Many conservative and Reformed Christians often face the charge that they too often place great emphasis on the divinity of Christ at the expense of His humanity. My experience in working with the poor and in council schemes/estates for the last 12 years is that far too many who work in this field elevate His humanity often at the expense of His divinity. ‘Jesus loves you’ has become a tired, overused mantra handed out without much theological thought  behind it. John 3:16 is bandied about like the final word on the issue. When we get visiting students or teams who sometimes come to do short term work with us, I will often get the locals to challenge anybody who tells them that ‘Jesus loves them’ by asking them ‘Why and how does He love me?’ Sadly, and shockingly, 90% of them are unable to answer that question with any depth at all. Yet, the answer is shockingly simple is it not?

1 John 3:16 is explicit: ‘This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. More amazing still is that he did it whilst we were His enemies and He was ours.’ That’s Paul’s point in Romans 5:6-8. ‘You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’

So, it seems to me that Christ does love His elect so much so that He loved us when we were His enemies. So, whenever we take the gospel into a scheme/estate (anywhere for that matter), we are going into enemy territory. Don’t come to us and patronise us with ‘Jesus loves you’ when in reality God is opposed to unrepentant sinners at every point. They are separated from Him by their sinful rebellion. ‘Jesus loves you’ isn’t the good news for the unconverted, it’s good news for those of us who have bowed the knee to Christ in repentance and faith. That’s why an understanding of the atonement is fundamental to the delivery of this good news. God became man in order to deal with this sin problem that we have. He did it because only He could appease God’s righteous wrath which currently rests upon the sinner.

I have many great friends who oppose me on this but I just can’t get around it. I don’t know if I would have lasted as long as I have in a ministry like this without holding dear to this doctrine. When I came to realise the enormity of what Christ had done for me, despite the fact that we were enemies separated by a huge chasm, I was (and still am) stunned. That drives my evangelism despite the charge that, according to so many, my Reformed convictions are supposed to kill it. For me, the atonement is an intensely pastoral doctrine in that it offers great peace of mind and confidence that the work of redemption has been completed by God for God. It is also immensely motivating for our evangelism because in the gospel we have the final solution to their eternal predicament. They don’t have to remain God’s enemies. They don’t have to remain in their sin. They don’t have to remain at war with God. Peace terms have been offered. All on His terms of course. But, so immensely generous and gracious that it seems almost unbelievable. The atonement matters to us in so many ways.

But what about the saying, ‘God hates the sin and loves the sinner’? Very nice, but this is not written anywhere in the Bible. These words are, allegedly, attributed to Mahatma Ghandi, who, if true, seems to have done more to influence Christians in this type of thinking than God’s Word has! On the contrary, I love the sinner by telling telling them how much God hates their sin and how they are his enemies destined for hell if they do not respond to His good offer of salvation in Jesus. John 3:36 seems clear on this: ‘Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.’ What motivation is there for repentance if God loves them but hates their sin?

God doesn’t get angry with people because they reject Him. He is already angry with them. His wrath is already upon them. That’s our starting point. The good news is that the God-Man took that wrath upon Himself and fully absorbed and averted that wrath from the repentant sinner. Where once there was this wrath and condemnation now there is love. Yes, God is love but that love is not encapsulated in trite sayings, it is so much deeper, painful and self sacrifical than that.

My second week was in Kentucky where I spent some time with some great men from around the states led by some even more generous men with a great desire to serve pastors of all stripes. It was immensely encouraging. Coupled with that I got to do some more meetings about 20schemes, preach and answer 100′s of questions about the work of reaching Scotland’s poorest with the gospel of Jesus. In both states one question came up time and again:

Can Americans really get past their culture, move to the poor areas of Scotland and plant churches there?

