Our very own Macedonian Call?

Last week I had the privilege (and surprise) of being asked to speak at the Gospel Yorkshire conference.  As ever in those sorts of situations there are things that I didn't get to address or talk about or nuance quite as I would have liked.  One of those was a perceived North South divide, the other was some issues to do with class.  I thought I'd try to type myself a bit clearer on those issues.

North South divide
This is a reality, the North of England has a lower percentage of believers per head of the population that most of the South, barring the South West I think.  And therefore just as in matters of normal life there is a natural influence that comes with this.  This can mean that those of us in the North develop a bit of a chip on our shoulder (or on both as I'm sometimes asked if I have - slightly ironic as I was born in Ipswich and am not quite a qualified naturalised Northerner as I've only lived in the north for 20 years).

On Thursday I made reference to a comment about Southern churches with a Yorkshire postcode.  What I was trying to get at was the idea that as churches in the North and Yorkshire we need to contextualise.  We ought to reflect and speak the gospel into the area and towns we meet in, the issues it faces, the hopes and aspirations it has, in light of its unique local history.  This will mean that it is different from churches in other areas, not just North South, but East West and even within a town.  What I was trying to get at was that we need to exegete our local culture.  Our churches if we reach locals will reflect local culture, but more than that we will reach locals best if we address the local culture with the gospel.  There's loads more I could share on that but I'll leave it at that for now.

That does not mean we do not need help.  I'd love churches across the UK to see the North, and especially Yorkshire, as missionary country.  I'd love them to encourage people to think about moving and serving in existing churches here.  There are faithful, gospel loving churches in lots of towns and cities sprinkled across the North that would be greatly blessed by the presence of more people who love Jesus and are willing to serve no matter where they are from.

One of the issues we face in Doncaster is that we are short of leaders, now long term I'd love to have more Yorkshire accents being heard from our pulpit, but that is a long term project in a town where evangelical Christianity among the population is below 0.5%.  But in the short and medium term we need workers to come and join us, to labour in the harvest field to see won and discipled those very people who will be leaders of the future.  It is not a problem to have southern voices at a Gospel Yorkshire conference or preaching from a pulpit, but I personally feel it will be if in 10-15 years we aren't hearing more Yorkshire accents too.

Addressing the Class issue
This is another subject which we touched on on Thursday and which I'd like to just share some thoughts.  I hope I made clear that the gospel and God's kingdom is for all classes, as well as all ethnicity's, languages etc.  God's vision of his Kingdom is vast.  But we naturally tend to reach people like us.  We don't deliberately set out to it is what we drift into.  We tend to spend time with those like us because we share loves, likes, hobbies, neighbourhoods etc... and so that is who we meet.  We need to be deliberate in reaching those not like us.  I think class is one of those areas, Christianity in the UK is predominantly middle class which means we will predominantly reach the middle class.  Unless we are intentional about reaching the working class (45% of the population).  Hence my focus on reaching the working class, especially in light of Yorkshire having a working class mentality.

That does not mean that you have to be working class to reach the working class.  It means we have to love people and seek out those different from us.  We need middle class background people to move into areas of gospel need and love those they find there, love them enough to commit to them and take the gospel to them and disciple them.  That will be hard, it requires wisdom and humility to listen to the culture, especially one very different from our own, and discern it's gospel echoes as well as the places it has been warped by sin.  It requires compassion and humility to walk alongside and learn with rather than assume we come to teach or solve problems.  I know because I've learnt some of those lessons the hard way through mistakes I've made serving such a community with my background and assumptions.

So come and help us.  No matter your class or county of origin.  If you love Jesus and love people and are prepared to listen and learn and love there are harvest fields that are ripe for harvest but where there are currently few workers.

British Evangelical's blind spot?

I listened to a fascinating, informative and insightful talk by Mika Edmondson on the Black Civil Right movement and the American church's response to Black Lives Matter.  It was impassioned and full of love for people and a concern for the honour and glory of God.  It's well worth a listen.

