Afua Kuma, The Surprising African Jesus, (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock, 2022)

reviewed by Rosie Hopley, CMS MA student

The Surprising African Jesus is an illuminating read, and a book I am grateful to have encountered. The purpose of the book is to bring to light the lost prayers and praises of Afua Kuma (1908–87), a rural and illiterate Ghanaian woman (p. 1), reputedly from a royal lineage (p. 4–5). Through the dogged translation work by Jon P Kirby and transcription by Joseph Kwake, the reader is immersed in a world where we see Jesus being given wondrous praise through the inspired prayers of Afua Kuma, a theologian whose work is oral, contextual and deeply embedded in its African grassroots (p. 1).

The Surprising African Jesus is well worth reading, especially if you are interested in cross-cultural ministry and want to learn from a woman enthralled by the majesty of Jesus. Afua Kuma’s prayers and praises kept drawing me back to the wonder of Jesus, who he is and how he is deeply committed to making himself known. She is a pioneering African theologian whose work deserves a wider reading. Kuma’s language is vibrant as she intercedes for those who go to Jesus. She does not shy away from the visceral, pointing to the all sufficiency of the blood of Jesus: “I want to find shelter in him – to bathe in the blood of Jesus and be saved by his sacred blood” (p. 111).

For anyone who wants to understand the importance of local theology emerging from people in their own tongue, customs and culture (in this case Twi, spoken in Ghana), this book is a good primer. It will give you valuable insights, an understanding into many of the local mores and customs, so ably illuminated with the footnotes and glossary terms.

Another reason this book should be read by scholars, mission partners and students is that it is a reminder of the treasures that God places in the most unassuming of vessels. Of royal blood but “not raised in a chief’s court” (p. 4), Afua Kuma employs the language of royalty, using this to glorify Jesus. Speaking in the Twi language, her words point heavenward to God and hark back to Scripture, as these prayers illustrate (p. 76, p. 78):

“Jesus listens with patient ears,
He judges not us but our deeds.
Go and tell him all of your cares…

“But he has tied his cloth to mine
and lifted the weight off my chest.
These things weighed heavily on me.
I have carried them on my back.
But he has tied his cloth to mine
And has taken them off my back.”

This is a wonderful echo of 1 Peter 5:7 “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” and illustrative of so much of Afua Kuma’s oral works.

If you are interested in reading the words of an oral theologian, deftly captured in this translated and transcribed work, I would commend this book to you. Afua Kuma’s words bring Christology to life, and are an important contribution to the African recording of praise, prayer and contextual theology. They also bring a welcome and expanded global sense of God’s missio Dei, since Afua Kuma’s prayers and praises paint a vivid picture of Jesus who speaks to, cares for and deeply loves his African children. Read it and be empowered and strengthened!

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Lisa Spriggens and Tim Meadowcraft, Eds., Practicing Faith: Theology and Social Vocation in Conversation, (Eugene, Oregon: Pickwick Publications, 2022)

reviewed by Rosie Hopley, CMS MA student

Practicing Faith: Theology and Social Vocation in Conversation is a deep and rich read. This is a book composed of thirteen essays tackling topics including friendship, trauma and holding hope, hatred expressed in the Psalms, food in sacred spaces, compassion, hospitality, guesting and hosting, risk and vulnerability, grief and loss, among several other wide ranging conversations within the context of theology and vocation.

The collection of essays and response articles arose from a conference, Whakawhiti Korero, held in 2018, which brought together thinkers and practitioners of differing areas of scholarship. Lisa Spriggens and Tim Meadowcraft, the text’s editors, continued the discourse and the book “reflects a slice of that conversation” (p. xviii). What is contained in each chapter reflects the conference’s original intent, as expressed in Māori, that the time spent together, ideas and conversations facilitated a “speaking together” (p. xvii).

How do therapists and practitioners integrate their own faith with their vocational work? Set in five themes exploring wellbeing, formation, hospitality, therapy and theology, the writers follow a format of conversations between social vocation and theology. This book sets out to offer multiple examples from the writers’ own practice, and thoughtful, reflective discussion. Engagement with Scripture weaves through each section, helping the reader to anchor ideas and practice, and their own reflections, with the work of scholars, historians, social scientists and other academics. Examples of scriptural examination and reflections included Jonathan Rivett Robinson’s engagement with Mark 7, and the possible use of humour when Jesus met the Syrophonecian woman (p. 129), Richard Neville’s exploration of the incidence of emotions through the Psalms (pp. 224–226) and Sarah Penwarden’s explorations of lament, depths and range of grief and reflections on Holy Saturday.

I particularly enjoyed the response after each section, as each essay is briefly responded to, engaged with, and critiqued.

A highlight was Ryan Lang’s chapter “A Song in the Night: A reflection on Singing in Scripture and Social Vocation”. If this were the only essay, with the corresponding response from Jonathan Rivett Robinson, it would be worth the purchase of the book, although the other essays are excellent too. What resonated for me as a reader is how Lang succeeded in fusing our understanding of singing with the mission of Jesus, how song was prevalent after the Israelites were delivered from slavery, and the relevance of our own song. Lang explores singing in suffering and brings useful insight to those who grapple with how to sing in the midst of the darkest of night, in the midst of trials. Lang brings a compelling argument, and encouragement too.

This is a book that will be helpful for practitioners, theologians and students, indeed anyone seeking to further their understanding of practical theology. In particular, counsellors seeking growth, church leaders exploring the importance of friendship in their own spiritual flourishing, counsellors working with survivors of sexual violence and those working with aged care would do well to pay attention to this book.

For anyone who wants to think about how theology and social vocation can be intertwined, enrich one another (p. 250) and be integrated (p. 253) I would recommend exploring this text. Students and scholars will find thought provoking essays, and the response pieces after each section bring an added dimension and are especially helpful as examples of generous, humble scholarly engagement.

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René Padilla, What is Integral Mission? (Oxford: Regnum Books, 2021)

reviewed by James Butler, Church Mission Society

René Padilla, who died in 2022, has been one of the key voices encouraging an understanding of mission as holistic or integral. Misión integral, as it is called in Spanish, was first introduced to Western mission through the Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization in 1974. Padilla and his Latin American evangelical colleagues pushed their American and European counterparts to move beyond a binary of evangelism or social justice to see them as a whole. Integral is the word for wholemeal in Spanish and just as wholemeal flour or wholemeal rice is not described as being made up of two things, but whole, so they encouraged Christians to embrace evangelism and social justice not as two things which needed to be brought together, but as a single whole.

This book was originally published in Spanish in 2006 and has been translated into English to encourage greater engagement with integral mission. The book is clearly aimed at a church audience, encouraging conversation around mission themes. It is split up into 19 short chapters taking a short reflection from Padilla’s writings and bringing them together with a poem, quote or reflection and a series of questions encouraging further exploration, often through Bible study. This meant it was a far more introductory account to integral mission than I was hoping for. Rather than going deeper into the theological and missiological themes, it takes a more practice-focused approach, exploring a range of issues and topics from the perspective of integral mission. It is aimed at evangelical groups, offering challenges to ingrained understandings of mission, and assumes readers will be confident at engaging with biblical texts in groups.

There were some real gems within the pages of the book. I particularly liked the chapters on the political nature of prayer (Chapter 9), the challenge to Christians to recognise structural injustice (Chapter 10) and the relationship between integral mission and economic justice (Chapter 14). However, at times it felt a little repetitive, a result of bringing together a series of articles rather than a book was written as one. There were parts that felt a little clumsy in the current climate, particularly the way Padilla talks about racial justice and colonialism. While his account and the challenges he makes may be helpfully stretching and challenging for those who have not thought about these things before, for those who have some sense of Black theology and postcolonial theology some of the phrasing might feel slightly awkward. Similarly I’m not sure his discussion of persuasion rather than coercion in evangelism really gets to the heart of the problem of mission’s ties to colonialism. Those things said, I think this is a good book for beginning to think about integral mission, its history and the implications for mission, church and discipleship. Padilla seemed to move easily from talking about individuals, to communities and to churches demonstrating his more holistic approach to the world.

Overall I can recommend this book to those who have not really explored integral mission, particularly for groups who want to reflect together. It is not all that I was hoping for in terms of my own exploration of integral mission, but I will certainly recommend it to those wanting to think and act more holistically in mission. It provides a fine starting point for engaging with Padilla’s work and his legacy of integral mission.

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Michael Bräutigam, Flourishing in Tensions: Embracing Radical Discipleship (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock, 2022)

reviewed by James Butler, Church Mission Society

This book caught my attention because of the language of discipleship. This has become something of a buzzword and a catch-all term for thinking about growing and enabling faith and about learning in recent years. I was interested to see whether this gave a different perspective, particularly due to the language of flourishing, tension and radical. I confess that having read it, I struggle to identify who it was aimed at. It is a bit too deep and technical to work at a popular level, and yet I’m not sure whether it offers much in the way of new insights or developments at a more academic level. Perhaps it operates at more of a textbook level for students, and there are certainly indications that much of the discussion and reflection comes from Bräutigam’s own teaching. The fact that each chapter ends with some practical reflection questions probably backs this up.

The book explores following Christ today in a society which, according to the author, trivialises following Jesus, domesticates God and distorts the gospel. In Chapter 1 Bräutigam offers a framing through psychology and the work of Daniel Kahneman. He identifies two systems of thinking. System one sees the world as predictable and coherent, offering quick solutions to problems. System two thinking is a slower system which explores the details and engages with tensions and uncertainty. Bräutigam suggests the problem with discipleship has been system one thinking when actually we need system two thinking. This all sounds well and good, but I wonder whether his somewhat uncritical imposition of this system gives a clue to the problem with the whole book. He assumes that the issues of discipleship he identifies are system one thinking, whereas what he is doing is system two thinking. However, he provides no evidence for this. In fact, throughout the book the voices he engages align well with his arguments and critical voices seem to be missing. I am led to ask the question, is this actually system one thinking posing as system two thinking, and does this therefore call the whole system into question?

The book is made up of three parts focusing on three “stages” of discipleship: Deny Yourself; Take up your Cross; Follow Me. Each section is split into three chapters. I found so much of the book to be familiar ground. It does draw together a wealth of theological voices, Bible passages and some reflections on contemporary culture and life, and there are certainly some nuggets and challenges along the way. There are some turns of phrase which got me thinking, and challenged my own faith practice. Scripture plays a key role in the book and I certainly appreciated being brought back to these passages in the context of discipleship.

