Prayer and the Church Fathers

The second part of Hall's book 'Worshipping with the Church Fathers' is on prayer. There is a lot of good and interesting material in these chapters, here are just a few of those I noted.

Many of the fathers at times imagined a likeness of God to which they prayed. When this practice was condemned many found it difficult to engage in prayer. An older monk wondered if God would only hear theologically well-informed and well-phrased prayers. Hall writes, 'We do not have to pass a theology exam before we dare to pray. God knows our hearts better than we and accepts teh offering of the heart, even when the mind's thoughts expressed in prayer are foggy. We are called to think ever more truly of God, but God accepts us where we are - delighting in our mumbles - and slowly teaches us the grammar and content of prayer.' (page 118)
And thank God for that!

I appreciate the comment on page 130 that the Lord Jesus, although perfect in every way, engaged in prayer, an activity necessary to maintain the health of his relationship with his Father and the Spirit. How much more then do we need to pray in a way that enlivens our relationship with our Father and the Spirit?

And finally, Hall quotes CS Lewis (not a church father, but used to illustrate a point)
'Every war, every famine or plague, almost every death-bed, is the monument to a petition that was not granted.' (page 159)
The challenge of unanswered prayer in not why didn't God make it sunny today, or find me a parking space, but 14 million affected by floods in Pakistan, 40 million victims of HIV/AIDS in Africa, more than 200,000 dead in an earthquake in Haiti. These are the monuments to petitions that were not granted before which we must bow in humility.

Reading Lists

I've managed to bomb through my reading list over the last few weeks and will be blogging about these books soon.

So I'll have to come up with some new targets for the remainder of this year! Suggestions for good reading are always welcome!

What is an intentionally missional church?

While at the Keswick Convention I picked up a magazine, ‘Mission Matters’, which is a free magazine, and so I hope it is ok for me to share with you part of one of the articles in this magazine.

Bryan Knell, Consultant with the Global Connections network, was writing on the theme, ‘What is an intentionally missional church?’

Missional has become something of a buzz word in recent years, with really being clearly defined. I think that it is one of those terms best defined in action, or perhaps in the six characteristics of a missional church that Bryan has identified.


Before getting to these six characteristics, Bryan writes, ‘changing the culture of a church from being pastorally centred to being missionally centred is almost impossible. Very few established churches have managed to make the change.’

I’m sure those of us in established churches (in this context not newly planted churches) will be well aware of the challenge and difficulties in making this change. However, I’m very grateful for Bryan’s qualifications, ‘almost’ and ‘very few’. I believe that congregation need to become missional. I believe in a God who works miracles, who sees an army in a valley of dry bones. My God can change the established church I serve into a missional church. And he can do it in your church also. This doesn’t remove the need to serve and work for this goal, but encourages us that with God nothing is impossible.

To Bryan’s six characteristics (and so added comments):
1. Vision – the dominant and priority vision of a missional church is to see the Kingdom of God expanded by gospel proclamation and social action. Mission is not limited by geography or method. How healthy a church is, how much it has achieved in the past year, its aim for the coming year and its 5/10 year goal will all be determined by mission.
It is good to see gospel proclamation linked with social action, for too long these have been held separately by too many in the church. There is no one method that fits all, or will achieve all the missional purposes of God – i.e. we need to do more that preaching! I’m challenged by how few of our plans are determined by mission, this needs to change.

2. Decisions – all decisions at every level will be made on the basis of mission opportunities and prospects. “If it does not involve mission, we will not do it.”

3. Equipping/Empowering – the church will make it a priority to train, equip and mentor its members for mission. This will involve helping Christians identify where they can naturally do mission and giving them confidence to make the most of these opportunities. Secondly, it will also involve identifying new circumstances where they can be involved in mission together and thirdly, decide which mission projects will be supported by the church.
It would be good to be part of a congregation where mentoring was seen as part of ‘the minister’s’ role.

4. Preaching/Teaching/Learning – the Bible will be taught through a mission hermeneutic. This means that it will be assumed that mission is the over-riding message, focus, fabric and structure of the whole Bible – Genesis to Revelation; that all the issues that the Bible covers have to be understood in terms of their affect on and contribution to mission. The Bible will be taught not just as valuable spiritual wisdom but to equip Christians to respond to the questions and issues that they face as they do mission.
This is very good, reflects Chris Wright’s work in his book ‘The Mission of God’. We do not have a biblical basis for mission, we have a missional basis for the bible. Let’s get that one the right way round!

5. Worship – worship will be inspired by missional concepts.
a) Firstly, the glory of God which is enhanced when people come to acknowledge him as Lord through mission.
b) Secondly, the prospect of worship in heaven when people from every tribe, language, people and nation will gather round the throne. (Rev 7)
c) Thirdly, worship will be enhanced and invigorated by the testimony of those coming to faith and being blessed by God through mission as it is in heaven. (Luke 15:7)
Some challenging idea here and in the final point.

6. Community – fellowship will be vital because of the challenges, pressures and attacks that Christians are facing as they reach out in mission. People are drawn together when they unitedly attempt a task or face a challenge.

