On Thursday night I was in Chelmsford Cathedral for the inauguration of our new Methodist District. Much of the service was not culturally ‘me’ although it was typically Methodist, but one highlight was the sermon by Tom Stuckey, the Ex-President of the Conference, on Romans 1:8-17. He said that our Districts (and those who chair them) are to be about mission – I was glad to hear that, because much of this reorganisation that has been planned for a few years strikes me as more like rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.
Tom said that it all starts with passion. Paul says in verse 16, ‘I am not ashamed of the Gospel’. He compared this with the passion Paul demonstrated after arrest in passages such as Acts 26.
But, he said, it’s not enough to have passion: terrorists have a passion. The passion must be driven by vision, and Paul’s vision was that the Gospel ‘is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek’ (verse 16 again). Paul wants to live on a bigger map, he said. His doctrine of justification by faith is a protest on behalf of the Gentiles against Jewish exclusivism (so Professor Jimmy Dunn).
But then comes the question of motivation: how do you keep going with this in what Tom called ‘a tired church’? Here he quoted verse 17 about ‘the righteousness of God’. Passion comes from compasion, and compassion comes from a righteous God who justifies by grace through faith (following Luther).
Somewhere within the sermon he quoted Rowan Williams’ definition of mission, that it is ‘seeing what God is doing in the world and joining in’.
It was a terrific sermon, but a lot hangs on personal interpretation. The Williams definition just quoted is very popular, but it needs teasing out. It could be very appealing to a Methodist theology, because it chimes with a doctrine of ‘prevenient grace’ (i’e., that God is always acting in grace before and ahead of people). Questions arise in terms of how we know what God is doing in the world. If we are not careful we just leap on the latest bandwagons, religious and/or secular. We then end up just as copycats, rather than being the innovative children of the Creator God. But if we do sense the prophetic words and deeds of God going ahead of us, then this is dynamic.
The other part that I would have preferred to have had fleshed out a little more was the section on vision, and justification being a protest against Jewish exclusivism. There is also something quite natural here for Methodist theology. We have our roots in Arminianism rather than Calvinism: ‘for all, for all my Saviour died’ – he did not die merely for the elect. We can resonate with a lot of the social and political concerns for ‘inclusion’ of various sorts. What we can lose sight of is that a Gospel with an inclusive offer ends up as one with an exclusive result. Everything hangs on what we make of the inclusive Gospel offer.
My greatest sadness of the evening happened after the sermon. There was – as I hope I’ve just indicated – a lot to ponder. Space was created for reflection. ‘Parsons’ Noyse‘, a classical trio consisting of three ministers, played some Beethoven. Perhaps people didn’t quite know how to treat this part of the service. The response was to treat it as a recital. The ‘performance’ (and I’m sure the members of Parsons’ Noyse didn’t see it this way) earned applause. And for me the volume of the applause drowned the Gospel challenge that Tom had brought.
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