My favourite chapter was actually the last, entitled “Seeing the Friend’s Face’, encouraging an encounter with Jesus and offering Lectio Faciem as a model for contemplating the face of Jesus. I found this chapter compelling with the potential to offer a new perspective, and it made me think of the importance of desire within the journey of following Jesus. I wondered whether the book would be improved by starting with this evocative image – it certainly would have taken the focus of the book away from the one following and onto the one being followed. There is a tendency within discipleship material to put the focus on human agency despite advocating for the work of Christ and the Spirit in the disciple. I did at times feel I had a list of the things I had to do as a disciple, and, despite being told that it wasn’t in my own strength, it wasn’t until Chapter 10 I felt I was offered a clear picture of what that might look like in practice.

The book has an interesting set up, framing discipleship as a creative tension, but I don’t think the idea is really carried through in the foreground of the book and often feels like a bit of an afterthought. You can probably guess that I struggle to recommend the book. I think there are similar books which are more accessible and theological accounts of discipleship which offer more in the way of insight. That said, there are things which got me thinking, and I will be returning to Chapter 10 in the future.

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David W. Bebbington, The Evangelical Quadrilateral Vol 1: Characterising the British Gospel Movement and Vol 2: The Denominational Mosaic of the British Gospel Movement, (Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2021).

reviewed by Philip Lockley, Cambridge

Some years after they split up, The Beatles issued a two-volume collection called Past Masters – an assemblage of singles and B-side songs that were otherwise difficult to get hold of, as they were issued separately from their influential LP albums. This two-volume book does something similar for the dispersed scholarship of a doyen of the history of British evangelicalism, David Bebbington – now emeritus professor of history at the University of Stirling. It gathers together 32 discrete journal articles and book chapters written between the 1980s and 2020s, almost all of which were previously published beyond the covers of Bebbington’s own influential “LPs”, including his best-known book: Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: A history from the 1730s to the 1980s (1989).

The title phrase The Evangelical Quadrilateral comes from Bebbington’s most significant and lasting contribution to the study of evangelical Christianity: a four-fold characterisation of both the evangelical movement in general and evangelical Christians in particular. Bebbington first developed this way of describing who or what is “evangelical” in the early 1980s, bringing his idea to maturity in Evangelicalism in Modern Britain. For Bebbington, evangelicals are those “who specifically emphasize the four elements of the Bible, the cross, conversion and activism” (I:vii). While other Christians and their movements in history (or indeed the present day) might also prioritise one or more – say, the authority of Scripture or being actively missional – evangelicals are distinguished by their emphasis on these four together, and may be boundaried from other Christians by their combined scope.

In an introductory chapter to the two volumes, Bebbington offers a robust defence of the Quadrilateral from various attempts by other scholars to challenge, nuance or increase its parameters across the last three or more decades. It is a testament to the strength of the theory that it has held such explanatory power for so long. Both this Introduction and a wide selection of chapters across the two volumes reveal with admirable clarity how fields of research in the history of evangelicalism have developed from Bebbington’s pioneering effort to map the evangelical landscape.

The first volume in the collection deftly threads together focused studies of themes and movements from the mid-eighteenth to the early twenty-first century, as well as much of the English-speaking world. The second volume is more clearly structured by denominational categories, with clusters of two or more chapters devoted to Anglican, Methodist and Baptist themes or individuals respectively. Later chapters are brought together in less satisfying catch-all sections that span such contrasting subjects as the Brethren, Frank Buchan’s Oxford Group and the rise of Charismatic Renewal in Britain.

Bebbington’s book-length studies have consistently had an eye for the ways in which evangelicalism in any period or context responds to and absorbs the changing culture surrounding it. Here, then, are articles emphasising how eighteenth-century evangelicals were shaped by the Enlightenment, their nineteenth-century successors by romanticism and their yet more recent heirs by modernism and postmodernism, which Bebbington at points elides under the alternative term “expressionism”. In several chapters dated into the 2000s, Bebbington consolidates another argument first made in Evangelicalism in Modern Britain: that Charismatic Renewal within a range of evangelical denominations should be understood as a spirituality moulded by the “expressionist” culture of its times.

Elsewhere in these volumes, Bebbington offers focused studies of how single doctrinal themes such as eschatology, holiness and entire sanctification, and interests such as science and history, came to be viewed very differently in different periods of evangelical thought and culture. Likewise, chapters on the reception history of theological lodestars John Calvin and Jonathan Edwards offer rich insights on continuity and change in mainstream evangelical beliefs over several centuries.

Bebbington always writes with precision and authority. He has long attracted readers among non-academic yet interested audiences, especially contemporary evangelical believers themselves – and this collection deserves to do so too. Many of the articles and chapters here are based on extensive reading in manuscript archives and long-forgotten evangelical journals, and the insights from them are rarely dry. Yet the final chapter in Volume 1, on Evangelicals and Public Worship, 1965–2005, is especially fascinating for its source material: the author’s own notebooks recording observations of a vast range of church services that he personally attended over a period of 40 years. Across this time, Bebbington tracked extensive changes in sermon styles, liturgy, use of space, visuals and technology, music, women’s roles and leadership, and a host of behaviours by worshippers, especially reduced formality and more expressive prayer and sung worship. Bebbington recorded some worship contexts where such changes had been resisted. However, the evidence compiled points compellingly to Bebbington having himself lived through a distinctive era of changing evangelical culture. By narrating this history back to others who may well have lived through and forgotten it, Bebbington proves – as has his whole career – the value of history for evangelicalism. A past master indeed.

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Andrew Root, Churches and the Crisis of Decline: A Hopeful, Practical Ecclesiology for a Secular Age, (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2022)

reviewed by Mark Collinson, Winchester School of Mission

Andrew Root is a professor at a Lutheran seminary in Minnesota, and has been writing a series on practical theology in response to Charles Taylor’s analysis of a secular age. This book tells three stories. These stories lightly bounce off Root’s theology, but make no mistake, Root still delivers the theology.

The first story is about a church in decline. Imagine a church that has seen better days, and now has a worshipping community of 20 to 30 people, nearly all of whom are in their 70s and 80s. Sound familiar? The inspiration for this book comes from just such a church that was closed and sold to a microbrewery in a hipster urban area. As a pub the church building attracts exactly the kind of people with whom a young energetic digital age pastor of 10 years ago was unable to engage.

The second story is about how Karl Barth discovered the touchstone of his theology that became manifest in Church Dogmatics. When Karl Barth started ministry as a pastor in a small village in Switzerland in 1911, he had rejected the pietism of his father (who was also a pastor) as out of date in comparison with the modern theology of the German universities. As a student Barth soaked up liberal theology that lauded the achievements of the Enlightenment. He was a strong supporter of socialism, through which God would bring justice to the proletariat. But with the advent of war in 1914, the failings of modernism became apparent in the industrial scale killing on the battlefields.

Having rejected pietism, and been let down by liberal theology, Root tells of how Karl Barth found faith in God. Barth visited an old German pastor in Württemberg, Christoph Blumhardt, who had inherited and developed his father Johannes’ healing ministry. Way back in 1843 when he was a young pastor, Johannes had an extraordinary pastoral situation of a young woman, Gottliebin, who, it appears, was demon possessed. Over a period of two years, he visited Gottliebin and her family, praying with them, in the midst of visions of a ghost, bumps in the night that even made the neighbours complain, and Gottliebin’s illness that could be cured by neither medicine nor psychologists. Eventually, Johannes asked “Are you alone?” to which he got the answer, “No” in deep male voice that was not like Gottliebin’s. “Who is with you,” he asked. “The Most Wicked One,” came the response. Now that Johannes knew what he was dealing with, he prayed steadily for exorcism, which happened one day just before Christmas, as Gottliebin’s sister proclaimed, “Jesus is Victor!”

This story lays the foundation for the theological heart of the book, which Root exposes in various themes, and he suggests could contribute to a hopeful practical ecclesiology for a secular age. Root assumes that Charles Taylor’s analysis of A Secular Age applies as much to the modernism of the early twentieth century as it does to the twenty-first.

There is much here that I found joyfully critiques some of the contemporary cultures that we find in the Church of England. First, Root says, the church cannot know how to find God: the church has to allow itself to be found by God. Second, Root says, the church is not the star of its own story, God is. Whether it be the ancient church building of a village parish, or the building up of a congregation in a revitalisation, we sometimes get so focused on church that the focus is taken off the power of God who reveals himself, sometimes in ways that are (using Taylor’s language) transcendental.

Third, the “crisis” in the title of the book is the church’s preoccupation with chasing relevance. One crisis is recognising the irrelevance of the church in the (Tayloresque) “immanent frame”. Another is seeking to regain it. Relevance opens doors to “resources” that the world would give the church if it trusted they would be used efficiently. I don’t think Root recognises the significance of the word “resource” in relation to churches in the CofE, but he is firmly in the camp of what HeartEdge would recognise as asset-based community development (ABCD). The resolution to this crisis, Root suggests is twofold: that even in the immanent frame of society the church allows God to be God, and that this God can only be recognised through dialectic.

Here, the word, “dialectic” becomes really important, because it is both the answer to all our churchy problems but also the most difficult bit of theology to make practical. I’m not sure that Root finally delivers on it (in this book, at least). Being “dialectical” means expressing two things that are both true and opposites (or at least in tension) at the same time. I liken it to the kind of sermon that captures the vision expressed by Taylor when he describes, standing in the wide open field of the immanent frame, how we feel the tug of the wind of transcendence pulling us in both directions, first this way towards God, then towards the reality of the immanent frame. In non-academic speak, it’s about heaven touching earth. It’s about being in the world not of the world. It’s about being grounded and supernatural. As Root says, the dialectic is the way of divine action itself: look no further than the incarnation.

There is also something for Anglicans here in our current paralysis about human sexuality. According to Root, Barth rejects both pietism (for Anglicans, read evangelicals) and liberals (read progressives) for the same reason. They are both in their own ways committed to “religious individualism”. What he means is that individuals commit themselves to a “religion”, making the individual the driver of religious experience. This individualism once again takes the focus off God, and turns our Christian faith into “religion” on both sides of the coin. Barth is clearly in favour of people having religious experiences, because he was transformed by Gottliebin’s story, but he is at pains to prevent Christian practice from being religious.

