quote:

---

there will be 'a grass roots movement of the Holy Spirit’

---

quote:

---

The headline that interest me is that 100s of Christians are having 100s of conversations about Christ on the streets of Reading. Time will tell what comes of this and what we can learn from it.

---

quote:

---

The substance of what is or isn't happening in Reading will emerge in time

---

quote:

---

Maybe return to this in the New Year and see what wheat has fallen in Reading and what chaff is heading for the fire.

---

quote:

---

Other pastors in the town have begun to get involved.

---

The Reading Christian Network, of which The Gate is a member, has nothing at all to say about the “outpouring” or any consequences thereof on its website.

GetReading is a local paper which I have had dealings with in the past and whose journalism I have found to be reliable. I can’t find any mention of The Gate in the paper and the most recent mention of the pastor Yinka Oyekan I can find dates back to 2013, with the church hosting event by US entrepreneurs apparently advising people how to start small businesses.

I can’t find any relevant mentions of churches, evangelism, conversions, or revival.

As to The Turning™, it seems to have had limited takeup in the UK. this page lists some forthcoming dates, although it is now billed as an “evangelistic movement” and not an “outpouring”. It has however crossed the Channel to France

The serious-minded French Baptist Federation reports 2500 conversions in Reading (!) and 865 during the Lille outreach (!!), with visits to 150 more towns and cities across France planned

So in the New Year we appear to have no revival in Reading, and a new itinerant training programme for decisionist evangelism coupled with ongoing cognitive dissonance about this being the “signs of a new revival”.

Can anyone find anything more positive to say about all this?

==

*I'm PM-ing Ramarius to alert him to this thread.

[ETA: I can't. Apparently he has both PMs and e-mail messaging disabled ]

[ETA again: found an email address in an old PM. Will try it]

[ 03. January 2017, 20:37: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by Doc Tor (# 9748) on :
 
Miss Tor has been in Reading since September, and has found a home at one of the evangelical Anglican churches. She is a sometime-attender of the CU (she is non-conventional GLE in either dress or mannerisms) and finds it a bit strained.

I did ask her about this, and she looked at me blankly. She did recall a conversation with someone at some point during Freshers' Week when she was in town, but as she was barely sober for any of the seven days, she doesn't remember much about it. ( )

Basically, zero impact as far as she and her friends are concerned.
 

---

Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on :
 
It might be worth looking at the archives of this Christian hyperlocal news site for Reading and the local area. I've not seen much from a quick search.

http://www.xnmedia.co.uk/
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
It looks like the site hasn't been updated since 2015.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Sounds like Cwmbran all over again. And Dudley before that.

I grew up in Cwmbran and although I don't do back much these days, no-one I know there other than revivalist folk have ever said anything about the so-called revival there.

I'll be interested to hear what Ramarius has to say of he can be found.
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Pastor Yinka Oyekan has published a "Learning Review" of The Turning, which I've just found, here.

[ETA published on his Facebook page on October 13]

[ 03. January 2017, 21:32: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
A couple of quick takeaways from the above report.

First, the good news: Oyekan acknowledges that the original script did not contain a proper kerygma (p14).

(On p12 he mentions that the evangelist who introduced the script, Tommie Zito - who he seems to have distanced himself from - got it verbatim from his mentor, none other than Rodney Howard Browne, whose name will be familiar to Toronto Blessing and Lakeland Revival veterans).

His solution is... to revise the script. He says it must be used in combination with Bethel-style "soaking" in the Spirit to be effective (p6 et al).

The more depressing part, to my mind, is in the numbers.

Oyekan reports (p4) a total of 1850 "people prayed for" said to include "many first time commitments and rededications to Christ".

Of these, he reports (p19) that an initial followup meeting for tea/coffee was secured for 26% of a sample of 101 respondents who left details and describes (p20) the other 74% [of those "first time commitments and rededications to Christ"!!] as having "brushed them off and not wished to continue the dialogue".

So here is the cognitive dissonance exposed.

The huge headline number of conversions (and, not too loud now, "rededications") is divided by four - simply for a followup tea or coffee, let alone getting people streaming into churches.

The tragedy is that this reported fact is buried in a 26-page document in stark contrast to the loudly trumpeted claims.

Which, by the time they have crossed the Channel, are being reported (reference above) as "over 2500 people turning to Christ".

[ 03. January 2017, 21:49: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by mr cheesy (# 3330) on :
 
Interesting how there was a flurry of excitement about this in June (maybe something about New Wine), but essentially nothing said since.
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
I think the endorsement by Baptist Union leader Lynn Green probably helped. The Christian media interest seems to have been prior to New Wine.

The "silly season" summer timing is very reminiscent of Cwmbran as Gamaliel says.

I would however hesitate to draw too hasty a comparison between the key players in terms of character.

I'm not fan of Bethel-inspired theology, but to his credit Oyekan has at least been accountable enough to publish a report with figures that admits some problems, and that is a million miles from anything that happened at Cwmbran under Richard Taylor's watch from what I can see.

The wider problem is the uncritical reporting of such events, the lack of fact-checking, the constant double standards of conversions vs. "recommitments", and the false expectations this hype generates, leading not only to disappointment but also fatigue and the diversion of resources away from more sustainable and fruitful long-term initiatives.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Dare I also suggest that the weaknesses in the approach are inherent, intrinsic and inevitable (see what I did there, preacher's alliteration ... ;)although I'm not a preacher).

They are:

Inherent - because the theology/soteriology that it is based on is in itself somewhat flawed. It inclines to 'easy-believism' - say the prayer and bingo, you're 'saved'.

It is, as Eutychus says, a decisionist model.

Intrinsic - these 'techniques' - altar-calls, praying the sinner's prayer and so on - are embedded in such revivalist movements and they don't know any other way of doing things. At least, in this instance there's an element of self-reflection going on.

Inevitable - the skimpy or disappointing results in relation to the hype are inevitable because all they are doing is stopping people in the street or on doorsteps, taking them through a very reductionist 'script' and expecting them to make some kind of amazing, life-changing and cosmic decision purely on the basis of a couple of minutes interaction.

If anyone has done any door-to-door canvassing, market-research or selling, and I'm afraid I have, then you get used to people saying, 'I'll think about it ...' or 'Come back at 3.30pm ...' and then find that they have no intention of following through.

You can make a parrot say, 'Lord Jees-AHS I ask you into my life ... squawk!'

Now, I'm not suggesting that a sacramental model is necessarily any more 'effective'. I remember reading something Archbishop Makarios said after he'd visited Kenya and baptised thousands of Kenyans who flocked to hear him - he was seen as something of an anti-colonial hero of course.

He said that he doubted whether the smallest fraction of the people he'd baptised - and I think it was somewhere in the region of 5,000 people - had any inkling what they were doing or any seriousness about it.

Whatever tradition we are from, there is no quick-fix. Discipleship is a lifelong thing. Salvation isn't a product.

The model on which this whole 'Turning' / Awakening / DIY Create Your Own Revival schtick is based is fundamentally flawed.

Calvinists blame Finney.

You don't have to be a fully-paid up TULIP Calvinist (and I'm not) to find fault with this model.

Its intrinsic weaknesses are readily apparent.

That said, evangelical and charismatic churches can be very successful in creating and developing consistent and dogged disciples. They do that despite the model they are using and because it requires stamina and dedication to stick with it despite the ups and downs and roller-coaster ride it offers.
 

---

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :
 
Anyone here from Reading care to tell us about the impact in the town?

I'm within easy travelling distance of Reading - 40 miles or so - but have heard little about it. It all seems to have gone quiet within the denomination too - despite being affirmed by the Gen Sec in the early stages.

A little bit of research reveals that in 2013 Yinka invited a group of American businessman over to teach his church how to generate wealth. I don't see or hear much result from that either. The church seems to have a bog standard prosperity type message with all the expectations and all the hype that usually brings.

