Letter from the Manse

It’s quarter past seven on a Sunday evening. I’m at home.  It doesn’t happen often. In fact, I doubt if there have been a dozen times in the last thirty years when I’ve not been in church on a Sunday evening. Of those nearly all have been down to illness or accident (I once spent a month in hospital with my leg in traction). But today’s different. It’s Jesse who’s ill so I’ve stayed in with him and John while Anne takes Vicky to church. In God’s kind providence David …

By the time you read this, the St John Ambulance HQ will be ours and twenty-two years waiting will be at an end. God has given us that building for our own. And it would have seemed strange to write a letter from the manse at this point and not to have commented on such a major event in our life as a church. Ever since we covenanted together to form a church back in 1984 we’ve been searching, praying, …

I’ve just posted my booking form for the Grace Baptist Assembly. Hands up those of you know exactly what the Assembly is, or does. No idea? Well, I can’t really blame you. I’ve been going for twenty-five years and I’m still not sure. But I’ll try to make things as clear as I can.

I’ll need to start with some history. There have been Baptist churches in England for nearly four hundred years. But they have always been divided theologically. Many of the earliest Baptist Churches in …

Next week I fly out to the Philippines for a twelve day trip. I’ve been invited by Cubao Reformed Baptist Church to join them for their annual pastors’ conference. I’m looking forward to visiting what I’m told is one of the most beautiful countries of the world; I’m looking forward to meeting the members of that church. But I’m also apprehensive. Not just because I’ll be leaving behind Anne and the children. Not just because I dread airports and all the complications of getting …

As I sit at my desk typing this letter, I have in front of me an austere looking volume bound in grey cloth with a black label on the spine. The gold lettering on the label proclaims the title: Banner of Truth, Vol 1, Issues 1-16. I bought the book a few weeks ago. I was browsing along a church bookstall before a meeting. The books on sale were mostly new but at one end I saw a small pile of second-hand volumes. …