But whilst I listened I found myself thinking where has the evangelical church in Britain been similarly blind and inactive when injustice is plain?  Where have we failed to be the voice the scriptures and our Saviour would call us to be for people made in his image and for whom he gave his life that by believing in him they might find life?

It is something I want to take time to think through more carefully.  But certainly I found myself initially reflecting on the churches silence, and at times demonising, of the deprived and working class.  Interestingly even as I have reflected on this there have been examples of exactly that over Brexit.  Our society is deeply divided along class lines, with misunderstandings and stereotyping rife among those on each side of the divide.  Opportunities, access to good education, a voice in the political process, job chances, health, and even life expectancy are not equally distributed in our society.  We are not an equal opportunities nation.  Are we an equalising opportunities church?

Are we a voice for those needing it?  Are we providing the opportunities society denies?  Are we holding out the gospel of hope to all regardless of background and which estate they live on?  I'd love your thoughts as I think on this more.

Jonah - a timely reminder

Back in the dark days of December I planned for us to follow Easter with a brief 4 weeks series on Jonah.  This week as I've been preparing it I've been confronted, comforted and challenged in ways that I hadn't quite expected.

Our area is changing.  There are over 300 (3, 4 and 5 bedroom) homes currently being built that significantly alter the socio-economic make up of the area.  At the same time there are plans, potentially, for another  700 homes of a similar type.  Not only will the area have doubled in size in 15 years but there will be a significant shift in the type of families living here.  And as that has begun to happen I have noticed a couple of trends which are already in danger of being firmly entrenched.  The main one is division between the haves and the have nots.  Our playground community has always been relative division free, anyone would and could talk to anyone, but that is changing and changing quickly not for the better.

The divisions we see in the media between middle and working class are increasingly being seen played out in the community.  Which estate you live on seems to matter more and more in terms of who you build relationships with and who you talk to in the playground.  That presents all sorts of challenges for the community and for the church.

Into that evolving situation Jonah comes with its call to take God's compassion and grace to all, not to hoard it and restrict it to those like us or who we thought we would be taking that message to.  Here's my confession, my burden has been for the deprived in our community, to reach those who, by and large, our middle class British evangelical churches have not reached and are not planting to reach.  But what do I do with the growing middle class community in our area - at times I find myself thinking there are enough churches who reach them let them do it.  But God has sent them into our area, to the mission field I believe he has called me to, the place where he has planted Grace Church.

Just like Jonah I am tempted to have my prejudices, his is that his message and calling is to Israel mine has become that I am called to take the gospel to some estates and not others.  But Jonah confronts me with that prejudice and calls me to be a compassionate preacher more like my compassionate Saviour and Father than the compassionless prophet Jonah had become.  The gospel, my calling, the churches mission is to ensure that all hear the gospel and have the opportunity to turn to Christ.  But first the gospel it has to do it's work in our hearts so that we are remade into the image of the Saviour who calls us to go to make disciples of all ethnicity's, nations, tongues, and classes without prejudice.

Classist - It's easy to be blind to our church prejudices

Sometimes it takes leaving your culture and country behind for a while to give you new eyes when you return to it.  I'm just back from a few days in New York, a surprise present for my big birthday (so others tell me thought I though 21 was no big deal).  It was a great time of relaxation and rejuvenation.  It wasn't massively restful in one sense - we often walked 15+ miles in day neighbourhood rambling and seeing the sights and the less well seen areas of Manhattan and parts of Queens.  I'm not going to make any observations about America because a four day visit doesn't qualify me to do so, beyond saying New York is one of the friendliest places I have ever been to.

But it did make me realise something on my return.  We are blind to our own prejudices, because we have grown up with them or because they are just part of the fabric of the society we grow up in, part of the air we breathe.  If you've read anything of my blog you will know of my concern that Christianity in the UK is a middle class faith, it is a religion of the comfortable.  Now, don't misunderstand me, the middle class need the gospel as much as anyone, and it is hard work because they often don't realise it.  But you only have to plot churches on a map, or chart where churches are closing or struggling in a city or town to see that Christianity is a middle class faith and as such it has swallowed middle class prejudices that prevent it reaching the working class and deprived with the gospel.  But my time away has made me realise that we are more blind to that than ever. 

