Andy reports on a weekend of ministry in Leicester with Knighton Free Church – training Christians to help reach their Muslim neighbours at Knighton’s church-plant, and a “Grill-A-Christian” Q&A event with young people at the main church. Knighton Free Church are online here.
Have you ever wondered if all the world’s religions are essentially the same? For those who would consider themselves “spiritual” but also “tolerant” that’s the typical way out, but however nice it sounds, is it actually true? In this Short Answers film, Andy Bannister (that rare breed, a Christian with a PhD in another religion!) introduces us to four helpful questions we can use to compare religious claims—and a way through the maze of religious diversity.
Please share this video widely with friends or family and for more Short Answers videos, visit solas-cpc.org/shortanswers/, subscribe to our YouTube channel or visit us on Twitter Instagram or Facebook.
Short Answers is a viewer-supported video series: if you enjoy them, please help us continue to make them by donating to Solas. Visit our Donate page and choose “Digital Media Fund” under the Campaign/Appeal button.
“Do you care about the environment?” This has become a defining question of the 21st century, one that we find ourselves continually answering indirectly in the daily decisions of our lives. I was once asked this question directly. As I walked out of a bookstore, I was greeted on the street corner by a friendly college student wearing a Greenpeace t-shirt and holding a clipboard. He was delighted to hear that I did care about the environment. He explained to me how people are destroying the planet but that I could do something about it by making a donation. Before I opened my wallet to support this global cause, I wanted to pursue the question deeper. With genuine interest, I asked: “Why should I care about the environment?” It was obvious from his silence and blank stare that I had identified something of a cultural blind spot. After pondering my question for a while, he responded: “We should care about the environment for future generations.”
The answers “future generations” or “world heritage” seem to capture the most common responses I hear from those questioned with why they reduce, reuse, and recycle. These are good answers but notice that the logic is established in the value of people not nature. Intuitively we understand that we don’t owe a rock anything, even one the size of a planet. This is because one’s moral duty is owed to persons not things. It’s why we walk on rocks and not people.
Unfortunately, people have taken our moral duty to protect the environment to an extreme.
For example, both New Zealand and Canada have each granted legal personhood status to a river (Whanganui River and Magpie River). Before this, New Zealand began this legal precedence by giving personhood status to a forested hill country called Te Urewera, that technically owns itself. These legal moves grant these rivers and land the same value and rights as a human person. Although I appreciate this was done to protect the environment, it undermines its own project by calling into question the value of future generations.
We must remember that after WWII the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was created to stop people from ever being devalued again. That document begins with the famous declaration that all humans have inherent dignity. Inherent means that our value is encountered not created. That is, we come into the world with value. No human gave it to us, and thus cannot legitimately take it away. Our desire to protect the environment for future generations gives voice to that shared dignity we encounter in each other. However, when a government gives our value to an object or an animal—it cheapens, and even undermines our own dignity; it is the very definition of dehumanizing. Similar to poor environmental stewardship, future generations will pay for the mismanagement of our human value.
We should be concerned about policies that undermine the value of future generations, but we should ask if the environment matters without us? Here again, we run into the problem that things only matter or have value in relationship to a person or persons. Without persons the environment presents a very depressing perspective. This is where modern philosophy continues to undermine environmentalism. For example, the chair of the philosophy department at Duke University, Alex Rosenberg succinctly summarizes the foundation of modern thinking: “The physical facts fix all the facts.”[1] This seems to sum up the secular perspective and leads philosophers, such as Rosenberg, to the following conclusions: “What is the nature of reality? What physics says it is. What is the purpose of the universe? There is none. What is the meaning of life? Ditto.”[2]
I expressed my concern over this physics-only worldview with the man from Greenpeace by asking: “Why bother caring for the environment or future generations?” He looked perplexed, so I offered an explanation: “Physics tells me that the sun is dying and as it does it will expand until the earth is consumed in fire. If my life and the planet are destined for destruction and are ultimately meaningless, I might as well get what I can while I can.” With a mix of profanities, he said, “That’s messed up.” “I agree.” I told him, “but why?”
I find it odd that so many universities today teach that the physical facts fix all the facts and yet you should still recycle. However, that is not a physical fact. What do I owe a meaningless universe? Nothing! Yet, that is surely wrong and justifies this man’s revulsion. What’s the alternative? Rethinking our worldview. Perhaps we know the environment matters with or without us because our planet exists in relationship to another person—God. My answer to why the environment and future generations matter is because God matters. As a Christian, my responsibility to the environment and future generations is grounded in my relationship to God, which also give life and the universe meaning, purpose, and value. If you care about the environment and future generations, I encourage you to invite the person of God into your thinking.
