Kings Member Site

We are looking for up to 30 people to help us make Mobilise 2012 run smoothly and safely as Stewards. Could this be you?

When applying to Steward at Mobilise 2012, please note the following conditions:

1) that you will need to be available from mid-day Tuesday 10 April to 2pm Friday 13 April.
2) you will be allocated shifts for approximately half of the conference time.
3) as a thank you from us, we will reduce your booking price to just £50 (we will give you a refund if you have already booked in or a voucher code if you have yet to book in).
4) there are only 30 Stewarding positions available and will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.

A previously uneducated Prachi has worked very hard over the last year to finish her course in cosmetology

Prachi*, a 17-year-old girl who was rescued by police and Justice and Care in 2010, has graduated from cosmetology school and has started a job in a spa.

This is a big step for a previously uneducated Prachi who has worked very hard over the last year to finish her course in cosmetology through Save the Children, India.

Prachi, who had been forced to turn to prostitution because of her family’s poverty, had high motivation to learn. Right through her course, she envisioned a life for herself in which she could work and save money for the future. Keeping that ideal before her, she constantly pushed herself beyond what was asked of her. She would ask Justice and Care’s social workers, who have supported her since she was rescued,  to bring her books on English and General Knowledge because she believed it was important to know more about the world around her.

Prachi plans to save her earnings so that one day she can build a new and independent life for herself.

* name changed to protect identity

 

 

The What You Think Matters site has just passed its first anniversary.

In that time we’ve been visited 68,819 times (or 188.5 times per day), and in those visits people have viewed 155,813 pages (an average of 2.26 pages per visit). This suggests that however you arrive on the site, something keeps you interested enough to read at least one other page, and one in four of you then go on to read a third page.
 
We’ve published 248 articles, of which 16 are papers, 14 are by St Stuffed Shirt, and a vast swathe of the rest are by Andrew ‘I’d rather blog than sleep’ Wilson! (But some of the rest of us are also blogging elsewhere!*)
 
Our visitors have come from 146 countries from Azerbaijan to Zimbabwe (but mostly the UK and USA) and other than our own blogs, google, facebook, etc., our biggest referrers have been The Gospel Coalition, Trevin Wax, First Things and Patheos.
 
In my very first post on this blog I wrote that we were aiming to produce material that was interesting, cogent, real, had a dash of humour, and was wholesome. I think that – by and large – we have stuck to these objectives. If you’ve been following us for the past twelve months, or have just stumbled across the site, thanks for dropping by. I hope we see you again, and that WYTM manages to make it to its second birthday!
 
 
*Editor’s note: Some of you are also tweeting, which we notice Andrew hasn’t yet tried…

Should women be elders/overseers in local churches? That, in a nutshell, is the question that separates so-called egalitarians, who would say yes, from so-called complementarians, who would say no. (I say ‘so-called’, because lots of people who represent each of these positions think the terms are unhelpful and a bit annoying – but until new terminology emerges to the satisfaction of everybody, I’ll stick with the existing labels).

This isn’t the only issue that egalitarians and complementarians debate, but in a conversation where there are countless different positions and nuances, it’s the clearest area of disagreement; you’d be very unlikely to find a self-identifying complementarian who argued for female elders, or an egalitarian who didn’t. Stating the question like this has the added benefit of avoiding endlessly confusing discussions about ‘women in ministry’, ‘women preaching’, ‘women in leadership’ or whatever, when what people are actually talking about is whether women should be elders/overseers in local churches. I, for one, passionately support and encourage women in ministry, prophesying, deaconing, worship leading, preaching, teaching, leadership, missionary work, church planting and so on – as, I would argue, the New Testament does (Luke 24:10; Acts 18:26; 21:9; Rom 16:1-16; 1 Cor 11:5; Php 4:2-3; 1 Tim 3:11; Titus 2:3-5; etc) – but I still believe that only men should be elders. This post is a brief attempt to explain why.
 
My claim, building on my previous two posts on myths and facts in this debate, is that those who submit to the authority of God in Scripture should operate with the presumption of complementarianism. That is, the default setting of an evangelical ought to be that women should not serve the church as elders, and the burden of proof rests with those who would argue that they should. This burden of proof may or may not be met – that is exactly what the discussion is about – but unless it is, we should function as complementarians on the question of eldership. This is a very controversial claim today, but I make it for four and a half reasons.
 
Firstly, there is the presumption of obedience. Simply put, this is the hermeneutical conviction that, because of the shape of God’s big story in Scripture, we should assume that instructions addressed to New Testament believers are for us to obey today, unless we can be sure that they are not. I summarised this idea in my series on Scripture a few months ago:

Taking all these ideas together, then, I am arguing for something like a Five Act Play view of God’s story, and a commitment to obeying the imperatives addressed to new covenant believers, with the exception of commands clearly related to specific individuals (e.g. 2 Tim 4:13) and commands which clearly applied for a limited period (e.g. Matt 10:5-6; Acts 15:19-21). In a handful of cases, this may mean finding different physical symbols to express the spiritual reality the scriptures were highlighting. But usually, it will mean nothing more than hearing the words of God, and putting them into practice. Kind of like a man who built his house on rock.

 
So when we come across an instruction like “I do not permit a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man” (1 Tim 2:12), we operate with the assumption that we are to obey it, unless it is clearly limited to specific individuals or a specific period of history. We don’t ignore it until we’re persuaded that it applies to us; we follow it until we’re persuaded that it doesn’t. So unless it can be clearly shown, from the context, that Paul was aiming his instruction at some individuals and not others (like his “fetch the parchments” in 2 Tim 4:13), or that he expected it to be superseded within a few years (like Jesus’ “go nowhere among the Gentiles” in Matt 10:5-6), then we should assume that we should obey it. Even if, as with head coverings and brotherly kisses and the like, this requires translating the externals into our contemporary culture.
 
Secondly, there is the presumption of history. All other things being equal, if a debate is underway within evangelicalism, and the church through history has almost universally been on one side of the debate until the last few decades, then I would argue that the presumption ought to be that the church through history has been right. Previous generations of believers had the Holy Spirit in their midst, and read the Bible carefully and faithfully for centuries, and almost all of them concluded that women should not be elders/overseers in local churches; this carries weight, particularly since, as CS Lewis pointed out, older writers are often very good at pointing out ways in which our modern perspective can miss or even distort things in Scripture. That does not mean, of course, that the weight of opinion in church history has always been right (Luther springs to mind, along with many others). But it does mean that when the new idea comes along, the burden of proof rests with the new idea, not with the old one.
 