It's just the same old thing in my view - I find it very sad saying that as someone who is praying for revival. One thing I know - on the evidence "Reading" isn't it and is an obvious child of the Toronto stuff and a certain RHB.

I think we need to be prepared for some collateral damage on the horizon as promise fails to morph into delivery.

Still, the outpouring hits Bristol soon and I'll be intrigued to follow its course as there's lots of people I know and trust in that neck of the woods.

Like Euty, having read Yinka's assessment of the events, I am even more sceptical of what is really going on. IME if you feel you have to inflate numbers or stories then
a) it doesn't glorify God
b) it means people who discover the truth won't trust you
c)everyone will associate deceit with the church.

Not where we want to be. The truth please and nothing but the truth?
 

---

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
I think the endorsement by Baptist Union leader Lynn Green probably helped. The Christian media interest seems to have been prior to New Wine.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
Anyone here from Reading care to tell us about the impact in the town?

---

Nothing particularly as far as I can tell - not even heard much of it from friends who are much more in touch with the charismatic groups around here than I am.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I don't have any issue with the more moderate charismatics within the Baptist ambit, but do worry about the charismatic scene within the CofE as it seems all too prone to pursue whatever is the latest fad ...



There was a time when sensible voices seemed to be emerging - Ian Stackhouse, Nigel Wright ...

Are they still being heard?

I'm afraid I don't particularly 'pray for revival' any more. That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see an increase in conversions and at least some reversal of the decline ...

But the whole revivalist rhetoric puts me off these days. I don't want anything to do with contemporary revivalism.

I do, however, want everything to do with the sensible voices that remain within the revivalist constituency and I'm sure there are more of them around than appears to be the case at first sight.
 

---

Posted by ExclamationMark (# 14715) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I don't have any issue with the more moderate charismatics within the Baptist ambit, but do worry about the charismatic scene within the CofE as it seems all too prone to pursue whatever is the latest fad ...



There was a time when sensible voices seemed to be emerging - Ian Stackhouse, Nigel Wright ...

Are they still being heard?

I'm afraid I don't particularly 'pray for revival' any more. That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see an increase in conversions and at least some reversal of the decline ...

But the whole revivalist rhetoric puts me off these days. I don't want anything to do with contemporary revivalism.

I do, however, want everything to do with the sensible voices that remain within the revivalist constituency and I'm sure there are more of them around than appears to be the case at first sight.

---

I've heard little from Ian Stackhouse or Nigel Wright for some time. I'm not aware of any sensible theology being talked across the board these days.

Baptist life is becoming tribal and disconnected - we stand on the edge of a number of precipices and it won't take much of a push to go over the edge with divisive outcomes. It may be that some will end up in New Wine, others New Frontiers, a few to FIEC, BME will split off on their own or perhaps RCGP.

In the absence of robust reflection BUGB is fair game for all sorts of things. Lynn Green's endorsement of Reading shouldn't be taken too far - Reading was on her patch a couple of years ago. She knows the church and what it is like.

I'll personally sit up and take real notice when there's indisputable evidence of God at work - with no hype - coming from a source which is unexpected and not one of the usual suspects.

[ 04. January 2017, 14:38: Message edited by: ExclamationMark ]
 

---

Posted by Callan (# 525) on :
 
This reminds me about the joke about the Spanish exiles in Mexico. The joke was that their index fingers were shorter than was usual. Why? [Jabs finger repeatedly on table] I tell you next year that Franco will fall! Charismatics have been prophesying revival for as long as they've been on my radar (c1993). It hasn't happened yet.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
They've been doing it since the 1950s, and, in their older traditional Pentecostal form, revivalists have been doing it since the early 1900s.

I'm minded to start a new thread, 'Can revival be recovered from the revivalists?'

People talk about the Flag of St George or the Union Flag being recovered from racists and nationalists, perhaps the same could be attempted for the idea of revival?

Certainly my recollection is of more sensible discussion/reflection on the subject emerging between around 1999 and 2002/03 ...

But, like ExclamationMark, I've not been aware of much sensible theological reflection on the issue since then.

As for ExclamationMark's diagnosis of the state of Baptist-dom, I'm genuinely sorry to hear it ...



We found refuge in a Baptist setting after we'd emerged from the roller-coaster revivalism of the restorationist ambit in 2000. At that time, the Baptists seemed able to balance a kind of principled and reflective evangelicalism with a moderate charismatic emphasis and a dose of realism - with some welcome social-concern too.

I have very little faith in New Wine as I don't trust its level of discernment. I have no idea what's happening in FIEC circles these days. What does RGCP stand for?

Whatever happened to 'Mainstream'?

They were avowedly charismatic but seemed to have some sensible people involved.
 

---

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
I've heard little from Ian Stackhouse or Nigel Wright for some time. I'm not aware of any sensible theology being talked across the board these days.

---

quote:

---

I'll personally sit up and take real notice when there's indisputable evidence of God at work - with no hype - coming from a source which is unexpected and not one of the usual suspects.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I was intrigued by a comment made by a sociologist who'd studied the religious landscape of the UK on a relatively recent TV programme about the possible future of church-life in the UK.

She observed that the comparative success of the evangelicals and charismatics came at a price, because it made people think that in order to be a Christian you have to be demonstrative or extrovert in some way ...

So, effectively, swathes of evangelicalism/charismaticdom have painted themselves into a corner as they've yoked themselves to various forms of 'enthusiasm' as their defining feature.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
One of the points the sociologist was making, if I understood her correctly, was that MoTR or less enthusiastic churches are less visible these days, so the more visible and full-on 'lively' churches are effectively saying, 'If you want to be a Christian, you have to be like us ...'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Might not something similar have been said in the 1750s in the time of Whitefield and Wesley?

---

Apart from the differences Gamaliel cites, I would list the following:

- we live in the shadow of those revivals, or the accounts of them. Nostalgia features large here I think.

- there has been a financial side to revivals ever since Ananias and Sapphira. Moody & Sankey were accused of trying to sell Sankey's hymn books. But this is not on a par with today's huge Christian market. Revivals in general can now be now big money, and the crossover with marketing, conferences, tie-in merchandising and so on is well and truly here and does not help with transparency, accountability, and so on.

I've looked a bit more at the "Learning Review" paper and will post more thoughts on it as and when I can.
 

---

Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on :
 
I think I've said elsewhere that Cells of Our Lady of Walsingham (and doubtless many other peeps, too!) offer prayer 'for the conversion of England', as distinct from 'revival '.

I wonder what that would look like, should it ever occur? Perhaps the church(es) do need reviving first, though...

IJ
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
There's enthusiasm and there's Enthusiasm ... there's revival and there's Revivalism ...

I'm not against enthusiasm, in the sense of having a bit of oomph in the way one goes about things.

I do worry about Enthusiasm with a Big E.

Ronald Knox was good on that in his book Enthusiasm. The final sentence in the book with an apposite quote from a French play is masterly ...

Someone more adept at links and so forth than I am might oblige us with a link and Eutychus can translate ...
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Wake me up when somebody, somewhere does something incarnational. It'll probably be a Muslim or an atheist. And I am anti-Charismatic. A Muslim and especially an atheist are somewhat less likely to make any deluded claims of, or prayers for, magic; to engage in the opportunity cost of doing less, worse, than nothing.

How long before we outgrow this dross? This pap?

Wrong question. This is no longer just infantile. It's senile. Unto death.
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
A few more notes from the Learning Review of “The Turning” below.

Prior to the evangelistic campaign the church ran a “Company of Prophets” for adults and notably youth (11-18) to learn how to “prophesy over the lost” providing an “instant spiritual connection with non-Christians, who were amazed that we knew secret things about their lives” (p4).

This appears to be modelled on Bethel’s Supernatural School of Ministry practice, and basically be glorified cold reading.

Back on the evangelistic side, there is manifest confusion about just what is happening to people prayed for. Oyekan hopes that over time the “quality of conversion will improve” (p5)

This begs the question as to just what he thinks conversion consists of if it comes in various quality levels.

