Issue 14 W H O L E L I F E P R E A C H I N G Interview with Preaching from where I stand CONTEXT. CONTEXT. CONTEXT. The whole-life text Emma Ineson Nell Goddard Neil Hudson Mark Greene page 8 page 12 page 17 page 22 “This new resource from LICC is a great gift to us all.” Dr Krish Kandiah, Founding Director: Home for Good, and author of Twenty-Four: Integrating Faith and Real Life A six-part video series on the power of preaching for everyday life Full series available free online at: licc.org.uk/preaching © LICC 2017. All Rights Reserved. CONTENTS 3 Contents ISSUE 14 Regulars 6 Letters 7 Column – Calvin Samuel 8 Interview – Emma Ineson 37 Column – Natalie Collins 38 Book Reviews 8 38 44 The Preach Book Club Features Context. T H E Context. H O L E Context. W - Neil Hudson L I F E P R E A C H E R Preaching from where I stand David Lawrence Nell Goddard 30 12 17 Worship for the whole of life The whole-life text Antony Billington Mark Greene Serials 22 26 The Late Greats 28 God in the movies 45 Essential reading for preachers 46 51 How I prepare 52 Soul care for leaders 54 Unbelievable? 56 Painting the Word 4 WELCOME COUNCIL OF From your editor… REFERENCE David Bracewell – Zoe Ministry (zoeministry.co.uk); author; and previously Rector of Saint Saviour’s Church, Guildford. About LICC Kate Bruce – Director of the Centre for Communication and Preaching, Deputy Warden and Tutor in Homiletics, St John’s College, Durham University. Charlie Cleverly – Rector of St Aldate’s, Oxford and author of several books, most recently Song of Songs. Ian Coffey – Vice Principal (Strategy) and Director of Leadership Training, Moorlands College. Malcolm Duncan – Chair of the Spring Harvest Planning Group; Senior Minister of Gold Hill Baptist Church; Founder and Director of Church and Community. Ruth Gee – President of Methodist THANK YOU FOR CHEERING ME ON, FOR YOUR CONSTRUCTIVE Conference 2013/14 and Methodist minister. CRITICISM AND ENGAGEMENT WITH THE CONTENT, AND FOR Richard Littledale – Baptist minister, LETTING ME KNOW THAT YOU APPRECIATED THE WORK THAT author and broadcaster. HAS GONE INTO EACH ISSUE. Mark Meynell – Associate Director, Langham Partnership International; author and cultural commentator. Calvin Samuel – Principal of London School of Theology. ust as a dog is not just for years. Thank you for cheering me Christmas, worship is not just on, for your constructive criticism for Sunday. To be a Christian is and engagement with the content, Jto have your entire life reshaped and for letting me know that you by God: work, play, relationships, appreciated the work that has Preach resources, available in print finances – every part transformed. gone into each issue. I pray you will and online, are provided by LWPT. And yet how often does our continue to pour yourselves into the preaching address the weekday vital work of preaching the Word of Editor Jo Swinney concerns of our congregations? God with faith and passion, because Much of this issue of Preach comes as Herman Melville wrote in Moby Design to you courtesy of the fantastic Dick, ‘The pulpit leads the world’. Adept www.adeptdesign.co.uk team at the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity (LICC), Printing & distribution cpo.org.uk whose vision is to equip church leaders and preachers so they in Editorial office turn can empower their church The Leaders of Worship and Preachers Trust communities to make a difference PO Box 2352, Watford, Herts in their contexts. We have loved WD18 1PY working with them and know you T 01923 231811 will find what they have to say F 01923 296899 thought-provoking, inspiring and E [email protected] practical. W preachweb.org The Leaders of Worship and And now for some Preach-related Preachers Trust is an ecumenical Trust (Charity No. 1107967) news: this is my last editorial for the Copyright the Leaders of Worship and Preachers Trust 2018. All rights reserved. Permission is granted magazine it has been my honour Jo Swinney for the reproduction of text from this publication for the Leaders of Worship and Preachers Trust promotional and delight to edit for the past four Editor use only. For all other uses, please contact us. ABOUT LICC 5 About LICC Good news for the 98% And the 2% too. he vast majority of We speak, run courses and workshops, So, if you’re looking to make a greater Christians (around and offer training for churches. difference where you are, or you’d 98%) spend the vast like your church to become the kind T majority of their waking And if you click on our website of community that’s committed to time (around 95%) in non-church (licc.org.uk), you’ll find a trove of free frontline mission, check out what’s related activities. So just