Root counters the busyness of the church with an appeal for the church to wait. “Only by waiting can the church of the living God serve the world” (p. 141). It refreshes my sense of what prayer and worship is about, not so much as giving ourselves to God, but simply waiting for God’s next revelation of himself. I was captured by the sense that an exorcism in 1843, seventy-two years before Barth met Blumhardt, was definitive in restoring Barth’s faith in a God who acts. He wasn’t looking for a miracle last week, or last year (though Blumhardt’s ministry seems to be the envy of any charismatic leader of today). 1843 was good enough for Barth. Are we ready to wait decades, abiding in and yearning for God, before we get our next miracle story to share in a sermon?

The third story, woven in between the Tayloreseque take on Barth’s formational years as a pastor, is the story Root imagines if the church in the first story wasn’t sold to a microbrewery. What if the story of that church has a different ending? What if this church discovers its unique charism (what Root calls its “watchword”), celebrates the stories and gifts of her faithful worshippers, naturally incarnates ABCD and the kingdom of God starts bubbling up in their very midst? They discover they don’t need to recruit a new trendy pastor, they just need to ordain the lay leader who had led their congregation all along.

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Christopher James, Church Planting in Post Christian Soil, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018)

reviewed by James Butler, Church Mission Society

What is the future of the church in the post-Christian West? This is not the first book to ask this question and it won’t be the last. The particular contribution of this book is its practical theology approach. It is a detailed and focused study on the Seattle area in Pacific North West of the United States of America, which has been described as “the None Zone” with a high percentage of religiously unaffiliated people. James suggests that, based on current trends, Seattle gives a good indication of what the future looks like for the church in the US. Using a mixed method approach drawing on both quantitative and qualitative research methods, James presents four models of church that seem to be engaging well in this post-Christian landscape. The major contribution of the book comes from the time he spends presenting, evaluating, learning from these models.

The early chapters present the cultural context of Seattle and the Pacific North West, the qualitative data collected about churches in the area, and the ecclesiological approach taken around models of church. Chapter 4 presents the four models, developing careful descriptions based on the qualitative and quantitative research. Chapter 5 moves from presenting into evaluating using a missional lens. It explores each model’s strengths and some of the potential weaknesses. James then moves, in Chapter 6, to make some suggestions about how the models could be strengthened by learning from each other and from the missional theology he is engaging with. Chapter 7 presents some of the wisdom from these different church models and begins to sketch out some of the larger ecclesiological implications, presumably to be picked up and developed at a later date.

There is much that can be celebrated about this book and the research it is based on. It is a careful and detailed study, one that is clear about its focus on Christian witness in an increasingly post-Christian west. It is a study which is unapologetically theological, being open about its position and commitments and making bold critiques. It is firmly focused on practice, deeply committed to Christian witness and generously ecumenical.

I do have some reservations. While the missional lens chosen for the study is one which brings helpful and significant insights into practice, it can sometimes feel a bit overbearing. There is an assumption that missional theology is the way forward, and everything is evaluated based on that theology. I would have liked to have seen some critique of the missional lens from the actual practice he observed. It could have been strengthened by at least entertaining the question of whether other missiological approaches might have made better sense and might be more appropriate in a post-Christian world. This means that some of the suggestions for the different models can feel a little heavy handed. A helpful avenue of further reflection would be James’s assertion that many of the models have the resources within them to overcome their weaknesses, and more could have been made of this. The book is the product of a doctoral thesis and as a result takes a while to get going. The first three chapters survey the field and context and it would have benefitted from getting into the meat of the insights a little quicker. I wonder whether this earlier discussion could have been condensed, which would have had the added bonus of allowing some expansion of the final chapter where the fascinating insights highlighted could have been developed a bit further. The final thing which struck me from reading this, which is less a criticism of the book and a more a wider comment on thinking about models, was that this felt very different from a British context. I could not imagine some of the approaches working in the UK, and the scale and funding was unfamiliar.

Overall an important contribution to a growing field particularly because of the rigorous qualitative and quantitative research that has gone into it. It provides a helpful model for a practical approach to ecclesiology and is a rich engagement with missional theology. As well as its contributions to academic theological accounts of church planting, the book will be of interest to theologically engaged practitioners and important for teaching around church planting and contemporary ecclesiology.

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“Living alongside people”– learning in and through relationships. An interview with “Sarah”

by James Butler

James: Sarah, tell us a bit about yourself and your involvement in the church.

Sarah: I’m a children and family worker in my local Methodist church. I run activities for children and families including a toddler group and a Messy Church during festival times. I go into the local primary school to read Bible stories and listen to readers, and I lead services in the school at festival times, such as a Christingle service at Christmas. Alongside this I volunteer at the local children’s centre, attend the Friday community coffee mornings and host a monthly sewing bee day.

I have also been training to lead worship in the Methodist Church, which in Methodism means planning and leading the service, but not preaching. This can be very rewarding but also challenging, making sure it is interesting and accessible for all. Leading a community in worship is a real privilege. I am still working through my training as a worship leader. The material is all online, which for my learning style and dyslexia is a real struggle at times. I have a loving and caring husband, who is fabulous at supporting my work. He is also involved in most of it, helping where he can. I have made many lovely friends and I feel really settled and called by God to be here.

James: We’re thinking about how faith grows and changes, so what is faith to you and what encourages or enlivens you in your faith?

Sarah: For me faith is about living alongside people, loving and caring for them. I want to bless the people I meet, including those who, like in the story of the good Samaritan, I might be tempted to walk past on the other side. The thing which has really enlivened me in my faith is the toddler group, which I run with the team. It is exciting to see the adults at our toddler group blessing each other, supporting and caring for each other and being so generous towards each other, particularly when some of them have so little. They often ask whether we need anything, and for me that is like Jesus working in everyone, even if they have no idea that Jesus is there with them.

James: As you know, this project has been looking at the grassroots experience of learning and how people grow and develop in faith. Are there times in your own life can you identify this kind of growth and change?

Sarah: Well for me, the biggest thing has been bereavement. When my husband died leaving me a young widow with two young children, I knew I was not alone and God was by my side. I could talk to him, cry with him, scream and shout. He would be there with his calming spirit. He would not leave me as I am a child of God and he loves me whatever I do, wherever I am. Knowing how much I was loved deepened my faith and made me want to know more. While praying I felt a sense of peace fall over me, knowing God had his calming hand on my grieving body.

But eight years later I met a new partner who had two young children and then 18 months [later] he suddenly died, leaving two young boys orphaned, and I thought, “How could there be a God?” After eight years of being on my own, I was thinking I’d got another future ahead. A friend of mine, who had also been widowed and was a churchwarden and children’s worker, invited me to come for Sunday lunch. I thought that would be lovely. And she said, “You’ve got to come to church first.” I just thought, “Oh really, I don’t want to go, you know, I don’t believe this. I can’t say these things.” I couldn’t say them from the heart, because I didn’t know at that time if I believed that. I just thought, “She does a really lovely Sunday lunch and she’s really good company and so is her husband and daughter; OK, I’ll go sit at the back. What harm is that going to do?”

So, I went, and I did sit at the back and there was somebody that I knew and she just put a hand on my hand, didn’t say anything. And then I just cried all the way through this service. At the end the person who was presiding said, “Somebody here is really hurting and these words of this, this last hymn we’ve sung, are going to resonate with them.” And I just thought, “Oh my goodness, I think she’s talking about me.” And she just looked at me, and then they prayed with me. At that point I actually felt hope, which I hadn’t felt for quite a few months. I started to realise that although I didn’t believe in God or feel that he’d been there for me, he was still there with me.

James: Thank you for sharing that. It really resonates with many of the stories we have heard, that these big things in life can actually become places of experiencing a deepening in faith for many people. Do you see people’s faith growing and changing around you in the community?

Sarah: Yes, I’m quite a people-watcher. I like to sit and watch and then kind of reflect on that. I learn from watching people and talking to people. It’s all part of getting to know them, I think. In the toddler group, as I get to know the families, I see how they learn. I hear their expectations and in response I start to change things and accommodate their needs in different ways. For me the toddler group is church. We have a craft team; we do different activities together and I see how we are forming a community and learning from each other. The mums might not see that as church, but I do. We are showing them love and blessing them, as Jesus did, and one mum has started asking questions and has asked for a Bible.

James: That’s interesting, because one of the big questions from the research has been the place of the Bible and of the Christian tradition. How do you see that in your work?

Sarah: We really don’t push that. Lots of parents come from the children’s centre, which is just down the road. We just we offer them a space. We offer them refreshments and we offer them support, a chat, activities, those kinds of things. We don’t push the God bit as it were, but hopefully through our actions and what we share, we talk about church, we talk about what we’re doing in church, we talk about the other things going on. For that woman who asked for a Bible, I think just from her seeing the examples, learning from us, seeing different things and feeling supported, that encouraged her to open up. It’s more than just statutory support; I think we are learning from them too.

James: Do you see that happening anywhere else?

Sarah: Yes; before Covid we had “Brunch and Natter” once a month, where people from church would come together to eat and discuss the lectionary passage or something topical in the news. We would share a meal and chat together. I see that as church. It’s about us going out to people instead of expecting them to come to us. We are meeting them where they are, and supporting them and being more like Jesus, really. It doesn’t have to be worshipping in a church. It’s about the practical things of life.

James: When we spoke during the research, it was in the middle of the pandemic and lockdown. How did that change how you approached community and learning?

Sarah: It was challenging. We had online coffee mornings to keep in touch with parents. We did what many groups did – recorded stories on YouTube and Facebook. We managed to stay in touch with families. It has also shown us that Zoom can help us to reach out to certain people who can’t get to church on a Sunday or who work shifts and can’t be there. It would be really good to still have an interactive Zoom service, as we have been doing. I don’t know how that would work, but through Zoom we have been able to connect with different people.

It was also great to be able to connect with more people from the Methodist District who are involved in similar things. Before it was really hard to get together because we were far away from each other. But now we can meet on Zoom. It has been a really good learning opportunity and good way to meet different people from around the country and around the District. We have our lay workers meeting once a month on Zoom now, where we can share ideas and we can talk.

