Life in the Pandemic IX: Non-convention(al) Keswick

Keswick without the convention, isn’t quite like Anfield or old Trafford without the fans, but there are similarities. The buzz of coming together with thousands of others with a common purpose is hard to beat. It taps into our basic constitution as social beings. But here we are in a pandemic. And one in which, when the threat has loomed large, that collectivist instinct has come to the fore. Ironically we’ve banded together against the common invisible enemy, by hunkering down in our separated households. Of course, there has been technology to help us out. And indeed in a few days’ time there will be a “virtual”, technologically delivered “Keswick”. But it won’t be the same, will it?

By now many of us are used to existing on a diet of Zoom or Teams meetings (other video conferencing technologies are available), some small and some large. We’ve delivered or listened to seminars, asked or answered questions, met, discussed and made decisions. In other words we’ve done most of the things we’d normally do, just in a slightly different way. There have been differences of course. Online meetings probably require slightly more concentration, and seem to be more draining. Many of us have had to catch up on the etiquette (or netiquette) of the online world. And how quickly the media and politicians learned that it was important to sit in front of an impressive, well-stocked bookcase, particularly if the occasional, significant title was turned face on to the camera.

For months now, church too has been online. All the familiar elements are still present: notices (of course), hymns and songs, talks for children, sermons for adults. There have been some advantages of “doing” church this way. No one can see you turning up late. No need to skulk at the back if you are, or make your way to the only available seats (which are always at the very front). No need to dress up (or down). The guitars are always in tune, the singer/singers always on key. And if the sermon is a bit boring, no one can see you scrolling through the Facebook feed on your phone. Or even getting up and going to make a cup of tea. Or (perish the thought) switching off and opting out (if you “turned up” at all).

The objective in coming to Keswick at this time of year is precisely to turn up at the big tent and do many of the same things mentioned above. I know that to some this will seem like a strange way to spend a holiday (something I’ve written about previously). But the Keswick Convention has, for a very long time, provided Bible teaching to a high standard and fairly relaxed worship in a beautiful setting. There’s always the opportunity to dip in and dip out, and intersperse the teaching with other elements of the British summer in the Lake District (walks and ice cream in the rain). And of course conversation with like-minded others – fellowship. This year we’ve had the rain, and we’ve had the ice cream, the surroundings have been beautiful, but we haven’t had the teaching, reflection and fellowship. And it makes a difference.

A crowd always does make a difference. From the mob in ancient Rome requiring bread and circuses to keep them pacified, to the torch-wielding faithful of the Nuremberg rallies, crowds have always been more than the sum of their human parts. The strange, sometimes scary, dynamic of crowds has long been an object of study. Le Bon’s theories from the late 19^th Century are still quoted today. He wasn’t very impressed with crowds. You can find a whole Government manual on how to deal with crowds prepared by the Emergency Planning College (part of the UK Cabinet Office). More trivially, crowds can do some things better than the individuals that comprise them, particularly where expertise plays no particular role. If you have a glass jar full of jelly babies, and ask people how many there are in the jar, the answer averaged over many individual guesses (ie the answer of a crowd) is more likely to be accurate than most of the individual answers. This advantage is dwarfed by the more familiar disadvantages of crowds and their effects on the constituent individuals. People do and say things in football crowds they would never think of doing standing as an individual in the middle of a street. And crowd (or mob) justice is of course, rarely justice at all.

Christian crowds are, at a minimum just that – crowds. At least in history, apparently Christian crowds have been just a capable of excess as any other kind. They are composed of human beings with all the peril that can bring. But precisely that observation shows why they are also important. Human beings are designed to meet and act together. For a Christian crowd, while there obviously are activities to be avoided, some are certainly to be engaged in. Learning together, being taught in a crowd, is something that Jesus Himself was interested in. He taught crowds, and indeed cared for crowds, and was interested in crowds, as much as He was also interested in and taught and cared for individuals. And it seems that while He dealt with and interacted with individuals, it was also often with a view to  teaching a usually much larger group that was looking on. The idea of the gathering is fairly basic to what’s going on in much of the New Testament.

A crowd of course can be any size beyond a minimum, and the minimum appears to be quite small (3?). Even to the smallest crowd, Jesus promises His presence (Matt 18:20), where He is the purpose of the gathering. And many of the things He expects us to do as churches (a name for a particular kind of Christian crowd), are expectations of us as churches, not just individuals. So while we can, and should, pray on our own, we are expected to pray together. While we can read and learn on our own (and should), we should be doing these things together, and indeed publicly. While I can sing on my own (and that’s the way most folk probably prefer it), I’m expected to gather with others to sing. Indeed, I’m supposed to sing to (at?) others, as they are enjoined to sing with and to me (Col 3:16).  We are to benefit from being together and doing things together. Some of this will be the common the benefit of the crowd, plus an awful lot more. But for months now we’ve been prevented from doing these things together, corporately.

