Yesterday, I took Mark on a belated treat for his seventh birthday – a tour of Wembley Stadium. We had a wonderful time, with a knowledgeable and witty tour guide called Dominic.
I took my camera gear, and have posted photos for my Facebook friends and for friends and family on Flickr to see. (Sorry, but I don’t usually make pictures of our children public on the Internet.)
And I got annoyed. Later with myself when I realised I’d been careless with the focussing of some shots, but earlier I seethed inwardly when going through the security check at the stadium. As the officer checking my bags noticed I had a LowePro camera bag and that I had a DSLR camera with interchangeable lenses, he gave me a friendly warning.
“Don’t change your lenses on the tour, or the guide will think you’re a professional photographer, and they’re banned from the tours. Choose one lens and stick to it.”
So now you know. Amateur photographers don’t use SLRs. Clearly we only use our phones, or at best a compact. Is that the level we’ve sunk to?
Of particular interest to me are the United Kingdom stats, which can be found on the European Union page. As of June last year, 82.5% of the population had Internet access. As of August last year, 44.6% were Facebook users.
OK, so some will have opened accounts and either not used them or only used them sporadically, but how much more convincing do churches need that an Internet and social media presence and strategy is no longer optional, it is central? It isn’t enough to say that these statistics don’t reflect the much lower usage among members of an elderly congregation, even when that is true, because such thinking openly betrays the lack of missionary thinking. Is the Internet just a glorified internal communication tool for the church, or is it somewhere to interact with the world in the name of Christ and with the love of God?
Both my churches here have Facebook pages that I set up. At present we don’t use them a lot, and I have to remember to put updates on them. Mostly there is the automated feed of my blog posts through them, but we could think of more, I’m sure. Similarly, Knaphill has a website. Addlestone used to, and is in the process of designing a new one.
The church needs to recognise that people are living a large amount of their lives online today. I don’t simply mean the minority who live almost exclusively online to the detriment of face-to-face relationships: I mean that millions live online in extension to the rest of their lives.
So thank God for initiatives like CODEC and others, such as the forthcoming Open Source evening at the Pentecost Festival (which, sadly, I can’t attend). We need to take what comes out of these ventures and translate them into mission in the local church.
All of this may be obvious to readers of this blog. You come here, either because you visit the site, you get the email updates, you follow it in a feed reader or via my Twitter stream or on Facebook through my account, the blog page, or one of the two churches above. But others need convincing, and this is something we need to communicate passionately and eloquently in our churches – not so that our online usage is a mere digital church notice sheet, but so that we genuinely and conversationally interact with a massive section of the population that we say we want to reach.
One or two of my church leaders recently wanted to think about streaming a video feed of church services online. It isn’t going to prove practical since there are too many hurdles, such as child protection, data protection, the number of personnel to do it effectively and possibly the cost, too. However, nothing could delight me more than that they are thinking imaginatively and not letting the old “We haven’t done it before” slogan prevent them coming up with ideas. What a great bunch of people they are to work with, especially in this culture.
says Jason Gardner in an article which begins by reflecting on the use of social media such as Facebook and Twitter in recent people movements in North Africa. You may have read about the Egyptian who called his newborn child ‘Facebook’ in tribute to the way that site was used to spark potential social change.
So Gardner asks us to pay attention to Web 2.0, which
is about customisation and collaboration … That means that the story of the world is no longer dictated to us: we write it together.
Even powerful dictators’ efforts to use kill switches on the Internet have run into trouble as international people movements such as Avaaz have solicited funds from tens of thousands of people around the world to provide satellite links and other means for the previously disempowered citizens to keep communicating with each other and the outside world.
When I have written about this before, I have quoted Rex Miller‘s maxim that it isn’t that the medium is the message; rather, the medium is the worldview. Collaborative media mean collaborative approaches to life. And Gardner rightly says the church needs to take heed.
His particular application is in involving youth, and he makes the point that God is involving us collaboratively in his kingdom.
However, it’s worth thinking about for the whole church. While we have a long way to go, it gives me great pleasure to be involved in leading a church that already has signs of taking this seriously. I have a Leadership Team that meets weekly at Knaphill, and although I’m seen as the overall leader we take counsel together.