As of July 23, he reported (p5) that 810 people had been trained in street evangelism for a four-week mission which he elsewhere reports as having seen 1850 people “pray the prayer”.

If my maths is right that amounts to 2.3 contacts per trained person, or each person praying with one contact every 12 days, which on the face of it does not seem very extraordinary, still less so when you consider, as per Oyekan’s own figures, that only about one quarter of those prayed for were successfully contacted afresh.

Oyekan also emphasises the importance of “standing in the outpouring” (p10) prior to evangelism. In other words, a long worship session during which people get “blessed up” before taking to the streets. From a sociological point of view this doubtless lowers their inhibitions.

I think what is unusual in The Turning - and slightly countering Martin60 here - is the combination of this very charismatic and Spirit-directed ethos with a highly mechanistic decisionist script.

Oyekan clearly has his doubts about the latter (“one pastor was in tears as he felt it was deficient in its gospel proclamation”, p13) but at the same time sees the script (or some variation on it) as a useful tool. He mentions but does not publish his detailed reservations about the script as originally used (he hints, p14, that the original script doesn’t mention the resurrection – I haven’t checked this yet).

He further adds (p19) that “The visiting evangelist would happily rest at the idea that making converts is what God is doing in this season, a concept I do not share”. In other words, Tommie Zito is an out-and-out decisionist (which helps to explain the ridiculously huge claims on his website), whereas Oyekan is not.

This difference of opinion as to what constitutes conversion is at the heart of the confusion here, and it is not resolved.

Finally, the following over-optimistic back-of-an-envelope calculations indicate the kind of naivety in play (p22-23):

quote:

---

If just five churches with an average attendance (60 members each) are all witnessing, praying for or leading someone to Christ just once a week for just one and a half hours, then between 300 and 600 people will either come to faith or rededicate their lives to Christ a week. (…) Scaling up these numbers over 52 weeks gives you a staggering figure of 31200 people prayed for.

---

quote:

---

We have in the space of just seven weeks trained up 810 people in how to share the gospel with the lost. I estimate with the number of cities asking us to bring this grace to their town (18 at last count) that we will train between 50,000 – 100,000 people in how to share the gospel in the streets of the UK in the next 18 month.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
It's dross or nothing, vacuum, that nothing can fill.

---

I disagree, I think what's needed is faith plus realism.

We had somebody testify to healing last Sunday. She had requested prayer from the leaders (invoking James "is anybody sick?") for healing of a historic badly broken ankle which gave her a lot of pain and was to require surgery to basically weld it into one fixed position.

We had obliged in a private time of prayer with her (sceptical as we are, we really don't like doing this kind of thing!).

Six months on, she has reported that she had expected to be healed and running around on a new ankle; that this had not happened; but that since we prayed the constant pain she had been in had disappeared entirely, and that she had also experienced emotional healing with respect to the circumstances of the break.

Psychosomatic or not, an operation is no longer required, something her osteopath has described as "extremely rare".

We did not follow this up with an altar-call for healing and nobody made it out to be something it wasn't. We don't announce healing as a sign of even more healings to come, or revival. More an incidental bestowing of grace.

But we didn't make it out to be nothing either, because it clearly was something.
 

---

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :
 
I've got this feeling that if a metanarrative is of any use to the UK church at present, exile might have more going for it than revival. It's not like life in Babylon just yet, of course, but worth keeping an eye on some of the social trends.

And a Happy New Year to you all


 

---

Posted by Bishops Finger (# 5430) on :
 
'How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?' seems somehow apposite....

Martin - can you give us a concrete example of the sort of incarnational something you'd like to see? I'm not being obtuse, coz I think ISWYM, but some clarification would be welcome...

IJ
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
@Eutychus

Alleluia for the grace. Where faith meets fact.

Faith: It's good that it was shared and taken seriously, that she was cared for, lifted up, embraced communally. Fact: And yes, of course it was psychosomatic, what else could it possibly have been? And the opinion of an osteopath is worth what? Apart from being part of the positive caring placebo.

Reading is truly absolutely nothing. Less than nothing. No conversation can be had between it and faith and fact, it is divergently orthogonal to that line. It has nothing to do with either end. As it can't be had where its even more attenuated shadow falls on Leicester.

[ 05. January 2017, 12:02: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I sometimes get the impression from Martin60's posts that almost anyone can be 'incarnational' apart from charismatic Christians.

Muslims can be incarnational. Atheists can be incarnational ...

A charismatic pastor? Not so much ...

Of course, humanity sharing to some extent the imageo dei, then it's to be expected that we'll all, at some time or other, reflect something of the glory and majesty of Almighty God - however indistinctly or even imperceptibly ...

I don't see any reason to suggest that charismatic Christians are less capable of being truly incarnational than anyone else.

The issue I have isn't with them being charismatic as such - I'd say that all believers are 'charismatic' in the true sense of the world - salvation itself is a 'gift' - a charism.

The issues I have are broadly similar to those expressed by Eutychus and ExclamationMark.

There is an unfortunate tendency for enthusiastic and revivalist forms of Christianity to veer into exaggeration, manipulation and delusion. The same probably applies to the vatic and 'enthusiastic' dimension within other world-faiths too. It may be expressed differently but there will be parallel tendencies.

There are similar tendencies within political groups. We are talking about sociological as much as spiritual phenomena here and the two are interlinked.

The other thing that bothers me about this whole decisionism malarkey is that the next time any of these people encounter the Gospel they could think to themselves, 'Oh, I've already "done that", I've prayed the prayer ... I don't need to do anything else ...'

The people who promote this kind of approach are all too keen to dismiss nominal or 'cradle' Christians from other traditions. 'Oh, they've just been christened as babies ... They're only involved for social reasons ... yadda yadda yadda ...'

And without in any way diminishing the perniciousness of a 'magical' approach to the sacraments/ordinances or to deny that many people simply have a form of 'cultural Christianity', the irony is that they themselves promulgate something similar with their quick-fix, easy-believism pyramid-selling type approach.

That's why evangelicals and charismatics of all people should be the most opposed to revivalism (but not revival).

Why? Because it debases the coinage.
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Fact: And yes, of course it was psychosomatic, what else could it possibly have been?

---

quote:

---

Reading is truly absolutely nothing. Less than nothing.

---

I wouldn't be anywhere near so bugged about all this if I thought that were true.

The trouble is, I'm sure some people will genuinely encounter God through and in spite of how this has all been conducted.

Even if one assumes the leaders are all evil or wholly deceived, I don't think it's fair to extend that judgement to the sheep, still less the hapless unbelievers on the receiving end.

(Don't forget even your own congregation, which is into all this sort of thing apparently, has you in it )

Any (genuine) testimonies on their part will then be held up as evidence that "God's in this, even if we didn't get it all right" as though that was an excuse for, if not an outright justification for, not exercising due diligence and good governance (as well as for their particular brand of Revival™).

People twist God "using the foolish things of the world to shame the wise" into a justification for acting foolishly, and that's what gets to me.

I wonder where Ramarius has got to?

[ 05. January 2017, 12:18: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
@Bishops Finger

Obtuseness is my job. Excellent question. The kind of thing that you or anyone would know if they saw it. Anything in the direction of James' true religion and Jerusalem's communism without desperate distorting damnationist agenda. In other words I have no idea as I'm not doing it and don't know anyone who is apart from the penurious clergy gathered here whilst far flung in France, New Zealand, Wales, the US. And apart from all efforts that serve the common weal with enlightened self interest. From retained privilege. That go back to middle class enclaves at night. Anything that goes further than that, that volunteers, gets down, lives, in the gutter, throws itself there not in self destruction but the sacrificial sharing, laying down of privilege, staying with those it lifts up and spreading out from there.

I suspect I'm being a fool as in my erstwhile armchair pacifism.