It’s a legitimate question and one that encourages me every time it is asked in the US. It shows, if nothing else, the self-awareness of those asking the question. Here in the UK we have been facing criticism in some (middle class) quarters who feel that encouraging Americans to come to Scotland is a huge mistake. The thought (where there is any) being that they will just not be able to make the (often huge) cultural leap needed to engage effectively in housing schemes. Now it is a legitimate issue and we do need to address it. So, let me clear.

• At 20schemes we would prefer to recruit Scottish people above all others in an attempt to reach poor Scottish people.
• We would prefer these Scottish people to come from Scottish housing schemes so as to be best prepared to engage with the culture.

We do have some Scottish people interested in applying to 20schemes. However, ALL of them are from middle class backgrounds. We also have 8 applicants from the US at the moment. ALL of them are from middle class backgrounds. So, here lies the issue: which middle class cultural group is the best one to reach Scotland’s schemes? The answer is difficult. Middle class Americans who come over here actually tend to do better with the culture than their British counterparts (including, surprisingly, Scots people). Certainly, they are more naive when it comes to the culture, but that is a help rather than a hindrance. They are not hindered by an inbuilt fear of scheme culture and life. They are more open, friendly and hospitable, naturally, than their British counterparts. Their cultural gregariousness is actually a benefit in a culture such as ours whereas it is frowned upon in middle England and regarded as arrogance. Indeed, I would argue forcefully, from a decade of observing international teams both here and in Brazil, that middle class Americans have far less of a cultural jump to make than the British middle classes in our particularised scheme culture. Certainly, an American accent is regarded with far less suspicion and hostility than an English one!

Can and should middle class Americans move to schemes to plant churches? Yes they can and yes they should. Should middle class British do the same. Yes. If God has called a particular individual does it matter what their class or culture in the long run? He is above that. We can’t ignore the difficulties but we should not allow cultural snobbery to dictate a move of God’s Spirit. Scotland is in trouble. Her housing schemes are a vast spiritual wasteland. Nobody is reaching them effectively through church revitalisation or planting. This is not to say that there are not pockets of encouragement and good things going on. I am sure there are. But, as a country, we are not seeing a generation of men rise up to want to win back the schemes for Christ.

Many of the men I know who are at Bible colleges and/or on local church internships, whilst sympathetic to the cause, have no intention of going into housing schemes. They want to be youth workers, pastoral assistants or missionaries but they certainly don’t want to be any of those things in areas of urban deprivation (not in Scotland anyway). Why is that? I think there are a several reasons. Firstly, many churches and gospel ministries in these places are dying, often with aging congregations holding on to history and past glories, unwilling to change. In a world of options men would prefer to go elsewhere or plant their own church rather than have to deal with that kind of political battle. Secondly, almost every man I have spoken to recently about our ministry, WITHOUT EXCEPTION, has pointed to ‘family responsibilities’ as the reason they can’t seriously consider our kind of ministry. Thirdly, I think there is a problem with how middle class churches and institutions are training people. We have more seminars and conferences than ever before. We have more churches who are training leaders than ever before. Yet, still this shortfall.

The larger problem, I fear, is in the fact that we lack the courage to take risks at local church level in the UK. Churches want the perfect CV, the perfect candidate and the perfect answers to theological questions (or not as the case may be). The pond we are fishing in here in the schemes is never going to produce that (certainly not at the outset). Local men are not going to handle 40 hour a week lectures on Exegesis and Hermeneutics. They are not going to be polished speakers or have the finesse of fine apologetics. Unless I’m reading my Bible wrong, the early disciples weren’t University graduates either. They were common men with a love for the Lord, supernaturally endowed with the spiritual gifts necessary to build the church.