Thirdly, there is the presumption of specificity: the more specifically a New Testament passage addresses an issue, the more weight it should be afforded in deciding what to do about that issue. This should be common sense, really; there are two passages in the NT that clearly address the question of who is qualified to serve as an elder/overseer in a local church (1 Tim 3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9), so these should be the starting point for determining who is qualified to serve as an elder/overseer in a local church. (Not that you’d know this from reading the two heavyweight tomes on this subject, mind you: Piper and Grudem’s Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood and Pierce and Groothuis’ Discovering Biblical Equality have fifty-five chapters and two appendices between them, on a wide variety of biblical texts, yet none of them focus on either of these. What is all that about?)
 
The point is: both of these passages list their qualifications on the assumption that the elder/overseer will be a man. I find it hard to believe that, if God had wanted women elders/overseers in the church, he would have inspired the two passages that address this topic most directly to include several specifically male qualifications (faithful to his wife, managing his household well, keeping his children submissive), with qualifications for women coming later in each case (1 Tim 3:11; Titus 2:3-5). And I also think it improbable that this would have cropped up in two separate letters, had it not been standard practice (Paul includes almost identical requirements for villages across Crete as he does for the Artemis-worshipping metropolis of Ephesus). So in our church, when appointing elders, we pretty much go down these lists, and if someone fulfils all the qualifications - above reproach, faithful to his wife, managing his household well, not a lover of money, not violent, and so on - then they are qualified to be an elder/overseer. If they don’t, they aren’t.
 
Fourthly, there is the presumption of compatibility; the principle that statements which were compatible in Paul’s mind can and should be compatible in ours. If Paul felt able to (a) commend women deacons and co-workers, and celebrate the truth that in Christ there is no male or female, and yet also (b) urge that wives submit to their husbands, and women not teach or exercise authority over men, then it would appear that he did not see (a) and (b) as incompatible. That is, it does not work as a counterargument to complementarianism to say (as is so often said), ‘But in Paul’s gospel, there is equality between men and women.’ Of course, there absolutely is; but for Paul himself, this was not incompatible with insisting that particular roles be played by both genders in the home and in the church. If we were to parachute into Ephesus or Crete in the 60s and observe the churches there, we would presumably see communities in which men and women were esteemed as completely equal in the gospel, as well as communities in which the eldership authority rested with men. If Paul did not see those two as impossible to reconcile, then no matter how strong the cultural pressures, neither should we.
 
Fifthly, there is the very subjective, nebulous and touchy-feely presumption of counterculturalism (which I highly doubt to be a real word). This one won’t persuade anyone intellectually, I’m sure, but I’ll throw it in because at an emotional level, it may resonate with many. My idea here is that when two ideas within mainstream evangelicalism are in opposition to each other, all other things being equal, the more countercultural of the two – the one which the contemporary culture regards as the least acceptable – is likely to be correct. I say this because those on the unpopular side of the debate are, in all probability, only holding to their position because they are convinced it’s what the Bible says, whereas those on the popular side of the debate have not just their conviction about Scripture, but a host of other advantages when it comes to attracting people, evangelism, contextualization and cultural engagement, which may in some cases skew their interpretation. (The very laudable desire to end up with a Bible that is not sexist, for example, could cause people to raise the bar higher for complementarian arguments than for egalitarian ones, and I suspect it sometimes does). Put differently, I can imagine that many advocates of complementarianism, and young earth creationism, and [insert culturally unthinkable theological position here], would emotionally prefer not to hold the view they do, yet they do so anyway out of biblical conviction. That obviously doesn’t mean they’re always right – it might just mean they’re weird – but it nudges me towards presuming that they are, in cases where I’m not sure. And it certainly makes me very nervous of mocking them or attacking them for it; I don’t think 1 Corinthians 11 means Western women today should wear head coverings, but when I go to churches that do, I find myself filled with respect for their commitment to live biblically in the face of unpopularity.
 
Taken together, and with significantly more weight on #1, #3 and #4 than on the other two, I think these four and a half presumptions – of obedience, history, specificity, compatibility and counterculturalism – add up to the presumption of complementarianism. Egalitarians may be right that God wants women to be elders/overseers in local churches, but I think the burden of proof rests with them, and despite encountering many excellent people and many excellent scholars, some of whom are good friends of mine, I am not persuaded that they are. I will continue to listen, read, talk and write, and I am always open to further discussion, but for the moment, I will continue to pray that my daughter will prophesy, lead, teach, preach the gospel, lead worship, plant churches and reach nations – but not that she will be an elder. And I think she’ll be OK with that.
           

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Andrew’s next book, If God Then What? Wondering Aloud about Truth, Origins and Redemption, will be released in April, published by IVP.

Anyone who puts their faith in Christ is once and for all declared righteous by God. Romans 4:5 “However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.”

The implications of that are enormous!  Our behaviour doesn’t effect our righteousness before God (good or bad).  We can never be condemned as a result of sin.  Good works are irrelevant to our standing before God.

But, to those who have been made righteous, God also gives this command:  “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Peter 1:15).   His plan for us is to grow in personal character and hatred of sin to the point where we are completely like him (1 John 3:1-2).   This will certainly happen for every believer (Romans 8:30), although perfection will only fully come at Christ’s return, or the believer’s death.

God is calling us as his children into conformity to Christ.  Ultimately we are all conformed to something (parents, political view, peer pressure).  The only way we can be truly free is to conform to Christ and his character.

2 Cor 3:18 says the transformation is God’s work- that is it is is grace at work in us.  But, unlike justification, we have a part to play with our works.  See Col 3:5-10

Dan highlighted 5 keys to growing in holiness:

1) Expect Change.  Remind yourself that you have been called to reflect God’s perfect character.  Sadly we’re very used to explaining away our unchanging sinful behaviour by claming “that’s just they way I am”.  God’s called you to change!

2)Pray to Change.  Matt 5 “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be filled”. It’s a prayer God loves to answer.

3) Embrace God’s discipline. Heb 12:10 God disciplines us as a loving father does a child.  He does that so we may share in his holiness.  As God is sovereign, his discipline logically includes anything he allows to happen to us.  He can use all things to shape us for our good and make us more like him.

4) Bias to Action.   James 5:13-14  When trouble or sickness comes, the believer needs to take hold of it and take appropriate action- not just get despondent or bitter.

