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From the Manse June 2004
Dear friends,
“As you know our interest and enthusiasm for the situation at Charlesworth has grown, and we have been looking forward to moving back to the NW to renew old friendships and establish new ones. I am delighted to be able to accept the church's invitation extended to Eve and myself regarding moving to Charlesworth with a view to the church setting me apart for the work at Charlesworth Particular Baptist Chapel... Please convey to all the members our excitement at the prospect before us of working together for the building of biblical churches...” Martin’s obviously excited. And so am I. It seems to me a wonderful thing that God should open the way for a preacher and evangelist like Martin to move to a work which had reached such a low ebb. The book of Revelation pictures churches as lampstands, intended to throw light into a dark world. But the warning is given that lampstands can be removed (Rev 2:5). The light can be extinguished. Well, the light has never quite gone out at Charlesworth - but it has burned very low. We’re praying that it will blaze up again in the months and years ahead. Martin and his family hope to move up in September. Lots of things have to be sorted out before then. They need to sell the house in Devon and find suitable property in Charlesworth. We need to set up the practical arrangements for their financial support (more complicated than it sounds). I think we should arrange a weekend of special services at the chapel to welcome Martin and mark the beginning of his ministry. And they should be well advertised locally - hopefully, local people will come along, if only out of curiosity, to view the new man in their midst. Why not contact the local newspapers and make them aware of the fresh start at the chapel? Who knows? They may want to interview Martin, or even send a reporter to the special services. All that’s before Martin arrives. But then - when the special services are over - the real work begins. Martin will be preaching week by week to the folk who already worship at the chapel, encouraging them, building them up in their faith. Strengthen the things that remain.. (Rev 3:2). But then there are lots of other folk, living in the area, who have some historical connection with the chapel. Perhaps their parents went there fifty years ago and are buried in the graveyard; perhaps they themselves attended the Sunday-school as children. Martin will want to make contact with those people and encourage them to come along. Then, we know of other folk in the area who seem to be evangelical believers but don’t now attend any gospel church. Some drive out of the village and attend liberal or confused churches elsewhere. Others worship in their own homes. Why haven’t they come into the chapel before now? We don’t know - but we need to find out. So Martin will be trying to meet those folk. But then there are the thousands of folk in Charlesworth and the villages around, who have never had any link with the chapel, and who have no contact with the gospel. Martin - and Eve of course - have to find ways to confront those folk with the gospel. They’ll have to find out what are the most effective ways of reaching people in that community. Door to door work? Leafleting? Children’s activities? Evangelistic meals? School assemblies? Every community is different. Things that work in one place may be completely inappropriate in another. They’ll need to know where the natural contact points are. Where do people gather? Where will Eve naturally meet other mums? What expectations do local people have of the minister? It will take time for Martin and Eve to get the feel of the area and the community. Or rather, communities. Charlesworth is far from being a single, uniform community. On the one hand, it’s semi-rural - surrounded by farms. (Martin & Eve’s experience of farm life in Devon should be a help there). But on the other hand, the village is now seen as a very desirable place for well-to-do commuters, driving in and out of Manchester. There are lots of people who have lived in the area all their lives. But there are also the new professionals who move with their jobs every three or four years. So within Charlesworth itself there are several distinct communities. And what about Gamesley with its overspill council estate of more than a thousand homes? What about Glossop - a sizeable town? And Chisworth...and Broadbottom... and Hollingworth...? Martin and Eve will need to be enterprising, imaginative, brave. And more than that, they’ll need to accept weariness, opposition, disappointment. Churchill in 1940 famously promised the British people, “blood, toil, tears and sweat”. Martin is well aware that that is the price he and his family must expect to pay as they give themselves to this venture. No true gospel church was ever built without labour and pain. Satan will mobilise all his forces to resist the advance of Christ’s kingdom in Charlesworth and the villages around. So that’s Martin and the work to which we’ve called him. But what about us? What about me? What effect should calling Martin have on us? Well, I’ve been forced to think seriously about myself and my priorities. Martin’s willingness to take up that work in Charlesworth comes as a rebuke and a challenge to me. He’s called to be an evangelist out there, involved in pioneering missionary work in a place where virtually the church no longer exists. Our situation here is rather different. We are an established church (albeit without a building of our own) with two pastors. We have a Sunday-school, a ladies’ meeting, teenage discussion groups, a missionary prayer-meeting, a monthly church bulletin... It would be easy for me to forget that I too am called to be an evangelist. Timothy was pastor of the very large, long-established church in Ephesus. His duties were endless - preaching, teaching, organising care for widows, sorting out problems, handling discipline cases. But Paul wrote to him, Do the work of an evangelist (2 Tim 4:5). However absorbed Timothy might be in the ongoing life of the church, he must never forget his responsibility to reach out to the unconverted. Nor must I. I’m excited at the thought of Martin evangelising Charlesworth. I find it much less exciting to think about my duty to evangelise Cheadle Heath and Edgeley. I can think up all sorts of imaginative ways for Martin to make opportunities out there. I find it much harder to seize the opportunities we already have here. It’s easy to dream dreams about the great work Martin’s going to do in Charlesworth. It’s much harder to get on with the hard, frustrating, scary, often unrewarding missionary work that needs to be done here. Missionary work at a distance, done by someone else, sounds glamorous. Missionary work when I have to do it on my own doorstep feels like hard slog. It’s right to be excited at the thought of Martin coming to Charlesworth. But let’s not forget the responsibility it places on us. If it’s right to call a man from the other end of the country to take the gospel to the unconverted, how can I say, “I’m too busy to evangelise the people where I am”? I’ve had to sit down and ask, “What more could I be doing to reach the people where God has put me?” Perhaps we should all be asking ourselves the same question. Blessings to you all, Stephen |
So
it’s agreed at last! We’ve invited Martin Grubb to move up to
Charlesworth to lead the work there. And Martin’s agreed. Here’s what
he wrote: