Virtual Church - a good idea?

I’ve recently been introduced to a really good development from Baptist House!  It’s called Daily News Sweep and it comes from the editorial team of the old Baptist Times (to get it simply go on the Baptist Times pages of The Baptist Union website).  This news roundup lands in the ‘in-box’ of my computer every day and is packed with interesting stories, basically of a ‘faith’ nature, gleaned from the press.  Today, for example, I read about the reluctance of many Anglicans in Africa, South America and Australasia to continue recognising The Archbishop of Canterbury as the head of their Communion – seems like Rowan Williams’ successor is in for a choppy time.

Another story from today’s Sweep caught my eye and is entitled: The Deep Limitations of Digital Church.  It was written by the President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Dr Albert Mohler.  In it he basically lamented a growing trend in the United States (and perhaps here in Britain too?) of people staying away from ‘live’ church in favour of simply tuning in to a webcast of the service at their convenience; sermons ‘on tap’ (with the ability to fast forward no doubt!) and fellowship at a safe distance....but is it really church?  Dr Mohler gives an emphatic ‘no’!

Now I have to admit to doing a bit of this myself.  I regularly tune in to the webcast of Yorkminster Park Baptist Church in Toronto most Mondays – I just love the minister’s sermons and the fine music.  This church also puts its order of service and notice sheet on their site – so (with a bit of detective work) I’ve even worked out the names of some of the choir members who sit on the front row and found myself saying the other week – ‘oh, Rosemary isn’t there today’!  Hang on – I’m three and a half thousand miles from Toronto – what am I doing noticing a missing choir member!! It’s fun but it’s not real fellowship.

Real fellowship is about that regular weekly commitment to come together as the People of God around His Word and Table.  Real fellowship is singing, praying, listening and serving together.  Real fellowship is sharing our joys and sorrows together in this journey of faith.  Real fellowship isn’t always easy but it always holds the potential for that touch of the Holy Spirit that turns a routine gathering into a service of worship.

So although I’m not going to give up on my webcast viewing – I recognise that the real thing for me doesn’t happen thousands of miles away in Toronto but here in Yeovil, at a church on South Street.

With best wishes,

Ian

Meeting Sincerity

Yesterday evening our Boys’ Brigade entertained a superb guest of honour at their annual Awards Evening.  Trevor Peacock – who played Jim Trott in BBC's Vicar of Dibley (the one who always said ‘no, no, no’ when he meant ‘yes’!) – came along to give a talk and present the awards.  Around these parts Trevor is a much loved ‘celebrity’ famed for his support of Yeovil Town Football Club.

I think all of us present last night were struck by his gentle warmth and obvious sincerity.  He spoke with such humour and his timing was evidence of his Shakespearean acting – he is so much more than the stumbling Jim in The Revd Geraldine’s parish.  What’s more he instantly engaged the boys with his anecdotes and kept their attention.  Yet more than that it was the way he gave out the awards that made the most impression – he made every boy feel special and willingly and graciously posed for a photo with each succeeding recipient.  He was a charming guest, full of fun and warmth – and his gentle, yet persuasive Christian faith shone through.

You know ‘sincerity’ when you bump into it - and last night we met it in Trevor.

Our prayer must surely be that all we do as a church will ring out with integrity and speak of sincerity.  The way we treat friends and strangers, our concern for the marginalised, our expression of heartfelt belief, even if questions and doubts also form part of our journey – all of this will say something very deep about the people we are and the Christ we serve.

My thanks to The Revd Tudor Botwood for taking last Sunday's service - this Saturday I’m looking forward to taking part in the Commissioning Service for new Street Pastors at St James’ Church.

With best wishes,

Ian

Doing Easter Together

Good Friday Workshop

Last weekend was fizzing with activity because a lot of our Easter at South Street was done together!

A week on from Maundy Thursday I’ve been revisiting some of the services and events we crammed into those few days and it strikes me just how much had to be organised behind the scenes to make it all work.

Maundy Thursday: I walk into the Chapel Lounge to lead communion and everything has been set out thoughtfully with bread and wine provided and placed on the table.

Good Friday: A bustling craft workshop with six activities was provided – all the materials carefully laid out and ready for use so folks could express their individual creativity!  Alongside that copious amounts of tea, coffee and hot cross buns were provided by an enthusiastic team. Later that morning we held a walk of witness and open air service – and this meant service leaflets needed to be printed, amplification and musicians organised and even police permission and public liability insurance for the walk obtained!

