As I’m a theology student…….

In my former life, conferences played an important role. Far from being mere “jollies”, they provided key opportunities to both hear and share the latest ideas and to network with the community. There were always issues big and small to be aware of. There might be specific new insights or results of real relevance in my own immediate vicinity of the scientific universe. Or there might be big new themes or the re-emergence of old ones that would be context forming and therefore had to be noted. And because science is a team game, conferences provided a space for personal interaction. As the pandemic raged and conferences (if they occurred at all) moved online, it was suggested that this would become the standard going forward. For the big international meetings it saved time and money (and it was good for the planet). But something was lost without the personal face-to-face encounters across continents that conferences provided. So post-pandemic they’ve come roaring back.

But that was then and this is now. After about forty years, I am again a student and neophyte. So I thought I should probably go to the odd theology conference. I was at last year’s Newton House conference in Oxford. But that was a bit of a home fixture because of the association with Union where I am studying. So when I saw that Affinity (formerly the British Evangelical Council) was holding a “Theological Study Conference”, that seemed to fit the bill. I duly headed to Northampton last week for three days on the topic of “Priorities for the Rising Generation”. Here are some observations (in no particular order).

Conferences, particularly those that have been running for a while, are usually composed of regulars (the majority) and newbies. The Affinity conference takes place every two years, and didn’t run two years ago because of COVID. That meant that quite a high proportion of the attendees were newbies. This was probably to the benefit of many of us. That said, quite a lot of folk knew each other from other networks in which they served or to which they belonged. But right from the start there was what I would call friendliness+. I’ve always found that people at conferences are reasonably friendly. After all, no-one is forced to be there, and usually there is a sense of shared purpose. But what linked me to colleagues at the conferences I used to attend were external factors in the main. The Affinity conference had that, but (and this would apply to other gatherings of Christians) we were also linked internally. In additional to a series of outward characteristics and observable shared motivations, there was that instant family rapport and familiarity often experienced when Christians come together. There was an instant ease with each other.

There is another interesting aspect to this that some might find surprising. After all Christians, particularly evangelicals, often have a reputation for not getting on, and for falling out over what, to many non-Christians, seem like trivia. I have no doubt there were lots of issues that we could have found to disagree about, and some are not trivial. Folks had come together from a wide range of churches, committed to different forms of church government, believing different things about baptism, with different ways of celebrating the Lord’s Supper. And yet the genius of evangelicalism is that it has always been possible to distinguish between primary and secondary issues (with an admittedly fuzzy boundary between them). There are those things that are central in Scripture (those great Gospel truths like the identity, life, work, death and resurrection of Jesus, the character of God and man as revealed) and those which are more debatable leading to legitimate discussion and variation in practice among those who all accept the truth, authority and sufficiency of Scripture (how often to celebrate the Lord’s supper, what mode of baptism to practice, never mind the type of songs to sing in worship). What one ends up with is a unity without uniformity that is much closer than is often enjoyed by those nominally belonging to the same institution. There is a contrast here with what was on display at the recent General Synod of the Church of England, although this was but the latest outworking of tensions that have existed within that particular body from its sixteenth century beginnings. Despite debate over the label “evangelical” and its usefulness, there is some continuing value to it when it is properly defined and realised.

But back to the conference. Papers had been pre-circulated so they could be read and digested before we pitched up in Northampton (they will eventually be published in the Affinity journal "Foundations"). So at the conference itself they were only briefly summarised with the bulk of the time spent discussing them in groups. This provided an opportunity to get to grips with the material, but also to reflect collectively on it. I found myself in a group with a rare blend of wisdom and wit, experience and perspective. Most were experienced pastors and ministers with years of service between them in all sorts of settings. There were leaders of national organisations, and some with other experience and expertise (including a publisher and a former GP). This was one of the most enjoyable aspects of the conference for me. It was a pleasure to listen to them, and they (graciously) occasionally listened to the new boy. Sometimes the discussion did range rather far from the topics in question, and to that extent things were probably not quite as focussed and disciplined as at more academic conferences and some of those I attended in a previous life. But this was because the conference attendees were in large measure pastors not academics. It brought a warmth and practicality to the issues being discussed.

I’m sure that there are more academically rigorous conferences out there, and I may even get to go to few. But I’m glad I was able to spend this few days in the company of such brothers and sisters grappling with and reflecting on some serious and difficult issues for now and the future. 

Messiness and main things

It can be very easy to fall out with people, something all human beings seem to have a talent for. Sometimes religious people in general, and Christians in particular (particularly those at the Protestant/Evangelical end of the spectrum) get singled out for being key exemplars of this propensity. Given that, it is worth pointing out that the Monty Python joke about “splitters” has much more to do with politics than religion, suggesting that this really is a human, not specifically Christian, frailty.