With a few notable exceptions where is most of the church planting taking place in the UK?  In middle class or student centres of population.  It is among the affluent and educated.  Why?  Because we are blind to the need on the council housing estates and the working class areas, or because we want to plant churches that grow into independent congregations so we can plant another, or so we look successful and that's harder to do in deprived areas.  I love pastoring the church I am privileged to pastor with it's very mixed congregation and it's working class and estate links.  There is a richness about the diversity in our church family.  There is a sense of barriers being bridged, though we still have so much more to do.

But there is so much more for the church in the UK to do in terms of reaching the working class and estates.  And what has struck me again is that quite simply most churches don't even see the need.  We all tend to want to see those we know - our friends, family, and colleagues - saved.  That is only natural and it is right, in one sense.  But it is also wrong if like Jonah we are not prepared to go to those who are not like us.  For Jonah it was nationality that limited his compassion and grasp of grace, for us in England is it class?

I've had a few conversations recently that have deeply saddened me.  One where someone has struggled to find someone willing to be mentored and coached to pastor a church on an estate desperately in need.  Another where someone else has spoken about reaching the working class and deprived being a generation or two into the future, where we almost need to gradually work our way down to reaching those areas.  Both of those conversations have broken my heart and left me discouraged and angry.

So my prayer as I return to work is that the church in the England would wake up to the millions who are sleep walking into a lost eternity in our estates and working class areas in towns and cities in England.  That God would stir up in us compassion for the lost, that he would destroy barriers as he had to for the early church and the Apostles (Acts 10) and that he would give us a heart for the lost and a belief in the gospel and his spirit that emboldens us to leave the comfortable in order to win the lost.  In short that the gospel would break through our prejudice - class.

Class divides and Church, Part 4

Having looked at some of the reasons why our churches might be middle class or certainly more accessible to the middle class, the question is how do we change that?  I want to tentatively suggest some ways that might be helpful.

Develop a vision of a classless (gospel) church.  As you read Acts you can't help but be struck by the believers all encompassing vision of who both the gospel and church was for.  We need to do the same, to develop and cast a vision of a truly classless church.  We need to challenge the unwritten rules of church, to challenge the assumption that middle class values are gospel values, and preach a better, more biblical vision to our churches.

Perhaps churches ought to think about selling existing buildings and moving church to working class areas. Encouraging those who are willing to relocate too but asking the more middle class to commute on Sundays.  Because the middle classes operate by network not neighbourhood we can reach the middle class from a working class base location, we cannot do it the other way round.

We need to think about restructuring church so that all can access everything (e.g. home groups, things that cost, transport).  We need to make preaching accessible to all by painting pictures,  telling stories and making practical concrete applications not just preaching abstract ideas.  We need to make Sunday school a place where we teach to those with varied learning styles, where we disciple, invest in and pastor young people from difficult backgrounds.  We need to share meals not in homes but as a fellowship all together where everyone is welcome and where a range of food is available.

We need to ensure that as churches we value the skills of everyone not just those who are good with words. How can church enable those with practical gifts to serve?  How can it make the most of the God given practical skills those from working class occupations have.

We must recognise that right now is a time of unprecedented opportunity for middle class churches to reach the working class and deprived areas of the UK. Cuts have left these areas in greater need than ever, largely because they are easy targets. These communities have no voice and no connections to protest the loss of a children's centre or youth club or community resource, we can be their voice and serve and lead them to Christ. There is a great gospel opportunity and need to serve in working class areas without charging, providing services and support.  Not riding in as the white knights who will do the rescuing but getting alongside the community to empower it and enable it to flourish and develop.

But maybe that all feels a bit too extreme.  Sell buildings, relocate and so on.  Well there is another way there are churches already working in such areas but as you can imagine the needs always outweigh the resources to meet them.  As you read Acts you find wealthy churches giving generously to meet the needs of others.  Could our wealthier more middle class churches partner with a church in a working class or deprived area?  Could it part fund a worker there?  Could it encourage short term missions teams to help run holiday clubs, staff CAP centres and so on?  Could it partner in the gospel by praying regularly for such a church?