I'm acutely aware of my privileged helplessness alongside the uselessness of Outpouring, Revival, Anointing, Prophecy, Healing and the council, social services, the NHS, the police, the homeless charities in the face of R. who sits on the freezing trendy inner suburban street begging to feed his opium addiction whilst missing his Depakote dose. He may well have died last night, sleeping in the park.

A community that took him in regardless would be a beacon on a hill.

But of course, he'd have to let them. And that won't happen either, as in my years of experience with P. because in part the only networked community of tough, decent Christian blokes who would take him in are 'primitive'. The only group I know that isn't is a superb, no holds barred, inclusive Christian, addiction rehab centre in Luton run by former addicts. So I DO know someone.

[ 05. January 2017, 12:48: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
 

---

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bishops Finger:
'How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?' seems somehow apposite....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

This appears to be modelled on Bethel’s Supernatural School of Ministry practice, and basically be glorified cold reading.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
The one and the same.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
The one and the same.

---

In that case, am I being unreasonable in being very wary - requiring to be persuaded rather than giving the benefit of the doubt?

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
Are you suggesting you apply less rigourous fact-checking to extraordinary claims made by those of your own political or religious persuasion?

I think that's precisely the mindset that's at work in Reading.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ExclamationMark:
We have still yet to hear of how many people are actually now attending churches, increasing congregations and being disciple.

---

quote:

---

It strikes me that this kind of reporting is yet another demonstration of the church wanting to impress rather than the church wanting to witness.

---

quote:

---

It all makes me rather sceptical, almost to the point of cynicism when I hear claims which can't be substantiated or which are conditioned in some way ("recommitments")

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
The one and the same.

---

In that case, am I being unreasonable in being very wary - requiring to be persuaded rather than giving the benefit of the doubt?

---

Are you suggesting you apply less rigourous fact-checking to extraordinary claims made by those of your own political or religious persuasion?

I think that's precisely the mindset that's at work in Reading.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:
If there's a general obligation to think well of others until one has clear reason not to, what I was implying is that this might be suspended or qualified in respect of somebody who presents themselves as a Christian leader with a prophetic vision and yet has publicly supported Trump - and in that case also someone who links themselves up with such a person.

---

I was careful to use the words "extraordinary claims" in my response to you.

Of course we should trust those we think well of implicitly, but when the stakes are high, I am a firm believer in trust, but verify.

I would rate my discovery of this maxim, in the course of an interpreting job in an industrial context, as one of the most life-shaping events of my life - not least because of having never heard it in a Christian context and having suffered the consequences of the mantra of "believing the best" in an environment of spiritual abuse.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - no matter who is making them. Indeed, the more affinity we feel with the claimant, the more we should feel a responsibility to check the claim, not the opposite.

I utterly reject the notion that our fact-checking should be based merely on somebody's declared political affiliations. On the contrary, I think such a mindset is right in step with the partisan divisiveness Trump and his ilk are seeking to promote for their own ends.

Finally (in this post), in the interest of good reporting I have been asked to correct my account of last Sunday's healing testimony here. The person remarking on the extreme rarity of the improvement was not an osteopath but an orthopaedic surgeon, and the surgical procedure that was avoided due to the ankle bones fusing "spontaneously" following the prayer was Arthrodesis.

[ 06. January 2017, 08:32: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Still not sure why the BU grabbed it so eagerly, though.

---

quote:

---

Two weeks ago a year ago, one night I was just going to sleep and I had this, I was just lifted up into God’s presence and I had this amazing vision of fire, and I saw that God was lighting beacons of fire all across our nation, starting here in Reading and spreading out across the nation.

(…)

I wrote it all down in my journal (…)

Because I felt that it would start in Reading, I rang Yinka and said “I’ve had this vision, and I just want to share it with you and test it with you.” So we met together a couple of days later, didn’t we? And what I didn’t know is, when I shared it was going to start in Reading and spread out, he thought it was going to start in Plymouth, I’ve only [sic] found that out, so he ignored it and I, if I’m honest, because I’m still learning in these things, I thought “well do you know, is it really Reading, because that’s just like near where I live, so maybe that’s just me”.

(…)

I am a friend of Yinka on Facebook, and when his name just keeps popping up again and again (…) I am of course praising God. But thinking “okay, God is doing something”.

And of course then that make me think about the thing that I had originally thought, that it started in Reading, but I’d screened it out, so I went back Friday morning, I went back to my journal and checked in it, and it says there, “it will start in Reading and go out from here”.

---

quote:

---

“We need to be open to critique, we need to be open to what God is saying to us.”

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:
If there's a general obligation to think well of others until one has clear reason not to, what I was implying is that this might be suspended or qualified in respect of somebody who presents themselves as a Christian leader with a prophetic vision and yet has publicly supported Trump - and in that case also someone who links themselves up with such a person.

---

I was careful to use the words "extraordinary claims" in my response to you.

Of course we should trust those we think well of implicitly, but when the stakes are high, I am a firm believer in trust, but verify.

I would rate my discovery of this maxim, in the course of an interpreting job in an industrial context, as one of the most life-shaping events of my life - not least because of having never heard it in a Christian context and having suffered the consequences of the mantra of "believing the best" in an environment of spiritual abuse.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - no matter who is making them. Indeed, the more affinity we feel with the claimant, the more we should feel a responsibility to check the claim, not the opposite.

...

Finally (in this post), in the interest of good reporting I have been asked to correct my account of last Sunday's healing testimony here. The person remarking on the extreme rarity of the improvement was not an osteopath but an orthopaedic surgeon, and the surgical procedure that was avoided due to the ankle bones fusing "spontaneously" following the prayer was Arthrodesis.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Was this first hand? By a Christian orthopaedic (why did SOF get their poxy spellchecker?) surgeon?

---

quote:

---

Or is this all your according to your faith that could be achieved?

---

quote:

---

Despite the fact that everything about the universe and evolution and this healing looks fully natural, driven ultimately by inferred ineffable necessity still infinitely less ineffable than God, God done it and completely covered His tracks?

---

There's no need for a binary all-or-nothing approach: I invite you to meditate on the "Why not both?" meme some more.

God was in some way involved in this process by virtue of the fact that the person asked for prayer and anointing of oil from the elders, and her acknowledging that in her testimony. That is good enough for me.

In other news, in an attack of conscience I have e-mailed Lynn Green alerting her to the existence of this thread.

Hello Lynn if you're reading

(I wonder if Ramarius is? )

[ 06. January 2017, 11:56: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Yes, I'd like to see Ramarius back too.

On the thing SvitlanaV2 raised about whether reasonable, well-informed people can be involved with 'revival' ... well, I would suggest that yes, of course they can.

The Wesleys were reasonable and well-informed, even if they could have some pretty odd ideas at times. Hence the title of Henry Lack's impressive biography of John Wesley, 'Reasonable Enthusiast'.

John Wesley and his contemporaries weren't quite so taken with 'revival phenomena' as many revivalists claim. Sure, they went along with the hootin' and the hoolerin' at times but it's pretty obvious from the contemporary accounts that they didn't take everything that happened at face value and as time went on were more inclined to be more sceptical towards some of the claims that were made.

As with everything else, it was a mixed bag.
 

---

Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
I was careful to use the words "extraordinary claims" in my response to you.

Of course we should trust those we think well of implicitly, but when the stakes are high, I am a firm believer in trust, but verify.

I would rate my discovery of this maxim, in the course of an interpreting job in an industrial context, as one of the most life-shaping events of my life - not least because of having never heard it in a Christian context and having suffered the consequences of the mantra of "believing the best" in an environment of spiritual abuse.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence - no matter who is making them. Indeed, the more affinity we feel with the claimant, the more we should feel a responsibility to check the claim, not the opposite.

I utterly reject the notion that our fact-checking should be based merely on somebody's declared political affiliations. On the contrary, I think such a mindset is right in step with the partisan divisiveness Trump and his ilk are seeking to promote for their own ends. ....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:


On the thing SvitlanaV2 raised about whether reasonable, well-informed people can be involved with 'revival' ... well, I would suggest that yes, of course they can.

