Truth, freedom and mission…
It was Simon Heffer who started it. In a recent lecture on City ethics he asserted ‘It should once more become unthinkable to tell a lie in business’. Well, duh, when did it become thinkable?
It was Psalm 62 that continued it, the poet bemoaning assault by liars, attack by those speaking untruthfully about him.
And it was a member of my congregation who sealed it: ‘as a result of your sermon, I went into the office and told people who’d been telling tales and being economical with the truth that it had to stop, we had to honestly sort out our differences and move on.’
At the heart of this is the fact that all truth is God’s truth (as Christian philosopher, Arthur Holmes once said) and we’re called to be witnesses to the truth, pure and simple. It means honest speech in our hearts and on our lips. But it also means calling untruth what it is, however unpopular. We cannot know the truth unless we recognise its opposites.
Mission is defending the truth that the stranger should be welcomed, the weak should be supported, the poor should be defended. These no-brainer, biblical statements are not self-evident to so many of our neighbours.
And witness to the truth must lead to actions. We set up foodbanks to meet an emergency lack of food faced by half a million of our immediate neighbours. But we also ask why a system allows it to happen and what a better one would look like. And then we put our resources to work making that system a little bit more of a reality than it is, creating opportunity for the poor to feed themselves, the workless to find employment, and the struggling to find strength in helping others face their problems.
If the mind is to be engaged in mission, it must start with our minds. We must be single-eyed in our search for the truth about life, the economy, politics, philosophy, violence, justice and equality. For that will lead us to the one who embodies the truth, namely Jesus.
And as we find it, we need to live it in our churches and draw others into its orbit so that with open eyes they too find the truth sets them free.
So like Simon Heffer, we need to be stating the biblically, blindingly obvious because our neighbours need to be set free.
Rev Simon Jones is ministry team leader at Bromley Baptist and associate tutor in New Testament at Spurgeon’s College. He blogs at a sideways glance.
Among my favourite hymns is Frances Ridley Havergal’s Take my life, which is simultaneously holistic, referring to the whole of life, and challenging – I can never sing it and feel comfortable afterwards!
The lines “take my intellect, and use every power as Thou shalt choose” resonate with the theme ‘mission of the mind’ – God gave us minds, intellects, brains for one good reason – to employ them! In my experience, all too often Christians downplay the role of the mind in favour of a skewed understanding of the Spirit, confusing emotional response with authenticity, and being suspicious of inquiry or questioning. In my twenties, in order to ‘belong’, I stopped questioning and suppressed views that did not seem to fit with the version of Christianity I was experiencing. It was only after God’s call to ordained ministry that I discovered the liberating potential of theological thinking – and that my questions and ideas were valid within the spread of orthodoxy (rats, I always liked being a heretic!).
I remain grateful to Scripture Union Bible reading notes for a little (maybe slightly trite) rhyme that has stayed with me through the years:
If we are all mind, we dry up,
If we are all spirit, we blow up,
If we are mind and spirit, we grow up.
It is not an ‘either/or’ but a ‘both/and’. To mature as Christians we need to employ our intellects properly, to engage with topics that discomfit us, to ponder possibilities that seem alien to the comfortable version of Christianity we experience week in, week out (whatever label we choose to use for ourselves). The prospect of ‘Catalyst Live’ really excites me and I booked my ticket months ago! The chance to feast on the ideas of some great theologians, the opportunity to stretch my intellect and wrestle with ideas, the gift of listening for God’s still small voice amidst the clamour of church life…. Yes please!
One day, a few years back, one of my church folk commented on my continued study, “surely you know all there is to know by now”. The quest for understanding, the desire to learn and grow, the need to stretch my mind, is part of my discipleship, my spirituality, my call – “take myself, and I will be ever, only, all for Thee.” Holistic discipleship, heart and mind, body and spirit – I want to be part of that.
Catriona Gorton is minister of Hillhead Baptist Church, Glasgow and blogs at A Skinny Fairtrade Latte in the Foodcourt of Life