James: And what have you learned in your work?

Sarah: I learned that you can’t fix everything. And you can’t be there for everybody all the time. It’s about being a team, not just you on your own. I’ve learned that whatever we do, whoever we are, God loves us and he is there. Lots of people don’t see that, but I know that he does. I know that he’s there supporting all these families.

James: And what is your hope in all this?

Sarah: It’s encouraging to have these conversations with the parents, about life and faith and to learn together. I’d like to see the parents who come regularly begin to take ownership of the group and be able to run it. We would just be there to support, but they could lead it. We have run this on a limited budget with a small group, and it would be great to see others growing and enjoying taking a lead in this.

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“Those times of things being crunchy” – learning and unlearning in the messiness of life. An interview with “Eleanor”

by James Butler

Eleanor: What struck me was that it wasn’t the quality of the teaching, or the handouts or the reading material that we talked about as being instrumental in our learning. Not that those things aren’t important, but that what seemed to stand out from the conversation in our focus group was that it was times of difficulty and stress where we really felt that God had done some of that unmaking and remaking work. Soon after the focus group, I used some of those reflections in a sermon. I looked at how it is in our brokenness that God seems to do God’s best work; that experience of feeling unravelled and being reformed. We don’t particularly welcome those times of things being crunchy, but so often that is actually the crucible where transformation happens.

The other thing that stood out to me in the focus group was how we narrate the things that happen in our lives. I had been friends with some of the people in the focus group and when I heard them describing their experiences, I knew more of the story and I knew some of what they didn’t talk about. I was struck by how we narrate those experiences, what we offer and what we choose to leave out. How does it shape what we say about God and about practice when we only give a little fragment of the story or we sanitise it, or we shape it in a particular way?

James: And what difference do you think that would make?

Eleanor: It makes it overly tidy. I could tell people were choosing not to say things because it was too personal, or they didn’t want to offer that level of vulnerability and embarrassment probably as well.

It made me think about how we process that learning in private spaces with trusted people, but the outcome of that learning we share more widely. You do that learning somewhere else and only when you’ve got to a point where you think this is respectable will you offer it, but in the sharing of that story we can lose some of the humanness and real life of learning.

James: You pointed to the difficult and the stressful moments as being the places of learning and how you were unravelled and reformed. In the research we found that through seeing these big moments in life events, we were able to tune into smaller examples of learning which had a similar shape. Where do you see similar learning in the day-to-day life of pioneering and missional communities?

Eleanor: In a more formal way, the organisation I lead had to go through a culture change recently. Our sport and faith leaders were very keen on one-to-one mentoring as a way of discipling young people, but from a safeguarding point of view we said that we can’t do that anymore. We moved to mentoring young people in a group. Some of them just can’t get their heads around this and that has been a challenge.

Another place I see learning happening is in the pioneer training in the hubs, which does have this transformative effect on people’s faith. In that case I think it’s to do with being validated and affirmed and given permission to think that differently, and to explore the things that they believed all along. We give a space where it is OK for them to believe and think the things they do when they have felt at odds with the teaching in their church for so long. That is transformative, so in other contexts it can be about a safe space to explore different things.

James: Yes, one of the reflections that came out of the project was that although we saw faith deepening and growing in those difficult and challenging events, it was a bit problematic if this was seen as a mechanism to help people grow and develop in faith. Life brings enough challenges without the need to replicate it in more formal approaches to learning.

Eleanor: Yes, and I’ve seen that in formal education and heard people say that it’s all very well being broken, but they just didn’t feel that anybody put them back together. It makes me ask how we can love and care for people when life does throw that stuff at you, rather than it being a reason to just leave people to it. That’s really important.

James: How does that connect to your own faith?

Eleanor: The focus group took place when I’d completed my ordination training and I was in a curacy in parish ministry. Since then there has been a five-year period of unlearning and detangling that I’ve had to do to free myself from the institution and from all the stuff that I was trained for, or at least repurposing it, and I’m still in that process. I’m happy in the pioneer work I’m doing, but people still point out more formal roles to me, as if what I’m doing now isn’t “proper”. I’m coming to terms with what I’m doing now being “proper”, valid and worthwhile, which uses my gifts and skills. There’s unlearning of institutional expectations and the way people perceive it.

I think it makes my faith stronger because I’m more dependent on what I discern is God’s call, and what I think God is really about, which is fullness of life. My spirituality is the other aspect that has changed over this time. I have a really good spiritual director, who’s very gentle and holds the space in a very gracious way. I feel no judgement from him and he makes some one or two recommendations that are genuinely helpful. I feel I’ve got a greater freedom in my spirituality, and how I practice and exercise that, than I did before.

James: One of the key insights in the project was about conversations and informal learning being central to how people grew and developed in faith. The conversations that happen over coffee, or on the dog walk. And while it might be the big life events, it could also be the small things of kindness or beauty in everyday life. Does that resonate for you in your pioneering?

Eleanor: For me personally that is where pretty much all my faith discovery comes from. While it is informal conversation, it is also informed by formal learning. So, someone says, “I’ve been reading this article, and it’s really interesting,” and then I’ll find myself talking about it to somebody else and about what I’ve learned from the conversation with the person. In the organisation that I lead, I host this learning community and I’ve been giving them loads of good stuff from CMS and from pioneer contexts, but I don’t really see them using it. However, when I go and visit them individually, and we meet over coffee, and we chat things through, that’s when it starts to click a little bit. It’s in the conversations and in getting to know them.

James: In pioneer circles we are influenced by the missio Dei and the idea that mission is seeing what God is doing, and joining in. What do you see God doing in terms of people’s faith, and how do you participate in that?

Eleanor: I think that we often don’t see what God is doing and join in; I think we stumble along. We try some things out and we figure it out as best we can. We learn from the way that we mess it up or it doesn’t quite work out. We talk about failure being part of the learning process, but I don’t think we live it out. Of course, we have put all this effort in and we don’t want to deal with the disappointment, but I think God offers that gracious space to receive these moments as revelation and to look back and see we are still learning. It is so easy to get sucked into doing things you think God is doing and yet be wildly wrong, particularly in some traditions which are more about control and power than about seeing people released into what God is doing.

James: Yes, and it is interesting to think about the role of the Christian story. In a pioneer context some people have experienced Christian truth more as a weapon than an invitation, so are there ways you have seen people helpfully engage with the Bible and the Christian story?

Eleanor: Yes; in my own research for my MA dissertation I looked at café church. I visited two different groups. In one of them I found people flourishing in a space where they felt accepted and genuinely welcomed. It did lead some to want to study the Bible and it was held in quite an open way, but I still felt there was a culture of wanting to please the teacher. They respected him and he had created a culture where they could respond positively, but I felt they were still a little way from owning these narratives themselves. There was one person who stood out as going on a journey of transformation with God. He had had an encounter with God where he was preparing to commit suicide and then cried out in a prayer of desperation and had been flooded by a feeling of love and warmth. From that experience he’d connected with the café and was learning and growing. The other café church I looked at felt bound up in the same traditional ways of talking about the Bible and there was very little contextual work going on.

I think there is something really important about being with others of a like mind, because it can be life-generating and lifesaving to connect with others in the kinds of communities of practice which CMS is developing with pioneers. It’s so important to connect with people who get where you are coming from and get the thing you are about in mission: people who want to engage with others in mission.

James: It is interesting that you used the phrase “like-minded”, because that came up a few times in focus group conversations in the project. It was a slightly alarming phrase for us initially, thinking people didn’t want to engage with other views, but it became clear that people were using it in a similar way to you – about finding people who wanted to have conversations that were open to different views rather than staying in a particular bubble.

Eleanor: Yes. I think there’s something about what I would describe as genuine Jesus community that has values of caring for people, encouraging them and affirming them: a group of people who are just absolutely for you. That’s transformative.

James: Finally, what are the things you want to continue to explore around faith learning?

Eleanor: For the contexts where I connect with faith learning, the key reflection for me is how do I navigate well the tension between providing a directed and stimulating learning space while also allowing it to be reactive and responsive? Faith learning and transformation can take place in situations that aren’t planned for or anticipated. That can be owing to stressful and difficult life events, or it can be the meandering, whimsical flow of the Spirit. Both catalysts are well supported by a community of people that are open, non-judgmental and affirming of the individual. At the same time, you need something with focus and purpose to gather people around. It sounds complex but those spaces where I’ve received this skilful combination have been facilitated by people who did it in a natural, relaxed way – the whole “non-anxious” presence thing! It’s about creating spaces where’s there’s intention but also openness. It’s an interesting dynamic to play with!

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Life-learning of faith: “… life is wrapped around it somehow.”

Reflections from a conversation with “Liz” – a participant in a rural churches focus group

by Clare Watkins

Clare: One of the things that struck us in the research was the way in which people talked not about how they learned faith in formal places, but in the more kind of everyday things. There’s a lovely bit where you say, “Over the years, as you get older, there’s lots of bits you pick up all over the place. It’s nothing big. It’s just small things.” There is a strong sense that it’s not like you’ve studied a big course, but that there’s something in the everyday that helps us to grow in faith.

Liz: Yes, I remember that. My world has changed in terms of formal religion, in the sense that during lockdown things stopped and there aren’t any evening services anymore. I do miss it, but getting to daytime ones is more difficult. So, I’m having now to make do with the morning service on the radio on Sunday, and Songs of Praise. I’ve dropped out in terms of formal church services, but in terms of what I said about learning through life, I’ve reflected on that quite a bit. There’s people you meet, events that happen, and things that change in your life. I remember talking to my aunt… She said, if you have a strong faith that’s imbued as a child, it keeps you going through life; you’ve got that solid faith that was there from a child and it keeps you going in rocky times. And somehow, you learn from everything as you go along.

Clare: It’s that “learning from everything as you go along” that interests me. This grounding in faith – it’s a rock, a foundation; but it’s clear it doesn’t stay the same all though life. So, what happens, do you think?

Liz: You go through life and you – you know; I got married, had children, and your perspective on life changes. My parents died, and my husband is developing memory problems and things, and I’m following through, really. I think your vision of the world changes as you go through life, and I’m thinking end-of-life type stuff now. It’s there all the time. I like dog walking and walking with nature, and I think about my mother’s favourite hymn, which is “Yes, God is Good”. And I tootle along, having my dog walk, having a little hum of “Yes, God is Good”.

