Unless the Lord builds the house, Psalm 127 tells us, its builders labour in vain.
In September’s en I wrote about how we Anglican evangelicals need a biblical theology of unity and separation, which we seem to lack. Theology is always practical of course – for it is about how we follow Jesus. So this month I want to write about another theological essential for our current situation, and that is humility.
Shortly before writing this I was one of 400 Anglican evangelicals at this year’s ReNew conference, organised by Church Society, the Anglican Mission in England (AMiE) and Reform.
Humility
Particular highlights for me included interviews with ministers who have either planted new churches or served for a long time in inner city or rural locations far away from established evangelical places. What was encouraging was not only what was said but the humility in which it was spoken. Here were no stories of triumphalism or formulas for church growth – merely the hard graft of taking the gospel to ‘the lost, the least and the last’.
We also had an inspiring contribution about John Stott. We heard how Stott was once caught surreptitiously polishing the shoes of people with whom he was staying; of how he prepared many of his sermons on his knees by his bed; of how, when asked for feedback from someone else for a talk they had given, Stott replied that he would only give input beforehand, but not afterwards (presumably realising how destructive that kind of thing, though well-intentioned, often turns out to be).
I was also struck by the humility in the talk given by William Taylor of St Helen’s Bishopsgate. He called for humility between Anglican evangelicals who will opt for different ways forward – whether within the Church of England or outside it, or some kind of mix of the two. ‘We must hold together and not spin off into our own little worlds’, he said. People would make different choices, but ‘we will have to learn to think more highly of others’, he said.
Going forward, we will need this humility in bucket-loads. We will need it to build bridges – rather than burn bridges – with those who should or could be allies (e.g. New Wine; HTB). We will need it to use existing structures (for example the Church of England Evangelical Council) to build godly, positive relationships and communicate clearly. We will need it when thinking about planting AMiE churches (I can see the case for the church plant in Dagenham; at least one other location has seemed more debatable).
We will need humility to reach out our hands and hearts to bishops who should or could be friends (e.g. bishops of Kensington; Lewes; Southwell; Willesden; Birkenhead; Durham; Winchester; Bristol; Peterborough; Blackburn). Would we – could we? – be humble enough to invite some of these to a ReNew?
We will need humility to facilitate much better communication between different parts of the country, so that the actions of one group in one part of England do not cause unnecessary difficulties for evangelicals in a different diocese. We will need humility to avoid the mistakes of evangelicals in the US Episcopal Church whose fragmentation and different directions facilitated the liberal takeover of that denomination.
And I too will need humility to admit that possibly – just possibly! – some of what I have written above may not even be wholly right!