Or for another example, you’ll notice this is one of those weekends when there is no new sermon on the blog. That’s because it’s All Age Worship Sunday, and we have a team that plans these services. While I might bring a general overarching theme or message, I couldn’t possibly put together the services we lead. The creative gifts present among the team are amazing, and the worship is all the richer for it.
OK, if I get round to it, I might put up the short PowerPoint presentation that accompanies my brief talk on a site like Slideshare, but it isn’t a conventional sermon. It’s a talk on the theme of ‘belonging’, because we’ve just had Founders’ Day for the Scouts and Thinking Day for the Guides. And actually, did I come up with the theme this time? No. I couldn’t make the planning meeting, due to an emergency. Two other people prayed and set the theme, and I have attempted to fit in.
Of course, we need to go much further, but one thing is for sure. However much I am set aside to pray and discern, there is no going back to the world where an Anglican rector friend of mine saw his calling as to come down from the mountain with the tablets of stone, and for the people simply to accept his word to that effect.
Next year marks four hundred years since the Authorised Version (King James Version for my North American friends) was published. In the UK, churches are planning to celebrate 2011 as The Year Of The Bible. A major project to support this is called Biblefresh, which seeks to help the church regain confidence in reading the Bible.
That’s a great idea. However, I’ve run into a problem. Last Monday evening, I was at a meeting of representatives from the four churches in this village (not counting the fifth church that thinks it contains the only true Christians), where we discussed how we were going to mark next year’s big anniversary. Some of them had met a few months ago to start thinking and planning. And our difficulty is this: it seems only natural to us to take our celebrations public. However, the Biblefresh focus on renewing the church’s confidence in Bible reading, important as it is, means that an outreach focus isn’t within its purview. You won’t really find much mention of anything like that on their website, except for the odd comment from Elaine Lindridge, a Methodist Evangelism Enabler in the Newcastle District.
So … I’m posting here, there and everywhere in the social media parts of the Internet to see whether other people have ideas. (These include the Facebook pages for BigBible and Biblefresh.) We’d love to be stimulated by creative sparks elsewhere that might inspire our thinking and praying. If you have any ideas, I’d love you to shre them here.
The bigger of my two new churches, Knaphill Methodist Church, has for some time had its own website. You can often find audio of recent sermons there. So if you go to the link above and click on ‘Latest Sermon or Talk‘, you will find my sermon from yesterday, and can hear how the text I posted here came out in real life. If you can stand the thought of hearing my voice, that is!
And as of today, the church also has its own Facebook page. Do pop over if you are on Facebook and ‘like’ us. We are likeable!
So, England were deservedly thrashed by Germany in the World Cup today. If I have any hope as an England fan, it’s that this humbling will wake up a sport drenched in greed, with players who earn five times in a week what I earn in a year and who still lust for further dosh with Hello magazine spreads, and start coming back to some healthier values. I’m not optimistic, though. Not while the Premier League has its stranglehold on the ‘national game’.
But there is another dark side. The English propensity to football hooliganism is infamous. Though far less evident than it used to be, the real issue seems not its near-eradication at the top level, but that it has moved to other arenas. There is still football-related violence in this country, but much of it now happens away from the stadia. Last week, I had an email from TEAR Fund which included this sobering statistic:
on England match days during the last world cup violence in the home went up by 25% in British homes, it is utterly unacceptable and totally preventable.
How sick is that? And tonight, after England’s defeat, the violence has come near to us on our estate here. Only yesterday, some lay leaders at the local parish church said they had already sustained £3000 of damage to the premises after earlier England games in the tournament, and they were talking of mounting a guard near the building after today’s match.
I don’t yet know whether anything has happened there this evening, but for approximately two hours from 7 pm, we have been serenaded by hovering police helicopters. Checking friends’ status updates on Facebook, we discover that a number of incidents have occurred. There has been a glassing at a local branch of Tesco (I’m not sure which one). Trouble also broke out at a pub we know that shows football on large screens inside while children play outside on a bouncy castle. And there has been an incident with baseball bats and a gun at the pub-restaurant on our quiet, middle class estate. That establishment is right opposite our children’s school. People are staying inside their houses, with windows closed on the hottest day of the year so far.