The Wesleys were reasonable and well-informed, even if they could have some pretty odd ideas at times. Hence the title of Henry Lack's impressive biography of John Wesley, 'Reasonable Enthusiast'.

John Wesley and his contemporaries weren't quite so taken with 'revival phenomena' as many revivalists claim. Sure, they went along with the hootin' and the hoolerin' at times but it's pretty obvious from the contemporary accounts that they didn't take everything that happened at face value and as time went on were more inclined to be more sceptical towards some of the claims that were made.

As with everything else, it was a mixed bag.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
It seems to me that this whole thing is exacerbated by the theology that implies that conversion is instant and necessary for salvation.

If the theology was actually that one grows in faith and that salvation was a long(er) term process, then there would be no urgency to loudly proclaim how many people had mumbled the magic words.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
The movement didn't seem to have a great deal of success among people who were as well-bred and educated as the Wesleys (plus a few fellow ministers from their uni days).

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:
To this day most spa towns still have at least one markedly evangelical church where the advowson belongs to an organisation called the Simeon Trustees, which bought advowsons in such places so as to preach the gospel to the quality that resorted there.

---

(Having looked up advowson in a dictionary)



Bought??

Is it time to start nailing theses to some church door in Bath or Leamington Spa?

This looks like an exciting new tangent for another thread to distract me from real life...
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Charles Simeon ... Noted Anglican evangelical divine.

It didn't just happen in spa town either. The parish church my wife belonged to as a child has a silhouette of Simeon on the wall and some kind of trust deed that said it had to retain an evangelical ethos in perpetuity.

So yes, we don't often hear about those Anglican evangelicals who remained with the Establishment, your Henry Venn and your 'Mad Parson Grimshaw' of Haworth.
 

---

Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :
 
Patrick Brontë, also of Haworth, though a generation later, was an evangelical. He was also a much more interesting person than the very over-simplified cartoon version put about by Mrs Gaskell for dramatic effect.
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Enoch:



Going back to the C18 Revival, It's an over-simplification to say that it was mainly the C18 equivalent of C1 and C2 people who responded. I suspect it was mainly they who became Methodists, but there was a big response, which was marked at the time, among the upper middle classes.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
The same may well happen to Pastor Oyekan's church or movement. Just give it time.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
I've always read that in general the upper middle classes in the 18th c. had little use for Wesley.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
You are reading 19th century distinctions back into the 18th century SvitlanaV2. Before the Methodists seceded, the Awakening would have been seen as a largely Anglican affair .

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bishops Finger:
IOW, did any form of revival truly happen?

By their fruits ye shall know them.

---

quote:

---

1) First, converted and unconverted men, women and children, stunned by a vision both of God's holiness and his mercy, are awakened in large numbers to repentance, faith and worship.

2) Second, God's power is manifest in human lives in ways no psychological or sociological laws can explain adequately.

3) Third, the community as a whole becomes aware of what is happening, many perceiving the movement as a threat to existing institutions.

4) Fourth, some men and women exhibit unusual physical and emotional manifestations. These create controversy.

5) Fifth, some revival Christians behave in an immature and impulsive way, while others fall into sin. In this was the revival appears to be a strange blend of godly and ungodly influences, of displays of divine power and of human weakness.

6) Sixth, wherever the revival is extensive enough to have national impact, sociopolitical reform follows over the succeeding century.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
All the healing, all the God incidents that look just like coincidence like the ones the Archbishop of Canterbury himself encounters, all the words of knowledge and wisdom, all the prophecy; they don't break through the bubble wall either!

---

quote:

---

Haven't heard any tongues for a long while inside the bubble. Never heard an interpretation of one.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Yes, ultimately the Wesleyan emphasis did lead to Pentecostalism, albeit at several steps removed. John Wesley has been described as the Grandfather of Pentecostalism ...

Whether he'd have recognised it as among his 'offspring' as it were is a moot point.

I don't see any of this as something to be 'charged' at Wesley's door either in a blameworthy or a celebratory sense. There's more to history than significant guys and gals.

---

quote:

---

I'm not suggesting that contemporary revivalists shouldn't go out evangelising or anything of the kind. I'm simply suggesting that they need to develop a more fully rounded and less reductionist theology and soteriology.

I don't see that as being too much to ask.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
A solution for someone like Pastor Oyekan may exist in exploring the new urban theologies. Cultural awareness could also be an issue, if he's trying to reach out to ethnic groups other than his own. The concept of revival is probably more meaningful and more 'realistic' in his homeland than it is here.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
Sadly, meaningless concepts can have huge social and cultural significance.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mr cheesy:
The thing is that Methodism splintered in the 19 century into various competing denominations. ... , some went more towards (perhaps oddly) more formal and/or high Anglican.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
I don't think that is odd, in fact, and not only because Wesley himself was Anglican. There is a well-documented sequence of second- and third-generation Christians going up both the social and ecclesiastical scales.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
It reminded me of some of the 'broader' Baptists I knew growing up in South Wales. They would still talk about conversion experiences and so on but often in hushed tones so as not to frighten the horses.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Interesting - in my present church (mixed "high church" and "broad" Baptist and URC), not only "conversion" but also "evangelism" are somewhat dirty words - as would be "Enthusiasm" if I ever used it. Indeed, evangelism has been given the far less attractive label "proselytisaion" by some.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
No, no, no: that's an irregular verb.

As in "I live out the Kingdom"; "You evangelise"; "They proselytise".

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:


I take your point about evangelists not making good theologians and vice-versa, but would suggest it doesn't have to be that way.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
The issue I have, as you have correctly identified, is the level and integrity of the claims that are being made here. They don't bear scrutiny.

---

A thousand times this.

Lynn Green never answered me
 

---

Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
If you look back at the older thread, there's no doubt about the Bethel connection. They are advertising the Supernatural School of Ministry on their website, and Oyekan explicitly thanks Johnson in his Learning Review.

---

Catching up and reading back - I realised that I had been one of those who made that point back on the previous thread.
 

---

Posted by chris stiles (# 12641) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
A solution for someone like Pastor Oyekan may exist in exploring the new urban theologies. Cultural awareness could also be an issue, if he's trying to reach out to ethnic groups other than his own. The concept of revival is probably more meaningful and more 'realistic' in his homeland than it is here.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
I would point once again to the Gypsy revival which has been going on for some 50-60 years and the ongoing manifestations of which I can visit any time I like.

....
At the same time, it has its own nasty underbelly. Not least the not-quite-good-little evangelicals that make up most of my prison congregation. But something has indubitably happened.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I'm not suggesting that such prayers are 'wrong' in and of themselves and that God covers his ears up and goes, 'La la la ... I'm not listening ...' whenever he 'hears' them ...

The issue for me is that it creates a false sense of expectation and leads to the kind of exaggerated 'results' that revivalists tend to report ... 'We had umpteen "commitments" and numpteen "redidications to Christ" ...' as if these things can be measured in a sales-y type of way.

I have no hesitation in considering that complete and utter bollocks.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by chris stiles:

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
A solution for someone like Pastor Oyekan may exist in exploring the new urban theologies. Cultural awareness could also be an issue, if he's trying to reach out to ethnic groups other than his own. The concept of revival is probably more meaningful and more 'realistic' in his homeland than it is here.

---

I have no idea what 'new urban theologies' actually mean in any distinctive sense.

I'm suspicious about the idea that "(t)he concept of revival is probably more meaningful and more 'realistic' in his homeland", I'm not sure what it really means.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
I would point once again to the Gypsy revival which has been going on for some 50-60 years and the ongoing manifestations of which I can visit any time I like.

They currently have twelve evangelistic meetings a week going on round my city. The revival means that you can find a pastor and probably a bible study group of some time on pretty much any of their official designated sites in France - themselves an outworking of the social change the revival has achieved.

