Limapela Education Project
Faith in Action
This project aims to provide quality education to children in Zambia's Copperbelt Province.
Rob Yule believes that churches and institutions, like people, have their own individual God-given personality. In this his first sermon at Greyfriars Presbyterian Church, Mt. Eden, Auckland, given on 2 February 2003, minister Rob Yule gives a personal assessment and affirmation of what he sees to be Greyfriars Church's distinctive ethos, character and calling.
The identity of a person is forged at conception. Psalm 139 tells how God's unique knowledge of us and of our personal identity extends from before we are born, from the very moment we were conceived in our mother's womb:
'You created my inmost being ;
you knit me together in my mother's womb.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place.
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth,
your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be. '
(Psalm 139: 13-16, NIV).
Because he created us, because he knows us before we were born, from the moment of conception, God knows our true identity. He understands us, knows our special character, our strengths and weaknesses, our longings, our potential.
It's similar with a Christian. Our Christian identity is forged at our newbirth. Our Christian life also begins at a moment of conception, when God's Spirit mysteriously implants the seed of divine life in our hearts, making us children of God and sharers in God's eternal life. John says that our identity as God's children derives not from natural descent, not from the normal process of procreation, but 'from God' (John 1: 13). It is a new birth 'from above' or 'of the Spirit' (John 3: 3-8). The identity of a Christian comes from being born anew of the Holy Spirit.
A church has an identity too. Every church, indeed, every institution, has an identity, a genetic imprint or special character deriving from its beginning or foundation. I like to use the word 'ethos' to describe this special character of a church. The ethos of an institution or organisation is like the personality of an individual human being. A good parent works with the personality of a child - knows their strengths and weaknesses, how to encourage them and help them reach their full potential. A poor parent criticises or undermines the personality of a child, hindering their development and frustrating their full potential.
It's the same with a local church. Each church has its distinctive personality. A good pastor works with that personality, to develop and enhance it. A pastor who doesn't recognise the true calling or personality of a church will often end up hindering or frustrating its development.
Just this week I received and read a little booklet on this little understood and seldom talked-about subject. It was written and given to me by Rodney Francis, formerly pastor of the Open Door Mission, the Palmerston North Elim church, now in an itinerant ministry. It's called Do you Understand the Prophetic Foundation of your Life and your Church? He says that he has seen many churches rise and fall, and large numbers of disillusioned and frustrated people drop out of them. There are many and varied reasons for this, but a common factor is often the failure to understand what he calls 'the prophetic foundation' of the church.
By 'prophetic foundation' he means something akin to what I am calling the identity, ethos, or personality of a church. 'Every God-ordained church starts off a prophetic foundation' he says. 'The pioneering leader (or leaders) carries a vision and a conviction that God has called them to fulfil a certain destiny. Whenever we build our life (or a church) on God's prophetic foundation the blessings of God will become evident. The prophetic foundation determines the emphasis, direction, vision, rules and regulations, and "flavour" of the church, and people are attracted and drawn to it accordingly.'
'The tragedy in church life,' Rodney Francis continues, 'is often that, over time, a church moves away from its God-given purpose. It evolves into something different to that for which it was raised up of God. Politics and "power seeking" taint the vision - and the people. 'To avoid these distortions is why I want to deal with the fundamental calling of Greyfriars in my opening sermons here.
As a newcomer, let me attempt to describe the ethos of Greyfriars' Church:
It is a traditional evangelical church, with a refreshing, matter-of-fact approach and a strong, orthodox, somewhat unfashionable formality and content. My wife and I have been impressed and attracted by it over the month we've been auditing the services!
It is a godly, loving group of people, particularly in three areas: an older generation, a group of younger middle-aged professionals, and a strong youth and young adult group. Arising from that love, you have a reputation for being a very caring group of people. My family and I have been very conscious of this in the preparations for our coming.
There is a strength and depth in Greyfriars - a solidity, not pursuing every passing theological or church growth fashion, but adhering calmly and courageously to the Word of God and 'the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints' (Jude 3, NIV). Part of this comes from its commitment to the historic, evangelical, Christian message. Part, too, comes from its history: being willing to do things differently from the spirit of the times.
As Ray Mortimer loves to remind us, Greyfriars began when you would have least expected a church to be founded - during the First World War. Its two periods of major building expansion took place during hard times too - McKinney Hall being built during the Depression of the 1930s and the Memorial Hall immediately following World War 2. This solidity, this 'unfashionableness', is a great strength of Greyfriars, and is part of its special character, its unique personality.
I'd like to offer a symbol of the identity of Greyfriars' Church. The day of my installation service was a glorious, calm, sunny day. On the afternoon, I took a walk up one of the walking tracks to the top of Mt. Eden, Maungawhau, to look over and pray for my new parish.
I was struck by the obelisk on the summit. It was erected by Stephenson Percy Smith, Chief Geodetic Surveyor, on 17 August 1872, as the initial base station for the triangulation of the recently established Auckland province. The inscription pays tribute to the pioneer surveyors 'who played so worthy a part in the transforming of a wilderness into the smiling land which lies before you.' Then it says: 'For their work continueth great beyond their knowing.'
It struck me that this is a symbol of Greyfriars Church. Greyfriars has been like a survey point from which many others, 'beyond our knowing', have taken their bearings in life. One thing you don't want in a benchmark is innovation, changing with the times. You want stability, consistency, reliability, durability-the essence of God's character, which is steadfast love and faithfulness.
Survey methods have changed radically in the last few years, with the advent of GPS, the Global Positioning System, based on a network of three satellites in geostationary orbit, moving in synchronisation with the rotation of the earth. But the GPS system still presupposes fixed Earth-based reference points. Even though the technology may change, the basic triangulation points remain constant.
I see Greyfriars as a church which has played in the past, and will continue to play in the future, an important role as a conservative, stable community-a fixed benchmark or reference point from which people may take their bearings in life. This is its core identity.
Greyfriars has adhered fast to the faith entrusted to the saints. It did so during the Geering debate of the 1960s, when the principal of our national church's theological college publicly denied the bodily resurrection of Jesus. I regard the book by a former minister of Greyfriars, Robert J. ('Bob') Blaikie, 'Secular Theology' and God who Acts (London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1970) as the best contribution to that debate from a conservative evangelical viewpoint, expounding the church's faith in a living God who acts in history and who raised Jesus bodily from the dead.
Right down to its very successful and widely-acclaimed Alpha programme, featured last year in the New Zealand Herald, Greyfriars continues to be known as a church where people can come and be sure that they will be pointed in the right direction, to the good news of God's saving grace in Jesus Christ his Son.
Greyfriars is a benchmark church, consistently pointing people to Jesus Christ, in whom they may find the purpose and meaning of life. May our role indeed continue 'great beyond our knowing.'
Rob Yule, 2 February 2003
© 2003, Greyfriars Presbyterian Church
