I will make no bones about it: I am an Old World (for which please read
'continental European') Christian, of Puritan inclination, and a
Dissenter - specifically, a Particular or Reformed Baptist. That means
several things. By conviction and heritage I belong to those who left
the Anglican communion as a matter of conscience, sick of its halfway
reformation and unwilling to conform to the general shabbiness and
unscriptural demands of the Act of Uniformity. My conscience with regard
to the extra-Biblical trappings of mere religiosity is tender. My
attachment to simplicity of worship as a gathered church is sincere. I
am sensitive to those doctrines and practices over which my forefathers
spent their energies and shed their tears and sometimes their blood,
both from within and then from without the established folds of their
day. I see things with an awareness tuned by walking the streets,
graveyards and memorials of men and women who suffered and sometimes
died for conscience' sake.
Out of such an atmosphere I cannot help but be sickened by the seeming obsession with Lent and Easter at this time of year, and Christmas at the end of the year. Please do not misunderstand me: conscience also demands that - where the cultural vestiges of a more religious society patterned to some extent on the significant events of the life of Christ provide for it - I take every legitimate opportunity to make Christ known. If an ear is even half-opened by circumstance, I willingly and cheerfully speak into it, and seek to make of it a door for the gospel. I do not see the point of making a point by not preaching about the crucifixion and resurrection of the Lord if some benighted soul wanders into the church with at least some expectation of hearing about his humiliation and exaltation. Continue at Jeremy Walker
Out of such an atmosphere I cannot help but be sickened by the seeming obsession with Lent and Easter at this time of year, and Christmas at the end of the year. Please do not misunderstand me: conscience also demands that - where the cultural vestiges of a more religious society patterned to some extent on the significant events of the life of Christ provide for it - I take every legitimate opportunity to make Christ known. If an ear is even half-opened by circumstance, I willingly and cheerfully speak into it, and seek to make of it a door for the gospel. I do not see the point of making a point by not preaching about the crucifixion and resurrection of the Lord if some benighted soul wanders into the church with at least some expectation of hearing about his humiliation and exaltation. Continue at Jeremy Walker
No comments:
Post a Comment