It wasn’t easy to find the Barbican Centre for this year’s Evangelical Ministry Assembly (EMA) amid London’s burgeoning road and building works. But it was worth the tricky navigation for Tuesday – Thursday, 27–29 June.
The conference theme was ‘Bearing Fruit and Growing’, with the morning Bible readings coming from Ephesians. These were given by Andy Gemmill of the Cornhill Training Course in Scotland and reminded those there that, amid the spiritual battle, ‘your church is what Christ’s rule looks like now.’ We need to ‘do church’ (I’m not sure I like that phrase) by faith, not by sight, because for all its present flaws the church displays God’s wisdom to the astonishment of the heavenly powers.
Luther’s sufferings
But, in this anniversary year, a distinct Reformation flavour was provided on the first day as Dr Garry Williams of London Seminary sketched a ‘pen portrait of Martin Luther’. His focus was on Luther’s anfechtung – there is no direct English equivalent for the German word. It may be a trial sent by God to test man, or an assault from the devil. It stands for all the doubt, turmoil, panic, desolation and despair with which a Christian has to contend. Often, in his sovereignty, God even uses the devil to bring about his purposes in our lives. Ministers would do well to train their congregations for such conflict. A Cornhill student told me that she found this message especially encouraging.
