The Vote to Reject The Ordination of Female Bishops is Potentially Disastrous For Christian Witness!

You could say it’s none of my business!  After all I’m a Probationer Presbyter in the Methodist Church of Great Britain and a new one at that; what possible right could I have to comment on the decision made by the Church of England this evening to reject the ordination of female bishops?

No, I’m not an Anglican but then this disastrous decision has ramifications that range far wider than the Church of England.  The average member of the general public does not, on the whole, make any real distinction between the different Christians denominations, nor do they have any interest in the way General Synod votes: all the average unchurched person will understand is that once again the church has said that approximately half the human race are not fit to be leaders.

How can we, as a people driven by mission, try to claim that the Christian faith is as relevant as it has always been when its apparent attitude to women makes it appear completely irrelevant to many?

It is not even as if a strong case can be made from scripture to reject female leadership.  In so far as I can tell the opponents of female bishops rely on one or two suspect passages in Paul’s epistles that may not even have been written by Paul.  The most widely quoted passage is 1 Timothy 2:11-12, “A woman should learn in quietness and full submission.  I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.”  In the first place we should note that the passage clear states “I do not permit”, not “God does not permit” or “Christ does not permit.”  The author of the letter is giving his own personal view, not a command from God.  I say the author to make my second point, the Pauline authorship of this letter is hotly disputed and if it did not come from Paul himself that diminishes its authority.

Those who rely on Pauline authority for rejecting female leadership are on very shaky ground, for in many places Paul can be seen to actively support women in leadership roles. In 1 Corinthians 16:19 he sends greetings Aquila and Priscilla and the church that meets in their house.  Surely if Aquila alone had been leader his wife would not have been mentioned.  Elsewhere he refers to women as co-workers.  And it is Paul who wrote that there is neither Jew nor Gentile, male nor female, slave nor free, but all are one in Christ Jesus.

As I have written before, to say a person isn’t fit to be a leader because they happen to be female is every bit as evil as suggesting that they would not be fit to be a leader because they are black, or because they have ginger hair.

In none of this do I seek to condemn my brothers and sisters in the Church of England, the majority of whom are in favour of female bishops; I pray with you that by the grace of God this disastrous decision can be reversed a lot sooner than 2015.  I also pray that those who are opposed to female leadership, not only in the Church of England but in all Christian Denominations (and, yes, there are still people who think like that in the Methodist Church too) would consider if their position is truly scriptural and totally without any hint of uncertainty (I am convinced that it isn’t) and think again about the potential detrimental effect their decision to oppose female bishops could have on Christian witness in our nation.

Christmas Is Coming.... Are You Ready?

It’s the middle of November and this morning I walked into a charity shop and heard the voice of Cliff Richard singing ‘O Little Town of Bethlehem’!  Now I’ve nothing at all against Sir Cliff, indeed I own some of his albums on CD, but I really don’t want to hear Christmas carols in the middle of November.

I walked on through the town and entered the local shopping centre.  Strung from the ceiling were garlands of Christmas greenery with twinkling fairy lights embedded in them.  One local store already has its shop Christmas tree up!  It’s the middle of November.

I may be a (new) Methodist minister but I’m also a typical man.  For me the
preparations for Christmas usually begin around 23^rd December.  That’s when I generally go out to buy cards and presents, write said cards in a blur of frenzied activity that ensures the handwriting in most of them is virtually illegible and wrestle with wrapping paper and selloptape to produce something that bears a passing resemblance to a wrapped present.  No ribbon or bows of course; I never could see the point of either!

You can, perhaps, understand why I view the playing of carols and erecting of Christmas trees in mid-November with some ire.

I have, however, discovered that as the full time minister of four Methodist churches I don’t have the luxury of waiting until 23^rd December to sort out Christmas.  In October we had to decide what services we were holding over the Christmas period in order to get them onto the preaching plan.  Then there was a village Christmas card to choose, Christmas posters for outside the church to select and planning meetings for Christmas services to fit in the diary.  I have been hearing the word ‘Christmas’ for the best part of two months now.

In my best moments, even as a typical man, I understand the need to prepare for Christmas: if the women in our lives left it as late as men to plan Christmas then we’d probably all be eating beans on toast for Christmas dinner….. though, come to think of it, that would be a lot healthier and a lot less hassle.