5)Take a long view.   James 1:2-4.   Consider all hardship and difficulty as progress towards the long term goal of your complete maturity and perfection as a believer.

Questions

1) The gift of righteousness.  Remember the circle.  Did that illustration speak to you?  Is permanent righteousness as a gift something you find hard or easy to accept?

2) In Ephesians 6 we’re commanded to take up the Breastplate of Righteousness-  what does that mean and how can that help us to live as a Christian?

3) Be holy.  What do you think it will look like for us to one day be completely righteous in behaviour as well as in name?  Will we all just become clones?!

4) What things make us hungry for growth in personal  holiness?  How do any of the 5 points Dan mentioned help in pursuing spiritual growth?

5) How would you like to see your character grow in the next 12 months?  Pray for one another

Poverty in Europe part 4

If you have been following the last three posts you will see that I have been reflecting on my long-term involvement in eastern Europe and helping churches there to provide real support for disadvantaged groups within their communities, such as the elderly, orphans, the sick, ex-prisoners and addicts.

In the last post, I began to reflect on the dilemma of balancing charitable support with help that enables more people to rise up from poverty and become more self-sufficient. This is a constant balancing act since some people are just too weak or sick to provide from themselves. However, many can do a lot if given the appropriate encouragement and help.

About five years ago I came across an interesting agricultural project emanating from Zimbabwe. It’s called ‘Foundations for Farming’. Some of you will be familiar with it. The story is roughly this: A white Christian Zimbabwean farmer, Brian Oldreive, was dispossessed of his farm as a result of government policy to remove white farmers and release their land for use by blacks. Brian went through a difficult time but then started managing farming estates for others and began to experiment with new farming techniques. This has gradually developed into a complete method and is now known and shared as ‘Foundations for Farming’. It is specially suited to smallholdings and involves zero tillage and very exact planting, mulching and watering techniques. The results have been outstanding – greatly increased yields in staple crops such as maize and also many other vegetables and common crops. ‘Foundations’ is now becoming well known and used in Africa. It has been recognised by the Zimbabwe
government and is being widely taught across many African nations. It particularly helps poor people with access to small amounts of land to move towards self-sufficiency or to becoming small business owners.

While reflecting on the situation in Ukraine one day I suddenly thought: “Can ‘Foundations’ be used in an eastern European and Russian context?” I asked this question to official representatives of ‘Foundations’ and they felt it was likely to succeed in places with ample land and good quality soil such as the Ukraine.

So, to cut a long story short, our charity BREADtrust sent some Ukrainian friends to a training conference in Zimbabwe earlier this year. The first experiments were conducted immediately afterwards, during this last summer’s growing season, and the initial results are very encouraging. Next year we are planning to do a carefully monitored field trial in eastern Ukraine with the hope that this farming technique could provide the basis for increased self-sufficiency for many poor people, as well as the development of business opportunities for those who can grow to sell.

I’ll know the results in about a year’s time. I’ll keep you posted. What I do know is that similar trials in India and Mexico have shown encouraging results… Let’s hope we see the same in Ukraine!

I recently left my job as an administrative assistant at New Community Church so that I could concentrate on finishing my PhD. As a leaving present, I was given a Kindle: a fantastic gift for, as my colleague pointed out, ‘you read all the time’(!) Once you own a Kindle, there are two things you must do: browse the ‘Free Book’ section and download as many Dickens' as you have not already read/do not own, and check out the special offer section. One such book on offer was entitled Genus by Jonathan Trigell.

It’s about a not-so-future society where a genetically enhanced human population is slowly taking over the nation, whilst the ‘Unimproved’ are slowly marginalized and vilified.  Oh, and because of the growth of Islamic terrorism, religion has been outlawed.  It’s not a great book to be honest: it is essentially a postmodernist comment on the emptiness of modern society…I think.  But what I found interesting was this theme of progress/modernism/the future being synonymous with the rejection of religion.  For many people, there appears to be a linear and inevitable ‘progression’ from the dawn of rationalism that emerged during the Enlightenment, that demands the triumph of secularism, atheism and the exposure of religion as, at best, the ‘opium of the masses’, at worse a sinister, destructive force bent on breeding hate, division and thwarting progress and civility.
 
I have always found it interesting that the term ‘Enlightenment’ denotes not just the 18th century movement that promoted human reason as the ultimate means to a better society (and essentially in direct opposition to established religion), but also refers to the acquisition of spiritual knowledge.  Two ideas that are in essence at odds with each other labeled with the same word.  Christians don’t tend to like the term ‘Enlightenment’ because of its anti-religious connotations, or because of its association with Buddhism or other new-agey mystical religions (shudder).  But the more I think about it, the more I feel that we, as Christians, should reclaim the word ‘enlightened’, if we take it to mean understanding things more clearly, of receiving knowledge of truth, and of being truly free.
 
In his essay, Was Ist Aufklärung, Immanuel Kant described Enlightenment thusly:

Enlightenment is man’s release from his self-incurred tutelage. Tutelage is man’s inability to make use of his understanding without direction from another. Self-incurred is this tutelage when its cause lies not in lack of reason but in lack of resolution and courage to use it without direction from another. Sapere aude! “Have courage to use your own reason!”- that is the motto of enlightenment.1

 
Massively simplified, the indication here is that to be enlightened, one must think for oneself in order to acquire knowledge and truth.  It is in this process that true freedom is found.  Now it’s not my intention to get into an in depth critique of Kant or his fellow ‘Enlighteners’.  I for one agree wholeheartedly with the concept of thinking for oneself.  It certainly separates the wheat from the chaff.  However, one can read here an implicit criticism of a) submission to anyone other than oneself – MY mind and MY opinion become the ultimate authority - and b) a suspicion of anyone who claims to have all the answers.  Kant’s Enlightenment thinking by definition demands a rejection of ultimate truths fed to us by any authority other than ourselves. 
 
And this thinking has definitely saturated into our culture and society today.  This is why we don’t like the government telling us what to do.  This is why we want the choice to do what we want and no-one can tell us we’re wrong.  This is why religion should be private and not be imposed on other people.  Again, this is a massive oversimplification of some very complex issues, but my point in writing this blog is to state why, as someone who is a Christian and submits to an institution and accepts the teaching of it (the Church) and believes I have one ultimate authority in my life, external to what I think and what I want (God), I still consider myself to be ‘enlightened’.
 
