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!

Reflections on Remembrance Sunday

I was eight years old and hadn't long been in the Cub Scouts when we were told that we all had to turn up to church on Sunday because it was Remembrance Sunday and we would be marching from the Methodist Church to the local war memorial for the Act of Remembrance.  It was a bitterly cold day with a strong biting wind.  In those days grey short trousers were part of the Cub uniform.  As we marched to the war memorial I was shivering violently with the cold and I could feel the goose bumps peppering my legs.  We passed a little old lady who commented, "Isn't it nice to see little boys in short trousers!"  I'm a Christian Minister and so I can't repeat the murderous thoughts that went through my head!

Remembrance Sunday has always been a difficult day for me.  As a committed pacifist I was always uneasy with aspects of Remembrance Sunday and for many years did not wear a poppy, red or white.  As a Local Preacher I always blocked Remembrance Sunday on the Plan so that I wouldn't have to take a Remembrance Day service.  I did take one as a Local Preacher, when I forgot to block it, but as I was at a church that didn't go to the local war memorial until the afternoon I got away with a service that only briefly referred to Remembrance.

This year was different.  This year I am a Probationer Minister in The Methodist Church and I had no choice about taking a Remembrance Day service and, as it turned out, leading the Act of Remembrance at the war memorial.

As I thought about my love of peace my mind drifted back to a school trip I made to Belgium when I was fifteen.  We were visiting some of the museums and sites associated with World War 1.  I'll never forget standing in the remains of a trench and wondering what it would have been like to climb out of the trench, rifle in hand, and run towards the enemy trenches, knowing I faced an almost certain death before I'd advanced not more than a few feet.  I'll never forget standing in one of the war cemeteries surrounded by white stone crosses and headstones, each one of them representing the life of a man killed in that terrible war.  It was at that moment, as I thought about the terrible waste of human life that the First World War and, indeed, all wars represented that I became a confirmed pacifist.

"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God" said Jesus.  How could I square my pacifism with remembering those who gave their lives in war and celebrating their undoubted bravery?  The more I thought about it the more I realised that many of those who go to war do not do so because they love war, but because they love peace and believe that peace is worth fighting for.


I know that I could never take the life of another human being, that I could never go to war as a soldier and fire weapons at other human beings; but what I can do and tried to do on Sunday, is to honour the courage and bravery of those who did lay down their lives in the cause of freedom, security and peace. 

I even wore a red poppy this year in their honour!

The Storms of Life

In 1951 comedian Red Skelton and a party of friends flew to Europe, where Skelton was to appear at the London Palladium. As they were flying over the Swiss Alps, three of the airplane’s engines failed. The situation looked very grave and the passengers began to pray. Skelton went into one of his best comic routines to distract them from the emergency as the plane lost height, coming closer and closer to the ominous-looking mountains. At the last moment the pilot spied a large field among the slopes and made a perfect landing. Skelton broke the relieved silence by saying, “Now, ladies and gentlemen, you may return to the evil habits you gave up 20 minutes ago.”

Fresh out of Oxford, John Wesley was perplexed over England's complicated social problems: slavery, economic uncertainties, corruption, drunkenness, gambling, and prostitution. This deeply religious, sensitive soul became a parish minister and, subsequently, a missionary to American Indians along the coast of Georgia. His ministries were far from successful. Disappointed and discouraged, he returned to Britain.

During the voyage, his ship was raked by a raging storm. Wesley was unashamedly frightened. In fact, the only calm persons aboard were Moravian missionaries. Noticing their behaviour, Wesley asked if they were not afraid. "Why should I be afraid," one answered, "I know Christ."

Like the young John Wesley the disciples in the boat on the Sea of Galilee were afraid, very afraid, afraid that they were about to lose their lives.  Despite the fact that it is a large inland freshwater lake rather than a true sea, the Sea of Galilee is subject to ferocious storms.  Even modern sailors on Galilee fear those sudden storms that blow up out of nowhere, so it isn’t hard to imagine how afraid the disciples were in their small wooden sailing boat.  Some of them were experienced fishermen who had sailed on Galilee hundreds of times; they were afraid because they knew that there was a very real possibility than the storm would sink the boat and they would all lose their lives.

Can you think of a time when you were afraid; perhaps when either your life or the life of somebody you love was in danger?  A friend at college told me of a time when he was afraid because he was sure that he was going to die.  He was approaching a road junction a few years ago when a lorry pulled out in front of him.  In the few seconds it took for the collision to take place time seemed to slow down: He knew that there was no way he would stop the car in time and there was no way he could steer around the lorry.  He felt very, very afraid and it was only in the final moments before the collision that he felt a deep sense of peace as he remembered that as a Christian Christ was with him and that even if his earthly life ended he would go on to eternal life in heaven.  Sitting in the wreck of the car after the collision, having sustained only whiplash and a broken finger, he was amazed at how strong his faith was at that point just prior to collision and he realised that it was a special gift in that moment from God.

The disciples had every reason to be afraid and yet their fears were groundless because Jesus was with them in the boat, just as Jesus was with my friend in that car.  Jesus was asleep with his head on a pillow, unconcerned by the howling wind and the waves tumbling over and around the boat because he had faith in his Father to protect them all.

