it drew together singers and choirs from across the area and along the ‘corridor’ of gazebos one charity organisation after another rubbed shoulders. During the afternoon I bumped into so many people from our congregation involved in all these different organisations - and that's a healthy sign for any church - to have people involved in the community.

I was also pleased to see COTHA (Churches on the Hill Amersham) and CTACB (Churches Together in Amersham and Chesham Bois) have stalls next to each other playing a full and much appreciated part in this community day event.  It’s where we need to be – out in society – as a Church in The Market Place. So ‘well done’ to everyone who helped make it happen.

However, that concept of being ‘part’ of the community isn’t limited to a town show – it’s part of our everyday ministry.

Whilst on holiday in the Austrian Tyrol recently I was struck by the ornate onion shape domed church in the village of Kitzbuhel where we were staying.  It was just off centre and surrounded by a fascinating and large graveyard.  Walking through this hallowed space was a salutary and, I think, slightly overwhelming experience.  In keeping with local custom most gravestones had pictures of the departed on them – spending fifteen minutes reading the inscriptions and looking at the photographs was enough for me.

Our church at Amersham – like most in which I’ve served – isn’t quite as ‘pretty’ as the one in Austria and is surrounded not by a well kept graveyard but by a well used car park.  I confess I prefer the later!  I like the sense that around our building cars come and go bringing people to our services and meetings and those put on by our user groups.  There is something about that sense of momentum which chimes in with an understanding of ourselves as a ‘Church in The Market Place’.

Best wishes,

 

Ian

Meetings Meetings Meetings!

After almost a month’s absence from the world of blogging and spending the last fortnight on a family holiday in Austria it’s well and truly time to ‘come down from the mountain’ and return to the world of routine which September always beckons.

To ease me into that pattern yesterday I attended a training day for Trustees of The Retreat Association at St Philomena’s Convent, Euston Square in London.  Fitting the ecumenical nature of the day our trainer was a wonderfully engaging Jewish lady – who promptly finished our time together mid afternoon so she could join with others at her local synagogue to celebrate Jewish New Year.
Our day was organised because as Trustees we have to be increasingly aware of our corporate responsibility and the manner in which we should strive to conduct our meetings – the phrase ‘cabinet responsibility’ kept cropping up yesterday.

In August there is something of a moratorium on meetings at church but in September our diaries often bulge with them.  People either seem to love ‘em or hate ‘em! I cannot work out whether it was a compliment or criticism when a lady from a previous church once described me as a ‘Committee Man’ – not actually a title I would readily award myself!

It’s been more than a little familiar to observe the process by which governments have recently made decisions about Syria.  This ongoing tragedy which has so far produced thousands of needless deaths and two million refugees hasn’t been an easy one for national leaders to respond to – and in any case each leader operates within a different protocol in their countries.  So the American and French Presidents can authorise military action without consulting their democratic institutions because that power is retained in their office.  The British Prime Minister, whatever his personal views, had to allow Parliament a vote.  That seems to have made President Obama think twice – so now, although it’s not strictly necessary, a vote will be taken in Congress next week.

All of this, it seems to me, isn’t just pedantic bureaucracy but a recognition that corporate responsibility is usually preferable to idiosyncratic personal leadership.

The truth is that building consensus and giving opportunity for dissenting voices to be heard is just as much a mark of strong leadership as riding off on a white stallion crying ‘For England and St George’.

The reason this recent debate about the need for parliamentary approval seems so familiar to me is that it rings true in church life also.

Amersham Free Church has a combined Baptist and URC tradition (all be it with a good dollop of Church of Scotland thrown in for good measure!).  All of these traditions – in their Church, Elders’ and Deacons’ Meetings hold to the idea that church life isn’t about being directed by a Bishop, Synod or even Minister – but by the people of God gathered prayerfully together seeking the mind of Christ – the technical term for that (but not one that I think the Charity Commission are too aware of in their advice to Trustees!) is ‘Congregational Government’. 

So I’m pleased it’s September and the return of ‘The Meetings’ – it’s not just about minutes and agendas – but travelling together, listening to one another, sharing the burden and, pray God, hearing Christ speak to me through my fellow Trustees, Elders, Church Members and friends.

Oh, and to our lovely trainer yesterday and her Jewish Community at this time of Rosh Hashanah ‘Shanah Tovah’ – have a good new year!

With best wishes,

Ian