Ed Shaw
1. How did you become a Christian?
I started trusting in Jesus at a young age (about five) – a combination of the impact of my parents’ love and prayers, a talk at Sunday School, the death of my younger sister Alice, C.S. Lewis’ The Last Battle – and, of course, God’s kindness and mercy in Jesus.
2. What lessons have you learnt since that you would want to pass on to a younger Christian version of yourself?
The danger of growing into the older brother in the Parable of the Prodigal Son: doing the right things for the wrong reasons and being consumed with a stupid envy for the experiences of the younger son. I wish I’d completely learnt this lesson…
3. How would you describe your prayer life?
An embarrassing reflection of my unbridled activism, fuelled by my crazy belief that it would be better for me to be doing something than ask God to do something. So, pray for me.
4. Which two or three Christian books apart from the Bible have most influenced your faith?
At university, and for years after, I often struggled to reconcile my love of books, beauty, politics, places, with being a Christian in a CU environment where Bible teaching and evangelism were often portrayed as the only valuable things you could do with your life. Julian Hardyman’s Maximum Life was such a lifeline to me: helping me to see how all good things could be enjoyed to the glory of God.
I worked for churches for almost a decade before I realised that God has called and gifted me to be a pastor. The book he used to do that was Marilynne Robinson’s beautiful novel Gilead. The overlap between the thoughts, feelings and experiences of her fictional pastor, John Ames, and me finally convinced me that I was a pastor too.
Wesley Hill’s Washed and Waiting arrived in my life when I thought I was the only Christian who experienced same-sex attraction and helped me know that I was not alone. I sat and read it in one sitting and wept in the knowledge that I was in good company. Wes has since become a friend and his book inspired me to do all that has led to the setting up of www.livingout.org and the writing of my own books on sexuality.
5. Who or what have been your biggest Christian influences?
My Mum and Dad. The church families I have been part of. Friends. Strangers like C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Tim Keller, Marilynne Robinson, Eugene Peterson, Flannery O’Connor, Wendell Berry, who now feel like friends. Anglican liturgy and the poetry of John Donne and George Herbert. Ministries like CYFA Ventures, the Cornhill Training Course, and UCCF.
6. What are the main challenges you believe Christians face today?
Here in the West: getting used to being despised and rejected when we want to be liked and accepted.
7. What encourages and what discourages you?
I’m encouraged by how recent events have opened our eyes to see the genuine misogyny, racism, homophobia and class snobbery that have so often marred evangelicalism here in the UK. To work with others at the Church of England Evangelical Council in starting to combat these has been a huge privilege – though there’s still a long way to go.
I’m discouraged by how often evangelicals are governed by fear of other Christians and the world around us. I’ve been kept going as a Christian through reading and relating to numerous non-evangelical Christian voices and non-Christians who often make the case for being a Christian better than we do: read Louise Perry’s The Case Against the Sexual Revolution (reviewed in the November issue of en) if you want a good recent example.
8. What makes you laugh?
My own ridiculousness. My family and friends. Well-written TV comedies (M*A*S*H, Frasier, Yes Prime Minister, Blackadder). P.G. Wodehouse.
9. What would you want to say to the wider evangelical world?
I would love us to increasingly baffle and intrigue the watching world by somehow managing to be famous for combining a genuine humility with our passion for the truth: an impossible combo without the help of God’s Spirit.
10. Which Biblical person (other than Jesus) do you most look forward to meeting in glory and why?
To avoid the challenges of choosing from one of the minor prophets, I’m going to say Asaph, the writer of Psalm 73. It feels like we were separated at birth: I love the journey he so honestly goes on in that psalm, a journey I keep on taking myself.
