Much like that children's party game "Stations", it is now clear that it is "All Change" again this summer with regard to Ministers and Churches. So its “goodbye” to Rossington, Edlington and Carr House Wesley for me and “hello” to St Andrews and their near-neighbours Flintwood (Conisbrough stays with me for at least a further 12 months). As expected the changes got through Circuit Meeting yesterday without a hiccup - not that there was much chance they wouldn't since they were presented in a way which avoided any opportunity for anyone to amend them. It’s not a lack of democracy that concerns me (though clearly there were those where were “drunk with anticipation” the day before), but more the refusal to accept the concept of a “testing of the spirit” (1 Thess 5:21 & 1 Jn 4:1) which is worrying.
It raises again the question of leadership and authority in the Church which has been the subject of much debate at Connexional level. The biggest question is not about leadership, but rather about wisdom and authority ie who does God speak through? Sure, we have leaders at every level of an organisation. But the question is whether we believe that certain people have a “hot line” to God which the rest have to acknowledge and obey without question, or whether we believe in the collective wisdom of the people of God who, having heard the ideas of the leaders, will make their own judgement on the point in question.
A good example is the “Bishops” debate. In the report which was brought to Conference two years ago it was assumed that we would accept Bishops, so the question was “who” would be Bishops. Conference amended the report to allow an option of not having Bishops (but only by implication in the option “none of the above options” which they inserted). In the debates at all levels of the Church it was clear the majority said “no” to Bishops. Now if you believe in the collective wisdom of the people of God you would have thought that that would have been an end to the subject. But in the Report to this year’s Conference on the findings from around the Connexion, while it was accepted we clearly couldn’t proceed with accepting the idea of Bishops at this time, also went on to declare that “it be recognised that it is inappropriate, in the light both of the Methodist Church’s Covenant relationship with the Church of England and its ongoing discussions with other ecumenical partners, not to envisage taking up this discussion again at some point in the future”. And that, “the Joint Implementation Commission be encouraged to continue its discussions in relation to episcopacy”.
Now please excuse me for being cynical but this sounds very like the Committee which wrote the report for Conference saying that the collective wisdom of the Methodist people is wrong and though they have been defeated this time they will come back again to have another go at getting it through at some time in the future!
So please consider, where do you consider wisdom lies and who is it who knows the will of the Almighty? A few selected people or does God ask all of us to be part of that process of discernment?