The disciples, of course, didn’t understand this; they thought that Jesus just didn’t care about them.  They woke Jesus with the words, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”  These are harsh words to direct at anybody, let alone the Son of God.

Jesus acted instantly he was awake; he stilled the storm and pounding waves with the simple words, “Quiet!  Be Still!”

In this instant Jesus revealed something about himself to the disciples; something they perhaps weren’t ready for.  They had witnessed Jesus perform miracles before, healing people and casting out demons, miracles that had been performed by prophets in centuries past; but here Jesus was displaying a power they believed could only be exercised by God himself.  If Jesus could still the storm with a few simple words, what did that say about the identity of Jesus?   Their words betray their confusion: “Who is this?  Even the wind and waves obey him?”  Eventually they would understand who Jesus was an is; just as we know who Jesus was and is: God incarnate come to earth to teach us how to live and show us how to love and to die on the cross so that we might receive forgiveness for our sins and the promise of eternal life.  For now, however, Jesus was a mystery to them.

Why were the disciples so afraid?  It seems incredible to us that the disciples were so afraid when Jesus was right there with them in the boat.  We know who Jesus was and is!  We are sure that in a similar situation we would not be afraid, but I think that most of us here will be able to point to times when we have been afraid and Jesus was right there with us, because the risen Jesus is always with each and every Christian person every single moment of their lives.

I have just finished my training in Durham for Presbyteral ministry in the Methodist Church.  At the beginning of my first week in Durham in my first year I went on a coach trip with my fellow Student Ministers to Barnard Castle.  On the way back the coach developed a braking fault and was vibrating alarmingly as the driver tried to bring it to a safe halt.  I was terrified, certain that I was going to die and was told later that all the blood drained from my face.  The fact that I was in a coach full of student ministers gave me no reassurance that God would protect us and it should have done, because he did.  At that moment I am ashamed to say that I had very little faith.

There are times in all our lives when the storms of life threaten to overwhelm us.  Some who teach the unbiblical prosperity gospel tell us that when we become Christians our lives will be wonderful and problems will be a thing of the past.  This is dangerous, unbiblical and untrue teaching!  Jesus didn’t promise to protect his followers from trouble; indeed he said “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”  Jesus didn’t promise us an easy life, but he did promise that he would always be with us when he said, “Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”  Just as Jesus was with his disciples during the storm on the Sea of Galilee so he is with each one of us in our times of trouble, to help and guide us.

Many Christians can testify to Jesus’ presence and help in times of trouble.  Simon Peter, sitting in a cell in Jerusalem awaiting execution was rescued from his captivity by an Angel of the Lord.

Billy Graham tells the story of a Christian missionary who, together with his family, was trapped in a house surrounded by angry natives who wanted to kill them.  All night they prayed and were astonished to find they’d reached morning without being killed.  They also found the formerly hostile tribesmen strangely receptive to the gospel.  After several had been baptised the missionary asked the tribesmen why they hadn’t attacked.  “We couldn’t” they replied, “Your house was surrounded by a great army of men in white!”

Of course Jesus doesn’t always calm our storms for us; but even when he seems to be sleeping in the stern of the boat he is still with us, giving us faith and courage and guiding us through the storms of life until we reach safety.  If we come to Jesus in prayer and ask him for help he will never fail us.  He may not always give us the help we want, but he will always give us the help we need.  We may not realise at the time that Jesus was with us, but looking back we can almost always see that he was there.

Like the disciples in the boat on the Sea of Galilee we will face many storms, but we can know that just as he was with them, Jesus will be with us too; he will never leave us or forsake us but will be with us always, to the very end of the age.

(Adapted from a sermon preached at Cleveleys Park Methodist Church on 24th June 2012)

The Fruitful Field – Seeing The Bigger Picture!

There are times in life when we are forced to admit that we may be wrong, times when if we are to have any integrity as Christians we must say publically that we have been wrong.  Today I have to do that, today I have to eat humble pie and it’s a pretty large and tough slice.

When The Fruitful Field consultation began I was a Student Minister at Wesley Study Centre (WSC) in Durham and I admit that the main concern of many students was how the proposal for a single Connexional hub would impact WSC; certainly that was my own concern.  Indeed, I spent some days preparing an individual submission to the consultation arguing for the retention of WSC, along with Queens Foundation, Birmingham and Wesley House, Cambridge.  I admit that my focus was firmly on pre-ordination training of Student Ministers and that I gave very little thought to the wider training proposals to open up more training opportunities for Local Preachers, Lay Workers and other members of the Methodist Church.  This was partly because I was commenting in the main on the type of training I was currently undertaking but mostly because my focus was on trying to influence the committee to the view that WSC should continue as a pre-ordination training institution.