Dr Andy Steiger is the author of ‘Reclaimed’ which can be found here.
[1] Alex Rosenberg, The Atheist’s Guide to Reality: Enjoying Life Without Illusions (New York: W.W. Norton Company, 2011), 162.
[2] Rosenberg, The Atheist’s Guide to Reality, 2-3.
Solas’s partnership with Scripture Union Scotland partnership continues! Andy Bannister spoke at an SU nationwide event online – about the reliability of the Bible!
In our western cultures, the way we present the gospel and the way it is embodied appears to be anything but “good news”. It’s worrying, disappointing, even life-diminishing news! But in a world of pandemics and Putin, how can we hold out real, authentic good news to our friends who are so desperate for it? Andy and Kristi explore this question with Paul Woolley this time on PEP Talk.
Have a look at these resources from LICC which Paul mentions:
https://licc.org.uk/resources/6ms/
https://licc.org.uk/events/40-cities-tour/
Paul Woolley joined the London Institute of Contemporary Christianity as CEO in January 2021, having been Deputy Chief Executive at Bible Society. He was previously the founder and director of the influential faith and society think tank Theos. In addition to studying theology, he has worked in parliament and the media. He is married to Ruth, and they have four young children. They live in Wiltshire and enjoy being outdoors, playing board games, and keeping chickens.
The Persuasive Evangelism Podcast aims to equip listeners to share their faith more effectively in a sceptical world. Each episode, Andy Bannister (Solas) and Kristi Mair (Oak Hill College) chat to a guest who has a great story, a useful resource, or some other expertise that helps equip you to talk persuasively, winsomely, and engagingly with your friends, colleagues and neighbours about Jesus.
Our children’s library contains many different books, recounting the adventures of various characters like: The Gruffalo, Superworm, The Monkey Who Lost His Mum, The Whale and the Snail, Thomas the Tank Engine, and many others. We also have a collection of beautifully illustrated books about the Bible, retelling stories about Jesus.
Now, you probably have never lost any sleep over the question: Does the Gruffalo actually exist? Of course, not – we recognise that it belongs the realm of fiction. However, have you ever wondered if Jesus actually existed in fact? That’s a question that has consumed a significant portion of my life and the lives of countless others for almost two millennia.
The good news is that it’s a question we can answer beyond reasonable doubt. Even the agnostic professor of the New Testament Bart Erhman begins one of his popular books: “The reality is that whatever else you may think about Jesus, he certainly did exist”.
We have as much reason to believe that, as we do to believe that Caesar Tiberius existed. There are 10 sources for his existence recorded within 150 years of his life (one of which is a Christian source); while there are 42 sources for Jesus’ existence in the same period (9 of which are non-Christian sources).
In his book “Is Jesus History?” the historian John Dickson takes the reader on a guided tour of those ancient sources that corroborate much of the Bible’s testimony about Jesus. For example: two mentions in the Jewish historian Josephus (Antiquities 18:3, 20:9); one mention from the Roman historian Tacitus (Annals 15:44); as well as mentions from critics who record not only the existence of Jesus but also that Christians worshipped Jesus as God from the earliest of times:
“The Christians, you know, worship a man to this day — the distinguished personage who introduced their novel rites, and was crucified on that account” (Lucian)
“Now if the Christians worshipped only one God they might have reason on their side. But as a matter of fact they worship a man who appeared only recently. They do not consider what they are doing a breach of monotheism; rather they think it perfectly consistent to worship the great God and to worship his servant as God… When they call him Son of God, they are not really paying homage to God, rather, they are attempting to exalt Jesus to the heights” (Celsus)
So, without any further commitment, it is reasonable to conclude with a high degree of probability that Jesus really did exist. The more interesting question is why some 2000 years later should we care that he existed, any more than we care about the Caesars?
The philosopher Peter Kreeft paints a picture that helps us see how remarkable it is that we remember Jesus at all:
“He never entered politics, never fought a battle, and never wrote a book. He lived in a backwater nation, never went more than one hundred miles of his home, and was executed by crucifixion as a dangerous criminal. His moral teachings were not completely new. Nearly every piece of advice he gave us about how to live can be found in his own Jewish tradition, as well as in the philosophies of others. What caused his unparalleled impact?” (Peter Kreeft).
