Tuesday to Thursday has been spent in Oxford meeting with the staff of the other UK Baptist Colleges. This is always a rewarding few days – networking sounds far too mechanical and functional for what takes place. Someone in chapel during prayers gave thanks to God for friendships that are mature and enduring, and others that are now forming, and that seemed to be much nearer the reality of what it means to gather, listen, talk, learn, laugh, pray, share meals, be made welcome in the life and affections of others.
The main discussion focus was our shared work on exploring then beginning to formulate a framework for good practice in ministry. Lots of thinking was already in place from a previous meeting – and we were wisely and creatively led towards a more concretised form. Now I didn’t like the word concretised, and still don’t – but – if I allow that to become an image of a path (even a concrete one!), on which people are invited to walk, then that’s part of a nobler tradition of following after Christ, or as St Benedict would say, running on the way of Christ.
Of course I did indeed visit Blackwell’s, and spent nothing there! Oh not because there weren’t any books I wanted / needed / liked / coveted. But I did note several for future further consideration. I did however find St Philip’s Books, what you might call a discerning second-hand bookseller, who knows the value of his stock and sells it just this side of reasonable. I found the Gifford Lectures of Karl Barth, The Knowledge of God and the Service of God, faded spine, solid clean copy, and as earlier noted, the price just this side of reasonable. I’m looking forward to reading Barth’s Gifford Lectures. Lord Gifford’s endowment was aimed at promoting Natural Theology, and these lectures were delivered by the arch-enemy of all Natural Theology. Barth must have hugely enjoyed standing on that prestigious platform, his lectures (and his own sweeping theological landscape) assuming the futility of the entire Natural Theology enterprise – and based not on science, philosophy or natural history, but on the Scots’ Confession. Once I’ve finished Hauerwas on Barth, I’ll read Barth.
Stuart and I drove down in my car – now here’s the puzzle. How come my insurance company quoted £30 to add his name for a week, but could add it to the policy for a year for £18? Now I’m sure somewhere in the mystic, apophatic depths of insurance company risk assessment software, there is an explanation – for now, like a good theologian confronted with infinity, paradox and eternity, I recognise mystery, the finite reach of the human yearning to know, acknowledge with humility the need for intellectual reserve, and live content in the knowledge that somewhere, some time, all mysteries will become clear. But for now I look through a glass darkly…..
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