Being a Christian flies in the face of ‘modern’ concepts of freedom.  The Bible says “You are not your own; you were bought at a price.” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20)  Paul refers to himself as “a slave (servant) of Christ Jesus” (Romans 1:1).  And when Jesus calls us to himself he says “My yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew 11:30).  An easy burden, but a burden nonetheless: a burden of submission to God, of accepting his will, his discipline and his guidance.  Yet at the same time, being under the authority and hand of Christ is exactly what sets us free and ‘enlightens’ us.  Jesus said he is “the way and the truth and the life” (John 14:6). He is the only, ultimate, objective truth: the truth is not something we come to ourselves – it is only Jesus, in any time, any circumstance, any experience.  The Bible says “you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).
 
There are countless references to freedom in scripture – but one way in which we are free is that we KNOW the truth, we KNOW the answer.  The message of the Gospel is not incompatible with modernity/progress/the future.  As the truth it is universal.  There is a massive freedom in knowing we have had a revelation of truth.  This is one thing we never have to doubt, and it is the truth we can build all other things upon.  Unlike those who are forever wondering and questioning, we have reached the end of searching.  And to me, this seems like a pretty good definition of ‘enlightenment’. 
 
So thank you Enlightenment philosophers for encouraging us to think for ourselves and seek truth.  Turns out Jesus is the answer after all…

This is the firstof a series of outlines of Vision talks I have preached – this one from January2011
Acts1:1-8. Jesus tells the disciples to await the promised Holy Spirit. As weprepare to launch into multi-site, elders decided to have 40 Days of prayer andfasting – going deeper into God before making a major reach.
Overviewof preaching series in Acts 1 to 13 taking place over next 7 weeks to back up ‘40Days’. Encourage fasting on Wednesdays to coincide with prayer celebrations inevening. (Explain different levels/types of fasting). Distribute home-producedbut extremely professional 40 Days booklets – includes Bible study notes andprayer topics as well as FAQs re multi-site.
Outlineneed for 100 further volunteers to cover multi-site arrangements at end of 40Days. Need to maintain revenue giving and rise to challenge of giving to multi-siteas an extra. Everyone to receive a letter from me with all the details of whatwe will need and asking them to prayerfully review their giving.
Talkabout the arrival of Lawrence and Mary, the first black African family in thechurch 14 years ago. Interview: Lawrence – ‘I want to be behind the new thingGod is doing. We live only once!’ Mary – ‘I want to look back in 10 or 20 yearsand say – I was involved in starting that. We are building for futuregenerations, too.’Explainthat to maintain the diversity balance we need 20 from the black community togo to the new Lee site with Phil Varley and Robert Kwami. Ask them to step up.

Just before Christmas, a brief thought-experiment by Doug Wilson precipitated a fascinating discussion about the nature of poverty, to which (I'm told) we're going to return shortly. But arguably, before you can decide what poverty is, you need to decide what wealth is. So it's handy that the impishly insightful Idahoan has just posted a witty and simple answer to that question, which made me laugh, think and wince all at once:

Wealth is made up of goods and services. One kind of money, the real kind, is a measuring stick for those goods and services ... As an example of the [other] kind of money, if two boys were playing in the backyard, and one of them bets a trillion dollars that his team is going to win the Super Bowl, only an idiot would then add that trillion dollars to the GDP. Nothing was created, no wealth came into being. The only thing that was added was fuel for the second boy’s daydreams. That’s it; that’s all.
 
Wealth can be destroyed, of course. This is something that hurricanes do, and wars, and floods. That is one kind of economic set-back. But there is another kind of economic set-back, which is what happens when the foolish boy who thought he had a trillion dollars discovers that he doesn’t, and moreover, that he never did.
 
When a lot of people discover this at the same time, there will be economic consequences—but they do not necessarily result in the destruction of wealth. More often they result in the rearranging of wealth—barring an asteroid landing on Manhattan, the wealth is all still here. If a lot of people believed the miscreants, then you can have massive reallocation of wealth, which is a different thing altogether. This is what happens when someone makes real commitments on the basis of false promises. If a lot of people have done this, the upheaval will be enormous.
 
So here is the final note. The “lost” money that we will all be lamenting sometime in the near future is money that we never had, that never existed. Unfunded pensions come to mind, as do unfunded entitlement programs. The news stories that cover them will describe them all as “lost trillions,” but it would be better to describe them as “newly-discovered as non-existent from the git-go” trillions.
 
Only Christ holds the future. Only Christ governs compound interest. Only Christ can tell you to lay up treasures in Heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, where thieves do not break in and steal, and where this kind of legalized plunder has no place. These economic bubbles that are bursting all around us are actually revelatory of a basic theological problem. When men believe the state is God, they come to believe that this state should have the prerogatives of Deity. They want to say of their god, and do say of it until they are let down in some grotesque fashion, that they know not what the future holds, but they know what holds the future. And then, wham.

 
Now, it’s fairly obvious that the distinction between these two types of money is not as hard and fast as this, and I doubt Wilson actually believes it is. But if we accept it for a moment - money backed by something that currently exists, whether gold or grain or whatever, versus money that is backed merely by the hope that gold or grain will exist in the future - then there is an uncomfortable similarity between the boys and the banks. There also seems to be a disconcerting resemblance between the premises of capitalism in general, whether practised by Christians or not, and the presumptuous attitude condemned in James 4:13-17. Or have I missed something?
     

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Andrew’s next book, If God Then What? Wondering Aloud about Truth, Origins and Redemption, will be released in April, published by IVP.

At the start of 2010, Rob McLellan was a film studies tutor at a sixth form college in the north of England. Today he is in discussions in Hollywood about the possibility of making a feature film.

Such is the success of Bible-based film competition Enter the Pitch, brainchild of Bible Society’s Arts Development Officer Luke Walton. We asked Luke to tell us about it.

What is Enter the Pitch?
 
It’s a competition to win £25,000 production budget and also a load of professional help to make a short film drawing inspiration from the Bible.
 
Where did the idea come from?
 
In 2007, Bible Society was working on a campaign in Manchester to engage young people. We wanted to come up with a film concept and that led to the idea of bringing together a group of people to support and initiate a competition. The connection between the Bible and Hollywood has been very strong, right from the word go, both in creating historical dramas and in terms of shaping the arc and the story line of many different stories. There are lots more cracking stories in there, though, that have never been made into epic films.
 
