Nicky Gumbel: A divided world demands a united Church – Christian Today

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At a time when the Church is perhaps at its most divided, living out unity has never been more important, Nicky Gumbel told a packed HTB conference at the Royal Albert Hall yesterday.

Carey Lodge. Christian Today. 5  May 2015

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4 thoughts on “Nicky Gumbel: A divided world demands a united Church – Christian Today”

  1. The church is at least an alliance of several parties. The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have managed to work together for 5 years due to a common purpose but their ideological differences have not lessened. Evangelical unity is based in a unity of purpose. A job to do. As people work together it is inevitable that their differences will come to the surface from time to time. It is the task that produces the unity of purpose and the motivation to discuss differences in a constructive way. Without this, an academic study will only produce a more complex map.

    • Dave
      When I said, “those who regard themselves as Christians fundamentally disagree about what the biblical revelation says and means” I was speaking about the whole church not just about the evangelicals within it. I would be surprised if you disagreed with that statement. But I observe on your “Evangelical unity is based in a unity of purpose. A job to do” that I don’t believe you can define that “unity of purpose” without unity on (what I regard as) fundamental doctrine. There is confusion in the two quotes I gave from Nicky Gumbel’s address. The “message we have” is an agreement about doctrine: as I said, that we are all guilty before God and that Christ died for our sins to take our guilt away. How then could he also say that “unity is not doctrinal, but relational”? Surely it is both.

      Phil Almond

      • Unity is doctrinal and relational. It is also organisational and purposeful. given 2000 years of christian history we will never get back to 100% doctrinal uniformity.Evangelicals have sufficient unity of doctrine to work together. This should not be prevented by such issues as the ministry of woman, baptism, equal marriage or divorce. The doctrines of the nature of God and salvation are far more important. There is a problem in regarding evangelism as more than a recruitment drive if we are asked to work with those who reject the possibility of hell.

        You speak of disagreement about “biblical revelation says and means”. I think the problem is more with those who quote scripture when it suits their purpose and ignore it at other points and feel free to criticize it if we bring it up.

        Dave

  2. “The key to this, Gumbel continued, is that unity is not doctrinal, but relational, modelled by the Trinity and all about Jesus”.

    “The message we have is that Jesus came to take away all our guilt, and we’re now forgiven and free,” he said. “What an amazing message – why are we fighting each other? It’s a waste of time.”

    But the truth about the Trinity is a doctrine. The truth that we are all guilty before God is a doctrine. The truth that Christ died for our sins to take our guilt away, and thus to meet our deepest need, is a doctrine.

    And the reason that professing Christians are “fighting each other” is that those who regard themselves as Christians fundamentally disagree about what the biblical revelation says and means.

    To avoid a possible misunderstanding, I should say that I am talking about what the truths of Christianity are, not about who are the Christians – that is, known to God to be Christians, ‘born from above’, so to speak. Because born again Christians can be astray in their doctrine just as they can go astray morally. Conversely it is possible for someone to intellectually believe all the truths of Christianity and yet not be born again.

    And this disagreement is much deeper than the disagreement about sexuality or the ordination of women. Those who regard themselves as Christians disagree on who God and Christ are, what they are like, what they have said and done, are saying and doing, will say and do; what the condition of human beings is, what is their greatest need, and how that need has been and can be met by God’s great salvation. We are in fundamental disagreement about what is the message that the divided world needs to hear.

    Phil Almond

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