Being the People of God: Missional Ecclesiology for Uncertain Times
Paul Bradbury, Isabelle Hamley and Andy Smith (eds) Being the People of God: Missional Ecclesiology for Uncertain Times (London: SCM, 2025) xiv + 254pp, £39.99
We have a lot of theologically trained and equipped people in our churches such as local preachers and ministers, lay workers and many others. And this is the type of book for all who have a good level of understanding and who want to develop their thinking and more importantly their action is the broad area of mission, church planting and growing churches. Its an apt title given that we are God’s people, we (continue to) live in uncertain times and want to be a church that reaches out to all around us. So, read on.
This is a Church of England focused text but the breath within that denomination enables much of this thinking to be applicable to Irish Methodism. The twenty-three authors involved are mostly drawn from those working or writing in the areas of pioneering, church planting and development and outreach. And there is even one of these who was born in Enniskillen.
The chapters are grouped in three broad areas of ‘being worship’, ‘being witness’ and ‘being pilgrim’ and I’ll focus on a couple of chapters. ‘Mission in a Changing Landscape’ attempts to summarise insights from the ‘being witness’ section and focuses on helping churches to grow and thrive in a context where we are no longer at the centre of community. One recognition caught my eye as perhaps something we are still to fully embrace, namely the shift from church as host in a community to that of guest. As I write this review, debate about religious education curriculum in Northern Ireland shows so clearly that for many we still want to live in Christendom where the church was the norm and set much of society’s agenda. Our witness in a changed society ‘means watching for signs of the Kingdom in unexpected places, knowing that as we step out into the unknown, we discover that Jesus is ahead of us’ (p142). This experience of the church as guest in society is very common in many parts of the world, but one that post Christendom Europe is a tad slow to embrace. When Jesus was a guest at a wedding, there He revealed his glory. Recognising ourselves as guests today may well be very liberating.
‘Being Witness in a Global City’ resonates with Dublin and perhaps every large population centre in a now very diverse island of Ireland. We have our own language based congregations (Korean and French) and are involved with a broad range of others through sharing our buildings. This celebrates the diversity of the Irish Christian community but the chapter’s author points us to what Corinthians teaches about the unity of the body of Christ, and perhaps we have still further to travel. ‘Being Witness on the Edges’ challenges our thinking of church as a gathered community and seeks a refocus of church as a community of disciples who live their lives almost exclusively beyond the church. We aren’t always good at this and perhaps suffer at times from ‘ecclesial arthritis’ (p99). If we know something of the problem we are much better placed to address it.
The chapters of this challenging text build up a deep and wide understanding of church for today and tomorrow. Lessons from yesterday need to be learned so that we can be the people of God in uncertain times. This book help us.
Rev Dr Stephen Skuce
Superintendent for Growing Churches