We wanted to see what people’s ideas were and then raise the game. One of the challenges for anybody who’s trying to progress in filmmaking is finding the funding to really raise their game. What is lacking in the film industry is people with pots of this kind of money. Offering a prize of £25,000 is about substantially raising the game to a industry level for short film making.
 
So where have you been able to get that kind of money from?
 
Our funding is drawn from a number of sources and individuals, I won’t state who the individuals are, but we’re very grateful for their support. The organisations that are currently participating in this are Pinewood Studios, The Grand, Clitheroe which has a solid link across music, theatre and cinematic arts – and crucially Bible Society. We’re increasingly seeing wider interest in participating in our project and we welcome and invite that.
 
It’s not all about the money though, is it, you’ve got some amazing people on board as judges, helping to make the films and giving of their time and expertise to the winners – Nev Pierce, Nick Park, David Suchet, David Oyelowo, Stuart Hazeldene and X-Men producer Ralph Winter to name just a few. How does a guy working for a charity based in Swindon manage to get these people to give such a huge amount of their time?
 
I am really thankful for the way this network has come together. I already knew Nick Park [creator of Wallace and Gromit], and without that, almost certainly getting contact with some of these people would have been very, very tricky indeed. I also owe a huge amount to Mark Blaney and Jackie Sheppard of Footprint Films who have been with me every step of the way as consultants to the project. They have been outstanding and tireless supporters of the project, bringing feature-level business skills to the short film format.  I’m also grateful to Nev Pierce [Editor-at-large of EMPIRE magazine], who was a contact through a former colleague. I’ve gone to these people because I’m interested in their work, and am committed to working professionally and at a proper standard with integrity. We’ve had to work slowly, building the relationships, the contacts, the networks that add up until the point where you have a certain momentum and others are able to join in.
 
For example, the screenwriter Stuart Hazeldene is on the panel this year, he joined us after David Oyelowo, on the panel in 2010, invited him to join us. 
 
In such a relationally-based industry, it has been important that the people who work with us have enjoyed it; they’ve found that it’s been encouraging to them and a positive experience. They’ve seen that we’re serious about what we’re doing; we’re not just trying to get a bit of free polemic or using it for a didactic purpose, but are genuinely interested in the process of creating something excellent, and just happen to have a particular source of inspiration.
 
Christian films tend not to do very well in the UK. Is part of the goal of Enter the Pitch to try to change that?
 
We’re not about making specifically Christian films. In fact our film makers are not necessarily Christians or of any faith disposition, and we welcome, and have welcomed, people of all backgrounds to participate in the competition. We are interested in the genuine dramatic human nature of the stories in scripture, and in drawing people to something which is enduring and universal. I firmly believe that film makers are the very best story tellers and are the very best at identifying those enduring human stories in a way that speaks to a new generation.
 
Can you explain how the process works?
 
We’re looking for a 2-minute pitch for a short film. To pitch you must upload a short film onto the website selling your idea. (The site will open to submissions in summer 2012. Register on the site to hear when dates are announced).
 
A panel will review all the pitches and create a shortlist which will then be uploaded onto the website. The public then have one month to watch a minimum of six pitches and vote for a minimum of three. The reason we do this is to ensure that people vote on the quality of the pitches, not just for their friends.
 
The top twenty pitches are then viewed by the judging panel, who whittle them down to ten. These ten finalists are invited to come to Pinewood Studios for a weekend to present their pitches live to the panel. We’re pretty unique in being a live pitching competition, and for those ten, the prize really is the opportunity to simply put their idea in front of a professional panel in the industry. You can’t buy 20 minutes with people at this level; you have to have shown your merit to get this far, and the experience people have gained from it has been a benefit in and of itself.
 
The judges then select a final three, who are invited to stay on and give a longer pitch the following day. Interestingly, our top three pitchers over the last two years have all gone away the night before and come back with a more thoroughly worked up and developed proposal. They have shown themselves to be adaptable to the critique from the panel. It’s a very creative and consultative process as well as obviously being quite nerve-wracking and testing. It means, though, that those who go through to the second day of the final weekend actually have shown their ability to address the weaknesses that have been uncovered in their pitch and take it to another level. That’s part of the business as well. If you’re going to a studio to pitch an idea anywhere in the industry, those kind of skills need to be developed, and they’re not necessarily skills that people learn in film colleges and places where they are honing their practical film making skills.
 
Wow, that’s an intensive process. It’s no wonder you’re able to come out with such high-quality films. What has happened to Simeon Lumgair and Rob McLellan since they won the 2009 and 2010 competitions?
 
Simeon has got several film festivals coming up, one based in Toronto, one in India and one in China, and he is working on a number of projects he’s got on the slate as well as running his film company, Quirky Motion.
 
Rob is just at the beginning of his year, he’s only just entering Rahab into competitions now, so we will see what the festival circuit looks like for him. He has had one invitation to screen already, so that’s looking very positive. He has also received an invitation to consider directing a feature in America as a result of his trip out there [as part of his prize], and has received a number of other professional approaches. So for Rob it looks a very, very positive year coming, though it’s always difficult to predict exactly how it will fall out. We are currently exploring the development of the Rahab short as a feature, following particular interest from the industry.
 
That’s amazing, so it really can launch someone into a career in films!
 
Yes, I’ve got a video of Rob in Hollywood, after we’d taken him to meet with the people at Industrial Light and Magic, and he’s really excited. He says, “You win the competition and that’s just the start. It changes your life forever!”
 
So for anyone considering entering in 2012, what are your top tips for making a stand-out pitch?
 
My top tip is that story is key. Make sure that your pitch really conveys your story, whether you do that by speaking to the camera or by showing a clip of what you think it’ll feel like or even by doing just story boards, you have to above all be telling us what is your compelling story. If you have not read Save the Cat by Blake Snyder you could do far worse than to start with that excellent book. Snyder would tell you that if you can’t sell your film with the title and the log line then you haven’t got it yet. With only two minutes to pitch, that is advice well worth following.
 
Secondly, think about how you change the context from how the original story was told to a more contemporary context. There are various techniques that people have used to avoid some of the more difficult comparatives, so horror or science-fiction genres enable people to leap to a different context and retell the story in a new way.
 
My third tip is avoid all polemic. It never works, whether you’re trying to make a point about how miserable and horrible this book is, or when it becomes nothing but a sermon on screen. Neither of those things belong in our competition. We’re interested in good human stories that have a enduring relevance.
 
