It’s a while since I have written - not because there has been nothing to say but almost the reverse - there has been too much. The war in Afghanistan; panic in the US; religious hate crime legislation in Britain etc. Perhaps more on these later, but for the moment there is one item that is, for me, deeply significant and symbolic.
Last week in the Dundee Courier there was a small piece of news. A theme pub chain was applying for permission to convert an old building into a theme pub. Nothing earth shattering about that -so why was I so upset?
Not because I view all pubs as inherently sinful. I confess to enjoying an occasional drink in a licensed establishment and have nothing per se against the idea of having a social drink with friends.
Nor is it just because I think the West End of Dundee has sufficient pubs (which it does) or that there will be problem with parking (which there will). No. What upset me was the history of this particular building. Hear the story.
The building is known as McCheyne Memorial and was an outreach of my own church, St Peter’s, many moons ago. St Peter's Free Church was built in 1836 as a church extension charge. It flourished under the ministry of McCheyne and, after his death, Islay Burns - to the extent that in the 1860's it was decided to open a mission station about 250 yards up the road. This led to the building of McCheyne Memorial Church which was duly opened in 1870. The opening was performed by the noted Baptist minister, Charles Haddon Spurgeon. I have a ticket for the opening ceremony which has an interesting footnote - it requests the bearer to be liberal in their givings as the outstanding debt on the building is large! Thus there were two churches, St Peter’s and McCheyne Memorial – between them capable of sitting 2,000 people – both preaching the gospel and both flourishing.
Move ahead 100 years. By then both had gone through the various church reunions in 1900 and 1929 (Free Church to United Free, United Free to Church of Scotland) and were part of the Church of Scotland. As a result of declining attendances they were united to form St Peter’s McCheyne Memorial. They decided not to use the original St Peter’s building – I suspect because of the state of the organ - and the united congregation met in McCheyne Memorial. Twenty years on and that congregation has declined so much that it too has now linked with another linked congregation and they have moved to another building. As a result, McCheyne Memorial , a church which was built as a result of gospel expansion, is now to be turned into a pub. Why? What has gone wrong?
I am sure there are a multiplicity of reasons and I would want to avoid simplistic answers. However it seems to me that there are important lessons for the Church in Scotland to learn before Ichabod is written over the whole nation. Let us examine some of the reasons given for closure.
1) Lack of money - This Church did not close because of lack of funds. McCheyne Memorial was one of the wealthier churches in Dundee, largely due to legacies left by previous generations who were keen to see the gospel continue to prosper.
2) Decline of interest in religion within society at large – At first glance this appears to be true. 90% of Dundee’s population do not regularly attend any place of worship. Yet I am not convinced that this is due to a lack of interest in religion. One only has to go into Waterstones or any other bookshop to see that the religion section is filled with books – sadly most of them nothing to do with Christianity.
3) The Church is not appealing enough to the young. If only there had been livelier worship or more contemporary appeal then perhaps the young would have come. Again that is possible – but I doubt it. Such attempts to woo the young are too often patronising short term fixes which do not deal with the real issues at hand.
It is hard to state these issues without sounding arrogant or self-righteous or simplistic. And yet I must try. For me the bottom line is that the Church in Scotland has largely forgotten the gospel or been sidetracked from it. At the end of the 19th century it was quite clear that biblical criticism had undermined confidence within the Church about the Word of God. Many men continued to use evangelical language but the basis and the intellectual coherence of that language was removed as the theology of the Church was undermined. As a result the Church lacked the rigour and the honesty to tackle the problems it faced within a rapidly changing society. Rather than challenging that society the Church tried to keep up with it (in order to demonstrate relevance) and as a result, for most of the 20th century, was playing catch-up.
I think this is especially true of the Church of Scotland. Don’t get me wrong - I am not attacking the faithful ministers, elders and members in the Church of Scotland who have sought to maintain a witness to biblical Christianity. No, I am talking about the general national broad church consensus of the Kirk. There are only two things that seem to matter to that dominant group – firstly filling the churches (in which they have spectacularly failed) and the other is ensuring that the ‘rules’ of the Church are obeyed. Deny the resurrection and you will be called a radical and courageous theologian. Deny the ordination of women and you are a heretic who deserves to be thrown out of the church. I am not convinced that the broad church mentality is as tolerant or as broad as it sometimes claims. Only this week I have been made aware of one fine Church of Scotland minister whose elders are out to get him because he dares to preach the gospel, and another situation where the local Kirk is up in arms because another group has dared to enter ‘their’ parish to preach the gospel, (the fact that they have long since ceased to proclaim that gospel seems to carry little weight with them).
Does this mean that the Church would have survived if only it had been Free Church? Yes – if it had adopted the mentality and approach of the 1843 men. No – if you mean the 20th century church. Whilst decline was going on at the broad church/liberal end of the spectrum, many of those who were more theologically conservative were also being sidetracked from the gospel. Recognising the deadness and deadliness of the broad church/liberal position they sought to protect the gospel by building a hedge of minor issues and shibboleths around it. The result of this was a siege mentality in which men lived in fear and some sought to protect the gospel by attacking their brethren over minor issues. Thus the church going public in Scotland were presented with tow equally ugly choices – a broad church liberalism which lacked intellectual coherence and spiritual vigour and a narrow church legalism which seemed to lack the beauty, vision and humility of the gospel. Little wonder that they deserted the church in droves.
Is it too late? Is this land, which was once known as the ‘land of the Book’, to forever desert the gospel? Must we write ‘the glory has departed’ forever? I hope not. Whilst the Church of Scotland was prepared to sell McCheyne Memorial to people who would turn it into a pub, that is not the whole story. St Peter’s might have suffered the same fate but in 1989, despite the opposition of some within the Church which regarded the purchase of such a building as a ‘white elephant’, the Free Church decided to purchase the building and preserve it as place for gospel witness. For some years the prophets of doom appeared to be right. The congregation declined from two handfuls to one handful. The end seemed in sight. And yet the Lord in his mercy had other plans. Now on a Sunday morning one can sometimes look out at a congregation of 100 people. Most of these are young people and most have no Free Church background. Indeed they come from many different religious, social and ethnic backgrounds. It is still small. It is still fragile. But it is also a great joy to see such a group and witness their enthusiasm for the Word. Why should it be unusual?
It is only a small example (and by no means the only one) but I believe that it is an indication of what might yet be. There is a spiritual hunger in many of the people of our nation which is not being met and which will not be met by spiritual legalism or spiritual liberalism. The contemporary preaching of the always relevant Word of God and the practice of that Word is guaranteed opposition (especially from the liberals and the legalists) but it is also guaranteed success. Gods Word will not return to him empty but it will accomplish the purpose for which it was sent. If the church repents of its sins, loses its obsession with trivialities and wakens up to the many opportunities we now have in our society then one day we will see the pubs turned into churches and the lost ground regained. To the Glory of God.
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