If there is one book

"If there is one book that you should buy at this year's assembly it should be 'Deep Church'," so said Rev Norman Graham of Denny Baptist Church, and so I did. I left assembly with this one new book under my arm and today I finished reading it. It is a great book, really thought provoking, extremely challenging; for anyone looking to ask questions about why our church does things they way they do them and how they can do them differently, it is a gem.

A few highlights would be comments on the Christian's view of the arts and culture. No one taught me a theology of that in church or at college but now with a daughter whose life is filled with the beauty of music and plans a career as a performer, some simple reflection on common grace, beauty, creation and creativity I pray will help her and the church around her to understand how her life might be meaningful beyond simply being an asset to a worship group.

Yet for me the challenges came most deeply in the chapter entitled Deep Ecclesiology. I am aware and experience the frustration of many that our structures can inhibit the move of the Spirit and a speed of response to a fast changing world. I also believe that we live in a time where institutions are not trusted, particularly by a younger generation and that to throw off the shackles that build up over time and to start afresh is very attractive.

Jim Belcher however stands by his Presbyterian institution whilst seeking to release a movement of God's people into Orange County. I found his understanding of deep ecclesiology extremely helpful. The idea of an institution that releases a movement of God's people scattered throughout Scotland seems to me something of what I long to see happen in the Baptist Union of Scotland and in each of the churches.

For such a turn around to occur it will take a change from control to reliance, from independence to interdependence, from institutional relationship to personal relationship, from security to adventure and maybe most of all from timidity to confidence in what the Lord can still do. As I read this morning in Psalm 127 "unless the Lord builds a house the work of the builder is wasted."

It's worth a read. It would also make a great book to study with friends.

Please pray for the BUS as we go into a couple of weeks of key meetings, charting paths, sharing hopes and praying for the Spirit of God to work in us, revealing the rule of Christ for our lives at this time.