Finally, I really think comedy hasn’t been plundered enough. It’s a natural human reaction to laugh at things we find difficult, and sometimes it’s a good way of exploring what we feel about those things. There is some laughter to be had at all the strange moments in the Bible.
 
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The winner of Enter the Pitch 2011 has just been announced and his project is now in development for a shoot later in the year. Submissions for the 2012 competition will open in summer 2012. Visit the website and register to be kept in touch with the key dates, but don’t wait until then to start finding your story and filming your pitch.
 
Main picture: After the announcement of the winner of The Pitch 2011: Right to Left: Winner Tim Bassford, runner up Jodi De Souza, Judge Nick Park (creator of Wallace and Gromit), Steve Lancaster (representing one of the sponsors: The Grand, Clitheroe), runner up Carolyn Goodyear and Producer for The Pitch Luke Walton.

A fascinating editorial in The Times on Boxing Day, on the subject of the persecuted church in China, contained some remarkable one-liners. Some of them sounded like they came straight out of 1 Peter, or Tertullian, while others displayed an insight into atheistic idolatry, and the moral fog that it engenders, that you don't typically find in a secular newspaper. I've highlighted a few soundbites, but the whole piece was interesting (and incidentally, for iPad users, there's a free thirty day trial for the app at the moment):

Any secular ideology claiming a monopoly on political authority feels threatened by religious belief. More than a century ago Marxism set itself up in opposition to the “opiate of the masses”, and Soviet communism, for more than 70 years, attempted to eradicate Christianity and other religions from Russia. Only the State, Lenin and his heirs insisted, could guarantee human salvation. China, under Mao, was equally vicious in its persecution of religion, focusing especially on the traditional beliefs of Confucianism …
 
The party sees religion, and Christianity in particular, as a threat because it worries about the existence of a rival organisation whose members have a different loyalty and are guided by priorities set by others. And as a younger Chinese generation loses its fear and proves less amenable to manipulation and propaganda, party magazines warn that the erosion of traditional atheism will create splits within the party organisation. Indeed, it appears that the recent toleration of religion has led to a growing number of party members themselves becoming believers.
 
The real problem for China, however, as it was for the Soviet Union, is the growing cynicism and spiritual vacuum in public life. This makes it increasingly difficult to underpin standards of ethics or to enforce respect for social norms. The Russians, in the dying days of the Soviet Union, attempted to commandeer the Russian Orthodox Church as a way of enforcing moral standards to underpin communist materialism. It did not work, as the Church proved the more powerful and in the end became one of the forces undermining communism ...
 
The persecution of Christians will almost certainly fail. As so often, it may instead strengthen the faithful in their beliefs while winning converts from those looking for spiritual renewal. Christmas, a time of traditional celebration, may prove in China to be a test of faith, resilience and endurance that few Christians face elsewhere.

 
This is a really helpful reminder that Christianity is inescapably political. If Jesus is Lord, then nobody else is, whether they are transcendentalised or not.
       

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Andrew’s next book, If God Then What? Wondering Aloud about Truth, Origins and Redemption, will be released in April, published by IVP.

'The impetus to become a multi-site church was initially driven bya lack of space to contain the growth we were seeing - not primarily as astrategy to stimulate further growth. Ideally, as with the move tomultiple meetings, multi-site initiatives should rise from the need to managecurrent growth rather than as a means to start growth from a staticposition.'
For further information on our 'Move to Multi-site' see the latestpaper on Multi-site 

One of the books I currently have on the go is the autobiography of Paddy Ashdown, A Fortunate Life. I was never that convinced by Ashdown the politician, but he certainly had a fascinating life prior to politics, as an officer in the Royal Marines, member of the Special Forces (based in my home town of Poole of course!) and then agent for MI6. It is all real James Bond stuff.

One story Ashdown tells is of active service in Borneo in which he recruited a band of ‘irregulars’ from the local tribe. These men were head hunters by tradition and after one expedition “produced a bag out of which rolled four human heads.” Ashdown protested about this, but the men explained that without the evidence of heads they would be unable to prove their prowess. As a compromise, they settled on merely collecting the right ear of their victims, a compromise Ashdown considered fair, but which he recognises would have caused a scandal had it become known in Britain.

This story put me in mind of the recent scandal of US Marines urinating on dead Taliban fighters in Afghanistan – an action that drew unequivocal condemnation from all quarters. It also put me in mind of David cutting the foreskins from 200 Philistines as a bride-price for Saul’s daughter Michal. (I’m not sure I would appreciate that exchange for one of my daughters, fellas!)

The way in which a culture treats the dead speaks volumes about that culture – which is why the burial rites of ancient civilizations is always of such interest to archaeologists and anthropologists. Whether it is the charred remains of Viking longboats, pyramids in Egypt or barrows in Dorset, the rites of death tell us much about the attitudes of the living; and an important corollary is how dead enemies are treated.

Objectively, urinating on a dead enemy (or lopping off his ear) might seem a lesser indignity than killing him in the first place. Given the choice, I’d rather lose an ear than my life. (Didn’t Jesus say something along those lines too?) But to treat the dead with dignity – even dead enemies – is a sign of one’s own civility. Even in the blood and filth of battle the knowledge that the dead will be honoured rather than desecrated is somehow civilising, and to defy this convention is to in some way dehumanise oneself.

Ultimately, our concern for the dead illustrates an underlying assumption that this body is not merely so much organic matter but a being of ultimate significance.

I took a funeral today, at the end of which I pronounced the words of committal:

Forasmuch as it has pleased Almighty God of His great mercy to receive to Himself the soul of our sister here departed, we therefore commit her body to be consumed, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our earthly body, that it may be like His glorious body, according to the mighty working, whereby He is able to subdue all things to Himself.

Ultimately, a body – even a dead one – has God’s fingerprints, and God’s claim, all over it.

This morning a friend sent me a link to a couple of Youtube clips. When that happens, I usually know what to expect – some new music recommendations, a comedy clip, a dazzling insight from Keller, or a dog on a skateboard (depending on which friend it is!) I was, therefore, a little bemused to find two videos of a mathematician doodling pictures in order to explain the Fibonacci sequence and the shape of pinecones.

I’m not entirely sure what made him think of me: I’m inept at maths and have never owned a plant that’s lived longer than a fortnight! I can only imagine he’d spied some of my inane doodles on post-it notes and felt I needed some extra help…
 
But for some reason I watched the videos and found myself captivated.
 