In all the talk of biblical manhood and being manly it seems that growing a beard and going to a manly type conference is as near as we are getting to encouraging entry into housing scheme ministry. Everybody agrees to its necessity and are wishing me lots of luck in what we are trying to do but that’s about it. Therefore, we need a new approach in how we tackle the problem of planting in our specific field. Scrap that, we need an approach full stop. Our aim here is to generate, at least initially, outside interest in order to stimulate inside growth and momentum. If we have to go the states and other countries then we will. It is better than sitting here wringing our hands at the dearth of young men wanting to step out in faith. We are certainly starting down a risky road. But I think it is necessary. I think that such is the problem in our country at this moment in history that, in God’s providence, we have little choice but to take these steps. I think we are not going to see local men taking responsibility unless we put steps in ourselves to ensure future growth and development. I think it is going to be a long, drawn out painful process. I think it is going to be a lot of growing on the job. I think it is going to be intuitive, a lot of making it up as we go along and maybe a few painful mistakes along the way.

We need men and women from all cultures seeking to proclaim the gospel and establish healthy churches. When did we get so uppity about it? No, we don’t want gobby, glorified tourists swarming the country but neither do we want to do nothing. Pray for us at 20schemes as we seek to provide solutions that are both God honouring and sustainable. Superficially, it will look like a lot of outsiders coming in, but underneath we are working on a long-term, sustainable strategy to grow truly indigenous planters, women’s workers and ministry apprentices. But we need more than a good plan and a well worked strategy. We need God’s favour and need the support not the critical cynicism of our Christian brothers and sisters.

We live in a community that has been heavily damaged by drugs. Most of the people that we work with have a steady diet of prescribed as well as street (unprescribed) drugs running through their system everyday. We have seen a handful of addicts over the last few years saved by the gospel and wonderfully changed by God. Is there anything that we need to watch out for as we disciple them? Is there anything that is particularly important? Here are a few things that I’ve learned about discipling drug addicts who have come to Christ.

• One of the first things that we have to watch out for in discipling addicts is that we don’t come in with a ‘saviour complex’. We need to watch our attitude and know that we are not going to sort people’s problems out with some sort of magic wand. A saviour complex is dangerous for both the wannabe savior and those they impact. The wannabe savior will collapse under the weight of the world’s problems because there are so many. Their ‘disciples’ will end up followers of the wannabe savior instead of the actual saviour – Jesus Christ. If we have a saviour mentality then we must repent and teach people the Bible properly! It is of utmost importance in any discipleship of fellow Christians that we continually point people to the gospel. The gospel alone has the power to transform people’s lives and is the only way that people will produce long-term fruit. This doesn’t feel as good because people won’t depend on you as much but it, ultimately, brings glory to God. When people walk with the Lord Jesus we don’t end up burned out thinking that we have to solve everybody’s problems. The people that we are discipling will tend to want to cling to us but its important to keep pointing them to Christ! It’s like raising a child. We don’t want them clinging us for the rest of their lives. We raise a child so that they will be independent and make good choices because we have given them a good foundation. This is what we must give people when they come to Christ from an addictive background.

• Secondly,  know that in discipleship very often it is one step forward and then three back! This is something that you will have to learn quickly. New Christians will slip up. They will seem like they are doing really well and then out of nowhere (or so it appears) they royally screw things up! This is part of discipleship. The key is to show people how to get back on to the horse after they have messed up. We teach our new believers that they will mess up (we all do) and when they do they need to run immediately to the grace found in Jesus Christ. We teach them not to hide their sin under religious works and language, but to admit sin regularly and appreciate God’s grace all the more. Our job is to pick them up, dust them off and then point them towards Christ again. We have to do this again and again and again. This can be discouraging at times but the key to remember is that we are not the one who is changing them but Jesus through His Spirit as we minister to them through His Word. We can easily slip into the mindset that we are sorting them out and get downhearted when they fall.

• Thirdly, we have to watch closely for lies. Those who have been addicted to drugs for a long time will be in a pattern of lying, deceiving and manipulating. They will look you straight in the face and tell you something and yet it will be a complete and utter lie. They are masters at it. One of the most painful forms of deceit is emotional manipulation. Most particularly, we need to watch out for false waterworks and the, “I haven’t got any money line.” We must, of course, help where help is needed but a lot of the time they have wasted their money on drugs and just not bothered to save enough for their food! When we are disciplining a constant liar we need to be constantly on our guard. We need to be watching and challenging where we see lies. We also need to be teaching them that lies (even small ones) are from the devil because he is the father of lies. This is difficult sometimes because the person who is lying to you seems charming but, still, we need to see through the charm and challenge them when they are being deceitful. They will blag you over anything and we need to be firm, gracious and honest with new believers. We need to point them towards Christ and pray that God would root out their lies.