Unity is of course important. In philosophy it has been a matter of debate from Plato and Aristotle forward. In politics, it is valued because of the perception that people don’t vote for divided and disunited political parties (a rule most recently restated by Nadhim Zahawi, Boris’ final chancellor). More importantly for me, it is enjoined by the Psalmist  (Ps 133:1 – “how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity”) and prayed for by Jesus (John 17:21 – “..that they may all be one..”). But unity is one of those odd things that while important, is not really of value in an of itself. Just as faith can only ever be as strong as its object, so unity is only of value where there is something (or someone) to unite around. This brings us back to splitting.

One of the accusations constantly thrown at the Reformers in the sixteenth century was essentially that they were “splitters”. They were introducing division into the church that had no business being there. The point was often made that it would not end well; once a splitter, always a splitter (partly the Python’s point). It was predicted that once the split had occurred from Rome there would be other splits, until the whole reforming project ran into the sand. Where previously there had been glorious unity under Rome, there would be all these fissiparous protestants, both defacing the beauty of the church, and generally causing lots of trouble. And it did rather look like this for a while. Except for a couple of things.

The unity of Rome was both around the wrong object and was in part illusory. The human institution of the church, with its accretion of prelates and both extrabiblical and unbiblical ritual, with its devotion to international politics and political rather than spiritual leadership, had moved so far from the church as instituted at Pentecost as to be unrecognizable. It had become a barrier to the saving truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, not its doorway. Even so, even Luther recognized a high threshold for secession, and his original intent was reform rather than schism. That door, if ever open, was swiftly closed against him. In any case, Luther faced a situation in which no-one was entirely sure what the truth really was that everyone was supposed to unite around. He was active during a period of theological pluralism, when even for key ideas (including some that would become hotly contested like justification) the right line was often ill-defined. The production of Erasmus’ new translation of Scripture, a great improvement on the Vulgate, had the effect of showing up that in certain areas what had become accepted truth was far from it. The institution, when challenged, reacted with hostility. A split became both inevitable and unbridgeable where truth was defined by God in His Word, as opposed to a human institution.

And while it still looks to some that chaos was the result, chaos that is still with us, this is surprisingly deceptive. That central role of Scripture as defining truth has another important aspect to it. Some things are both true and necessary – get them wrong and the consequences can be eternally disastrous. Deny them, and the outcome is likely to be as unpleasant. It is clear that Jesus is not just a great teacher or prophet, but God and man. As hard as this is to get our heads around, undermine, redefine or deny the truth of who Jesus is, relegate the truth of His life, death and resurrection to opinion, and the Gospel is emptied of its transforming relevance and power. This hypothesis has, as it happens, been tested in contemporary Europe (including the UK) and North America, and the results may be clearly observed. However, it is less clear whether it is necessary for Christians to meet at 10.30am every Sunday morning, sit in wooden pews and sing songs written prior to the nineteenth century only accompanied by a pipe organ. In the New Testament there is teaching about some of things we should do as Christians, and in some cases the way in which we should do them. But there is surprisingly little practical detail, leaving ample scope for a legitimate spectrum of practice. This has not prevented some Christians from falling out over details that Scripture simply does not supply.

John Newton, former trafficker in human slaves, writer of “Amazing Grace” and latterly Church of England vicar and rector wrote “If a man is born again, hates sin, and depends upon the Saviour for life and grace, I care not whether he is an Arminian or a Calvinist.” I think Newton puts it rather well. Essentially he was saying that we should keep the main things the main things, and not fall out over the other stuff. And this was the genius of the eighteen century revival and awakening. Even though there were fallings out, and the big one was the Calvinist/Arminian division between John Wesley and George Whitefield (the one referred to by Newton, and one that still exists today), there was an underlying unity in the Gospel. Even the division between Wesley and Whitefield should not be overstated; they found a way to work if not together then at least with a degree of harmony. Wesley famously preached Whitefield’s memorial sermon in 1770.

Of course there will always be a legitimate debate about what the main things actually are, and where the border really is between main and secondary issues. I think Newton summarises them well. There are primary issues, those necessary for salvation, and then there are secondary issues. We can debate these, and perhaps we should, but we should not be falling out about them. Because some have fallen out about them in the past, we find a range of different groups, and it can all look a bit messy. And yet I have always found so much in common with fellow believers in, and followers of Jesus, that there has always been a degree of unity for all to enjoy. This unity, based on God’s Word, is the sort of thing experienced at places like Keswick.

Keep the main things the main things and it turns out things are not as messy as they first appear.