To answer this question, we need to consult the primary historical sources of those who witnessed the life of Jesus, who watched Him perform divine acts, who heard Him claim to be a divine person. For example, you could take an hour or two to read the shortest and earliest of the gospels – The Gospel According to Mark.
Mark’s pre-eminent question is: WHO IS JESUS? He starts off by telling us the answer, which he will seek to persuade us of throughout the rest of his book: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God” (1:1). At the centre of the book, there is a conversation between Peter and Jesus where Jesus asks “And who do you say I am?” and Peter replies with his marvellous confession: “You are the Christ” (8:29). Also, near the end, Mark records a Roman centurion who witnessed the death of Jesus: “Truly this man was the Son of God!” (15:39). Mark’s gospel is all about identifying Jesus.
In this first half of the gospel, Mark takes us breathlessly through a series of action packed stories of Jesus. If you simply skim through these early pages of the gospel you’ll see Jesus:
Mark wants us to see the good news that Jesus can overcome over the greatest threats to human flourishing: natural disasters, demons, diseases, and death. Mark also wants to show us that Jesus not only claims to be God, but does things that only God could do!
At the climax of the gospel, Jesus is arrested and sentenced to death for the crime of blasphemy – of claiming to be the Son of God. Jesus should have been just another forgotten victim of Roman brutality – another failed Messiah. However, in the final chapter of Mark’s gospel we read the account of the first eyewitnesses to the resurrection of Jesus from the dead – vindicating His claims to be the Son of God and the Lord of life.
Strangely, however, Mark ends on a minor key: “Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid” (16:8). Obviously, that’s not the end of the story – more happened afterwards. But the question is why does Mark end this way? It seems Mark is wanting to draw you, the reader, into the story. He’s challenging you – now that you know who Jesus is – it’s your job to respond to the story and then you need to go and tell.
Jesmond Parish Church (JPC) is a thriving evangelical Anglican congregation of the Church of England in Newcastle. Solas’s Andy Bannister had spoken for them online during the pandemic, but was invited back to speak in person recently. JPC is a very missional church, which is quite focussed on taking the gospel of Christ to their city. They invited Andy to speak, with the specific remit of speaking to the many people they draw to their services who are not yet believers in Jesus. They are a church which is popular with students too, which also means there are always young people present, many of whom are thinking through life’s biggest questions and exploring the Christian faith.
Andy spoke at three services on the Sunday, to between five and six hundred people. The early service was ‘Covid-friendly’, in which masks and social distancing were still enforced- to allow people who were not able to mix more freely to attend church in person with confidence. The morning service was specially designed for visitors who might not be familiar with church, The congregation were encouraged to invite friends and the leaders explained the elements of the service as they went through it- not assuming any prior knowledge or familiarity. In fact the folks at JPC invited any newcomers to observe the Christian faith in practice as they worshipped, prayed, and read scripture together.
An especially lovely element to the services were the interviews they did with people who have come to faith in Christ over the last two or three years. They were interesting, engaging and really helpful for not just encouraging Christians but helping people looking into Christianity to see what becoming a Christian looks like in practice. In the morning the person speaking had no background in the church, but was drawn in through friends – and found real faith in Christ. In the evening the testimony was of someone who was brought up in church, but had no real personal faith – and had to discover what that meant as an adult. Both of these were really helpful stories!
In the morning Andy preached on “Can life have meaning without God?”, using John chapter one as his basis. He explored some of the problems with Atheism but brought the talk to a conclusion with Philip’s plea to Nathanael about Jesus, “Come and see!” Jesmond Parish is about to launch a Christianity Explored Course, which is a wonderful way for people to come and see who Jesus is. You can watch the talk here.