It has been entirely legitimate for us not to meet in person for a period, partly because the Civil authority has told us that we can’t. And we understand their pandemic-related reasons for doing this. As in other areas of life, we have turned to technology, and been grateful for it. But it is not the same. Even outwith the pandemic, there has been the occasional suggestion that we don’t lose much by not gathering physically; that we can do Church “online”. This is misconceived at best. Technology has its benefits as a short-term, emergency, fix. But, fundamentally it doesn’t meet that requirement of meeting together that the New Testament is clear about (Heb 10:25). Listening to sermon online is just not the same for either preacher or congregation as joining together in the shared experience that we normally experience (see this post along the same lines). That personal, face to face, together in a crowd meeting, seems actually to be necessary for the stimulus and encouragement that we all need. 

Fuss about nothing, you might respond. After all, there is a sense in which we meet with Jesus remotely! It is only in one sense though – unlike you and me, He isn’t limited to a particular location. That said, we don’t “see Him now” (1 Pet 1:8). But of course our hope is that one day the situation will be transformed and we really will see Him, and be with Him, collectively. Is anyone seriously going to suggest that as good as things can be here and now (and Peter says that even in current circumstances we can know “joy inexpressible”), it won’t be better then?

So hopefully, one Sunday soon we’ll be back together the way we should be. And hopefully, by this time next year, we be gathering in Keswick for the 2021 convention, much as we've enjoyed just rain and ice cream this year.

Life in the Pandemic VIII: So many goodbyes….

There are many folk who are grieving these days and having to say their goodbyes. While some probably knew the time was approaching when an older relative, spouse or friend was going to leave this life, they didn’t think it would come so soon, precipitated by an unknown virus, in the midst of a global pandemic. For others death has arrived as an unwelcome, unexpected surprise and shock. And there have been those stunned by an overwhelming sense of injustice at a young life cut tragically short. No death is just a statistic. Each one leaves grief in its wake. Every death matters, just as much as every life.

As long as there have been people, there has been death. It is the inevitable last experience of our lives here, all of which follow a pattern. We move from our earliest memories, on a journey via definable phases and critical events. Shakespeare likened life to a play (of course he did) and talked about how men and women have their  “..exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts; His acts being seven ages.”(1). Less poetically perhaps, I remember enjoying 18^th and 21^st birthday parties with friends. Then it was University graduations and rounds of weddings. There was the arrival of kids (for most), and catching up with family exploits in the occasional Christmas epistle (some of which I actually read). I’m just getting to the stage of metallic wedding anniversaries and those milestone birthdays as the decades accumulate. And also for me, now there is that gradually souring note of parents, aunts and uncles being lost; a hint of what’s to come. The deaths of celebrities and others I grew up with, some I looked up to, are becoming more frequent. The diseases of ageing are beginning to take their toll on my contemporaries. A cancer scare here and there. And instead of births and birthdays, I know it that eventually there will be funerals and condolences. And then….

Fair enough, I know that this might be a bit morbid, but I’m thinking that it needn’t be. I’ll admit that the pandemic has encouraged morbid thoughts. Daily death statistics will do that to you. But we all know that we cannot live in this world forever, even if sometime we secretly think as though death won’t come for us, only other people. In our general culture too, pre-pandemic, death had perhaps become remote, the business of various professionals, leaving the rest of us to get on with living. So thoughts of it could be suppressed, and squeezed down into the farthest, dark recesses of our minds. The pandemic has changed that, at least for the moment. But as well as the pandemic I have two other reasons that have caused me to reflect on this. The first is, as it happens, a death, the second is a book.

Last Tuesday I heard of the death of a man called Peter Maiden(2). I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t know me, although we met on a couple of occasions. He came from, and never moved far from, Carlisle (in the northwest of England, up near the Scottish border). He was widely known as the International Director of a missionary organisation called Operation Mobilisation from 2003 to 2013 (although he had been involved with OM since 1974) and he was a trustee of the Keswick Convention. I heard him teach the Bible on a number of occasions. And although I can’t honestly remember any of the specifics, what does stick in my memory is his manner – gracious, humble, straightforward. Others have been speaking and writing about his influence on them through his teaching, leadership and books. Now, to be honest, his death is not that of a close friend of relative. There are many folk who will be grieving for him in a way that I am not. But I am aware of a loss. He was one of those people who served as a marker for me along the route of my journey. Not just a marker of the way, but a marker of the destination. His teaching and living pointed to a life beyond this life, that in many ways is more important than this life. He devoted his life to sharing and teaching what he took to be the words of God. In the process he was used to influence many thousands, including me. His death is, of course, a demonstration of his mortality, but it is to me a reminder of mine. His life here has ended, something he was prepared for, knowing that more was to come. I wonder - was he deluded to think like this? Were those he influenced deluded? Was (or am) I deluded? I don’t think so.

