KNOWING OUR TIMES:
How British culture impacts our mission
By John Stevens
FIEC / Affinity / 10ofThose. 76 pages. £3.99
ISBN 978 1 912 373 215
John Stevens is the National Director of the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches (FIEC) and also an ex-lawyer with a very fine mind.
In this short and immensely helpful booklet he gives a kind of ‘state of the Union’ address for conservative evangelicals, drawing together all kinds of evidence to make his points.
Our society
He surveys what has happened to British society and thinks through what should be our reaction to it. He looks at: the political and legal situation as it pertains to Bible Christians; the multi-cultural and multi-faith nature of our country; the church generally in all its collapse due to liberal theology; the state of evangelicalism; and what is happening about getting the biblical gospel across to our land.
He estimates that around just 3% of the population are born again, and growth by conversions is sparse. Churches from FIEC reported perhaps a 1% growth by conversions, from quite a low base, in the most recent survey. Growth of church plants tends to be from other churches, though church plants do see a better rate of conversion than elsewhere. It is the very rich and the very poor who seem most open to the gospel. The complacent middle-class will hardly give the gospel a hearing.
Post-Christian Britain
This is a brilliant book. I have one caveat. I think John is doing his very best to be encouraging – fair enough. But he keeps using the analogy of the early church. We are now not a Christian nation in any way, but in a missionary situation. I would not argue with that. However, our times are not the same as the first century. When the apostles took the gospel to the societies of their day it was a message those people had never heard before. That is not how it is for us. Because of our Christian heritage, people nowadays think that ‘we have tried Christianity and we don’t want it.’ That makes it rather more difficult for us. We need not be discouraged but must take this on board in our estimation of where we are.
Not just for pastors
Every pastor should read this book. But I think it would be of enormous help if the material could be conveyed to their congregations as well. Ordinary Christians need to see where we are too and not beat themselves up, or beat up the pastor, when the going is tough and there are few conversions. We need to hold our nerve and look after each other. I was especially glad that John makes the point that the larger churches really need to be looking out for and helping the smaller ones.