Clare: The context for our research around faith learning was the recognition that all our churches are in institutional decline, even though within those churches there are very often people of fervent faith. Chapels are closing, and I think there is a view, particularly from the “church management” and clergy people, that somehow because of that, faith is disappearing. And actually, I think one of the things that strikes me in what you say, like many of our respondents, was that, although it is sad when places close, nonetheless faith is still alive.

Liz: Yes, I think so, it’s quietly there. Whereas in the nineteenth century, and early last century, it was very fashionable to be going to church and to have a faith in everything, now it’s wildly unfashionable and it’s very hard to have sensible conversations. I mean, there’s one or two people I talk with, such as the farmer’s wife who lives up the road. We have a little chat quietly sometimes, and not particularly about faith, but just what’s happening and what’s going off. But you can’t speak the words these days, somehow, in the way you used to do. Which is why I’ve got the hymn “Yes, God is Good”,because that’s quite neutral. And I like my old hymns!

Clare: “Not being able to speak the words” – that’s really striking.

In the focus group you described your walks in relation to growing in faith. You say: “I remember different people and have little thoughts for people who are ill, because they don’t come to church, but that’s my sort of outdoor church.” Given what we’re describing – chapels closing, generations of people who just would never enter a church – what are your reflections on that kind being at prayer, or being with God, in this “outdoor church”?

Liz: I think that’s probably my church these days, and I go for my walk every day. I was out this morning; you go through the shopping list and what you are doing, and then you think. You get reflecting about people, and think about events happening, and what would my mother have said, and that type of thing. Then you sometimes sing a little hymn or something like that. It’s about half an hour a day. It’s my quiet reflection time where nothing else is happening. It’s time for the brain to float through, really, and think about things.

Clare: And would you see that as a time of prayer? Or is that not quite what you’d call it?

Liz: Yes, it is. It is the time when I’m on my own when I can do things like that and pray for people that I’m worried about. It’s not a formalised prayer, but it is – I suppose it comes to that in the end. It’s just thinking of people and hoping for them, really.

Clare: When you spoke about these walks in the focus group, you also described learning from your friend –about living, and goodness, and faith, although you never discussed faith explicitly. Do you think that’s happening with people who don’t know the church? Do you think there are ways in which people who don’t know the church can encounter that faith?

Liz: Yes, I think they possibly could. It’s like you are walking with people. You don’t stand back and tell them what to do. You walk in their shoes, and you understand what their life is, so you understand why they’re reacting like that. That’s my thoughts: “Why did that happen?” “That was odd.” “I wonder where that’s coming from.” You need people alongside. Our minister’s very good because she’ll walk with you and ask you questions and be interested in what everybody was doing. I think that’s really good, but you have to give a lot of yourself for that; it’s not easy. But living alongside and walking alongside, I think that’s how it works somehow. It’s lots of little things – but I suppose that’s possibly what the early church was like, when people went and lived and walked together and worked together, before it became organised… That’s how Christ started, I think, and that’s how it developed over the years for me. We’ve got very busy doing the “up here stuff” in your head, organising things and having buildings to keep. I mean, I was church council secretary for a couple of years and we spoke most of the time about buildings and money. And you know, it’s fine, it keeps it going, but we’re not about buildings; we are about people. I don’t know what you do. People get anxious about managing things. It’s a huge responsibility; after 100 years, are you going to be the one who closes it? That is hard. We, the people who used to belong to the church, we meet and have little chats, and we’re quite good friends when I see them, but they’re all getting elderly, so a lot of them aren’t out that much. But you’ve got each other through the church, I do like that. But it’s about having facility for people to meet up. I don’t know. It’s sort of incidental somehow.

Clare: I like that – “incidental of church gatherings”. Do you think you and the people that you talk to from the church have a sense of doing the kind of accompanying you talked about, just being alongside people and getting to know them?

Liz: I mean, I certainly do it through [the] Women’s Institute. It’s interesting; both my sons are volunteers in different things – one’s a school governor, and the other one is secretary of the fencing club – and I think they’ve learned it’s people doing things together. The church used to be doing things together. It’s like doing meals, and that sort of thing is good, because you all chat in the kitchen. The best stuff happens in the kitchen! Then you have to go and do something formal, and it’s nice to have a sing, but it’s a bit more formal. It’s people working together for a common cause, which you hope will be for the church and Christ, and God things. But life is wrapped around it somehow.

So I don’t know. It’s about how do you put things on, so that people can get together and support each other? And you hope then that the religion, the other things, will come in through that; but it’s very complex, it’s very difficult.

These reflections led Liz to think about the ways in which the churches’ organisational development through history hasn’t always helped this sense of grass-roots care and mutual support. She reflects on learning from her reading of the history of the Salvation Army and its founder, William Booth.

Liz: While Booth was working and doing and drawing people in and helping people, he could walk alongside people – people with alcohol abuse, that type of thing, and bring them off the streets, feed them. You were there. And then it became very big, and it became a world thing, the Salvation Army. And it’s still there, and it’s still going, but I don’t know, I’d sort of read to about the early twentieth century, about the time he died, and it seemed to have become more of an organisation. The passion wasn’t there anymore, and it became an organisational thing rather than a spirit and a burning to do it. It’s an interesting one.

Clare: Do you think that’s what’s happened to our churches?

Liz: I think the C of E is sort of an institutional thing, because it was a power base. In the nineteenth century, everybody was in it – everybody had to have access to a church, so they built lots of churches. They built a lot of really interesting, nice churches and then we were slightly overdone with church. As time went on, and I think you spend so much time worrying about bricks and mortar that you forget about the people who are going there, really. I don’t know where the churches are these days.

Clare: The online journal that we’re publishing this in, ANVIL, has a mission focus, and we have a real concern about how faith is being handed on. I’ve been very conscious that – and I’m alongside you on this! – you’ve said a few times: “Well, I just don’t know.” And – without expecting any clear plan of “this is what we have to do” – I just want to ask: in your own context, what do you think that you feel prompted to do or called into doing that somehow responds to that sense of mission?

Liz: I think life’s a journey, and you take the journey. I would say to a friend: you never know what’s around the corner, life’s a journey, enjoy it while you can, and do what you feel you need to do. And I feel that sometimes, you don’t want to do something, and you think, well, I’ve jolly well got to do it, because it’s important. I think it’s like this. Nothing is static, nothing is ever the same. And you only learn that, I think, as you get older…

I’ve got to 71 now, and actually do know quite a lot. And I’ve learned quite a lot and it will be lovely to pass it on. But people think you’re boring. So what do you do? And I kept thinking, “One day, I’ll write it down.” I’d love to really just hand on what it was like, and little things I’ve learned, really. I had started a couple of times, and life just takes over and you’re just so busy that it doesn’t happen.

I love the idea of nurseries and old people’s homes together, and intergenerational things. We’ve split the generations off – the children used to be in communities where everybody was together, of all ages, and you learned, incidentally. We’ve actually sectioned society now so that we don’t interrelate very much. Is that one of the things that’s going wrong at the moment? That we’ve we put people into chunks, and they don’t get to mix with other people.

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Navigating the challenges of learning through conversations and relationships: reflections from the Wales Learning Network

by Delyth Davies

Introduction

In 2018 the Cymru Wales Learning Network team of the Methodist Church in Britain embarked on this theological action research project in partnership with the University of Roehampton and the Susanna Wesley Foundation. The local reflector team of three staff members, Amy Adams, Gareth Bennett and I, were eager to engage with this project in order to understand what it is to be a learning community and how this helps us in our work, supporting learning in Methodist churches across Wales.

The context we were working in at the time was very different from that of the present; not just because of the unforeseen impact of a global pandemic and how it led to enormous changes in areas of learning and development, but the picture of the Methodist Church in Wales was different too. As a team, we were working alongside two separate Welsh- and English-language synods, which were in conversation about merging while at the same time supporting Connexion-wide¹ learning and development opportunities in areas of mission and ministry. One of the areas we wanted to explore was how to enable churches to move from theory, and their vision for what they wanted to do, to practice and what part factors such as ownership, agency and motivation played. This ultimately led us to the following definitive research question.

In the Methodist Church in Wales:

• What enables or disables learning towards action?
• What ways could the Learning Network in Wales be a resource for such learning?

After a process of exploration, training and planning for us as a team, a number of interviews and focus groups with churches and ministers were set up across Wales. The data gathered from these formed the basis of the reflections, and the final document recording our learning, produced in collaboration with the Roehampton team, has led to some useful insights and exploration for us as a team, in two aspects in particular – how people learn, and the importance of relationships in learning.

Reflections on how people learn

One of those most telling findings from this research project was the tension between structured training and learning through informal conversations. The experience of those questioned was that learning is far more effective when it is conversational. References were made to “conversations around the well”, demonstrating the importance of story-sharing and of learning from each other. In conversation the agency for learning is shared and people had clearly enjoyed learning in this way. Opportunities for conversation, for discussion groups and enabling learning from each other were already key parts of many of our events both in Wales and across British Methodism. Yet as a team we were aware of the contrast between this insight of learning together and from each other and the expectations of some participants attending training events. People expected to be told how to do things, and we had heard how potential attendees did not sign up because they believed they already had sufficient information and skills in a particular area of work.

Reflecting on learning in the context of church life, another key observation was that learning has traditionally been associated with Sunday preaching. The expectation of cognitive learning through the sermon rather than, what we described as, learning for action seemed to lead to a disconnect. We saw a gap between the informative sermon and its potential for transforming lives for mission. Along a similar line, Bible studies were often associated with being academic in nature. One church had moved from naming the Bible study to Bible chat, which seemed to have made a difference in how people approached it – a simple yet effective solution. Interestingly, who was leading the discussion also made a difference. We noted that people often felt more confident in participating in conversations that were led by a person other than the minister as the minister was generally seen as the “expert”. It raises interesting questions about how, within the context of the formal and traditional aspects of church life, we in churches can provide meaningful worship and learning opportunities in which conversational and informal learning have a place.

As a Learning Network team, we have followed these findings to develop more of our work around conversation. This heightened awareness of the value of conversation in learning led us to be more intentional in initiating and planning facilitator-led discussions that enable opportunities for exploration. This of course is in addition to the normative and the mandatory training courses that we are expected to deliver or facilitate.