In writing about preparing for Christmas I have, of course, focussed mainly on the material things, the things that don’t matter.  There is a preparation that I do every year in the run up to Christmas, in the season of Advent and that is to do my best to prepare myself spiritually to celebrate the incarnation of Almighty God into our world and to look forward to the promised return of Jesus.  Prayer, Bible study and worship with a special focus on the coming and coming again of Jesus are the truly important ways in which we can prepare ourselves to celebrate Christmas.

For me the highlight of Christmas isn’t the presents, the food and the drink, spending time with family or even the Doctor Who Christmas Special; it’s the midnight communion service on Christmas Eve when we celebrate with a solemn yet joyful memorial of his death and resurrection the birth of our Saviour and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Although I am looking forward to Doctor Who as well…..

Taking a Break For the Sake of the Kingdom

It seems a long time ago now, but back in May I had a meeting with my Probation Supervisor (I started as a Probationer Presbyter in the Methodist Church of Great Britain in September) as part of preparations for starting in full-time ministry.  Amongst the things we discussed was the need for me to book a week’s break sometime between 1^st September and Christmas. 

I must admit that I was sceptical that I would need a week off so soon after starting but I had the common sense to listen to him and book that week off.  I’m glad I did as I’m now in the middle of that week off and feeling the benefit of it.

I don’t know if I’m typical, though conversations I’ve had suggest I am, but because I’m in full time ministry with a stipend I’m finding that I’m working harder and putting more hours in than I ever did when I had a job and earned a salary: because I’m working for the Lord so directly and enjoying serving him as a presbyter, and serving the people of the churches I have pastoral oversight of.  It is such a joy to be doing what I’m doing, to finally be fulfilling the vocation God gave me when he created me.

Even in the midst of this joyful busyness I know that I need to rest.  Indeed, all Christians need to step back from the busyness of their activity for God and rest and spend time with our Creator.  Our Lord Jesus himself needed to rest and spend time with his Heavenly Father.  There are many examples given in the gospels of Jesus withdrawing from activity, either to rest with his disciples or to be alone with God.  In Luke 9:10, for example, we are told “When the apostles returned, they reported to Jesus what they had done.  Then he took them with him and they withdrew by themselves to a town called Bethsaida.”  In Mark 1:35 we are told “very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.”  In John 6:15 we read that “Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself.”

If Jesus, God himself incarnate in man, needed to take a break how much more do we need to rest from our labours for God and spend time in his presence relaxing and recuperating.  Such rest enables us to be more effective for our task of serving in the Kingdom, because it restores our energies and enthusiasm for the gospel.  If you are a busy Christian, and so many of us are, please remember to take time out to rest and relax and time out to spend with the God who loves and cares for us more than we will ever know!

I Believe in Angels

‘I believe in Angels’.  It’s the title of an ABBA song but also a statement of personal belief.  I believe in angels!  I do.

I’m thinking about angels today for two reasons.  The first is that I’ve just come across a TV programme from a few years ago called Touched by An Angel.  In this series a group of three angels are tasked with bringing guidance and messages from God to various people who are at a crossroads in their lives.  It’s a challenging programme and one that God used to speak to me.

The other reason I’ve been thinking about angels is that I’ve been reading about Celtic Christian spirituality and several of the books have had chapters or sections on angels.  The accounts of the Celtic saints include stories of encounters with angels.  The early life of Patrick incorporates a tradition that ‘the angel was wont to come to him on every seventh day of the week; and as one human talks with another, so Patrick enjoyed the angel’s conversation.’  Columba was once surrounded by angels as he prayed on Iona, the encounter witnessed by another monk.

The scriptures tell of encounters between human beings and angels.  The apostle Peter, for example, was rescued from a prison cell in Jerusalem by an angel who delivered him from certain death.  The Letter to the Hebrews tells us that the angels “are spirits who serve God and are sent by him to keep those who are to receive salvation.” (Hebrews 1:14)  As we approach Christmas we cannot help but remember the angel Gabriel who visited Mary to announce the good news of the incarnation.  Angels are mentioned in the books of Daniel and Revelations.