Last Tuesday I was at an unrelated prayer meeting in a small group in which there was a non-gypsy woman who had been converted through the testimony of one of the believers.

I have a dozen or so gypsy pastors working under me as prison chaplains.

In summary, there is no shortage of evidence as to the reality and extent of this revival.

At the same time, it has its own nasty underbelly. Not least the not-quite-good-little evangelicals that make up most of my prison congregation. But something has indubitably happened.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
The issue as far as I'm concerned in Reading is NOT about what is referred to as a revival.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:


Crass methodology and over-egged reporting are just the sort of things which make MotR churches reject the very notion of evangelism.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eirenist:
Just possibly, Svitlana,the media didn't focus on the 'revival' in Reading because there was nothing 'newsworthy' to report. Sorry to be cynical.

---

Well, there wasn't a revival. But lots of people praying in the street sounds rather unusual to me. However, I don't know Reading.
 

---

Posted by mark_in_manchester (# 15978) on :
 
Yes, I think lots of people praying in the street, some (yes, let's not put a number on it) people agreeing to be prayed with, and a fraction larger than nearly-none-at-all waking up a few days later and going back for a cup of tea (rather than thinking 'thank f*ck I got away from those loonies, what was I thinking) is...remarkable.

If it was presented in those terms, and the church was warm in spirit, ready and happy to just greet the one leper who came back - then the whole thing would be brilliant. It's the 'pray harder, God likes big numbers' bullshit which spoils it.
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Lots? How many? Which streets? When? What did the press say when invited? Where are the film reports on regional TV and sound reports on local radio? Youtube even?
 

---

Posted by Curiosity killed ... (# 11770) on :
 
Wherever there are street pastors there can be people praying on the streets with unknown people. Lots of street pastors around.

There are not usually a formulaic prayer to signify a conversion, but a prayers that are requested by those involved.
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
"Pics or it didn't happen! Lols!!!!!!"



(Sorry, I couldn't help myself!)
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
I did some maths in this post based on Yinka Oyekan's own report in which he reports 1850 people were prayed for over a mission period of 4 weeks.

That is 66 people per day. He reports 810 people trained in evangelism, so another way of putting it is that over a period of 4 weeks, those people prayed with a total of between 2 and 3 people each.

Reading reportedly has a population of some 320,000.

So during a 4-week period, 1 in 173 or 0.6% of the population were prayed for. For the sake of comparison, this proportion is about the same as the proportion of adults in the US who identify as transgender.
 

---

Posted by mark_in_manchester (# 15978) on :
 
I have reservations about all this. But to play devils (?!) advocate a little more - me praying with 2 or 3 strangers over the next four weeks would be such a step-change in my evangelistic activity, I couldn't over-emphasise it.

Are other folks really so much more out-there than me, in this regard? I'm being honest here - I have a witness, of a sort, and I'm old enough to not give too much of a shit what people think of me. I should be able to do it; I believe it matters, and that I have good news to share. But I don't.
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
mark_in_manchester

It's because you and I are Methodists. Our lot gave up on this sort of thing about a century ago, give or take a few decades depending on what type of Methodist we're talking about, and what part of the country. And we both live in parts of the Midlands and the North where the 'return of God' has little to do with Christian street evangelism, or Christian activities of any other type.

By contrast, many commentators here are anxious (post-)evangelicals in smaller towns or the Christian hotspots of the South East, battling against surges of middle class irrationality and hopeless expectations of the Holy Spirit. It's a different context.

However, as a former Methodist church steward I share with Eutychus an admiration for numbers as applied to church concerns.

[ 15. January 2017, 16:22: Message edited by: SvitlanaV2 ]
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
as a former Methodist church steward I share with Eutychus an admiration for numbers as applied to church concerns.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
We both live in parts of the Midlands and the North where the 'return of God' has little to do with Christian street evangelism, or Christian activities of any other type.

By contrast, many commentators here are anxious (post-)evangelicals in smaller towns or the Christian hotspots of the South East, battling against surges of middle class irrationality and hopeless expectations of the Holy Spirit. It's a different context.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
Well, I don't think it's entirely the Methodist bit. I'm equally concerned by the fact that I find it extremely difficult to share my faith, or communicate to those who experience the (to my mind) very clear effect that it has on the way I relate to people and generally operate.

There are many things I'd like to share, particularly ideas and the fundamental, ineluctable (to me) good news that we're all in this together and all held in God's infinite love. But how to share that in a way that doesn't do violence to me or what I want to share? No idea.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by mark_in_manchester:
me praying with 2 or 3 strangers over the next four weeks would be such a step-change in my evangelistic activity

(...) I should be able to do it; I believe it matters, and that I have good news to share. But I don't.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
But how to share that in a way that doesn't do violence to me or what I want to share? No idea.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
as a former Methodist church steward I share with Eutychus an admiration for numbers as applied to church concerns.

---

I don't know what you mean by admiration.

I have no interest in numbers for numbers' sake. But I do have an interest in numbers as a reality test, especially when manipulated numbers feature large in the version of reality being projected.

I also think that if one is engaged in some sort of planned project, then under God one should intelligently use numbers to see if it makes sense. Jesus talked about counting the cost.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
"Pics or it didn't happen! Lols!!!!!!"



(Sorry, I couldn't help myself!)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by ThunderBunk:
But how to share that in a way that doesn't do violence to me or what I want to share? No idea.

---

Surely it's also important not to do violence to the hapless recipient, too?

By the way, Thunderbunk, I was struck by what you said about communion earlier in the thread and since I was presiding communion this morning I made the most of it to present it as, in your terms "an opportunity to connect to God" - including an evangelistic opportunity.

Thus illustrating that things posted on the Ship can have real-life consequences!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
But you do seem to have absolute faith in how they can reveal the truth, and sweep away inaccuracies and obfuscation.

---

That's the way my business accounts work

I don't have absolute faith in numbers, but I think they represent a useful benchmark against which to check the claims - also numerical - of the outreach itself.

Numbers don't tell the whole story, but they incontrovertibly demonstrate the cognitive dissonance at work here.

quote:

---

the kinds of people who are desperate for 'good news', who want to believe that the Holy Spirit can defy what seems like hugely difficult circumstances.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:


To me the good news of the Gospel, even the resurrection itself, is essentially the Holy Spirit defying the most difficult circumstances.

What I object to is people being persuaded they can engineer that, or dressing up their systematic approaches as something they are not.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
Perhaps the basic problem in some churches is not so much the lack of proper 'business accounts' in evangelism but a deficient theology of the Holy Spirit? I don't know.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Bishops Finger:
Possibly - it seems that often the only 'newsworthy' religion-related event involves a 'Vicar' (they're always Vicars, no matter what denomination) who has been accused of some form of sexual misconduct.

IJ

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:

So which of us are in the south-east?

Eutychus is in France. I'm in the north-west of England. If there are commentators here who are in the south-east or in small towns and so on I don't see how that unduly affects their perspective.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
An infinity of infinitesimals does indeed make for a meta-infinity.

---

quote:

---

Does (infinity) x 0 = infinity, 0, or anything in-between?

---

If you express (infinity) above as 1/0, then your sum becomes 0/0 = ?

Could be 0, as there's a zero on top, could be infinity as there's a zero on the bottom, or could be 1 as the same number is on the top and the bottom!

Sounds like a case for L'Hopital's Rule to me Can't link, funny characters in URL.

[ 17. January 2017, 12:56: Message edited by: mark_in_manchester ]
 

---

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :
 
From Hendrik Van Loon's "History of Mankind", which I read as a child:

“High in the North in a land called Svithjod there is a mountain. It is a hundred miles long and a hundred miles high and once every thousand years a little bird comes to this mountain to sharpen its beak. When the mountain has thus been worn away a single day of eternity will have passed.”

The best description of eternity I have ever read. However, we digress ...
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
Chaps, stop bein' so calculusly literal.