imagine material – clips, articles, downloads available online or get in touch. what the impact might be on our – as well as simple sign-ups for our neighbourhoods, on our schools themed prayer journeys and our and clubs and workplaces, on our punchy weekly emails – Word for the whole nation, if all of us were really Week and Connecting with Culture. able to help one another to make a London Institute for difference for Christ right where we Contemporary Christianity are, out on our daily frontlines. St Peter’s, Vere Street, That’s LICC’s focus: empowering London, W1G 0DQ Christians to make a difference in [email protected] God’s world, and envisioning and licc.org.uk equipping church leaders to help them do it. Founded by John Stott in 1982, and now led by Mark Greene, LICC’s growing team seeks to combine biblical wisdom, cultural insight, and practical ideas to offer individuals and ministers (the 2%) a wide range of resources that will equip the whole church (the 98%). 6 LETTERS AND TWEETS Interactive preaching Thank you very much for the issue of Preach on Interactive preaching (Issue 12). I found Steve Adams’ article and also his book, The Centre Brain, very stimulating, I have Letters always thought using questions as Jesus did is very effective but had not realised the most important question and tweets is why… …I limit my sermons to ten minutes and then have 15 to 20 minutes when the congregation can respond. What is God, not me, saying? What is your experience, what are your difficulties etc? This has given the congregation the opportunity to share experiences I have not had… …Where there is a large congregation I invite people to talk in small groups. I also invite them to write down Preaching about hold on to, but my concern is for those anything they would like to share who are confused, as I was when I which I can read out. This allows creation first received Jesus into my heart, people who are reluctant to speak in public to make their contribution. I’m hoping that this is not the only about how to reconcile the historicity I hope there are other preachers response to the letter from Richard of the early chapters of Genesis with who will share their experiences of Goodman (Preach, Issue 12, page 6). historical science. Not only that, interactive preaching. If it is then I can only assume that but for those not-yet-believers who I’m reading the wrong magazine for question how we can pick and choose Trevor Bell, Radstock guidance on ‘Preaching the Word’ in which parts of Bible history are the twenty-first century! believable, such as the virgin birth and Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, I believe that it is the duty of all while rejecting others that are clearly preachers to recognise that when written in context and language as TWITTER people enter the portals of our places history under the inspiration of the @UnbelievableJB Hey of worship they do not leave on the Holy Spirit. doorstep their brains, their intellect @_jeremiahj just saw your or their knowledge of the way science Long-age evolution attracts much interview with @joswinney in has developed over the past 50 media attention, especially by @PreachMagazine – good job! years, let alone the last 200 years! commentators who are self-confessed @JohnDavidWoods1 We do people no favours and do not atheists, but despite a broad spectrum @PreachMagazine delivers help them develop as Christians by of scientific evidence pointing towards another bran tub of all things pretending that advances in scientific a ‘young-earth’ creation, this gets Preaching. Great work out for studies have never occurred. zero attention because it speaks of a all who are serious about supernatural God to whom we are all To suggest that the Bible is a science preaching cross-culturally. ultimately answerable. book which informs us that the world @KrishK Thank you is no more than 6,000 years old is Websites such as creation.com and @PreachMagazine for your surely over-stretching things more answersingenesis.org are huge encouraging review than a little? Or perhaps Mr Goodman sources of information on this of #GodIsStranger is really playing (if he will forgive me) subject. Most importantly we need devil’s advocate in order to open up to hear what God is saying to us in debate. If he is, then I congratulate this increasingly secularised age, him, for I’m all for open honest debate. and eventually may have to agree You can write to us at Paul Wilks, Runcorn to disagree, but let us first cast WRITE TO US PO Box 2352, Watford, We don’t need to get hung up on the aside preconceptions and be open to Herts WD18 1PY, email mysteries of creation because Romans examine all avenues of research.