West Kilburn Baptist Induction

The deacons ask their new pastor vital questions (Can you spot the back of my head?)

It was great to be at West Kilburn Baptist Church recently for the induction of their new pastor, Steve Palframan. WKBC is an FIEC church now but CHBC would have been in the same NW grop of LBA churches back in the day. I have known the previous two pastors (Peter Law and especially Paul Pease before him). The induction included a church rededication. Also taking part were Paul Wells, who Steve knows from his previous church in Liverpool and Bob Cain from Flitwick who served as moderator when WKBC were without a pastor. The preacher was Yannick Christos-Wahab of Stockwell Baptist Church who preached well from Psalm 96. It was good to see a few familiar faces, including Welshman James Sercombe. Tasty African style food to follow. We wish the church well as this new chapter begins.

Conference on Singleness

George Chris
Keith Andrew

Saturday's conference at Highgate Road Chapel on singleness was a worthwhile effort. Some 90 people gathered (60 women and 30 men) - mostly singles I guess but not exclusively by any means. It was good for singles to meet and for all of us to look at the subject and simply to meet other Christians. Most present were fairly local but some had travelled a little distance (Southport, Wolverhampton,  Portsmouth, etc). We are grateful to the organisers for putting this on.

George Platt from Highgate Road started us off with a biblical theology of singleness.

There probably isn't a biblical theology of singleness but there may be one of marriage and so one is able to extrapolate. George, a good Baptist, appeared to want to emphasise discontinuity between the Testaments more than most of us. It is difficult to be positive about singleness (which we should be) without sounding slightly negative towards marriage.

Chris Bennett spoke on the gift of singleness taking the view that not all people who are single have this gift. Chris is very persuasive (from Matthew 19 if not from 1 Corinthians 7) but the view is fraught with difficulties. One wonders what married people who lack the gift of being married are to do, for example. We would prefer the view that sees singleness itself (like marriage) as a gift from God.

We men had a good session with Peter Law and Neil Richardson (while the women had a session with Vicki Gardner and Christine Sherwood). I liked Peter's frankness about his singleness. This session could have been longer. There was no real time for discussion. Keith Berry was also very helpful from Philippines as was Andrew King on singles in the church.

We finished with a question panel. Again, all very helpful.

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West Kilburn 150

It was good to be at West Kilburn Baptist Church today for their 150th anniversary services (their building is five years older than ours but I think the work in Childs Hill actually began 1863). Peter Law the present pastor chaired, the previous pastor Paul Pease preached (above) and several others gave testimony and prayed. There was also a bit of the history and a lovely tea to follow.

Abraham Conference at John Owen Centre

I spent yesterday at the John Owen Centre here in London, with about 50 others, at the Abraham Conference they have organised. Garry Williams, Director of the centre, began by outlining the work of the centre and then we were into the first session in which former LTS principal Philip Eveson helpfully outlined what we have in Genesis about Abraham, using diagrams to show the various chiasms and drawing out some interesting points about the careful way the Book of Genesis appears to be constructed. We had more of that sort of thing in the session after lunch when LTS Vice-principal David Green took us through the text showing us the significance of the word Ra'ah to see and its cognates and sometimes homonyms too. Again this was very interesting and helpful.

Personally, I found the third paper from James Mulrooney, an Edinburgh PhD candidate, who will be lecturing at LTS from this term, the most stimulating even though he used the phrase iconic mimesis at one point. He took us through Genesis 22 arguing for a nuanced typology that helpfully understood Abraham, Isaac and the ram in specific bounded terms. The paper generated a good discussion, most people being favourable to what was proposed while others were more sceptical.

In the evening we had the Lloyd-Jones Memorial Lecture, which was open to the public. Peter Law, a local pastor who regularly lectures in the middle east, was given the subject The great Abrahamic faiths? and he gave us some of the background to this phrase then argued, leaning on Daniel Strange, for a subversive fulfilment, that is a balanced acceptance of commonalities while seeking to expose and challenge differences.

Looking forward to day two.

Lord's Day June 29 2014

I went on Sunday to West Kilburn Baptist Church. This would be one of the churches that like Childs Hill was once in the LBA and the BU but has now left. It subsequently became quite Arminian but has gone in a Reformed direction more recently. I was especially friendly with the previous minister, Paul Pease and know the present minister well, Peter Law. Like Childs Hill they have a 19th century building but with chairs where there were once pews. They have a gallery where some sat.

Peter preached very helpfully morning and evening from Acts 15 and the first part of Luke 14. He was giving us systematic exposition but to the people before him. There were more of these in the morning (about a hundred or more) and less in the evening (twenty or so). The congregation is predominantly "African" but quite mixed ethnically. Like other churches I have attended recently they project their hymns on to the main wall (quite old fashioned ones this time around, although including the calypso carol!). There was a drum to go with two of the morning hymns and a little guitar band in the evening. Things were a little more laid back in the evening with an open time of prayer and I noticed that Peter preached from the pulpit in the morning. There was no collection. I liked the way Peter sought to tie together the different parts of the service with some comment.

Westminster Conference 2012 06

We appropriately closed the conference with a paper by Peter Law on the great missionary and translator Henry Martyn 1781-1812. It was appropriate in following on from the paper on Islam and this being the two hundredth anniversary of his death. Perhaps his being an Anglican fitted in somehow and even the fact that the paper was given by a graduate of the very Anglican Bash camps for public schoolboys but who is a Baptist but also an Arabic speaker who makes regular trips to the Middle East. Like Pascal, Martyn also died young yet did so much - what a challenge he is! Consciously or unconsciously this paper was no exercise in hagiography but a very human portrait of a man who was a sinner yet whom God greatly used.

Next year's conference is set for December 3, 4 and includes papers on C S Lewis, Isaac Ambrose, Henry Havelock and Edward Irving.

Westminster Conference 2013

This is just a reminder that the Westminster Conference is on next week (Tuesday, Wednesday Dec 4 and 5) at Regent Hall (The Salvation Army) 275 Oxford Street, London W1C 2DJ.

The programmes is as follows

 

1662 and all that (Lee Gatiss)

Two eminent ejectess, Philip Henry and Samuel Jones (Andrew Davies)

Hagiography and history (Andrew Atherstone)

 

Pascal: Truth Through the Mind and Through the Heart (David Gregson)

Christian attitudes to Islam (Roger Welch)

Henry Martyn (Peter Law)

 

The cost is £40. More details here.