In the growing infinity of universes that must concurrently exist, any one staggeringly insanely vast universe is an infinitesimal, no?

It gets worse doesn't it? What is the rate of growth of the current infinite set of universes?

Where were we? Oh yeah. Claims. In the face of that God dwarfing reality. Any and all claims whether for the Holy Spirit in Reading or in God incidents or any other claim of material significance at the level of quantum perturbation, healing or the fulfilment of prophecy are, is orthodoxly, faithfully, nothing.

Only One claim remains, with no quantifiable corollaries that disappear on cursory inspection, no delusion, no self deceit.

Can anyone think of reality that doesn't have to be an infinitely rapidly expanding infinity?

Is this what Nietzsche looked in to? Well, as long as it looks back ...
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
We could argue for pages about what a non-deficient theology of the Holy Spirit might be while people continue to get deceived and ripped off.

On the other hand, demonstrating that numerical claims do not stack up, or (thinking of other debunked and/or collapsed evangelistic enterprises) that plagiarism has happened, or that there have been direct lies, is relatively straightforward.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:


Eutychus is in France. I'm in the north-west of England. If there are commentators here who are in the south-east or in small towns and so on I don't see how that unduly affects their perspective.

[...]

The main issue here is the way that a particular form of evangelistic activity is being billed as an 'outpouring' and blown out of all proportion.

I'd suggest that evangelicals should be concerned about that irrespective of socio-economic and cultural background, although that does of course come into the equation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Charles Had a Splurge on:


But like you say we're not cutting him any slack now.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

The churches I go to wouldn't let any preacher through the door if they didn't already know more or less what he was going to say. I'm not knocking your system, but it must make things far less predictable!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:

Incidentally, I was speaking to a charismatic RC priest in another part of the country the other day. He is part of the local New Wine network and they will be having Yinka to speak to them soon. Obviously he (the priest) is quite happy with what he's heard so far.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
And ...? We wait with bated breath

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

I have posted an anonymised version of what I sent them here.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
Meanwhile a source from a major charismatic CofE church in the centre of Reading (i.e. a church theoretically sympathetic to the spirituality involved here, described as engaged in "a lot of outreach and praying"), reports detecting "no change in the spiritual atmosphere of Reading at all", and no difference to the numbers in that congregation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
For the record, I have also been in contact with Yinka too, now.

Meanwhile a source from a major charismatic CofE church in the centre of Reading (i.e. a church theoretically sympathetic to the spirituality involved here, described as engaged in "a lot of outreach and praying"), reports detecting "no change in the spiritual atmosphere of Reading at all", and no difference to the numbers in that congregation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
For the record, I have also been in contact with Yinka too, now.

Meanwhile a source from a major charismatic CofE church in the centre of Reading (i.e. a church theoretically sympathetic to the spirituality involved here, described as engaged in "a lot of outreach and praying"), reports detecting "no change in the spiritual atmosphere of Reading at all"

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
Why would they? A Sunday morning service is not usually the place to castigate a neighbouring congregation.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Martin60:
Yeats Second Coming prevails I'm afraid.

---

Eh?
 

---

Posted by Martin60 (# 368) on :
 
"The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity."

Source.
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
Just a thought. My understanding is that Yinka is either originally Nigerian, or descended from Nigerians although himself born in Britain.

Might there be some cultural understanding and significance in the "saying of yes" which folk from an Anglo-Saxon background might not have picked up?

---

quote:

---

I'm thinking perhaps that the speaking of certain words is considered to be intrinsically powerful in itself.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:


I can see some parallels with paedobaptism but there are significant differences - in classic forms of paedobaptism there is a communal aspect - the faith of the parents and 'sponsors' if you like - the faith of the Church ... whereas here it's reduced to a form of individualistic response - 'He/she said the magic words so they must be ok ...'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
'Is So-and-So really saved?'
'Well, he prayed the prayer ... I saw the pastor lead him in it myself ...'

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Without wishing to air-brush the cultural issues out of the equation, I suspect that Yinka's Nigerian heritage doesn't have a great deal of bearing on this issue ...

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
Coming soon to Wales with New Wine!

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
Coming soon to Wales with New Wine!

---

I know that Yinka spoke to Cardiff church leaders at a New Wine meeting a couple of weeks ago.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by MrsBeaky:
I couldn't face having the conversation about the wider theological stuff as I know they would think me completely "unsound" and that would prejudice the work here.

---

I can understand what you're saying, but I think the fear of "prejudicing the work" can actually end up prejudicing it even more.

If nobody calls anybody to account on this kind of thing it grows unchecked and, as Gamaliel points out, repeats itself depressingly often. Christians end up disappointed, confused and disilllusioned - and unable to talk about this "because it would be a bad witness".

Regardless of his theology, it is my contention that Oyekan's communication about "The Turning" is far too prone to over-optimistic misunderstanding by his target audience; it would never have caused the buzz it has done had this not been the case.

Now he enjoys a degree of legitimacy with the help of the likes of Lynn Green and New Wine, mainstream believers are being exposed to this hype.

Once somebody has a platform like that it is very difficult to challenge them, because doing so makes the people and organisations who endorsed them look bad.
 

---

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by MrsBeaky:
Some of the students had remarkable stories of Damascus road experiences. But lots of us did not.

I remember someone questioning my salvation as I did not have a defining moment....

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

---

Originally posted by MrsBeaky:
I couldn't face having the conversation about the wider theological stuff as I know they would think me completely "unsound" and that would prejudice the work here.

---

I can understand what you're saying, but I think the fear of "prejudicing the work" can actually end up prejudicing it even more.

If nobody calls anybody to account on this kind of thing it grows unchecked and, as Gamaliel points out, repeats itself depressingly often. Christians end up disappointed, confused and disilllusioned - and unable to talk about this "because it would be a bad witness".

---

I entirely agree .
And when I am in the UK I regularly have such conversations. But I am here as a guest in another culture. I am only here for three weeks and with a very clear aim and focus of welcoming some of the most marginalised people in this society and needing to focus on challenging some profound and heart-breaking attitudes to people with disabilities.
However some of my Kenyan colleagues have challenged entrenched theological and praxis positions and are now labelled "liberal" as I am by some fellow Christians in the UK when I speak up!
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
I shudder to think what labels I might have attracted...

Of course one's room for manouevre is limited as a guest. But more generally, when people are reduced to attaching labels to you rather than discussing the issues involved, it makes me start to wonder whether their beliefs actually have any merit.
 

---

Posted by MrsBeaky (# 17663) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:

quote:

---

Originally posted by MrsBeaky:
Some of the students had remarkable stories of Damascus road experiences. But lots of us did not.

I remember someone questioning my salvation as I did not have a defining moment....

---

Although I do have a defining moment, my story was so low-key that I indeed did question its validity. There seemed almost to be a boastfulness in recounting how dramatic one's conversion had been. Fortunately one friend reassured me by saying how much he wished he'd had the basis within Church and Sunday School that I'd had.

In my view, far too many take the story of Paul's conversion as normative, when it is exceptional. True too of the Spirit's outpourings at Pentecost, Ephesus etc., which are specific events to declare the ever-widening bounds of God's action and grace as the Church expands.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:


Now he enjoys a degree of legitimacy with the help of the likes of Lynn Green and New Wine, mainstream believers are being exposed to this hype.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
New Wine isn't something I've heard about in church or ecumenical meetings.

---

quote:

---

Mine is a MOTR ecumenical world, where community is often what brings people to the church, and a gradual acculturation into church values and beliefs is much more in evidence than decisionism.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
The ecumenical circles you move in may not be as broad as others, encompassing charismatic/evangelical believers. FWIW a soon-to-be colleague is a Catholic priest who is very much into New Wine.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:
My perspective from outside the UK is that New Wine has quite an influence across the board.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Decisionism has long been an issue in evangelical and charismatic circles. It's nothing new. The difference here is that it's being packaged as some kind of cure-all solution.