Its amazing seeing someone from a drug addicted background saved by the grace of God. But someone who has abused drugs for a long time will have a lot of baggage. We need to make sure that we point people to the amazing saving grace of Jesus at all times. We need to be patient with those we are discipling and remember that it is a long-term process. Finally, we need to watch closely for deceit and challenge our new converts to love the truth in Jesus Christ! Pray for us as we continue to disciple our newer converts that they would be transformed inside out by the grace of God!

“London’s New Housing Loses The “Dirty Word”

Apparently new homes being built in London are now being renamed, ‘neighbourhoods’ instead of ‘estates’ because the powers that be feel that the latter has a pejorative association. Indeed, according to the report, which you can read here, the word ‘estate’ is being airbrushed out of common use.

Professor Loretta Lees from King’s College London’s geography department says, “The word ‘estate’ has become synonymous with the term ‘ghetto’. “It’s become a dirty word. Back in the ’20s and ’30s it didn’t carry the same stigma.”

What is almost laughable about this whole thing is that those behind this social engineering think that the gentrification and re-marketing of poor areas is somehow going to relieve the underlying human, social and mental issues. As I’ve written before, gentrification is a good force as much as it is a destructive one in housing schemes. But, as we witness in Niddrie daily, new homes and pretty name changes do not suddenly make new people. There is only one power capable of doing that at grassroots level. For real, lasting change to effect our communities people need a change of allegiance to King Jesus.

The first thing I would say about any book on marriage is that I feel a sense of conviction and belief about what is being written when I know the couple are mature and have been in “the fight” for many decades. It’s why I body swerved a certain Mark Driscoll’s book in favour of this. In this issue here is no substitute at all for marital longevity and fidelity that has been through the fire of life.

Firstly, and I say this with great respect, there is nothing new or groundbreaking in this book that you won’t find in many other Christian books on the market. He hasn’t found a key secret or some deep, new truth that is going to blow you away. There are only eight chapters, although it does feel longer and somewhat repetitive in places. That being said, there is great truth it be found within its pages and needy reminders for our age which is currently lobbying to redefine the institution of marriage completely. It’s good to be reminded, for instance, that God ‘established marriage for the welfare and happiness of humankind.’ Tim is spot on when he reminds his readers that, ‘if God invented marriage, then those who enter it should make every effort to understand and submit to his purpose for it.’

There are some excellent insights, particularly concerning the nature of love, lust and attraction. Tim reminds us that, ‘when the Bible speaks of love, it measures it primarily not by how much you want to receive but by how much you are willing to give of yourself to someone.’ His whole chapter on the essence of marriage is a timely riposte to many in our culture who, guided by the media, have an overly subjective view of love. In the same vein, we read:

‘Wedding vows are not a declaration of present love but a mutually binding promise of future love. A wedding should not be primarily a celebration of how loving you feel now – than can safely be assumed. Rather, in a wedding you stand up before God, your family, and all the main institutions of society, and you promise to be loving, faithful and true to the other person in the future, regardless of undulating internal feelings or external circumstance.’

It’s a book that has been written (I suspect) with a largely skeptical audience in mind. It is a bit wordy for me to recommend to some of my people, although I have encouraged my wife to read it and I will recommend it wholeheartedly in a selective manner. The insights for single people, for instance, stand out as particularly good and the challenge to ‘rethink singleness’ is timely in an age when many are marrying much later in life than their forebears.

A good, solid read if you have not read much on the topic. Worth a punt.