“Christianity: Intolerant, irrelevant and out of date?” was Andy’s title in the evening. Underlying all of those accusations is the concept of freedom. One of our culture’s primary beliefs is that every individual must be free to do whatever they want. Christian faith is seen as a negative, or even harmful thing because it is perceived as restricting that freedom. Andy argued however that there is no such thing unfettered freedom – nobody can be entirely free from constraints. The question we all have to decide for ourselves then is ‘what are the best constraints to have’ and under what constraints will I flourish? Jesus said, “My yoke is easy and burden is light” and as such promised that in following him people would experience ‘life in all its fullness”. This talk is online here
Jonathan Prycke, Senior Minister at JPC said, ““We greatly appreciated Andy Bannister’s ministry at Jesmond Parish Church last Sunday. He spoke on ‘Can life have meaning without God?’ and ‘Christianity: irrelevant, out of date, intolerant?’ Andy very helpfully gets under the skin of these questions. He helps those who are not yet Christians to see that their secular materialist assumptions about life don’t hold water, before pointing them to Jesus as the one who makes sense of life. Andy joined us last year by video when we were only able to meet together online, so it was wonderful to have him with us in person as we begin to open up again. The church faces great challenges after its battering by the pandemic. But we know that our calling to take the gospel out to the community around us has not changed. Indeed, there are great opportunities created by the way that the foundations of people’s lives have been shaken over these last two years. Andy’s visit helped us to communicate with those outside the church who are asking questions. The model that he gave us also helped to encourage and equip those of us who are Christians in our own witness. We’re praying that the Christianity Explored course that we advertised at these services will be a place where seekers can continue to ask their questions, and can encounter Jesus in the pages of Mark’s Gospel.”
Andy said, “It was great to be back in front of a large live audience and to bring Jesus centred messages to them from the book of John. JPC is wonderful church which is really outward looking and evangelistic. Their leadership team are really strong, and the people really responsive and engaged. I hope to be able to work with them again. At Solas we’ll be praying that their Christianity Explored course is a blessing to many people in Newcastle.”
Find Jesmond Parish Church online here.
Their Clayton TV channel is here.
Have you ever wondered if you can truly change? If we’re honest, all of us have stuff about ourselves we’d love to change—aspects of our character we’re less than proud of. But change often seems really difficult, if not impossible. Why is change so tough? What’s the secret to real and lasting change? Could it be our desire for change (and our struggle to do so) is another clue to a bigger story?
For an in-depth look at this topic, have a look at this article by Gareth Black.
Please share this video widely with friends or family and for more Short Answers videos, visit solas-cpc.org/shortanswers/, subscribe to our YouTube channel or visit us on Twitter Instagram or Facebook.
Short Answers is a viewer-supported video series: if you enjoy them, please help us continue to make them by donating to Solas. Visit our Donate page and choose “Digital Media Fund” under the Campaign/Appeal button.
Hope Explored is a new course, from Christianity Explored Ministries (CEM), which is a really useful addition to their suite of resources for churches. While on one hand it has all the hallmarks you’d expect from CEM, (high-quality production, Jesus-centred, Bible-focused, videos and discussion materials), it also carves out new territory. That’s because Hope Explored is a very short three-week course, focussing on Hope, Peace and Purpose – as revealed in Christ through Luke’s gospel. This is an attractive starting point for people who are not yet ready to sign up for the deeper seven-session Christianity Explored course.
Alan Guy has been using the resource at South Glasgow Evangelical Church and said, “three weeks is an ideal introduction for people who are interested but busy and not yet ready to commit a huge amount of time.”
Our friends at Deeside Christian Fellowship Church (DCFC) in Aberdeen have recently completed their first Hope Explored course, having used a variety of evangelism courses over the last couple of decades. Peter Barrow, one of the church’s Leaders in Training spoke to Solas about how they got on. He said, “Hope Explored is really useful as a short, three-week introduction to the Christian faith. We had two aims when we ran the course, one was to communicate the gospel to non-Christian people, and the second was to help Christians to better communicate their faith. Hope Explored was useful for both those things.”
After running the course with a small team for five guests, including one from outside the church, Peter said, “The material in Hope Explored is really good. It’s typical Rico Tice! He’s warm, he’s easy to listen to, he’s a likeable guy who comes over well on screen and people trust him and listen to him! The videos are really relational too – people instinctively seem to connect to the content, they are done well.”
Alan Guy agreed, he said, “It’s a great tool for introducing people to the Christian faith. The video presentations are thoughtful and professional and relate very well to modern life.”
In Aberdeen, Peter reported that people responded well to the course, especially session three. “The conversations that the group had were great, as the DVD stimulated them to ask searching questions about who Jesus was and why he died.”
Alan Guy added, “The opening discussion questions helped us to navigate some common issues about the nature of life and some of the challenges of living with hope, peace and purpose. In a world that sometimes jars with these basic human desires. it was invaluable to take time to think about this in addition to the group bible study each week.”