I have never seen an angel and so far all the accounts of their presence I’ve mentioned are from the past, from Biblical times or from early British history.  There are modern accounts of encounters with angels too, recounted by people of the highest integrity.  One of these accounts appears in a book by Billy Graham all about angels.  He tells of a missionary who, together with his family, was in fear of his life.  Their house was surrounded by a hostile tribe who vowed to kill them once darkness fell.  They prayed all night and the attack never came.  Some days later the missionary preached ion that tribe’s village and won many converts.  He asked one of them why the tribe hadn’t attacked them and received the reply that they couldn’t because the house was surrounded by an army of men in shining white robes!

A brother minister whose integrity I totally respect tells the story of how his car ran out of petrol one Christmas Eve on a deserted road in the middle of nowhere.  This was in the days before mobile phones so he couldn’t phone for help and he faced a long walk to get home for Christmas Day.  He sat in his car for an hour, wondering what to do and praying.  In the distance he then saw a pair of headlights coming towards him.  An ancient rusty car puttered up and an old man got out and asked if my friend needed some petrol.  He then produced a petrol can, with just enough in it to get my friend home.  After filling my friend’s tank he drove off and quickly disappeared.  My friend swears he hadn’t seen another car on that road that night and didn’t until he reached home.   He has often wondered if the old man was an angel that God sent to help him.

Some Christians dismiss the idea of angels because they feel that in this sophisticated scientific age to believe in the supernatural is at best naïve and at worse deluded.  They might even ask how somebody who calls himself a ‘thinking evangelical’ can believe in anything supernatural.  I cannot claim it is because I have knowingly had an encounter with an angel, though I would dearly love to.

I believe in angels and other supernatural things, including miracles, because of the accounts of honest people of the highest integrity.  I understand and celebrate the achievements and discoveries of science but do not accept that just because something cannot be scientifically proven or accounted for it does not exist.  Science is limited and does not and cannot explain and account for everything.  If I believed that something has to be scientifically proven to be real then I wouldn’t believe in God.

I believe in God and I believe in angels and hope very much that I will one day have the privilege of knowingly encountering one of these wonderful ministering spirits.

Stamping Out Sexism in the Church

I have never written a letter to a magazine letters page in my life.  I’ve written to the Methodist Recorder a couple of times, but never to a magazine, until last week.

It was the November issue of Christianity Magazine that prompted me to write; specifically a letter that they published complaining about the magazine publishing a news item about New Wine’s support for Women Bishops in the Church of England.  The correspondent repeated the trite and ill-informed position that the Bible forbids a woman to have authority over a man and suggests that it is the place of women to be meek and submissive.  Reading this letter made my blood boil and after several days of reflection I decided that such sexist and misogynistic attitudes cannot be left unchallenged.

This is actually just the latest instance of encountering sexist attitudes in the church.  I was recently speaking to a woman minister who told me about a man who had left her church when she became minister.  Apparently he’d said that he had nothing against her personally; he just didn’t agree with woman ministers (and this in the Methodist Church which has had woman ministers since the early seventies).  He thought, I’m sure, that he was being kind with his words, but you can’t really say you have nothing against somebody personally when you are rejecting them because of their sex.

I suppose that it is still possible, if you ignore Biblical scholarship, reason and experience to hold a position that the Bible forbids women in leadership, but it is a tenuous position.  The same Paul who supposedly forbade a woman to have authority over a man also wrote, “there are neither male nor female, Jew or Gentile, Slave or free but all are one in Christ Jesus.”  It is also clear from Paul’s letters that women had positions of authority in the early church and Paul calls some women “co-workers.”   Even if you believe that all scripture is basically the result of Divine dictation with the author merely acting as a scribe for God, you cannot ignore the passages that treat women as equals with authority as leaders, both in the New Testament and, yes, even in the Old Testament.

Very, very few Christians, if any, today would accept discrimination in the church on grounds of race.  A letter written to a Christian magazine promoting a racist point of view simply wouldn’t be published, even if the write tried misquoting scripture to back up their argument.  To my mind sexism is just as unacceptable and evil as racism and should be treated by the church in just the same way.  Both denigrate human beings because of who they physically are, both fail to recognise that the image of God is in every human being and both fail to love our neighbour as we love ourselves.

It really is time that sexism in the church became a thing of the past!