Why not take a few minutes to check out the two videos and consider the creative genius who put these patterns together. Imagine the childlike joy He may have experienced as He pieced together the first pinecone, or spoke the first plant into being. Picture him holding the first artichoke in His hand, chuckling as He imagined generations of people wondering “How on earth are you meant to eat this thing?” and mathematicians trying to unravel the secrets of its leaf arrangements.   
 
I never thought I would see the day when I was waiting with baited breath for part three of a mathematics tuition video. But I defy you watch these videos and not (a) be impressed, (b) at least entertain the idea that there may be a plan behind such complexity and order and (c) make your own phi-angle-o-tron!

I’m going to make twenty statements, seventeen of which are fairly uncontroversial, two of which are disputed, and one of which is highly controversial. To call them ‘facts’ is, perhaps, slightly provocative, but I felt that calling them ‘statements’ was a bit bland, and ‘theses’ made me sound like Martin Luther – the disputed ones (#9 and #12) cannot really be called ‘facts’ but they appear likely to me, and the highly controversial one (#20), though I emphatically regard it as true, would not be accepted by any scholar who did not see Scripture as divinely inspired. As far as I can tell, though, the other seventeen reflect the best biblical scholarship available, and would be widely agreed upon by leading egalitarian (Fee, Wright, Marshall, Keener, Towner, Witherington, McKnight) and complementarian (Moo, Schreiner, Knight, Blomberg, Carson, Mounce, Köstenberger) scholars. Here goes:

1. Men and women are equally made in God’s image, blessed by God, and given dominion over creation (Gen 1:27-28).

2. Men and women are equally united with Christ, adopted as children, and heirs of God’s promises (Gal 3:28).

3. Jesus travelled with women, accepted financial support from them, and allowed them to sit at his feet as pupils, in defiance of social conventions (Luke 8:1-3; 10:38-42).

4. Women were the first witnesses of the resurrection of Jesus, and without them, there would be no gospel proclamation (Matt 28:1-8; Luke 24:1-11; John 20:1-2).

5. The Twelve apostles were all required to be men (Acts 1:21-22).

6. At least one woman in the New Testament church explained the word of God to a man (Acts 18:26).

7. Men and women both have the Holy Spirit poured out upon them, empowering them to prophesy (Acts 2:18).

8. Women in the New Testament church served as deacons (Rom 16:1-2; 1 Tim 3:11).

9. At least one woman in the New Testament church publicly read an epistle to the church (Rom 16:1-2).

10. At least one woman in the New Testament church was an apostle, and outstanding amongst them (Rom 16:7).

11. Women in the New Testament church prophesied in church meetings (1 Cor 11:5).

12. Paul did not allow women to chat to each other while others were speaking during church meetings, and/or to interrupt their husbands to ask questions while they were prophesying (1 Cor 14:33-35).

13. When the New Testament church gathered, anyone could bring a song, a teaching, a revelation, a language or an interpretation (1 Cor 14:26).

14. Married women in the New Testament church are instructed to submit to their husbands (Eph 5:22, 24; Col 3:18; 1 Pet 3:1).

15. In the thought world of the early Christians, relational submission did not necessarily imply ontological inferiority (1 Cor 15:28; Heb 13:17).

16. Husbands in the New Testament church are described as being the head of their wives, and instructed to love their wives as Christ loved the church (Eph 5:23; 1 Cor 11:3).

17. Paul said to Timothy that he did not allow a woman to teach or exercise/assume authority over a man (1 Tim 2:12).

18. The requirements for elders/overseers in the New Testament included being faithful to their wives, keeping their children submissive, and governing their households well, all of which assume that elders/overseers are men (1 Tim 3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9).

19. No spiritual gift – not prophecy, teaching, leadership or anything else – is identified in Scripture as being exclusively given to men or women (Rom 12:3-8; 1 Cor 12:4-13, 27-31).

20. All nineteen of the above statements reflect an internally consistent and coherent vision of the way men and women are to function in marriage and the church.

 
With the exception of the last one, these statements are essentially exegetical judgments: decisions about what authors and texts meant in their original settings. The last one is more a presupposition about Scripture; but although I said it was highly controversial, it is in fact likely to be affirmed by all self-identifying evangelicals, since it is nothing more than an application of a general evangelical conviction (the consistency and clarity of Scripture) to a specific issue. So frankly, there’s an awful lot for evangelicals to agree about.
 
The main reason for laying them out like this is to show, once again, how much agreement there can and should be amongst egalitarians and complementarians. (Many will be surprised to find that Gordon Fee and Phil Towner agree with Bill Mounce and Andreas Köstenberger on #17 and #18, for example, or that Tom Schreiner and Doug Moo agree with Scot McKnight and Tom Wright on #8 and #10). This, following my previous posts on how much we agree on marriage and the myths in the gender debate, is therefore intended to provide a platform for two further Wednesday posts, on hermeneutics and application, which move from exegesis (on which there is huge agreement) to how these passages should be applied (on which there is huge disagreement). See you next week.
     

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Andrew’s next book, If God Then What? Wondering Aloud about Truth, Origins and Redemption, will be released in April, published by IVP.

Poverty in Europe part 3

I have been visiting eastern European countries for many years, as you will have read in the last two posts. As a church, we have been seeking to help those trapped in poverty. Much of this help has come through charitable work alongside local churches in such countries as Romania and Ukraine.

Some people support us enthusiastically in these projects and through our charity (known as BREADTrust). However, I am often asked whether we need to do something more radical to enable people we are helping to be more self-sufficient and less dependent. This is obviously a good goal, but I have found it hard to put into practice with some of the most impoverished people who are so weak they cannot do much for themselves – very elderly ladies, disabled children, invalids, etc.

On the other hand, there are many people who can move out of dependence and weakness into profitable work and small businesses. In the past few years we have been seeking to assist people we know in Ukraine to develop micro-enterprises so that they can generate their own income. We have been experimenting with business ideas such as making building materials for the construction industry, animal husbandry, vegetable growing and creating productive smallholdings.

One of the most amusing and exciting projects we have been involved with recently is enabling a church to buy some land and a tractor. The tractor turned out to be a very ancient Soviet-era machine that looks distinctly elderly and rusty. However, it chugs along nicely and enables the church to produce a significant amount of food to sell in the markets and give to their poorer members.

There is a big difference between giving a man a fish and a giving him a fishing rod. In the next post I’ll tell you about a more ambitious agricultural idea we are seeking to develop in the Ukraine – and elsewhere in eastern Europe and Russia.