More recently I have engaged in debate in the UK Methodists group on Facebook concerning The Fruitful Field and again have basically centred my arguments around the need for WSC to stay open and to continue residential training for ordained ministry in The Methodist Church.  I have done so out of a sense of loyalty to the institution that I believe has prepared me very well to take up my station as a Probationer Minister (subject to Conference) in September.  I have done so out of a sense of loyalty and deep respect for the Director and staff of Wesley Study Centre.  I have done so because I believe that WSC’s links with Durham University Theology Department are important.  I have done so, finally, because I believe that St John’s College benefits from the presence of Methodist Student Ministers in its community and that Cranmer Hall (the Anglican training institution) benefits from its close partnership with WSC.

Basically my personal opposition to The Fruitful Field report was focussed on the fact that it would mean the closure of WSC as a residential training institution for Student Ministers.  I hadn’t thought too much about wider issues of training in the Methodist Church for anyone other than Student Ministers; I was failing to see the bigger picture.

The bigger picture is that training in the Methodist Church must be about much more than training those to be ordained as both academic and practical theologians.  It must be about training Local Preachers, not only those ‘On Note’ and ‘On Trial’ but also those who are fully accredited.  It must be about training Lay Workers for the important ministry that they undertake and it must be about making available learning for any Methodist member who is interested in deepening their discipleship and understand of the scriptures and theology.

The bigger picture is that, like it or not, the Methodist Church has limited financial resources.  Whilst available resources should not be the sole factor influencing the type and amount of training we deliver as a church; indeed we should really consider what training we need and then how we resource that training: we cannot do what we cannot afford if we are to be responsible stewards of the resources God has currently given to us.

The bigger picture is that the Fruitful Field report was written in an atmosphere of prayer and theological reflection, as stated in the report itself.  It is easy to be cynical about this, but I know at least one of those who sat on the committee and he is a committed Christian with high personal integrity as, I am sure, are the other members of that committee.  I truly believe that as they have worked on The Fruitful Field report they have tried to discern God’s leading and guiding in all they have done.

I am still sad that the Wesley Study Centre, a fruitful field in its own right, will not be part of the new vision of training for the Methodist Church of Great Britain.  I value the training I received there and the fellowship and love I found in that community more than I can truly say.  I am sad that the committed staff team at WSC will eventually move on to other things, disrupting their lives and those of their families: some may even face unemployment.  My love is with them, as are my prayers for their future.  God raised up WSC for a reason and perhaps that reason no longer exists, perhaps it is the right time for closure, sad and perhaps angry though that may make staff and students and former staff and students feel.

I am sad, but also a little excited too.  Excited to be part of a church that dares to look at its whole system of training and education and do something new so that many more people can benefit from formation, learning, training, theological education, scholarship, research and development.

As a very good friend of mine said on Facebook, sometime we have to “prune the fruitful branches that the vine may be even more fruitful.”  As Jesus said in Johns gospel, “every branch that does bear fruit he (God) prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.

We have two choices as Methodists; we can either oppose the Fruitful Field or accept the democratic decision of our elected Conference representatives to make sweeping changes in the areas of formation, learning, training, theological education, scholarship, research and development and work as a church to ensure that in these areas, as we should in all others, we offer to God the very best we are capable of giving.

The Privilege of Ordination

This last weekend I had the privilege, and it was indeed a privilege, of attending two Anglican Ordination Services where friends of mine were ordained as Deacons.  As a Methodist my own ordination, subject to my completing my time as a Probationary Presbyter, is two years away and so it was with a sense of anticipation that I witnessed my friends being ordained.

The first ordination service I attended was in Blackburn Cathedral on Saturday morning.  Not having attended an ordination service of any kind I wasn’t sure what to expect.  In the packed Cathedral there was sense of excitement and anticipation, a really strong sense that something very special was about to take place.  The choir struck up and the procession began, a procession of the choir, bishops, Cathedral dignitaries, attending clergy and the candidates for ordination.  I’m not normally a fan of all that pomp and ceremony, especially in church, but I did find it stirred me spiritually to see these men and women willing to dedicate themselves to God as ordained clergy, knowing all the hard work they have undertaken to prepare for life as ministers in the church.

The actual worship was very dignified and formal, as Cathedral worship often is and that kind of worship is not my usual way of encountering God, and yet I did, quite powerfully and profoundly.

One high point for me was when the bishop read the following words from the ordination liturgy:

“In the name of our Lord, we bid you remember the greatness of the trust in which you are now to share: the ministry of Christ himself,”

That is a sobering thought, sharing the ministry of Christ himself!  Whilst this same phrase isn’t in the Methodist Ordination liturgy I am still very aware that even as a Probationer Presbyter I will be sharing in the ministry of Christ himself.  What an awesome responsibility!  What a privilege!

The other high point was when the bishop placed his hands on the head of each Ordinand saying:

“Send down the Holy Spirit on your servant N
for the office and work of a deacon in your Church.”

Simple words, yet profound in their significance as each person arises no longer an Ordinand but a Deacon.  To see a friend receive this blessing of the Holy Spirit and the responsibility that comes with it was a very moving experience indeed.

The service in York Minster on Sunday morning was very similar, but equally a time of blessing, not only for the Ordinands but for many of those present as well.

My own Ordination, God willing, is two years away, but as I go into ministry as a Probationer Presbyter I will take with me the experience blessings I have personally received this weekend.