The book I mentioned above is the snappily titled “Evangelicalism in Britain 1935-1995” by Oliver Barclay(3). I confess it wasn’t one of the ones I mentioned in my last post as being on my summer reading list. I met Oliver Barclay too, when I was a PhD student in the 1980’s, at a Research Scientists Christian Fellowship (now Christians in Science) conference. He belonged to a very different generation, but was a clear and long-sighted thinker, encourager and organiser. In particular, he played a key role in the development of the Intervarsity Fellowship (now UCCF), the organisation that links and supports Christian Unions in universities and colleges in the UK. In the book, he relates the work and struggle of many men and women, who established the evangelical culture and infrastructure that I and many others depended on as we grew and matured in our Christian thinking. There were those who ministered in churches in University cities throughout the UK, with a clear commitment to the transforming truth of the Bible. There were resources like commentaries, and books in critical areas of apologetics, written from a robust evangelical perspective. He mentions the work of many who are now obscure to many of us. And the book stops in 1995 - a quarter of a century ago. As I read Barclay’s book, I found I was reading of many who seemed like giants – Martin Lloyd Jones, J.I. Packer, John Stott and many others beside. Markers for my journey, marking it out even before it began, now receding into the distance. These  were men and women, whether I encountered them personally or not, to whom I owe a great debt. They made the way easier for me, very often at cost to themselves. They were passionate about God and His word. They lived it as well as taught it. They weren’t supermen and women, they weren’t heroes to be placed on high pedestals; every single one of them had his or her flaws. But they were critical to me and many others. And one of the keys that comes out of Barclay's book is the utter centrality of that other book. To them it was the book of God’s words, a notion that the world they inhabited derided even more strongly than it is derided today. Their conviction and claim was that by teaching it and living it, they were encountering and living for the God who made, saved and sustained them.

The book was and is the Bible (of course), and its key message is the good news (the Gospel) of Jesus Christ. When others turned their back on its truth as truth, the Maidens and Barclays and their ilk believed, lived, taught and shared it, and encouraged others to do the same. I was one of those so encouraged. And ultimately it is the Bible and the God who stands behind it and is revealed in it, that provides not just the markers along the way, but the very way itself. It is a way does not end in bereft goodbyes. Don’t get me wrong, goodbyes there are and will be. Oliver Barclay moved on from this life in  2013, and I'm sure there was sadness and loss. And there will be a funeral in Carlisle at some point soon, with grief and grieving. There will be goodbyes along my journey, until it too, reaches an inevitable destination. But the Gospel is so powerful that it transforms these goodbyes. Death here is the destination of one part of our journey, but it is not the terminus. For those of us who have encountered, trusted and followed Jesus, the goodbyes are accompanied by a transforming hope that takes us beyond death and the grave, through resurrection to safety. And they are then followed by a welcome to a whole new journey.

1. William Shakespeare. “As you like it”, Act II Scene VII.

2. For tributes see https://www.uk.om.org/InMemoryOf/peter-maiden 
or https://keswickministries.org/a-tribute-to-peter-maiden/

3. Oliver R Barclay. Evangelicalism in Britain 1935-1995. A personal sketch. IVP.
  https://ivpbooks.com/evangelicalism-in-britain-1935-1995-pb

Life in the Pandemic VII: Don’t panic, there’s still plenty of books to read…

Frank Zappa is quoted as having said “So many books, so little time”. But of course, for a while now, many of us have had considerably more time for reading than we bargained for, thanks to the pandemic and the lockdown. I’ve been going to work in my dining room for the last few months, so as it turns out I haven’t had a lot of extra reading time. But I have enjoyed a few notable (and eclectic) pandemic reads…so far.