One example is a series of conversations we offered for those who lead “Local Arrangement” services when there is no minister or local preacher to lead the service on a Sunday. These are normally taken by church stewards and worship leaders, and they are not expected to include a sermon. As a team we had planned pointers for facilitating the conversation, but the sharing of information, experience and insights came from the participants. It was clear to us, both in the face-to-face and online events, that the freedom to share and to bounce ideas off one another brought energy into the learning space and a renewed enthusiasm for the role that they are called to and the mission opportunities that this brings.

The importance of relationships

The second key finding from the research for our work was the importance of relationships. The Methodist Church Learning Network is often presented as a means for resourcing learning, but in the research, participants expressed their appreciation of the relational nature of the network. These participants talked a lot more about the people they knew in the Learning Network than the resources produced. Creating and nurturing relationships helped provide spaces for deep conversation, reflection and growth.

In recent years, the Learning Network across the Methodist Connexion has sought to nurture and maintain relationships by ensuring that a learning and development officer is aligned to each Methodist District. Having that point of contact seems to have helped build trust and confidence in relationships with the Districts and their respective circuits and churches. Relationship building is a key aspect of the current work in Wales, following the merger of both synods to create a new bilingual synod in September 2022. This was vital, as two groups of people who were accustomed to operating separately in one language came together to embrace a new bilingual identity. The Learning Network team was in a unique position to be able to support the transition prior to the merger through our bilingual communications and resources, which we already had from working with both synods. Perhaps more importantly. we also saw that creating opportunities for coming together for conversation was key and this has resulted in two new pieces of work.

The first is in our support for Welsh language work and bilingualism, where we have developed opportunities for people to get together for conversations around what it means to be a bilingual synod and what support is needed for this. This has led to the creation of new resources to meet specific needs identified in these conversations and that has led to further gatherings to engage with new mission opportunities arising from the merger of the synods.

The second area is around “deep listening”, where we as a team felt led to explore, discuss and practise listening to one another. We gave an open invitation to anyone in the synod who wanted to join us in our exploration. We meet monthly online in a small group for an informal conversation based on a topic or reflection offered by any of the group members as they feel led. Our own experience of engaging with this piece of work confirms some of the findings of the research project. The building of relationships in the listening group provides a safe space of trust where we can be open to learning from one another and to sharing our vulnerabilities, leading to growth in confidence in sharing our faith.

The model of creating a community of practice in which there is an emphasis on learning in the context of relationships and opportunities for deep conversation was already familiar to us at a Connexional level. The coming together with other practitioners in specific areas of work has led us to opportunities to develop in our own learning and to engage in new initiatives. Our reflections on our own experience, the reflection on the wider experience in Wales through the research, and the opportunities for online work since the pandemic have led us to develop this model further in Wales with communities of practice established for tutors, mentors, administrators and youth workers.

The implications for future learning opportunities

The research project shows clearly that when effective learning takes place, it becomes transformational. As a team we wanted to capture that, and to provide opportunities where people are given the space to grow and flourish and engage in mission in their communities. The emphasis on learning through conversation and in the context of being in relationship has become a key part of our thinking.

Another factor that we have taken into account is in the way we publicise such events and, indeed, all events so that expectations are in line with the aims of the training. We have become more mindful of the need to make clear the participatory element of sessions so that people come prepared to engage in this way.

Since the research was undertaken, there have been major contextual changes that may have an impact on learning. The pandemic has led to further decline in numbers of members and attendees in churches, leading to more church closures and a reluctance by some people to engage with learning opportunities. On the plus side, the pandemic also opened up new ways of learning, with a significant increase in online learning opportunities. This has enabled the Learning Network team members across the Connexion to work collaboratively to offer shared cross-regional and Connexional online training, which is open to people regardless of where they live. In addition, there has been an increase in Conference-directed work that includes mandatory training and Connexional programmes, which have generated mixed reactions, ranging from embracing the learning opportunities to anxiety and even animosity. In the Methodist Church in Wales, the ongoing changes related to the merger of the two synods raise issues that are unique to that particular context. Finally, recent management changes within the Learning Network and changes in staff members are additional factors that affect the context. Our focus on conversation and relationship have helped us to navigate these challenges. All in all, we continue to be mindful of the importance of creating and sustaining an appropriate environment for learning and to share this insight with others.

About the author

Delyth Wyn Davies is a learning and development manager for the Methodist Church in Britain based in Wales. She has worked as the national children’s work officer for the Presbyterian Church of Wales and as Wales co-ordinator for BMS World Mission. She has translated over 35 Welsh-language Bible story books for children, edited Welsh-language Christian song books and is involved in gobaith.cymru, a Welsh website with downloadable hymns and song lyrics. She has written meditations for Fresh from the Word for IBRA and has contributed articles to Magnet and Cristion magazines.

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Notes

1. Connexion refers to the larger connected community of Methodist churches. For British Methodism this is across England, Wales and Scotland along with the Isle of Man, the Channel Islands and Shetland. https://www.methodist.org.uk/ about-us/the-methodist-church/structure/the-connexion/ ︎

The post The challenges of learning through relationships appeared first on Church Mission Society (CMS).

“Does not wisdom call?”: faith learning in Methodist practice

by Stan Brown, Graham Jones and Sue Miller

The mission of the Methodist Church

In its foundational documents, the Methodist Church in Britain “ever remembers that in the providence of God Methodism was raised up to spread scriptural holiness through the land by the proclamation of the evangelical faith and declares its unfaltering resolve to be true to its divinely appointed mission”.¹ Contemporary Methodism would hold to this calling, though the word “holiness” may not feature quite so prominently as it once did, the Church having shifted its favoured language over time – more recently from the word “discipleship”, which was very much to the fore when this research was initiated, to an emphasis on a “Methodist Way of Life.” The notions of holiness, and wisdom, however, remain fundamental to the Church’s calling and mission, and are fundamental in this project about learning for discipleship and mission, where the term “faith learning” came to encapsulate what was being uncovered in different learning contexts throughout the Methodist Church.

Faith learning

“Faith learning” emerged from the project as a term that conjured up the virtues of wisdom and holiness while also highlighting the processes involved in becoming faithful disciples, holy and wise. Exploring this process of reaching out for wisdom and holiness involves various questions. Can the process be facilitated? Does it need a teacher? Is it enabled by a carefully designed, structured course or does it require a particular and distinctive approach? This paper explores some of these questions in the light of the findings from the research – research that looked at collaborative learning in a wide range of places and projects within Methodism and her ecumenical partners. It reflects on how some of the answers chime with Methodist tradition and Wesleyan spirituality and considers the implications for contemporary practices and initiatives. It also explores how theological action research as a methodology has not only enabled the discernment of these findings but also, through its methods and informing framework, elucidated some of the tensions and insights about the place and nature of learning in Methodist polity and in the fulfilment of Methodism’s mission and calling.

What was uncovered in the research

A broader understanding of learning

Learning has long been recognised within the Methodist Church as “a means of growth in grace and holiness”,² and the research unearthed the need for a broad and rich understanding of learning, in terms of its source, nature and consequences. Various research participants expressed that learning involved moving beyond information and knowledge. Colin notes that:

There’s a difference between learning something so you can recite it, or you know what it is, and understanding it.

The recognition of the complexity of learning and its elements featured alongside other conversations about a perceived resistance to learning within Methodist churches, particularly among older members, with an association between learning and the classroom, with “right” and “wrong” answers, and a fear about anything too “academic” or “theological”:

One of the ladies in particular was very reluctant to join in anything that she thought was too academic. She used the word theological but I think she really meant academic. And therefore, the word “study” was off-putting so we called it Bible chat. And we said that it was going to be easy enough for everyone to take part in. (Anne)

The association between learning and change also came to the fore in much of the data:

With the learning that’s taking place around local preachers, it’s not just about learning stuff. It’s about how it changes them as people and changes the people around them… You see these folks grow… (Sarah)

Learning is the sort of thing that, if we are open to it, will change us and help us to develop. Learning is something that is an integral part of life, whether we want to do it or not. (Kate)

This notion of growth through learning, this moving towards holiness and wisdom, loving and living well, was visible in much of the data, regardless of location or grouping. The term “faith learning” seems to encapsulate the process and its impact, and to be recognised by many participants even if they do not, or cannot, name or explain what is going on. Also evident was the fact that learning often takes place outside (or alongside) the formal courses and the opportunities – in the informal, the everyday, in unexpected moments and encounters, in real-life situations. Much learning was incidental, incognito or disguised, occurring while other things were happening or the focus was elsewhere. We were challenged, too, to acknowledge that individuals and communities were often more developed in their learning than had been thought. What appeared to be constraining was the lack of confidence, particularly in being able to articulate the profound wisdom and deep understanding that was clearly evident.

Learning through conversation and in community

While a degree of reticence, resistance and a lack of confidence were detected when it came to learning, especially in formal situations or when the focus was on attending courses, barriers to learning were overcome when relationships, community and conversation helped to create a more propitious environment. When shared with those tasked with facilitating learning and development within the Methodist Church, there was considerable recognition of the validity of these findings. An extract from a research interview in part of the project looking at learning in rural communities illustrates this:

Oh we’ve looked at a very good initiative, Holy Habits. We’re using some of that material to develop… But out of that, you see, really what is essentially a community activity comes enrichment, but you don’t have to force it. (Terry)

The Holy Habits material is concerned with formation into discipleship and a distinctive way of life. The resource material is very flexible and has generally been well received in the Methodist Church, which produced it. Here Terry acknowledges the value of the resource, but the learning conversations in which he took part were “essentially a community activity.”

In a very different and urban context, here is another example of a response to the Holy Habits material:

Can anybody remember any of the headings we worked under? You see, I can’t. (Helen)

The structured content of the material is not what had an impact on Helen, yet her overall experience was a positive one. Indeed the “holy habit” of effective learning that seems to recur in the study is one of conversation, which is, as Terry says, “essentially a community activity.”