Easter Day: An 8am service on Ham Hill – would anyone turn up?  Yes – 30 wonderful people!! And everyone had a printed service sheet.  Back at church we returned for a delicious full English breakfast served with some style.  At 10.30am we held our ‘big’ service of the day supported by musicians, singers, flower arrangers, welcomers, refreshment providers – done by all those people who regularly ‘grace’ our church every Sunday with their offering of Christian service.  At 6.30pm it was a quiet service of communion and once again everything was beautiful set up and ready.  But it wasn’t over yet...!

Easter Monday:  A walk through the Somerset countryside organised by the Social Committee – it had been thoroughly planned and was led with quiet skill.

Phew! 

I believe that part of the message of the resurrection is the new community God is building – a Community of The Resurrection centred around Christ and celebrating his life, death and rising again.  I hope, like me, you felt that in some small measure we experienced something of that community last weekend – and the biggest of ‘thank yous’ to everyone who made it happen!

This weekend The Revd Tudor Botwood, Naval Chaplain at RNAS Yeovilton, will be leading Morning Worship and Mrs Linda Lovell will be presiding at Evening Worship.

With best wishes,
Ian

Christ's Light - brighter than any darkness

I remember flying out of Birmingham Airport, en route to Australia, on a low cloud August afternoon.  It was dreary.  Then came the moment, just minutes after take-off, when we broke through the cloud and entered a sparkling sun drenched blue sky!  The sun was out all the time – even though in Birmingham it had been obscured by thick layers of grey Cumulonimbus!

At Easter Jesus Christ won for us a great victory – the forgiveness of our sins and the hope of heaven.  Yet, all too often our pressing circumstances make it feel as if there are great clouds over us. Clouds of ‘struggle’, ‘uncertainty’, ‘fear’ or simply ‘monotony’. 

Part of our spiritual discipline, because I think it needs to be an act of the will, is to lift up our eyes and see the sunrise of Easter for what it is – a reality that we can depend on and rejoice in. 

Christ has risen and light has overcome darkness.  We can be a people whose lives have been touched and changed by the sunshine of God’s grace and love. 

That doesn’t mean we won’t get days when the ‘cloud’ comes down – but even at such times we need to hold on to the truth that above them God’s light is shining – that Easter is a truth that changes everything, even on the cloudiest of days.

I hope the commemorations and celebrations of the next few days will provide sacred space and spiritual encounter for us all.

With best wishes,
Ian

We all need a Barnabas

Dave finishing the Yeovil Half Marathon
Sunday 25th March 2012

He’s a favourite of mine, Barnabas – The Son of Encouragement.  In one passage he’s even mentioned before Paul and that might mean at one time he was considered the most reliable and experienced of the two.  Of course it all changed; yet Barnabas remains in the background, still reliable and still an encourager.

I’m grateful to have met a Barnabas or two in my time!  Folk who have spurred me on, prayed for me and the family or have simply been sources of encouragement.  In any walk of life such people are an asset, especially – dare I say - in church life.

Last weekend was full of Barnabases – or should that be Barnabi?!

One of our deacons, Dave, completed the Yeovil Half Marathon and was given so much encouragement both before and during the race.  He emailed saying how uplifted he felt by the cheering crowds on the roadside and by recalling the text an ‘encourager’ had given him from Isaiah 40.31 about those ‘who wait upon the Lord will have their strength renewed’.  All of us were thrilled to hear, at the end of morning service, that Dave had completed the course in less than two hours and raised at least £700 for Yeovil Street Pastors – in fact that news truly ‘encouraged’ us!

And then there was last Sunday’s Service of Infant Blessing.  The family had told me a few friends might be coming.  In the end I counted over thirty – and what a welcome addition they were to our morning service.  People who had come to share this precious moment – to lend their ‘encouragement’ to Harry, his mum, dad and brother. 

This weekend on Palm Sunday we’ll be celebrating communion together and sometimes, during the distribution of the bread and wine, I sit and think of those saints I’ve known and loved who used to share in this meal but are now in heaven.  I recall their faces and think about their inspirational example and how it has enriched my own pilgrimage of faith – and I’m grateful – grateful for their encouragement.