I sense many congregation know they need to change, but aren’t sure what they need to change into. I hope these six characteristics may be helpful for some in find a way forward into mission as a congregation.

Gordon Fee Interview

I picked this up from Mike Bird at euangelion - a source of many great posts!

Gordon Fee is soon to have published his commentary on Revelation, which I'm sure will be worth adding to the shelf. (If only I had more shelves!!!)

There is a video interview with Gordon on line at Grace Communion International. It runs about 30 minutes and is better than minesweeper for a tea break!

Sacraments with the Fathers

I picked up this book while at the Assembly in May and read it while on holiday.

Christopher A Hall Worshipping with the Church Fathers, pub IVP.

I obviously didn't read the blurb on the back because when I started I found the book wasn't what I expected or had hoped for. Not that I was disappointed, just surprised.

I guess I had expected a study of worship, both public worship and private patterns of worship as practiced by the church fathers, and found something different. Hall offers three sections: the sacraments, prayer, discipline (by which he means the call to the desert).

In the first section on the sacraments I really struggled to get over the allegorical interpretations of many passages. Sometimes a loaf of bread is just a loaf of bread, not an allegorical reference to the eucharist!

For example, on p. 39 we read of Gregory of Nyssa teaching that "the method of our salvation became effectual not so much as a result of instruction ... as by means of the flesh which [Christ] assumed ... therefore it was necessary that a means shuold be devised by which there should be in what is done by the follower some kinship and likeness to the leader."
So since in human flesh Christ died and was raised, so in baptism our human flesh shares in his death and resurrection. Now, I think this is right, Rom 6:3-4, but the way of getting there feels a bit strange.

On infant baptism and whether an infant will grow into Christian initiation, we are not to withhold baptism but to trust in God - p. 47. Gregory of Nazianzus teaches that infant circumcision is a model for infant baptism, see Col 2.

I found it helpful to read such comments and notice that the father's were answering the same questions we face when engaging in sacramental ministry, either as those leading a congregation or those worshipping in a congregation.

In general a helpful section and good beginning to this book.

Back from holiday

After a break in July I'm back from holiday and hoping to get back into the blogging again!

While on holiday I finished the three books in Stieg Larsson's series. The third is the best of the three, a real page turner with so many twists you really couldn't figure it out.

Two general comments.
The under current, which sometimes isn't very under, in these books of abuse against women, mostly sexual but not only, is at times disturbing. We can't say that this would only be true in Sweden, because it isn't. I think it is designed to disturb and to remind us that any abuse of women is abuse - zero tolerance begins here.

Also, if these books do accurately reflect life in contemporary Sweden then I'm glad I don't live there. It isn't the violence or abuse that disturbs me here, it is the attitude of the characters to life and relationships. If this is what it means to live in a liberal democracy you can keep it!

Another one completed

This morning I've finished the second 'big' book of my 2010 reading list, Larry Hurtado's 'Lord Jesus Christ: Devotion to Jesus in Earliest Christianity'.

I've posted some comments on this book earlier - here.

This is a good book and well worth reading.

I think Hurtado is persuasive in showing that devotion to Jesus as God began early, in the first century certainly, most likely in the 30's and 40's, the very earliest period of the Christian church.
Hurtado's historical work is valuable not least because our Christian faith and hope depends upon the history of Jesus incarnate, crucified, buried, resurrected and ascended for us.

It is helpful that Hurtado illustrates the difficulty faced in second century Christianity was to articulate their faith in Jesus as Christ and God - within the framework of Jewish/OT monotheism. That there is only one God, and that he is only one, is the constraint placed upon expressions of devotion to Jesus. To deny the divinity of Jesus is easy, to collapse God into Jesus is also easy, to portray Jesus as one among many gods is easy. All these moves were made in the second century, but none of them were found to be adequate in describing this Jesus who is both human and divine, one person within one God.

In the final pages Hurtado offers, 'The devotional practice of earliest Christianity was particularly foundational for doctrinal developments.' (page 649) Today we often think of worship practices as culturally conditined, and I think that is right. However, there remains something about our worship and devotional practices that shapes and informs our doctrine. I think that for the earliest Christians, including the apostle Paul, it was the encounter with the risen Lord Jesus and their subsequent worship of him as God that largely shaped their expressions of the gospel. The question then is what do our current worship and devotional practices say about our understanding of the gospel and what are we communicating of the gospel through them to the world?

So, my list needs amended.
Gordon Fee's 'God's Empowering Presence: The Holy Spirit in the Letters of Paul' moves up to the top of the list. I'm really looking forward to this one. Hopefully I'll finish this in the third quarter of 2010.
For the final quarter then, an addition to the list:
Bernhard Lohse's 'Martin Luther's Theology: It's Historical and Systematic Development', T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1999. I've had this book for three years now, I bought it in the Free Church Bookroom while at a Rutherford House Dogmatics Conference. So I'm looking forward to spending some time with Luther and learning from him something of the gospel.