In Aberdeen, Peter said they would do one or two things differently next time however. Next time they run the course they are planning to add an introductory session prior to the normal week one of the course.
Course-leader Doug Walker explained, “Hope Explored jumps straight into the Bible. We live in a culture in which Bible literacy is decreasing. Even 30 years ago many secular people had a basic understanding of what the Bible is about, but that’s not the case anymore.” Their planned introductory week would allow guests to get to know each other over food, watch the course trailer and chat informally to prepare people for what the course is about.. Adding an introductory week, and getting to know everyone then, will allow more space in week one to address people’s questions in a more friendly, less hurried way. They then plan to have an informal extra week at the end when everyone can share what they have learned and discuss over a meal where they’d like to go next.
Peter added, “While our main aim is to share this outside the church, it’s also worth mentioning that it’s often good for people who have been Christians for many years to get back to the basics to remind them of the reason for the hope they have so as to better equip them to share their faith with others in a clear and considered way. Hope Explored can be really useful for people like that”. This was something with which Alan in Glasgow agreed.
Deeside intend to run their next Hope Explored course, immediately followed by a Christianity Explored course, as they think that one will lead naturally into the other, with Hope Explored really whetting the appetite for people to go deeper into the gospels and life of Jesus and what that means for them.
Perhaps the best commendation of Hope Explored is that both churches immediately said, “when” we run the course again, not “if”!
Christianity Explored Ministries can be found here
Hope Explored course materials can be found online here
We had the opportunity to do another “Confident Christianity – Lite” conference recently, in Dundee. Our usual “Confident Christianity conferences”, draw on a speaking team from across the country, and usually large crowds for a full day event. The ‘lite’ version last only half a day, features only Solas in-house speakers and typically caters for smaller numbers.
We launched these ‘lite’ events in response to the needs of local churches who were not yet ready (post-Covid) to assemble large numbers of people in busy buildings for long periods of time; and for congregations who wouldn’t want to wear a face mask for a whole day! We’ve also found that these ’lite’ versions of our training conferences are easier for smaller fellowships to host.
This time we had the joy of returning to St Peter’s Free Church in Dundee – the place where Solas began and where several members of the team worship.
Andy Pearson, the new minister at St Peter’s welcomed everyone and kicked the morning off with an encouraging devotional message from Acts 13 in which Paul and Barnabas shared God’s word, saw opposition and God working to save people – and knew joy in the work of evangelism.
Solas’s Andy Bannister then led the folks at St Peter’s through a crash-course in question-asking, conversational-evangelism; with a particular emphasis on the secular workplace. After a short break he then looked at the ever-difficult topic of ‘suffering’. This is something which both causes sceptics to resist God and can prevent Christians from sharing their faith and so it deserves some thought. Andy asked everyone to develop a response to suffering based on God’s revelation in Jesus Christ – who both knew suffering himself, and promises to ultimately save us and deliver us into an eternity free from pain.
Andy was then joined by his Solas colleague Gavin Matthews for a Q&A session at the end. There were some really insightful questions which required some theological wisdom and a pastoral sensitivity. Alongside questions on science and sexuality there were hard questions about those who die without ever putting their faith in Christ – as far as anyone knows. In his reply Andy explained that while we can’t be sure of where someone else stood before God in their last breaths, we can be right with God through Christ now – and that is the urgent thing today.
Will Lind, St Pete’s Associate Minister commented, “It was brilliant to have Andy and Gavin with us at St Peter’s. We gathered together the morning after storm Arwen hit Dundee and the two of them were certainly a breath of fresh air! As Christians we often find it hard to share our faith: we live in a challenging culture and often worry we won’t be able to answer the difficult questions our friends and family might ask. Andy showed us that sometimes the most helpful approach is to ask a question in response. Both taught us not just by what they said but how they said it: at the end of the morning, they dealt with some searching questions from the floor with a wonderful mix of humility, honesty and humour. As we left the conference, speaking about Jesus felt that little bit more possible than it did at the start.”
Solas’s evangelism-training can be tailored to suit any church. We are still more than happy to do our full-day conferences to large audiences with a team of speakers. Equally we love doing these smaller events, in half-days, with a small team. It really is all about serving the needs of the local church. Please do contact us to discuss how we could help your church; or all the churches in your town, in encouraging, and equipping in evangelism today.