So to combine Dave’s experience of the Yeovil Half Marathon and the words of the unknown writer of Hebrews, in chapter 12: With this great cloud of witnesses around us (The Barnabases who have come our way) let us run with resolution the race that is before us – keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.

So let me encourage you to keep going!

This weekend we gather for Palm Sunday worship at 10.30am and then at 6.30pm we’ll watch that wonderful animation film of the life of Christ, The Miracle Maker – combining it with some worship suitable for the beginning of Holy Week. And our prayers go out to all from our church who will be attending the Baptist Union Retreat Group’s Spring Retreat at Ivy House, Warminster – and especially The Revd Barbara Carpenter, one of our former members, who will be co-leading it.

With best wishes,

Ian

Interrupting The Sermon

Perhaps it was having the unusual opportunity of sitting in the back row that ‘done it’!  On Sunday evening in our church, whilst listening to the Rector of Yeovil, The Revd James Dudley Smith give his fascinating lecture on ‘Queen and Established Church’ – anarchic tendencies overpowered me and I interrupted! 

James had just got to that bit of his history tour de force describing the liberating atmosphere brought about by The Glorious Revolution and the arrival on these shores of William of Orange.  Feeling that he’d missed an important bit out I shouted from the back that a predecessor of mine at South Street – its first minister and one time captain in Monmouth’s army, Thomas Miller was sent for by the king in 1688 and offered an Anglican living if he would ‘conform’.  Miller was a free churchman to the core and declined His Majesty’s offer asking that he be given leave to remain a Baptist Minister.  The king, apparently, gave him ‘full liberty’ so to do!

Well it’s a great story and I thought worthy of a bullish interruption from the back row!  Fortunately James agreed with me and ecumenical relations have survived!

Now I’m not encouraging further congregational contributions this Sunday but it has got me reflecting about the way we all receive sermons.  I suppose we can listen with too great a passivity – the preacher’s words floating over us and making the minimum impression.  Jesus once told a story about that in the Parable of The Sower.

An alternative way of hearing is to do so with our hearts as well as our minds – a listening out for God’s word and voice and so letting the sermon pierce or ‘break through’ and touch us.

The Revd Andrew Fuller was the first secretary of the Baptist Missionary Society and he wrote these words during his days as a Kettering pastor in 1806: 

You cannot conceive the difference between addressing a people full of tender and affectionate attention, whose souls appear in their eyes, and answer, as it were, to the word of God; and preaching to those who are either half asleep, or their thoughts manifestly occupied on other things.

Just love that phrase ‘whose souls appear in their eyes’.

Well I’m grateful to those who stay awake during my sermons and I hope James will forgive me for interrupting his.

This weekend we welcome the Sherriff family to church for the Infant Presentation of baby Harry and then in the evening service the Chaplain of St Margaret’s Hospice brings our Lent Lecture series to a close with a talk on ‘Queen and Voluntary Groups’ - and I promise to behave

With best wishes, 

Ian

Losing my voice!

It’s back today but for seven days it went AWOL!  Losing your voice is a strange experience.  Without it I felt disempowered and at times useless.  Almost everything I do ‘professionally’ depends on having a voice – even answering the telephone (as some of you experienced) became something of a comic moment.

These last few days have made me realise afresh how much I should value ‘normal’ health and those ‘routine’ abilities like being able to speak.  It has also, I must say, been interesting to live life at a slower rate – cancelling a week’s worth of appointments has not been an entirely unpleasant experience!

I do want to say a huge ‘thank you’ to Heather and Paul who stepped in and held the fort so wonderfully on Sunday – you’ll understand my concern when Rachel returned home from church and said ‘it went REALLY well’!

A few weeks ago on this blog I wrote about the importance of words – little knowing that just a few days later I wouldn’t be able to speak any.  The voiceless in our society are found at all levels and have been disempowered for all reasons.  In his ministry Jesus seems to have listened out for such people and willingly engaged with them.  Having someone to speak for you – advocacy – brings hope to an abused child, a political refugee or a subsistence farmer.  Being able to contribute to the debate – to speaks words into an arena - as a citizen, member or friend brings a sense of respect and self-worth to us all.  And no wonder one of the richest and deepest titles for Christ is ‘The Word’.

This evening we have a Deacons’ Meeting and this weekend we celebrate Mothering Sunday.

With best wishes,
Ian