Meanwhile our research among Methodists in Wales revealed an interest in the relationship between learning in worship through the traditional means of the sermon, and the learning in the conversations to which it might give rise. Here we see the interplay of a traditional and formal style of learning with the conversational culture of the Methodist people:

And it was… I learned more from getting to know someone in depth through the fellowship. So, how shall I say that, if we’re open… that suggests I’m just talking about the social networking afterwards but I think it’s more than that. It’s realising that learning in the context of the church means learning about the people as well as the sermon so to speak, which this church is pretty good at, I think. (Jen)

The preaching is acknowledged to be of a good standard, but only in the depth of relationship found through the meaningful fellowship of disciples does the real learning from the resource of preaching take place.

Learning through being involved in serving the church with others was also a significant theme. Ian had originally attended an Alpha course but did not subsequently attend any other courses that were being offered:

I was vaguely aware of them; I found that I’ve become involved in the church and I’ve taken the role of being the steward and now I’m treasurer as well. So, I found that my church work and community support have [me]… quite fully occupied in terms of property committee and being a steward. And the people I’m surrounded by keep my faith together, shall we say, and I haven’t really looked in detail at anything wider than that. (Ian)

Ian’s relationships are his source of learning, and, similarly, it is conversation in community that was often found among our research participants to be fundamental in “build[ing] them up in that holiness without which they cannot see the Lord”.^3[3] Conversation and faith learning would seem to be inextricably linked.

Resonance with Methodist tradition and Wesleyan spirituality

Conversation as formation and learning lies deep within the Methodist tradition and Wesleyan spirituality, and thus this finding should come as no surprise. The brothers John and Charles Wesley, along with their numerous siblings, had their primary education from their extraordinary mother, Susanna, whose impact was so significant that she has often been dubbed the “Mother of Methodism”. Susanna’s main pedagogy was one of strict routine and discipline, but alongside this stood another strand – that of conversation with her children:

I take such a proportion of time as I can spare every night to discourse with each child apart. On Monday I talk with Molly; on Tuesday with Hetty; Wednesday, with Nancy; Thursday, with Jacky; Friday, with Patty; Saturday, with Charles; and with Emily and Suky together on Sunday.⁴

An education for discipleship and mission in which careful attention is paid to speaking and listening. This Godly conversation was at the heart of John Wesley’s pastoral practice as a mature minister. A few examples from consecutive days in his journalling notes reveal just how significant this practice was:

March 1741

• Monday 30… 8.45[a.m.] at Bro. Waldron’s, conversed, tea, visited… 7.30[p.m.]… conversed to some…
• Tuesday 31… 10[a.m.] at Dr. Rawdon’s, tea, conversed; 11[a.m.] at home,
  conversed to many…

April

• Wednesday 1… 10[a.m.] at home, conversed to many… 5[p.m.]… tea, conversed…
  Thursday 2… 10[a.m] conversed to Bro. Hum[phreys], conversed to many…⁵

In between the many conversations on these same days Wesley frequently continues the conversations with “the bands” – small confidential groups meeting for faith sharing and mutual support. Small groups have historically been at the very heart of conversation-based learning and discipleship formation in Methodism.

In a study of discipleship formation in small groups, Roger Walton (a Methodist presbyter) argues that discipleship formation takes places around three centres of energy: mission, worship and community.⁶ He also identifies the basis of “Christian education” as enabling people to be at home in the language of faith.⁷ Learning to speak Christian is an essential part of learning to do Christian. Within this, Walton sees small groups as offering a space that is relatively free from the official doctrine or practice of the Church and allows a freedom of expression, exploration and growth,⁸ which is often lacking elsewhere.⁹

Methodist practice and different voices – the interface between the formal and informal

While the findings of this research are recognised by those involved in learning in the Methodist Church, with an acknowledgement of the efficacy and importance of learning through conversation, there is arguably some disconnect between this and actual practice, with a pressure to “deliver training” and run highly structured courses, particularly in areas requiring legislative compliance. There would seem, then, to be some inconsistency between (to borrow from the language of theological action research and the four voices) “espoused” beliefs about learning and “operant” practice, although even within the constraints of statutory courses, there is some recognition of the value of conversation, as in the example of the mandatory training around equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) in the Methodist Church described below.¹⁰

The EDI training is currently only available through an online learning platform designed for individual study and in a format that requires learners to complete every part of the course. The covering letter commending the roll out to superintendent ministers, however, explicitly states that although the course must be done individually and online, the most important learning will surely take place when this becomes part of the conversation of church committees and groups. We see the complexity and interrelation of the voices of theology identified by theological action research – the normative voice of the roll-out letter sent on behalf of the governing Conference recognising the relative place of the mandatory formal training in shaping the expressed belief and lived practice of local conversations.

Similarly, in responding to another mandatory training initiative, this time for safeguarding, research participant Julian demonstrates the complex interrelationships between different and differing voices, including the formal and normative voice of learning through courses and programmes sent down from the church structure intersecting with the conversational and community-based formation we have seen at work in their reception.

And what we try to do through the group work is open up those sorts of conversations. Recognising people may have their own personal experiences, and they will, and some people have an issue like a very dogmatic view of the world and Christian teaching. And we have to balance that with some of the statutory requirements and also the very clear Methodist policies and procedures.

The need for people to meet particular objectives, to comply, is more to the fore in these safeguarding and EDI courses than other learning activities run by the Church – there is more prescribed content – and it could be argued that these have a different impetus from the faith learning that we have been describing. However, the description of how conversation can bring such learning to life and open up perspectives demonstrates the complexities involved in enabling faith learning in the Church. There would seem to be opportunities for change and growth and the potential for contribution to faith learning through interventions with different originating emphases, with conversation releasing different perspectives and enabling them to be exposed and explored. Within this process, however, there is another conversation – between the normative voice of the Church and the espoused and operant voices.

The Methodist Church’s consideration of “God in Love Unites Us”, the report on marriage and relationships that was presented to the Methodist Conference in 2019 (with a subsequent vote to allow same-sex marriages in June 2021), has provided a powerful example of the value of enabling different voices to be heard in conversation.¹¹ The “prayerful discussions” that were encouraged following the 2019 report were cited by some research participants as particularly significant opportunities in the life of the Church for the exploration of different traditions, giving people a voice and permission to talk about their different perspectives:

It was just great to have an opportunity to explore an issue that was at the heart of the church. And I think it was great… And it’s very widely, we were actually very good at that, we actually made a lot of opportunities for people to discuss that. And, and it just shows, you know, how diverse we are because you know some people are very, you know, your opinion on the actual context was the opportunity to share together and learn together about, you know, we didn’t know what half the terms meant, I don’t think before we’d read the report… It was it was great to do that in in a, in a safe environment that was that was respectful and worked well. (Kieran)

The process, explicitly built on conversation, was designed to be a process of discernment but also of learning, with an interchange, too, between different theological voices: between formal Methodist theology – aspects of the normative expressed in the Methodist Conference report – and the theological voices espoused and operant in different Methodist spaces and held and expressed by different individuals.

Current initiatives and shifts in practice

We have argued that conferring and conversing are integral to Methodist tradition, and they continue to feature, not only enshrined in the governance of the Church through Methodist Conference but also newly conceived in various current Methodist initiatives, with conversation being highlighted as a means to learning and transformation.

The Strategy for Justice, Dignity and Solidarity (JDS) was presented to Conference in 2021 in a conference report that set out not only a plan and proposed actions towards the achievement of an inclusive church, but also something of the process that led to the strategy and its recommendations.¹² A number of “workstreams” were established that met regularly in order to discern what was needed to bring about change in the Church; the report notes that “the bringing together of different Methodists, for conversation and listening, has been a deeply transformative process”.¹³ This acknowledgement of the place of conversation is also reflected in the report’s recommendations, which include “gatherings to encourage real conversations”, with an endorsement of conversation and “deeper encounter” as a means to transformation.¹⁴ Similarly, the Walking with Micah project has incorporated conversation – local “justice conversations” – into its process for determining where to focus and renew its efforts in becoming a justice-seeking Church.¹⁵ People were invited to be part of “a big conversation”, holding conversations in their local churches, circuits, local preachers’ meetings and class meetings, in which they discussed their experiences, what matters to them and what it means today to be a justice-seeking Church. Questions were available to prompt the conversations, with the assurance that the products of those conversations would inform the direction of the project, with project leaders reflecting on what they “heard” and learning from the different experiences that were conveyed back to them. Effectively this was a process of consultation but inherent in it was the notion of sharing to prompt thinking about the issues – a recognition that ideas and thinking could be enabled and drawn out through exchange and encounter, which would then lead to further learning if shared more widely.

Conversation is not mentioned explicitly in A Methodist Way of Life,¹⁶ a re-working of Our Calling,¹⁷ a process that began in 2018. Among the 12 things identified as being necessary if we are to live out our calling is learning, and the guidance focuses not on learning with others but on individual learning (through podcasts, books and journalling). However, it also identifies being open as one of the other steps and, within that, hospitality, described as “an attitude of openness to others, to learn about them and from them, to widen our understanding and perhaps to be changed by the encounter”.¹⁸ This comes close to the conversation we recognise as being part of Methodist identity, and which was seen in our project as being central to achieving deep learning; within this is also acknowledged the relationship between encounter and change.

In 2020 the Methodist Church adopted God for All, a strategy for evangelism and growth that connects to Our Calling.¹⁹ Subsequently resources and programmes (which also reference A Methodist Way of Life as a resource) have been developed to help people across the Connexion to connect to the initiative and to take action. Reflection and learning are central, with a view to “bringing faith into conversation with experience” and with a drive also towards encouraging and enabling people to be in conversation as a means of sharing their faith with others. This approach was encouraged in a conference attended by one our research participants – the Reimagining Circuits Conference, a conference that drew on the evangelism and growth strategy and involved a key member of that strategy’s team. Michael, a minister who participated in our research, comments:

… the difficulty of it, I think, for people, it wasn’t quite grounded enough in day-by-day existence. What we need to be doing is grounding things in a language that people understand, that they can do something with.

Expanding on the source of these observations, he describes how:

… he was giving these examples where “when I talked to this person, and we went into this place, and we were able to sit down, and we saw this café, and we went there, and then we were able to this and talk about Jesus in this particular, and we got involved in this”.

The encouragement to be bold in sharing one’s faith in informal settings echoes the Everyone an Evangelist Process,²⁰ the process designed, as part of the evangelism and growth strategy, “to build confidence and skills in telling people about God”.²¹ Michael’s further reflections on the input around this at the conference suggest his recognition of a need for conversations that grow more organically out of the individual’s particular style, or personality, or background, rather than following a particular approach or relying on a certain level of extroversion.