As I’ve noted inside its front cover, my first lockdown read was Alistair McGrath’s biography of C.S. Lewis(1). To my mind both the author and the subject are interesting characters. McGrath is interesting because he began his academic sojourn in the world I am most familiar with. His initial calling was to science, eventually obtaining his Oxford DPhil in molecular biophysics. However, around the time he went up to Oxford, he discovered that there were other, complimentary ways of investigating and understanding the world around him, including theology. And it was to theology he turned, and in which he has made his mark. Lewis, along with other authors and scholars, helped him to understand his journey, and it is perhaps this that explains his interest in Lewis. McGrath’s approach as a biographer turns out to be quite scientific, because in order to master his subject, his approach was to immerse himself in the data - in Lewis’ case his published writings, broadcasts and, importantly, his letters. I came to Lewis in my teens, although I confess that I have still to read the Narnia books. My introduction to him was his science fiction trilogy (“Out of the Silent Planet”, “Voyage to Venus”, and “That Hideous Strength”) from which I moved on to books like “Mere Christianity” and “The Screwtape Letters”. What these don’t particularly reveal is much about the man himself. But McGrath does this forensically, although from a sympathetic standpoint. In doing so he reveals a complex character, flawed (as we all are) in many ways, navigating his way through two world wars and the cultural upheavals of the 20^th century. It is well worth a read.

Much harder work, but no less rewarding, was Peter Sanlon’s “Simply God”(2). This isn’t bedtime reading, but it addressed something that’s bothered me for a while. As readers of this blog will know, I’m interested in God. Admittedly my interest is more personal than academic, but that doesn’t mean I’m somehow exempt from doing hard thinking about Him. And one of the dangers I’ve become aware of is that I come to see Him as simply a bigger and better version of me. This is in part the age old issue of creating God in my image, instead of recognising that I’m created in His. Of course, I’m not alone. Arguably this is fallen humanity’s biggest and most devastating mistake, stretching all the way back to Eden and the Fall. And it’s pervasive. The “gods” of the ancient world were just big versions of their Canaanite, Babylonian, Persian, Greek and Roman inventors. The “straw-God” of the new atheists is/was just a big version of what they observed/observe in humanity around them. More worryingly the God who is the object of some contemporary evangelical prayer and worship often seems to suffer from similar deficits. But Sanlon’s starting point is that this is a total misconception. Yes we are created in His image, but it is a fundamental mistake to see in this the idea that the difference between us and Him is quantitative. It turns out (and no real surprise here if you’ve been paying attention) that He is a totally different type of being. The gap between Him and us is way bigger than, and of a completely different order to, the gap between a person and a paramecium. This causes an obvious problem. How are we to understand Him if He is so different? Thankfully, it turns out that He has provided help towards exactly this end, because He wants to be known. So He has revealed things about Himself in ways that we can understand. Not being able to understand everything, shouldn't stop us from trying to understand something. Starting with God’s simplicity (which in this context has a particular meaning and significance) Sanlon investigates God as He is revealed. And there is an interesting subtext. I may be reading more into Sanlon’s writing than is there (for which I apologise in advance), but I think he’s fairly angry about the small of view of God that many of us carry around in our heads. I think he’s right to be angry about this (if he is). And to the extent that this book helped me to understand that my view of God had been inaccurate, weak and impoverished, I’m more than happy to apologise! Hard work, but a good read.

A third lockdown read that I’ll mention is completely different. It’s John Searle’s “Seeing Things as They Are”(3). This book has nothing to do with theology. Searle is a UC Berkeley philosopher, as far as I know not a believer, with little interest in theology. I discovered him through his “Chinese Room” argument which appeared in the late 70’s/early 80’s; this seeks to show why brains are not computers and why computers cannot be conscious (or at least conscious in the way that you and I are). He writes with a compelling and elegant clarity. Not that I would claim to always follow his arguments fully, I’m sure I miss a lot. I am after all, just a scientist not a philosopher. But I always get the feeling that there’s something in his arguments, and that it’s worth paying attention. “Seeing..” is an attempt to explain consciousness, in this case the kind of consciousness that is involved in the process of perception. While many regard consciousness as a mystery (and some have argued that it is a mystery that can’t be solved), for Searle there is no mystery, once we think about it clearly enough. The mystery results from confusing categories, and holding on to philosophical baggage and bad arguments from the past. This one’s been keeping me going for a while. So quite handy in a pandemic.

And as if this were not enough already, I’ve just ordered my holiday reads. A similarly eclectic bunch including Stephen Westaby’s “The Knife’s Edge”, George Zuckerman’s “The Greatest Trade Ever Made”, and on the theological front Peter Hick’s “Evangelicals and Truth”. So many books. But then the pandemic isn’t over.

1.       McGrath A (2013) “C.S. Lewis: A Life”. Hodder & Stoughton.

2.       Sanlon P (2014) “Simply God”. IVP.

3.       Searle JR (2015) “Seeing Things As They Are”. Oxford University Press.