Class Divides and Church, Part 3

Yesterday we looked at a few possible reasons why church in the UK is perceived as and appeals to middle class people, today I want to suggest some more.

Middle class people generally value objectivity and rationality.  Our sermons reflect that tendency, partially because that is what our hearers value but also because that is the background of many pastors and preachers and that is certainly the way they are taught to preach.  However, people from working class areas judge authenticity by passionate engagement with truth rather than by detached logic.  It is not that they are illogical but rather that they want to see someone who passionate believes in what they are saying.  Discussion about truth will be passionate and at times heated in working class environments and that is not a sign of people falling out, or not listening to one another, it is them passionately sharing the truth and engaging with it.

Middle class people, and therefore, the vast majority of churches are ‘respectable’ and not forthright.   There are certain unwritten assumed rules about how we will interact, what we will speak about, how we will answer the question 'How are you?'  For those from working class background such interactions may be perceived as unreal or fake, because life just isn't like that.  We need instead to honestly reflect and lament the reality of living in a broken world in our service and in our conversation, and talk openly about the hope and transformation the gospel brings in those.

Our conversation is also another area where there is a stark contrast in approach to relationships.  Questioning is middle class, we ask one another how our weeks have been, how the family is, and so on in a series of questions.  However for someone who is working class that can seem like an inquisition, as if we are on the hunt for something, as if we don't believe them and are looking to catch them out.  By contrast in working class communities they communicate via storytelling, recounting their day, or an incident while the other listens before then sharing their stories.  If we want as churches to have a church that is cross classes we need to learn to story tell as well as ask and answer questions.

An issue I had been unaware of until we moved Grace Church to meet in Hayfield is the difference in the attitude towards use of homes.  Those churches of middle class background tend to utilise homes lots, we meet there for home groups, for leaders meetings, we rightly use it for hospitality etc...  And that is right.  However, that can also be barrier to those from the working class for whom entering someones home is hard.  We need as churches who want to be cross class to be finding ways of meeting people where they are at and where they find listening to the gospel comfortable, as well as gradually easing people into hospitality and making them feel comfortable with it.

The Bible assumes churches will be bridging divides, reaching groups unlike themselves, being multicultural and multi-class united around the gospel (see Acts 6, 1 Corinthians 11, James 2).  The Bible assumes churches will bridge economic and class divides, not that we will be planting separate churches in such areas for such people but church that bridge the divides.  So if we aren't, are we really gospel churches?  Is this our Jew Gentile issue, where just as the early church and its leaders had to be confronted and challenged to move beyond their comfort and their prejudices we do too? 

Class Divides and Church, Part 2

We need to stop and ask the question why are our churches so middle class in nature?  Here are some the contributory factors:

Our church are situated (planted) in middle class areas, or are in working class areas but are commuter churches.  Many of the churches situated in working class and deprived areas are struggling or have closed and been sold for other uses.  Many new plants are started in middle class areas because they are the people we know and the need we see because they are part of our network. And often those churches that are in working class or deprived areas are still middle class churches where people drive into the church building because that historically is where they meet but few if any live within walking distance of the church.

We operate in networks through work, education or hobbies which span a town or city or wider afield. The working class, by contrast, operate in neighbourhoods.  This means that middle class christians have little contact with those from working class or deprived backgrounds.  We spend our days with those in our work places our communities and our networks.  We will rarely if ever meet someone from a working class area within them partly because of a lack of social mobility but also because they live life based around the neighbourhood.  That means if we want to reach such areas and communities we need to live in them and serve in them and commit to them.

We put on events with middle class appeal.  Think about the last 3 evangelistic events your church has run and my hunch is that they would be for people like those already in the church.  In other words we put on events that appeal to people like us, therefore limiting their appeal to those different from us.

Because churches aren't in or connected to working class and deprived communities our Churches don’t play key roles in working class areas.  This means working class and deprived people cannot see the gospel tangibly lived out in front of them.