Scott Thomas from Acts 29 has produced a list of 20 attributes to look for in a church planter. You can read the article here. If I was to list my top 10 attributes for a scheme/estate/favela planter, they would, (with 2-10 in no particular order), be:

1. A deep and unswerving faith in and love for Christ as shown by a healthy personal, spiritual prayer/devotional life.
2. A visionary leader able to think 5 years ahead but also humble enough to let the Spirit lead and change any plan in a moment.
3. Able to preach and apply God’s Word simply and clearly.
4. A quick thinking, adaptable, entrepreneur.
5. Able to draw people to himself.
6. A heart for evangelism and mission.
7. A deeply committed and loving  husband of a biblically supportive and hospitable wife.
8. Courageous with a spirit of perseverance.
9. Mentally stable (ish), not easily disappointed or distracted by periods of small and/or no obvious numerical growth.
10. Must have a love of doctrine and theology with a particular understanding of the importance of a good ecclesiology in order to grow a healthy, biblically sound local body.

Scott’s article is a must read for those interested in church planting. However, I sometimes question if I had gone through an Acts29 type interview process a decade ago (when I planted my first church), would I have “passed”? It’s a good and helpful thing to do but we must also remember that God uses some of the most unlikeliest people in history to achieve His purposes. These processes are, I think, necessary guides in an area swarming with so many false starts and poorly thought out projects. Many men have been burned by the thought that they could plant a church and, once started, discovered just how much a war of attrition it can be. However, my worry is that we can over professionalise this area, particularly in my patch of the church planting world. I couldn’t even get a job stacking shelves in Sainsbury’s 15 years ago. That’s how unemployable I was. Yet, a decade and a half later I am thankful that God found a use for me by using latent gifts I never knew I had for the building up of His kingdom.

When I consider some of the members of my team (pre interns, interns and core team), pretty much all of them were (and are) a “risk”. I don’t imagine more than 2 of them would “make it” past the interview stage for most middle class churches hiring staff and/or interns. I remember in Brasil when we grew a team of 12 full-time workers for our church and street child ministry out there. They were like the Brasilian dirty dozen – a biggest bunch of misfits and biblical illiterates you could never hope to find. A local church pastor asked me privately: “Mez, why do you employ these people when there are so many better candidates in the church?” My reply was simple: “Look who we’re trying to reach, Pastor. I’m not trying to reach good people. I’m trying to reach those that society has written off. And who better to do that than Christians that the church would not even consider ‘fit for service’ (for the wrong reasons). God has sent me the perfect team.” And I was right (in the main).

I know that the attributes of a team player are far different from the attributes of a lead planter. Don’t get me wrong – my standards are high and if you work for me then you will be pushed to the limit. My point is in housing schemes we just have to look a little bit deeper and see a little bit farther when we consider who may or may not be suitable. I am not saying we have it right and it is definitely not failsafe (but no system is) but we are constantly learning and evolving our processes as we succeed and fail.

In the UK, if you are asking this question then I recommend you talk to your pastor and you contact ACTS29WE. They have an intense interview process which, if nothing else, will crystallise your theology and help you discover where your gift set might best used for God’s glory. Use the tools on offer for us today but remember they are a guide and not the final answer for your life. If you think you want to plant or work in housing schemes contact me personally. We offer onsite, first hand ministry experience with ongoing evaluation, which hand in hand with the Acts29WE process (which we would recommend you do) pretty much offers one of the most rigorous procedures in the UK. If you are not in Scotland I can put you in touch with some good guys in pretty much every part of the UK. If you survive all that then you definitely fulfill the criteria of number 8 above!

Why are you planting churches in Scotland? It’s a Christian country isn’t it?

This map is the result of a survey taken by a city centre church in 2007. The red areas indicates where there is very little and/or no gospel witness.

If we took into account every denomination in the city that could be regarded as (remotely) Evangelical and gospel preaching we would still be left with 98% of our city untouched by the good news of Jesus Christ.