For somebody who may be a little shy or a little bit more introvert in that respect, “well I can’t do that”.

The extent to which the Everyone an Evangelist process will be able to equip individuals to initiate and shape conversations in which they tell people about God needs further exploration but, in the light of the research we are reporting here, it is interesting to note an initiative that is about enabling people to learn about enabling others’ faith learning.

Our research suggests that the learning that takes hold in everyday and informal settings happens through a deep and complex exchange: listening is as significant as telling, and there is a degree of mutuality, which means that the learning is not unidirectional and not initiated and aimed at a predetermined outcome. This has significant implications for the extent to which such a process can be planned or curated.

Impact on our own practice

The learning from this learning project has significant implications for those in the Methodist Church who are involved in equipping others. Attempts to put the learning into practice by authors of this paper offer some examples. One is the explicit labelling of some courses as “conversations” – and not just labelling them as such but also facilitating them in line with this, not as a gimmick or educational trick but a genuine intention to engage in deep conversation. A specific case was the offering of continuing development sessions for local preaching tutors, some of whom had been resistant to “being trained”. Being invited to conversations in which their wisdom and experience were sought and valued proved to be both more appealing and more effective as a learning experience. Another example demonstrates change in the approach to learning facilitation, with a conscious decision to resist the instinct to reorder and supplement the chosen small group resources, which seemed disorganised and lacking in clear direction. Instead, allowing the cues in the conversation to determine which elements of the course material were accessed, the conversation was left to flow freely, silences respected, insights and personal stories allowed to enter and meander through the conversation and then leave freely. This was subsequently judged by the person facilitating to be one of the stronger small group series to be used in this setting in terms of depth and growth.

Supporting faith learning

The real challenge, of course, is how best to support learning that is momentary, informal and spontaneous, how to create opportunities for deep conversation, and how to build up people’s confidence and affirm the language being used to articulate learning. The tendency to trip oneself up is all too apparent when attempts are made to formalise the informal or create spontaneity. Maybe it would be helpful to take a step back and reflect on our understanding of what faith learning is and where agency lies? Are we maintaining a culture that views education as pouring into rather than drawing out?

T. S. Eliot’s words from “Choruses from ‘The Rock’” came to mind:

Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?²²

According to David Ford, for any seeker after wisdom,

the core activity is crying out for it. The cry goes first to God… But it is not self–generated. It is elicited… The One who evokes our cry generates wisdom and the desire for it. Our cry is a response to the call of wisdom herself. In the Bible, apart from the desire for God there is no desire that is more passionately and loudly encouraged than the desire for wisdom.²³

And the call of wisdom is nowhere better articulated in the Bible than in the book of Proverbs:

Wisdom cries out in the street; in the squares she raises her voice. At the busiest corner she cries out; at the entrance of the city gates she speaks… Does not wisdom call, and does not understanding raise her voice? On the heights, beside the way, at the crossroads she takes her stand; beside the gates in front of the town, at the entrance of the portals she cries out:

“To you, O people, I call, and my cry is to all that live… Take my instruction instead of silver, and knowledge rather than choice gold; for wisdom is better than jewels, and all that you may desire cannot compare with her.”²⁴

How well this chimes in with the notion that learning often takes place, as we described earlier, “in the informal, the everyday, in unexpected moments and encounters, in real-life situations”. Faith learning is not restricted to the environs or formal processes of the church, and wisdom is accrued relationally and conversationally, and its source is the One who also elicits our search after it.

So, instead of attempting to formalise the informal or create spontaneity, maybe the invitation is to nurture a culture in which a desire for wisdom is encouraged and there is greater confidence in the God-given wisdom already distilling in each and every one of us; to recognise that the Holy Spirit is unconfined, blowing where she wills and both alive in us and seeking to draw out of us the wisdom within.

We have taken the bold step of aligning faith learning, wisdom and holiness – or at least speaking of them in the same breath. What possible purpose could faith learning have other than to help us to become more holy and wise? And while we may wish to resist the notion of targets and learning outcomes, surely we would wish for our learning to be effective and fruitful? Our research confirms that formal courses have only a minimal part to play in this, but will we have the courage to work this through in practice? And will we take this into account the next time we are required to provide training to meet legislative compliance? In our list of priorities, which sits higher – the need to be seen to be doing the right thing or the actual effectiveness of the learning being offered?

If we return to the notion of “a discipleship movement shaped for mission” (a term coined by Methodism to describe itself during the early years of this century),²⁵ are there implications here for a Methodist understanding of mission? Is it also the case that mission is most effective when it involves deep conversation, when it is informal and momentary, and when it is, as expressed above, “in the informal, the everyday, in unexpected moments and encounters, in real-life situations”, often “while other things were happening or the focus was elsewhere”?

Methodism was raised up “to spread scriptural holiness through the land by the proclamation of the evangelical faith” and continues to declare “its unfaltering resolve to be true to its divinely appointed mission”.²⁶ Faith learning has a vital role to play in that, and our research sheds light on how it might be engaged in more effectively – or indeed how it might be recognised and affirmed in the places where it is already taking place and bearing fruit. Becoming holy and wise is a work of God in which we are called to share – so why not learn to share in it well?

About the authors

Stan Brown is a recently retired Methodist presbyter whose ministry has included time in HE chaplaincy and working to develop chaplaincy ministries in the wider Methodist Church. He has also served as a circuit minister in Newcastle, Halifax, Wimbledon and Kingston upon Thames. His doctoral research focused on understandings of chaplaincy as a form of mission and presence in predominantly secular institutions. Stan is a member of the Southlands Methodist Trust, working with Southlands College.

Graham Jones is an ordained Methodist minister currently serving as a learning and development officer based in York. Prior to this appointment he had been a local minister in Hull, a university chaplain in York and a rural officer based at the Arthur Rank Centre in Warwickshire. Graham is passionate about learning and developing a culture in the church in which all are encouraged and enabled to keep exploring and growing.

Sue Miller is director of the Susanna Wesley Foundation, part of the Southlands Methodist Trust, a charity based at the University of Roehampton. Formerly a principal lecturer at the University of Westminster, Sue has taught organisational behaviour and leadership to post-experience students and a range of modules to undergraduates. She has carried out research and consultancy in the areas of equality, diversity, inclusion, change and leadership in different sectors, including charities and faith.

More from this issue

Notes

1. The Methodist Church, The Constitutional Practice and Discipline of the Methodist Church, Volume 2 (London: The Methodist Church in Great Britain, 2023), 213, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ media/30255/conf-2023-cpd-vol-2.pdf ︎
2. The Methodist Conference, “Stirring up the Spark of Grace: Connexional Training Strategies,” Conference Reports 2008, no. 42, 430, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ downloads/conf08_42_ Conx_Training_Strat_report 210808.doc ︎
3. John Wesley, “The Twelve Rules of a Helper” (1753). ︎
4. Written by Susanna Wesley in a letter to her husband from 6 February 1711–12. Recorded in Percy Livingstone Parker ed., The Journal of John Wesley (Chicago: Moody Press, 1951), chap. 4, accessed 29 August 2023, https://ccel.org/ ccel/wesley/journal/journal.i.html ︎
5. Nehemiah Curnock, ed., The Journal of the Rev. John Wesley, A.M., vol. 2 (London: Epworth Press, 1938). ︎
6. Roger Walton, Disciples Together: Discipleship Formation and the Role of Small Groups (London: SCM Press, 2014), 39. ︎
7. Ibid., 45. ︎
8. Ibid., 111. ︎
9. Ibid., 47. ︎
10. For further discussion of the four voices, see the introduction to the project in this issue and Helen Cameron et al., Talking about God in Practice: Theological Action Research and Practical Theology (London: SCM Press, 2010). ︎
11. “Archive Marriage and Relationships – 2019,” The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ MandR19/ ︎
12. The Methodist Conference, “Strategy for Justice, Dignity and Solidarity: working towards a fully inclusive Methodist Church,” Conference 2021 Agenda, vol. 3, no 56, 753–89, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ media/21966/conf-2021-56-strategy-for-justice-dignity-and-solidarity-working-towards-a-fully-inclusive-methodist-church.pdf ︎
13. Ibid., 761. ︎
14. Ibid., 770. ︎
15. “Walking with Micah,” The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ our-work/our-work-in-britain/social-justice/walking-with-micah/ ︎
16. “A Methodist Way of Life,” The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ our-faith/a-methodist-way-of-life/ ︎
17. “Our Calling,” The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ about-us/the-methodist-church/our-calling/ ︎
18. “Open,” “A Methodist Way of Life,” The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ our-faith/a-methodist-way-of-life/visit-every-station/open/ ︎
19. The Methodist Conference, “God For All: The Connexional Strategy for Evangelism and Growth,” Conference Reports 2020, no. 4, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ media/19181/conf-2020-4-evangelism-and-growth.pdf ︎
20. Everyone an Evangelist, The Methodist Church, https://www.methodist.org.uk/ our-work/our-work-in-britain/evangelism-growth/practise-evangelism/equipped-for-evangelism/everyone-an-evangelist ︎
21. “Take your next steps in Evangelism and Growth”, The Methodist Church, 7. https://www.methodist.org.uk/ media/20686/3507-evangelism-and-growth-strategy-booklet-for-web-single-pages.pdf ︎
22. T. S.Eliot, Collected Poems 1909–1962 (London, Faber and Faber Ltd., 1974), 161. ︎
23. David F. Ford, Christian Wisdom: Desiring God and Learning in Love (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 51. ︎
24. Prov. 1:20–21; 8:1–4, 10–11 (NRSV). ︎
25. Martyn Atkins, “Contemporary Methodism: a discipleship movement shaped for mission [The General Secretary’s Report],” Methodist Conference Reports 2011 (The Methodist Church in Britain, 2011), accessed 4 June 2018, http://www.methodist.org.uk/ downloads/conf2011-pc-2-gen-sec-conference-report-0812.doc ︎
26. The Constitutional Practice and Discipline of the Methodist Church,.213. https://www.methodist.org.uk/ media/30255/conf-2023-cpd-vol-2.pdf ︎

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