I don’t think I’ve ever come across a more helpful book on sexual ethics than Sex Talks by our very own Matt Hosier. You should all read it. And then you should give it to your teenage children, so they can read it as well.

Sex Talks began life as a series of seminars at Newday, the Newfrontiers event for 12-19 year olds, so the heart of the book is pitched at teenagers. The first half tackles all the subjects you’d expect in a book on sex aimed at contemporary young people, and does so with appropriate bluntness, great wisdom, catchy chapter titles from pop culture (‘I kissed a girl and I liked it’), and an impishly humorous writing style. It’s the sort of book I wish had been available when I was fifteen; whether or not my parents would have been too middle class to give it to me is another matter!
 
But the real power of Sex Talks, and the reason I’m reviewing it here rather than on the Newday website, is the remarkable second half of the book. It takes the form of a massive Q&A, with every conceivable question being raised, and without exception answered well, wittily and wisely. But the questions are not just those of the very blunt teenager (‘Is anal sex OK within marriage?’, or ‘Is it wrong to date a lesbian while she is dating another girl?’), but also those which come up all the time in pastoral ministry and to which, if we’re honest, we all wish we had better answers. Some are painfully personal (‘In the eyes of God, are rape victims still virgins?’), and some helpfully confrontational (‘What would your response be to a married couple who use pornography?’) Many are, if anything, more applicable to pastors than teenagers (‘How does a Christian cope with being accused of homophobia if they take a biblical stance on homosexuality?’, or ‘What about gay churches?’) Matt also puts his years of experience in teaching ethics to good use, giving a carefully considered perspective on many tricky sexual ethical questions – IVF, gay adoption, and so on – which all of us will encounter sooner or later. You may not agree with everything he says, but you will hugely benefit from the experience of working out why.
 
And if you’re still not convinced you should read this book, then I can only assume that people in your community don’t think sex is that big a deal. Anyone? Didn’t think so …
 
You can get hold of the book here.
   

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Andrew’s next book, If God Then What? Wondering Aloud about Truth, Origins and Redemption, will be released in April, published by IVP.

The repatriation process which can usually take up to two years, just took eight months this time round.

KOLKATA: On 12thJanuary, 2012, seven Bangladeshi girls who had been trafficked across the border and sold into prostitution in India were reunited with their families. The girls, who are between the ages of 13 and 15, were rescued by police and Justice and Care in an operation on an escort agency in Bangalore in May of last year. The escort agency kept women and young girls captive in a boarded-up house and hired them out for sex. A total of 32 girls and women were rescued in the operation.

The girls were then safely housed in an aftercare facility in Kolkata where they were trained in tailoring, embroidery and learned how to read and write. Thirteen-year-old Reema even went back to school where she did well in Maths.

Even so, the question of when they would see their families again was always on their mind whenever our team met with them. “They were happy learning and amazed everyone by how quickly they picked up new skills,” says a member of our aftercare team, “but they longed to see their parents again. It was the one constant in their conversations with me.”

The repatriation process, which can usually take up to two years, took just eight months this time round, an encouraging sign that both India and Bangladesh are working harder to help victims of trafficking get home.

The Bangladesh National Woman Lawyers Association (BNWLA) helped the girls get back home once they arrived in Bangladesh. The organisation will be following up on the progress of the girls, who are excited to use their new skills to get jobs near their homes.

Members of Justice and Care’s aftercare team will be travelling to Bangladesh next month to meet the girls and ensure that they are doing well.

 

During the brief reign of Francis II (July 1559 – December 1560) the French court was increasingly dominated by the king's uncles, the Guise. It was in this period that Calvinism became highly politicized, particularly through the Conspiracy of Amboise which was instigated by Louis, Prince of Conde. The Conspiracy was an attempt to abduct the young King, Francis II, and arrest the leaders of the Guise faction, thus freeing France from the extreme anti-Calvinist policies that had been pursued. Calvin knew of the plot but disapproved which was one of the reasons it failed so dismally.

However, the plot was opposed by Calvin not because it involved armed resistance, per se, but because the resistance was not led by Anthony of Bourbon, King of Navarre. According to Antoine de la Roche Chadieu, following the line taken in the 1559 edition of the Institutes that resistance was legitimate if it was led by a “lesser magistrate” i.e. A prince of the blood, Calvin had said: -

“If some great man of the King’s Council, someone who has a right to be at the head of the kingdom… declared himself… then it would be proper for such a man to take control…”

 
However, Calvin, to be fair, also warned: -

“Once a single drop of blood was spilt, the gutters would run red with it everywhere, and that nobody would be able to prevent the most horrible disorder, and that it would be better for us all to die than to bring the Gospel into such disrepute…”

 
Calvin showed a similar ambivalence in his sermons from 1 Samuel, preached in 1562-3 but unpublished until 1604. In his 29th sermon in which he describes the ungodly rule of King Saul, he addresses the precise question of resistance to a tyrant stating: -

“People have a duty of patiently submitting to the yoke.”

 
But, almost in the same breath, he adds: -

“If the supreme magistrate should fail in his office and if we have been granted inferior magistrates as part of God’s gift to us, then they are able to constrain the prince in his office and even to coerce him in the name of upholding good and godly government.”

 
Maybe by this point Calvin was unable to exercise control over his more radical followers – it is a moot point. From hereon in Calvinism was on a course towards civil war which lasted, off and on, from 1562 to 1598. At the end of the French Wars of Religion the Calvinists had gained a measure of toleration, though on far from equal terms with Catholicism but, more to the point, it was tainted with blood. The Calvinist Churches never grew beyond the numbers they had attained in 1562 whereas, on the eve of civil war, it had seemed like the conversion of the whole of France was a distinct possibility.

These are some of the key principles which go through my mind as I prepare a vision talk.

• Root the talk in scripture, a biblical value, or narrative. 
• Connect our story with God’s story 
• Reflect back, tell stories, declare victories, face facts, and explain any delay or failure 
• Celebrate God’s faithfulness 
• Present the next step of the journey with faith. If you have achieved any momentum this helps. Remember that past performance is the best indicator for future performance. Outline in detail plans for next stage or year. 
• Invite everyone to join in the next step - please increase your giving, please move to another site, please step up and serve, please join a small group, please come to the prayer meeting... etc. 
• Make a special appeal to new people to join, sign up, to help us fulfil our God-given task and vision. 

I hope the vision talk outlines that follow will inspire you, so that you can inspire the people of God!