Apart from toddlers, teenagers probably ask the most questions about difficult subjects! Spare a thought, then, for Christians teaching adolescents in our schools. What can we learn about how to handle faith-questions in such an environment, where a mis-step can land you in hot water so easily? Today we hear from a science teacher about using questions like “Do you believe in aliens?” to encourage gospel conversations.
David Hutchings is a Fellow of the Institute of Physics and physics teacher at Pocklington School near York. David is a regular speaker on the philosophy, history, and theology of science across the United Kingdom. He is the author of Let There Be Science and God, Stephen Hawking and the Multiverse: What Hawking said and why it matters. The latter is reviewed here. His latest book, Of Popes and Unicorns: Science, Christianity, and How the Conflict Thesis Fooled the World, co-written with James C. Ungureanu, examines the 19th-century origins of the faith-science conflict myth.
The Persuasive Evangelism Podcast aims to equip listeners to share their faith more effectively in a sceptical world. Each episode, Andy Bannister (Solas) and Kristi Mair (Oak Hill College) chat to a guest who has a great story, a useful resource, or some other expertise that helps equip you to talk persuasively, winsomely, and engagingly with your friends, colleagues and neighbours about Jesus.
Loch Leven Church in Kinross invited me to speak at an outreach event they organised at Loch Leven’s Larder – a lovely café and shop in a celebrated beauty spot overlooking the hills and the loch. They’d booked the covered, heated outdoor seating area, from which we could listen to the band, and worship while watching the sun set behind the distant hills – enjoying good coffee and cakes. It was idyllic!
When we arrived to set-up, the café was buzzing with people – several of whom stayed for the worship once the open invitation was offered by the church, to anyone who wanted to stay. Stephen Jones, who was helping to run the event, (well-known to Solas readers from his contribution to the Frontlines series) said, “the fact that our church doesn’t own a building, and the school we often use isn’t currently available has been good for us in some ways. It’s forced us out into the community, to do the things we should have been doing anyway!” Richard Gibb from the church agrees, “temporarily lacking a venue has made us think innovatively. After speaking with management at Loch Leven’s Larder – we were delighted when they allowed us the opportunity to use this ‘neutral space’ for a very informal café church service,” he said.
Richard added, “We advertised this event to the wider community via our public Facebook page: “We Love Loch Leven” and it was brilliant seeing people come from a range of churches, bringing some of their friends, and also for the staff of the venue to be part of the event – as we were all reminded of the wonderful hope that has been made possible 2,000 years ago in the person of Jesus Christ who made it possible for us to be forgiven and reconciled with our Creator God.”
After the band had played, I spoke on the great subject of forgiveness and why it is the ‘glue’ that repairs fractured relationships between humans and between us and God. When someone has been wronged, denial and revenge don’t solve the problem – only forgiveness brings the parties together.
The issue of our need of forgiveness from God is remarkably similar. God offers to not count our sins against us, and not exercise his right to punish us, and calls us to confess and not deny what we have done wrong. Humans sometimes struggle to forgive one another because it requires vulnerability and there is always a cost. When God forgives there is also vulnerability and a cost. He approaches as – in vulnerability, so to speak – in the incarnation. When Jesus came, he didn’t come as a warrior to judge, but as a baby to forgive. Then at the cross he pays the costly price of forgiveness; taking the cost of sin into himself.
All of this comes together in two verses in the Bible, 1 John 1: 8-9, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” In Jesus there is truth and reconciliation between us and God. I encouraged people who were there to have a truthful conversation with God about their sins, because reconciliation with Him is possible, forgiveness is available because of the cross.
As well as seeing churches working together, and getting out into the community; it was especially encouraging to speak at the end to someone who is not a church-goer who was intrigued by the message saying, “I have never, ever heard anything like this before – I think this message was for me”.
At Solas, we love working with local churches sharing the gospel of Jesus with their communities all over the UK. If we could be of service to your church, please do get in touch using the connect button above to talk to us about what might be possible.
Lennox Evangelical Church in Dumbarton didn’t just invite Solas to come and do some evangelism-training with them; they made a day of it – by inviting us to work with them in an evangelistic meeting that evening!
They hired a local hotel for their annual outreach dinner this year which worked really well. Church members were encouraged to buy tickets and invite their friends to come for a good meal, and hear an after-dinner speaker. For many people, saying ‘let me buy you a ticket for a dinner in a hotel, and hear a short talk’, is a lot easier than saying ‘come to church with me!’ There seem to be quite a few people who will happily come to the hotel bar, who would not consider an invitation to an event in a church. The fact that Christians are offering to pay for their friends to come adds an element of hospitality and generosity to the invitation as well. The church subsidised the tickets to make it easier fr people to come as well.