Many of the really red areas represent housing schemes. Practically every major city in Scotland tells the same story.

Pray for Edinburgh. Pray for Scotland.

Without the cross of Jesus Christ there is no gospel. There simply is no good news without the cross. Indeed, any attempt to preach the gospel, minus the cross, is to offer people a placebo rather than the very medicine they require. (Alistair Begg)

There can be a misapprehension in some circles about how we minister to the poor effectively. I was at a conference recently and the discussion centred around handing out food and other necessities. My frustration was that this is often the apex of help given to the poor and needy when what is needed is a much more comprehensive approach to this ministry. The poor need to be taught as part of our service to them. They need to hear the gospel and when some respond (as they will) they need to be taught in order for them to grow, mature and be allowed to move into position’s of leadership. Of course, all doctrine and teaching is important but here are some reasons why I believe teaching the doctrine of the atonement is vital to our ministry among the poor.

1. It gets our foundation right in terms of understanding the human condition. We have offended our Holy God and His wrath rests upon the guilty sinner. God must and will punish the guilt sinner and His full wrath will be brought to bear. If he did not spare His own Son then we have no justification whatsoever for thinking that there will be some sort of ‘get out clause’ at the end for the poor and destitute.

2. It helps us to understand the seriousness of the task at hand. We are preaching to people lost in sin and under the just condemnation of God. It is easy to forget that and make excuses, especially in places full of the ‘disadvantaged’. There is no special dispensation for those of us who have had a crap life. We must take responsibility for our sins. What sinners need above all else is to be humbled by the gospel and not to have their self esteem boosted by self help nonsense.

3. It teaches our people ‘proper theology and doctrine’. The popular Christian mantra that ‘Jesus loves you’, whilst a truism,  is not the good news on its own. We need to explain how Jesus has loved us to death on the cross through his atoning sacrifice. He died because of the seriousness of our sin. Wrath currently rests upon the sinner and in love God has made a way possible to escape this. We must not confuse this, otherwise sin gets diluted along with the gospel.

4. It gives us a greater appreciation of the gospel. I was once accused by somebody of ‘always preaching Jesus in your sermons’. Whilst not meant as a compliment, I can tell you  that I was well chuffed! As I said on that day, and as I always say to this: ‘I am afraid I have got nothing else to pull out of the bag.’ How can I not preach Christ in light of the atonement? Such great love and such a great cost at the expense of such a great sinner. What else am I supposed to talk about in my sermons? What else am I supposed to talk about I my life? The doctrine of the atonement drives us into the arms of God and causes us to marvel at its wonder and glory.

5. It reminds us of the importance of solid, doctrinal, biblical preaching. This is the big pressure in our context. Time and again I am met with baffled looks in Christian circles when I explain that we operate a systematic, expository ministry on a Sunday in Niddrie. I can sometimes see people physically wince with disappointment. Give people what they want – that is the undertone. Preach to the issues brother! Fine. The atonement is the issue! If people do not understand the cross and its necessity then they understand nothing.

6. It keep us from preaching moralism. It is easy for law to overtake grace in housing schemes. This is the silent killer here. People live such chaotic lives that it is easy to send them away with a ‘to do’ list rather than continually preach grace to them. It is easy for Christians to put their assurance for salvation in the things they do for Jesus rather than in the Son of God himself. I woke up this morning confident of heaven. Not because I had a great devotional or because my prayers were on fire. Because Jesus died on the cross for my sin. He absorbed the wrath that was duly mine. He paid a price that I could not afford. He has been raised to the right hand of God the Father where he intercedes for me, even now. The atonement was his glorious, bloody idea from start to finish.

But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation. He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves; but he entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. The blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer sprinkled on those who are ceremonially unclean sanctify them so that they are outwardly clean. How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God! (Hebrews 9:11-14)

“When all your favorite preachers are gone, and all their books forgotten, you will have your Bible. Master it. Master it.” — John Piper