ACM Creation update August 2010
Upcoming change of role
After my last email to you in June, I am aware that not all of you will had seen the last paragraph of my past missive, so I am repeating some of this here. After much prayer I am shortly at the end of September changing my role at the University. I have decided to accept the offer of early retirement but rather than stop completely at the University, I am re-engaging in a different role as Research Professor. Some of the research work (including the bombardier Beetle) will continue but I am freed up to control much more my own time so that I can concentrate more on what the Lord would have us do with what both Juliet and I feel that we have left of active service. I am very conscious that none of us can predict our days and we need to strategically consider the times that we have to be used for the Saviour. We have thought through the issues financially and see that we can readily manage as the Lord has graciously provided for all our needs at every stage of our lives.
Recent meetings
Since June I have been doing mainly Christian Answer missions in the UK which all have been very blessed. They are very intense times of evangelism where the emphasis is very much on direct Gospel preaching in the open air with a team of people witnessing to those who stop. As you can imagine the response is very varied and at times antagonistic but in Cambridge (14th –16th June ), in Canterbury (14th – 17th July) and just recently in Bournemouth (11th – 14th August) it has been greatly blessed. Often the theme of Creation comes up as young people opposed to the Gospel seek to justify their opposition using Evolutionary ideas. What has been particularly thrilling has been seeing young men join me for the first time and come back again and beginning to speak on their own, and to have those with me who particularly feel drawn to personal work. The combination of such dedicated teams spending 5+ hours on their feet for 3 successive days speaking to scores of people among whom are serious enquirers, is a time of great blessing indeed. I enclose at the end of this letter the report I shared recently of the Bournemouth mission. At Cambridge and at Bournemouth we ran Creation meetings alongside and it was a privilege to speak to those who were seeking as a result of seeing that the real science does not contradict the straightforward understanding of Scripture.
Lastly can I recommend to you a book that I have recently read called Amazing Conversions by John Ashworth who opened a chapel for the Destitute in Rochdale in the mid 1800s and saw recounts the poverty and desperate condition of many and yet the remarkable effect of the Gospel on some. How much we should remember that the Gospel is indeed ‘the power of God unto salvation’. The book was recently edited by Alun McNabb (past pastor of Dudley Baptist in West Midlands) and can be obtained from the web site –
http://tentmaker.org.uk/content/?page_id=54&category=2&id=217
That same Gospel is closely attached to the matters of Creation and the Fall which faithfully preached are the key to unlock the relevance of the Gospel to today’s generation. Theistic evolution so much breaks this connection and is a serious departure from the Biblical Gospel. There may no longer in the West be such poverty as Ashworth saw on such a large scale (though there is for some cities the communities gripped by drugs or the increasing numbers of asylum seekers to which some churches are reaching out to). What grips many of our young people in the West is blatant hedonism and accompanied deep emptiness to which only the Gospel of God’s holiness and our fall from being created in that image can make sense of the utter degradation we are in by nature. But what a glory it is then to preach the Cross and salvation by grace. May we all burn with that glorious truth. In Christ we are sons and daughters of a soon coming King.
Report of Bournemouth Christian Answer Open Air Mission August 11th – 14th 2010
Thank you for praying for what was initially a small team – In then end it was one of the strongest teams we have had at this superb open air site. It was a remarkable 3 days with 25+ serious conversations each day. Examples were a man who was under some conviction and had just stolen an item, and who went back to the shop and paid for it and was invited to a local church. Pray for the ongoing email contact with the couple from Poland contacted on the Open air and who came to the Creation meeting and who are looking for a church in Manchester. At one of the OAs two teenage girls who had never understood the Gospel wanted to know more and took much literature. Another lady from the Caribbean had never grasped what the Atonement meant until it was explained to her. Many Moslem students studying English took Gospels in Arabic with keen interest being shown. This is but a small snapshot of what was going on all the time as we had OAs from 11 till 4pm. We also had one evening open air at which we met a backslidden youth leader who had sadly got into the grip of alcohol. Many passers by of course scoffed, but the consistent bold preaching of Christ and the Cross at the front, which was often conducted by the keen young men on the team , coupled with faithful contacting, was an immense witness. We were very grateful for the support of faithful Open air Missioners – pray for them as they witness each Saturday at Bournemouth throughout the year.
