London Journal #2

The church at which the Bible Conference is taking place, Stoke Newington, is 30 to 60 minutes away from the hotel – it took us one hour to get there this morning and 30 minutes to return this afternoon. London traffic! Even though I should mentally be accustomed to it by now, I’m still amazed at the narrow roads – something the British exported to their colonies, including Jamaica. It is fascinating to see the small cars make u-turns in these narrow streets with cars parked on both sides. Also fascinating is the practice of parking in any direction on either side (Vie got a warning when she first arrived in WW for parking thus. In Jamaica we park wherever we find a spot, and stay in the direction that we are driving. If we make the mistake to turn around to face the “correct” direction, that space would be long gone!).

This morning’s session’s presenter was Dr. Stephen Currow, a professor at Newbold College. His theme was Church Growth. Fascinating data from European Valuegenesis! There is not much of an Adventist school system in Europe, thus the study was done with 14 – 24 year olds in the local churches. I would love to see the breakdown based on immigrant vs. non-immigrant groups, as well as the children of immigrants’ response. Amazing, but not surprising was the stats that 78% of the respondents have no assurance of salvation!

After our Indian dinner, my session began in the afternoon. What a great bunch of leaders to share with! I used the paradigm of Acts to lay the ground work for my proposal that theology divides and missiology unites. The first question in the narrative of Acts was theological and chronological one – an eschatological question of “what” and “when” – the nature and time of the kingdom/end of time. Jesus said it was none of their business; they should be focused on the missiological task of witnessing. I went on to flesh out that theme from the rest of Acts 1and 2, and chapter 15.

On the way to the hotel we stopped at the supermarket to make sure that I had some heavenly fruit (the one that there are 12 kinds on the tree of life) for supper. I didn’t have time to change out of my dressed-up clothes to eat them (but really… only the inexperienced would think of eating them in the shower or over the sink, or… God forbid… with a knife and fork!). The reason I didn’t have time, is that I was reminded this afternoon that each evening I will be making a 25 minutes presentation on Music and the Church at each of the evangelistic sites. Tonight I went to the John Loughborough School, where my friend and College classmate, D. Robert Kennedy was preaching. Of course, I talked off the top of my head (as I’m wont to do too often!); but the Lord blessed. Kennedy also insisted that I play the piano for them; so I did “It Is Well With My Soul” while they sang. He made a good presentation on Daniel 5. It is always great to hear apocalyptic material preached expositorily.

Down the road from the church was a Jamaican restaurant. We could not resist. So even though it was almost 10:00pm, we stopped and purchased, and came back to the room and ate. It is almost midnight now, and I’m drinking ginger beer to settle the food before I hit the sack.