The hotel provided a lovely dinner, and people sat around tables of six – chatting with the friends they had brought, along with others. After dinner, I spoke on “The Pursuit of Happiness”, which is a talk I use a lot with non-Christian audiences. I talk about the way in which we look for happiness in all the wrong places and really only if look for in it connection with the God who made you and designed you and in whom you can find true joy and happiness.
The audience seemed to be really engaged and the aim was to help the church to have further conversations with their friends about Jesus to help them discover him for themselves.
Professor David Galloway, the host from the local church said, “The real encouragement was that fact that several sceptics in the audience listened very attentively to the talk and I know of several follow on conversations that occurred afterwards. One is particular with a scientist. We’ll certainly have a chance to follow this up. The “Pursuit of Happiness” talk just right for that occasion and that audience. we are now planning some follow up events to develop these contacts.”
One notable feature of the evening was that along with people from Lennox Evangelical, there were people from other churches in the area – and those with no church connection across all ages ranges. The youngest person I spoke to was eleven, and the oldest in their mid-eighties; with good range of people in between. Young adults are sometimes the hardest group to get to these events, but there were plenty of them present too, which was really good to see.
Thsi kind of evangelism can seem really daunting the first time you attempt it, so if you are wanting a hand in reaching out to your community, please do contact us at Solas. We work with all kinds of chuches in all sorts of different communities to help communicate the saving message of Jesus.
Have you ever wondered what love is? Is it just a chemical reaction, a trick pulled on us by biology to get us to mate and reproduce? If love is *more* than that, then why is it often so hard to find? And why do we all desperately want to be loved? The rock band U2 famously sang “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for”—but what if our desire for love is a clue to something so much bigger?
Please share this video widely with friends or family and for more Short Answers videos, visit solas-cpc.org/shortanswers/, subscribe to our YouTube channel or visit us on Twitter Instagram or Facebook.
Short Answers is a viewer-supported video series: if you enjoy them, please help us continue to make them by donating to Solas. Visit our Donate page and choose “Digital Media Fund” under the Campaign/Appeal button.
If you enjoy this short piece, check out the book it now forms part of: Have You Ever Wondered?
A strong contender for the four most well-known words in the English language must arguably be: “Once upon a time …” Whether we are children or adults, we love stories; indeed our love of stories is something uniquely human. From the earliest recorded cave paintings to the most modern movie, across time, country, and culture, humans are a storytelling species.
As a child, I loved nothing better than to lose myself in a novel. Now I am a parent, I’ve passed on this love to my children—they don’t care (that) much for television, but their rooms are lined with books. Shortly before writing these words, I was curled up in bed with my six-year old son reading him the first volume of the brilliant Wingfeather Saga; there were mighty protests of “Dad! Just one more chapter!” when I closed the book.
Some stories are here today and gone tomorrow, but others become classics, retold to generation after generation. When a story is first written, it’s hard to tell whether it will become a classic but I would suggest that one thing most of the great stories, the classic tales, all have in common is they are built around a common theme: the triumph of good over evil.
Whether it’s Frodo and the Fellowship’s struggle against the evil Sauron in The Lord of the Rings; or Harry Potter and his friends and their fight against Voldemort; or the epic battle of the Rebellion against the Empire in Star Wars; or Charles Dickens’s Oliver Twist with the angelic Oliver up against the wicked Fagin; or T. H. White’s epic retelling of the Arthurian legend in The Once and Future King—the list could go on almost endlessly. Our most loved, most classic stories concern the battle of good over evil.
But have you ever wondered why we love stories? After all, if we live in a godless universe, all that matters is survival and reproduction. The only truthful story in this kind of world would be something like The Little DNA Molecule That Could, which I suspect would be somewhat lacking in the plot department. What kind of bizarre trick has nature played upon us, messing with our genes in such a way that humans—and only humans—seem to think that story matters? We’re more deluded than the craziest power-mad wicked step-parent in a Grimm Brothers’ fairy story.
But it gets stranger, because not merely do we love stories, despite their total uselessness to the whole he-who-passes-on-his-DNA-the-most-successfully-wins game, but as we’ve seen, the stories that have the greatest longevity are stories where good triumphs over evil. For sure, there is some pretty dystopian fiction out there; but in most of the classic stories, evil always gets a kicking.[1]
But in a godless universe, that’s a load of old rubbish, isn’t it? First, because “good” and “evil” are meaningless categories in a world which is just atoms in motion. Morality is just a nice story for children—but grown up atheists are those with the courage to say “Bah, humbug!” to all that. On top of which, even if you don’t have the courage as an atheist to go quite that far, the grim truth is that good doesn’t triumph. It simply doesn’t. Chaos wins in the end: suffering and death await all of us, await even the universe itself. The story of your life is the same as everybody else’s: “Born. Suffered. Died.” So our love of stories where good wins is merely delusion, wish-fulfilment, or brilliant marketing by publishers.
Yet have you ever wondered if maybe there’s more to it than that? Could it be that the reason that we’re drawn to these classic stories is because deep in our very bones we know that they resonate with reality? That in some way (part instinct, part common-species-memory, part something yet deeper still) we sense they are reflections of the one true story?
The theme of good triumphing over evil is, of course, profoundly Christian. It is the theme that runs through the whole of the Bible culminating in the story of Jesus and his victory over the forces of darkness. That Christian storyline is reflected in many of our favourite stories, sometimes deliberately, sometimes accidently. For example, Tolkien wrote:
The Lord of the Rings is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision.[2]
Whilst in a 2007 interview, J. K. Rowling described herself as a Christian and explained how the Harry Potter books were deeply influenced by her faith.[3] Even the Star Wars stories, for all of George Lucas’s interest in Eastern religion, are saturated in Christian ideas: think of the sacrifice of Obi-Wan Kenobi in A New Hope, or the existence of life after death that runs through the movies.
If Christianity is the true story of how a good God created a good world and placed human beings in it; of how we were corrupted by our love of greed and power; but how God then stepped into creation to rescue us, even at the cost of his own life, then it should not surprise us that when human beings engage in our God-given role of “sub-creation”,[4] of creating stories of our own, that these should reflect the One True Story.
But one last thought. It’s been suggested that you can divide most of the world’s stories into two types: comedies and tragedies. A tragedy is a story which begins with all going well and then ends in catastrophe for somebody. (Think of Shakespeare’s Macbeth and the titular character’s downward spiral into murder and insanity). If you graphed the trajectory of a tragedy, it would look like a frown ☹️. By contrast, the graph of a comedy looks like a smile ?: at first it seems all has gone wrong, but then comes a dramatic turn of events and the story climbs up to victory (or what Tolkien called eucatastrophe).
If atheism is true, if we live in a godless universe, then we are living in a tragedy. No matter how high humanity may squirm up the greasy pole of existence, everything ends in wrack and ruin. But if Christianity is true, then no matter how dark things may look, as they looked for Jesus as he hung on the cross, we know that this is not the story’s end, but that evil will be ultimately defeated and that after the last tear has fallen, there is love. As Sam Gamgee said to Frodo in the film adaptation of The Two Towers:
It’s like in the great stories Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were, and sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you. That meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why.
I believe that our love of stories was wired deeply into us by the God who created us, as one more clue, one more pointer to who we really are and for what—indeed for whom—we were really made. And so the question becomes, will we follow Ariadne’s thread, the trail of the stones in the wood, the light from the lamppost—will we follow these clues where they lead? Or will we slam the book shut, close our eyes, stop up our ears, and mutter: “I’m just a 1% bit of pollution in the universe” to ourselves until the lights go out.[5] Now that really would be a tragedy.
—
[1] And even in dystopian fiction, like Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, as a reader you’re meant to protest; not cheer at the triumph of Big Brother.
[2] Humphrey Carpenter, ed., The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000), p. 172.
[3] See Jonathan Petre, ‘Christianity Inspired Harry Potter’, The Telegraph, 20 October 2007 (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/fictionreviews/3668658/J-K-Rowling-Christianity-inspired-Harry-Potter.html)
[4] A term coined by J. R. R. Tolkien.
[5] That was the atheist Lawrence M. Krauss’s memorable description of what he thought human beings were; cited in Amanda Lohrey, ‘The Big Nothing: Lawrence Krauss and Arse-Kicking Physics’, The Monthly, October 2012 (http://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2012/october/1354074365/amanda-lohrey/big-nothing).
Notifications
