Jubilee+ gives a lead
Every year Jubilee+, which has a vision ‘to see the church in the UK be a champion of the poor and a means to healthy communities across the nation’, holds a conference to envision, commission, support and equip those who have a calling to live out the gospel of Jesus through ministry with the poor. Last Saturday this annual conference was held in Wimbledon, London.
After a wonderful time of extended worship which exalted the Lord, Martin Charlesworth, who leads the Jubilee+ initiative, served us superbly with his opening message, one that has the potential to change the way we function as churches if we understand the commission God has given us to influence our communities.
The church and the welfare state
First Martin reminded us, with copy in hand, of the Beveridge Report that was produced in 1942, at the height of the 2nd World War, looking forward to how we would live when peace came. Beveridge proposed the welfare state which we, in the UK, now take for granted (often with little gratitude) embodying as it does a nationalised health service, pensions for all, state benefits for those who are unable to support themselves, and so on.
However, in a subsequent report, ‘Voluntary Action’, published in 1948, Beveridge identified some of the unforeseen consequences of such radical community support. Particularly, he perceptively recognised the impact of the reduced influence of the church:
“In former days ….there was a force for good inspired by religious belief and membership of the Christian community. Now this force for good is less widely influential than it was in the nineteenth century. It must either be revived or be replaced by some equally good alternative, if that can be found.”
Implications
Martin then spelt out some of the consequences with which we now live:
> The cost of welfare has become unsustainable as a result of the increase in life expectancy with its attendant problems of the greater impact of disease in old age, such as the enormous rise in cases of diabetes
> The high cost of care
> The breakdown of the supportive family unit …
> …and so on.
He then suggested the church needs to listen to three ‘voices’ if we are to recover our influential role:
1. The Voice of Scripture
We must embrace the Scriptural mandate spelt out by Paul in his letter to the Galatian church as he communicated the Jerusalem council’s judgement that the gospel was for both Jew and Gentile, ending with ‘only this, remember the poor’. (Gal 2:9-10) [During this session I found myself thinking back to Simon Pettit’s word in 1998: ‘It is an apostolic mandate to remember the poor’. This word changed Newfrontiers as a movement to become one in which churches intentionally sought to serve the poor.]
2. The Voice of Wisdom
This is a time of opportunity to be strategic. We need to know how to move people from crisis intervention to strategic sustainability.
3. The Voice of prophets.
As prime minister Joseph prepared. He understood by revelation that famine was coming and stored up food in the years of plenty to save the people.
A call to action
We need to prepare, as the church, to meet greater need, to grasp opportunities, to be ready for when secular authorities will come to us asking for help and solutions. We need all hands on the pump particularly:
- Intercessors,
- Activists who will ‘get their hands dirty’
- Those who can give finance
Social enterprises- Christians to be raised to national prominence as advisors and strategists
This powerful session ended with an opportunity to respond; many moved forward to receive prayer.
Footnote
This and other talks from the conference will be available shortly on the Jubilee+ website