I cannot prove that any of these incidents are football-related, but the timing is suspicious, especially for an area that is largely unfamiliar with this kind of trouble. Of one thing I am sure, though: our society that trundles along without God should not be so complacent. It reminds me of two powerful quotes from Eunice Attwood’s wonderful Vice-Presidential address to the Methodist Conference yesterday. Firstly, speaking of when she began to get involved with Healing On The Streets:
One of the Big Issue sellers who I know well, called me over and with a very serious look on his face said, ‘At last you’re here, we need you Christians here, Eunice. Why doesn’t the church come here every day? It’s no good staying in your lovely buildings’.
Secondly, in talking about her work with Street Pastors:
When John Wesley came to Newcastle in 1742 he spoke these now famous words, ‘I was surprised so much drunkenness, cursing and swearing even from the mouths of little children) do I never remember to have seen and heard before in so small a compass of time. Surely this place is ripe for him who came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.’
I didn’t get out on the streets tonight. Was I wrong? I don’t know. With police cars, a riot van, paramedics and other supporting people, part of me says I shouldn’t have meddled. But I didn’t know about those details until the helicopters started to disappear, and it’s surprising how alluring putting the rubbish out, emptying the dishwasher and making the children’s sandwiches become. But whether I succeeded or failed as a Christian tonight, Debbie and I shall have a rôle as representatives of the Prince of Peace tomorrow morning at the school gate, when we discover whether and how much people have been troubled by today’s goings on.
I don’t think I’m going to preach a brand new sermon this week. The Lectionary Gospel and Epistle are both fascinating: both Luke 7:36-8:3 amd Galatians 2:15-21 (especially if you take the latter in its context from verse 11 onwards) raise the question of table fellowship being used as a sign of who is included in or excluded from the people of God. In the case of the Luke reading, I don’t think I can yet improve on a sermon I preached three years ago on it, despite yesterday reading the chapter on the incident in Michael Frost‘s recently reissued expanded edition of Jesus The Fool. (Highly recommended, BTW.) When it came to Galatians, I again dug out Tom Wright‘s book from last year, Justification, which inspired my recent sermon about justification based on Romans 5:1-11. However, this time, much as Wright enlightened my understanding of the text, I didn’t come away feeling I had something to share with a congregation in a sermon.
So I thought I’d point you to something else on the web. Someone else, actually. Last year while I was on sabbatical, Ibloggedabout my encounters with the extraordinary George Kovoor, current Principal of Trinity College, Bristol. Well, George has just launched his own website, Kairos Global, and I commend it to you. At this stage it’s rather sparse, but you can start to gain a feel for the ministry of this remarkable man. The lead article that begins on the home page will certainly give you a flavour. There are also a couple of videos, showing five-minute extracts from longer presentations. One is also available on YouTube, so by the magic of WordPress I reproduce it below:
I can’t say I can work out what he’s doing broadcasting on TBN Europe in the company of the Creflo Dollars of this world, but Jesus didn’t worry who he mixed with (any more than the late Rob Frost worried about broadcasting on God TV) and at least it gets some sound teaching out there.
I think George’s site will be well worth watching, especially if it is updated frequently. If his admin can put on some of his talks, whether text, audio or video, in full, it will be invaluable for all of us who care about the evangelisation of the West – and, indeed, the entire world.
Oh, and for something lighter, you can always join the Facebook group George Kovoor Is Mad.
So the UK General Election will be on 6th May, as expected. In terms of Christian responses, Churches Together In Britain and Ireland has a dedicated site. The Evangelical Alliance and CARE have set up My Manifesto on Facebook and Twitter. Among my blogging friends, Paul Martin has written an eloquent post in which he calls for a preferential option for the poor. Peter Kirk discusses the Westminster Declaration, issued on Sunday by thirty largely well known Christian leaders, mostly (but not exclusively) from an evangelical background.
The latter stands for so many things both Peter and I believe in, yet there are concerns. It is pro-life, it favours options for the poor and unjustly treated and it upholds the sanctity of marriage. Yet the areas where it calls for Christian conscience to be protected are purely in the areas of what one might call ‘personal morality’ – the sexuality and sanctity of life areas. Peter thinks this is stilted, and I have sympathies with him in that view.