As confirmation of your point that we live in fast moving times, I've heard from chaplains at a number of universities that many students sign-up for full-on evangelical churches in their first year and then undergo some kind of rapid volte-face such they leave university either as MoTR Christians or without any faith at all.

The process of becoming evangelical and gradually morphing over 15 or 20 years into a more contemplative or sacramental type of Christian - a journey I've been on for many years - seems to be either accelerating or else speeding and spinning to an extent that the travellers are being thrown overboard.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Baptist Trainfan:
While I concede that there is no specific mention of "understanding" in this classic passage, I would content that "believing in your heart that God raised him" implies a certain level of mental engagement with the message. An unthinking verbal response alone is insufficient for salvation.

---

quote:

---

this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord’, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eirenist:
Whence comes this desire to constrain the way in which God's Holy Spirit operates?

---

Great question.

One of my own thorny issues is that I felt I had experienced something genuine in the Toronto Blessing, with tangible results. I still do feel that way.

That's why I find myself unable to dismiss any "move of God" in its absolute entirety; if my own experience is any guide, some people may be positively affected. Fortunately God is not limited by our bad practice or theology.

But one of our wisest critics at the time our church was into all that suggested there were dangers of "systematisation", and it did not take me all that long to see that he was right (and indeed move the church on from it).

It's like Moses striking the rock a second time because he'd seen it work that way before - a decision that cost him the Promised Land.

At the end of the day, I think this desire is about control and power. Certainly there is an implication in some promotion of the Reading Outpouring that there is if not a monopoly, at least exclusivity on a very special corner, of the Holy Spirit. Such a claim can of course can be monetised...
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I put odds on it being a rationalisation after the event.
 

---

Posted by Baptist Trainfan (# 15128) on :
 
@ Eutychus:

I am no scholar in ancient languages; but I know Portuguese. So I looked up the Jeremiah passage in various Bible versions. Unfortunately the word translated above as "know" ('conhecer') in each version is one which has the sense of "getting to know someone"; it isn't the other word ('saber') which has the meaning of "knowing intellectually". Presumably that choice of verb reflects the inflection of the original text.

Nevertheless I do not disagree at all with your premise!
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
@SvitlanaV2 - of course this form of decisionism offends the sensibilities of many evangelicals - whether 'emergent' or more traditional. Why? Because they'd see it as debasing the coinage and as a threat to genuine conversions.

It's often been questioned how many of the many thousands of converts made by Jesuit missionaries in the Far East I'm the 16th century actually knew or understood what it was they were supposed to be doing ...

So it's not only an evangelical thing.

I think I mentioned on this thread that Archbishop Macarios wondered the same thing after he'd baptised 5,000 people during a visit to Kenya.

It only becomes a problem, I suppose if one believes conversion is a serious and desirable thing and assumes that it should lead to active engagement in local church life, among other things.
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 
The problem for worldwide Christianity is indeed how to decide what makes people 'real' Christians. If you set the bar for 'intellectual assent', etc., too high then perhaps most so-called Christians throughout history haven't really been Christians at all....
 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 
Gamaliel: just remembered the subtitle of Wright et al's book Charismatic Renewal is "the search for a theology". I believe he says it is an "experience in search of a theology", a point I put to Yinka.

Baptist Trainfan: there is also the verb in Jeremiah to "teach", which implies learning.

SvitlanaV2: we can argue till the eschaton about how much intellectual knowledge is required for a "proper" conversion.

What gets me here is the juxtaposition of:

- a script that on the face of it is entirely based on intellectual assent to a propositional argument (basically, the "four spiritual laws")

- a claimed effect that focuses on anything but intellectual assent in the same way paedobaptism does.

I'm not sure I've got the extent to which this is messing with my mind across yet.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
I'm not simply talking about intellectual assent to a set of propositions, SvitlanaV2.

@Eutychus - and yes, paedobaptism doesn't require intellectual assent or consent on the part of the recipient, but even in the most paedobaptist of paedobaptist churches there is an expectation - however idealised - that it should lead to some kind of actualisation/articulation of faith - however that's expressed ...

Neither classic evangelicalism nor classic sacramentalism presents the Gospel as some kind of four-point statement to be repeated by rote off some kind of sales-pitch card ...

'It's not the robe that makes the priest,' as the Greeks say.

Sure, we all know that millions of people are christened as infants and don't subsequently 'own' or confess their faith - or even appear to have any.

But if one is going to go down the conscious-acceptance, make-a-decision route, then surely one has to adopt a more rigorous approach than simply inducing people to read words off a card and then trumpet it as if there's some kind of major spiritual breakthrough going on ...

Or, worse, market it as some kind of model that can be monetised ...
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
The sub-title about charismatic renewal was that it was a 'spirituality in search of a theology.'

The phrase was in circulation before the book was published, the authors simply used it as a handy peg to hang their arguments upon.

It's over 20 years old now, that book, but I still dip into it occasionally ...

I often tell people that it was the book that kept me sane.

Perhaps it, or something like it, might be a good way to settle your head now that Yinka and his pals have messed with it ...


 

---

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
even in the most paedobaptist of paedobaptist churches there is an expectation - however idealised - that it should lead to some kind of actualisation/articulation of faith - however that's expressed ...

---

That's where, in the present case, the "name it and claim it" aspect comes into it, perhaps.

As I understand it, once the prayer has been properly prayed, the parable of the sower applies.

I suppose the idea of hoping that the "quality of conversion" "improves" might be that as they get better at this, more of the prayees will end up in the fruit-bearing category. That would certainly make sense from a Bethel "Kingdom Now" theological perspective.
 

---

Posted by Gamaliel (# 812) on :
 
Yes, and it goes back further than that to Wimber and others who emphasised healing or 'power encounters'. The idea was the the more we did it, the more people we prayed for in the street or in meetings etc then the more likely it would be that we could 'build' our faith to the extent that the really big miracles would start to happen ...


 

---

Posted by Karl: Liberal Backslider (# 76) on :
 
Tangential, but normally being behind that sort of theology would be worrying enough, but Wimber made that the least of his crimes compared with penning the all-time horror which is Isn't He Beautiful.

But I digress.
 

---

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Eutychus:

SvitlanaV2: we can argue till the eschaton about how much intellectual knowledge is required for a "proper" conversion.

What gets me here is the juxtaposition of:

- a script that on the face of it is entirely based on intellectual assent to a propositional argument (basically, the "four spiritual laws")

- a claimed effect that focuses on anything but intellectual assent in the same way paedobaptism does.

I'm not sure I've got the extent to which this is messing with my mind across yet.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I don't know what you mean about posters living in more 'Christian' settings than you do. Wherever we live, whether its in leafy suburbia or the inner city, Christianity is a minority pursuit - although it is, of course, thinner on the ground in some areas than others.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
With regards to the theology you mention, I'm surprised that regular disappointment about revivals hasn't depleted the ranks of these churchfolk such as to make them irrelevant.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Gamaliel:
I don't know what you mean about posters living in more 'Christian' settings than you do. Wherever we live, whether its in leafy suburbia or the inner city, Christianity is a minority pursuit - although it is, of course, thinner on the ground in some areas than others.

---

I was referring to your or someone else's comment upthread that getting strangers to say a few religious words on the street isn't such a big deal, because people will say anything to get rid of someone irritating.

I really can't see that happening somewhere where the local population isn't already somewhat indulgent towards Christianity in a cultural sense. That's what my scare quotes were indicating.

With regards to the theology you mention, I'm surprised that regular disappointment about revivals hasn't depleted the ranks of these churchfolk such as to make them irrelevant.

OTOH perhaps these churches attract the kinds of needy people who stick around because there's always the hope of a great new thing round the corner. 'Sober judgement' isn't what they go to church for - there are other churches providing that, if they want it.

---

© Ship of Fools 2016


UBB.classic^TM 6.5.0