We have a class prejudice (we like/value people like us).  Everyone of us suffers from this bias, we valued those most like us, we naturally find them easier to relate with and therefore have fewer issues and conflicts and misunderstandings.  Until we recognise this and face up to it not just individually but corporately as churches large swathes of Britain will remain unreached.

We wrongly assume middle class values are gospel values.  In Tim Chester's Unreached there is a helpful table which provides a list of hidden class rules which determine how each class operates.  The tragedy is that some of these we have confused in our churches with gospel values.  Therefore what we preach is sometimes a mishmash of middle class values masquerading as gospel values.  This is a huge topic which I've blogged on before and will come back to again.  But let me give one quick example - in the application to read the Bible - we assume that a middle class value - reading/formal education - is a gospel value.  Actually we would be better to talk of listening to and obeying the Bible because that is a more biblical application.  The bible looks not for us to read God's word, but to hear God's word and put it into practise in tangible ways.  Speaking of it and applying it in such a way is more working class than middle class.

Class divides and church (part 1)

Last week at Yorkshire Training I did an introductory session looking at church and class divides.  the aim was to provoke the trainees and others their into think about church.  Here part one of what I shared with them, the rest will follow later in the week.

“To be valued in Britain at the beginning of the twenty first century a person has to be either middle class or ethnic and with no viable way to participate publicly themselves, this leaves white working class people feeling that rather than being valued as the primary movers against unfair hierarchies, they have become, ironically, a block to equality. Meanwhile, when made synonymous with the so-called underclass or non-working class (those for whom the collapse of the community and disappearance of conventional sources of manufacturing employment has had devastating consequences), the white working class way of life…is increasingly portrayed as a cultural disgrace.” Gillian Evans

Society has changed, the divides have grown.  With this dramatic social change we need to ask ourselves as churches have we mirrored the shift society has undergone in terms of attitudes and approaches or have we been counter cultural as we are called to be?  Classism is as much an issue in Britain as sexism and racism. If America’s hair trigger is race ours is class and we have been blind to it. Tragically our churches mirror society rather than stand out from it, they are riven with classism. Church in the UK has become a largely middle class pursuit.

Dr Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote this in the late 1970s, it is telling wake up call:  “The impression has gained currency that to be a Christian, and more especially an evangelical, means that we are traditionalists…I believe that this largely accounts for our failure in this country to make contact with the so called working classes. Christianity in this country has become a middle-class movement; … far too often, as nonconformist men have got on in the world, and made money and become Managers and Owners, they have become opponents of the working classes who were agitating for their rights.”

He wrote that nearly 40 years ago and yet the situation remains largely unchanged, in order for us to reach the non-middle class in Britain that needs to change.  If we want to build fellowships that reflect our communities we need to share the gospel with all regardless of class.  We need to build a classless church.  But how?  What are the barriers to this?  What do we do currently that makes our church appeal to the middle classes rather than others?

Divided Britain

Reading the news over the last couple of weeks it has struck me that Britain is more divided than ever. We may pride ourselves on being a multi-cultural society but actually the big division in Britain is not in terms of ethnicity or culture it is still in terms if class. British society is divided between the have a lots, have more than enoughs and the not gots.

Sadly I think as churches we have taken our eye of the ball here. Looking at the resources which are bring produced in increasing volume for the Church and Christians in Britain they are all aimed at the middle class. Our church services are mostly aimed at the middle class. Why do I say that? Because they require a high degree of literacy - we are a people of the book and rightly so because that is how God has spoken to us, but how do we therefore reach the illiterate, or less literate?

Tracts, have the obvious draw back that they require literacy, books likewise. Much of our preaching and evangelism likewise requires good listening skills and are pitched at undergraduate level. Now I am not for a second arguing that intelligence is class based, but that we need to think through in Britain how we reach those for whom that is an alien means of conveying information, let alone information as important and life changing as the gospel.

Many of the things we put on appeal to the needs of middle class because that is what we are and what we know, but the gospel calls us to take the great news of Jesus to every soul in our area regardless of social status.

Because "there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female, [and in modern Britain no middle class and lower class] for you are all one in Christ Jesus.