For example, if you hold a conservative view on sexuality, then none of the three major British political parties supports you any more. Labour has pioneered controversial legislation in this area. David Cameron for the Conservatives told Attitude magazine that the Archbishop of Canterbury should sort his church out on the issue. The Liberal Democrats have favoured gay rights for a long time, and in the recent controversy over the Christian owners of a B& B who would not accept a booking from a gay couple. the LD spokesperson Chris Huhne described anyone who believed gay relationships were wrong as a ‘bigot’. If political preferences are drawn on this issue, there is no safe port. We are a minority, and this is what happens. We need to campaign for our views, but have to be careful about a Christendom-flavoured stridency on the issue, and that is what worries me about the tone of the Westminster Declaration: it sounds like militant demands.
(I recognise, of course, there are several friends who read this blog who do not see sexuality this way. I do not propose to argue the rights and wrongs of different views here, I simply state that I have never been convinced by the arguments of those who wish to show a different conclusion from the biblical texts. Sometimes I wish I could – it would make life easier in today’s society – but I’m not.)
However, the Christian vote should surely never be on a single issue, but on a range. Christians of varying persuasions are often good at majoring on just one or two issues, not the big picture. Who will do the best good for the country, without us believing any messianic pretensions the parties may purport to offer? That’s a thorny question indeed.
Not only that, Christians bring the issue of character alongside technical competence and policies. Paul Martin calls us to examine the character of the local candidates – he doesn’t want simply those who will be cheerleaders for the national leaders. I sympathise with that, and especially at a time when integrity has to be a big question in our national politics. We can still do that in a General Election where there is only one candidate for each party in a constituency. It is less possible in elections where we have to vote for a number of candidates, since Tony Blair enacted legislation reducing that purely to a party contest. In those contexts he took the integrity vote away from the voters.
In short, it is getting harder and harder as each election comes and goes to know where I, as a floating voter, might place my cross. I have Christian friends who belong to each of the major parties, but I don’t find it easy to identify with one political creed, although I know it is important if you are going to get involved to do so. Furthermore, like most of the electorate I don’t have a technical understanding of economics, and so all those arguments that are presently raging are ones I feel I cannot call. I want to vote, not least because I have little right to complain about outcomes if I opt out, but that isn’t an inspiring and positive reason. I am conscious, though, of those who sacrificed that we might have this freedom. I am not taking it lightly, but I can understand those who wonder whether it will make a difference. Did The Who get it right in 1971 with ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’ – meet the new boss, same as the old boss?
Truly, discernment and prayer are necessary in large quantities right now.
I’ve been aware through mailshots and emails for a few months that the Christian missionary charity Focus has been putting together a new resource called ‘God: New Evidence’. With contributions from scientist-theologians such as John Polkinghorne and David Wilkinson, there are videos you can embed in your own blog or site free of charge, which are also available on a DVD for £14.99 (currently UK PAL only – NTSC following later). You can view them on the site or on YouTube by searching for the user ‘godnewevidence’ (omit the quotation marks). Here by way of a taster is the first one:
You can also become a Facebook fan or follow the project on Twitter. Bible translator and former biologist Eddie Arthur commends it here, as does Anglican priest Doug Chaplin here (with the reservation that he thinks cosmology might be more sympathetic to faith than evolutionary biology).
This is an encouraging and worthwhile resource. We should be careful not to claim too much for it in response to Dawkins hysteria. Just because Dawkins and his friends claim science can disprove God, we shouldn’t rush to assume scientific research can prove every aspect of Christian doctrine. (Not that I’m suggesting Focus think this, I’m more thinking about how people might try to use the material.)
What can we claim? Passages such as Romans 1 make it clear that an appreciation of the world carries with it a basic revelation of God – but no more. The Focus material is therefore an excellent argument for the existence of God, and forms a foundation which the Holy Spirit can use in further revealing the Good News of the Kingdom in Jesus’ incarnation, death and resurrection. In short, rational evidence gives us not complete proof but enough evidence for trust in God. The latter requires the work of the Spirit in a person’s life.
Just to say I’ve now created a separate page for this blog on Facebook. Go here and you can sign up to be a ‘fan’ (horrible word I know, but it’s Facebook lingo) to see my posts there. Some while ago I took the feed from the blog out of Facebook due to problems with the way FB generated ‘notes’. I hope this is a better way. Please give me some helpful feedback when it’s been up and running a while.
Yesterday, I took Mark on a belated treat for his seventh birthday – a tour of Wembley Stadium. We had a wonderful time, with a knowledgeable and witty tour guide called Dominic.
Big Circumstance 