Pure Church

I remember a couple months back sitting in Mark Dever's study as he was reading the manuscript for a new book, The Trellis and the Vine. I can only think of a couple books that provoked so much enthusiasm from Mark. He doesn't normally do superlatives, as he alludes to in this video. Here's his plug for "the best book on the nature of church ministry," The Trellis and the Vine.



Here are some of the endorsements for the book from the Matthias Media website:


Commendations for 'The Trellis and the Vine'

What Col and Tony have described here is exactly what I've been trying to do in my own life and in our congregation for years. According to this book, Christians are to be disciple-making disciples and pastors are to be trainers. Superb! This book sets out a crucial shift that is needed in the mindset of many pastors. The authors have carefully listened to the Bible. And they've worked on this book. The result is a book that is well-written and well- illustrated, but even more, a book that is full of biblical wisdom and practical advice. This is the best book I've read on the nature of church ministry.
Mark Dever, Senior Pastor, Capitol Hill Baptist Church, Washington DC, USA

I am thrilled that this book has been written! What God has done in Sydney over the last few decades is nothing less than supernatural?-and we in South Africa have long been the beneficiaries. The model of ministry presented in this book has left an indelible mark on my own ministry and been of inestimable value to the denomination I belong to. The mindsets put forth in this book have not only impacted many of our churches, but have changed our regional thinking, planning and strategy. We are indebted to Col and Tony for putting into words a culture of ministry that is biblically pragmatic, deeply theological and, above all, passionately concerned for the lost.
Grant Retief, Rector, Christ Church, Umhlanga, South Africa

This is a simple, beautiful book that I plan to have every pastor and elder at The Village Church read. It quietly and calmly beckons us back to biblical, hands-on shepherding and is a book desperately needed among large churches in the West.
Matt Chandler, Lead Pastor, The Village Church, Dallas, Texas, USA

Gospel ministry is about God's glory and God's people! This excellent book takes us right to the heart of authentic Christian ministry. Any church will benefit hugely from studying and acting on it.
William Taylor, Rector, St Helen's Bishopsgate, London, UK

For over twenty years, I have seen the ideas in this excellent book developed, tested and improved in the active ministry of the gospel. They are the kind of counter-intuitive ideas that, once encountered and embraced, make you wonder why you did not always think this way.
Phillip D. Jensen, Dean, St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney, Australia

If I could put only one new book into the hands of every person preparing for ministry today, The Trellis and the Vine would be it. Marshall and Payne leverage decades of experience in one of the world's great cities with the hope of stimulating gospel growth around the globe. This book will also refresh every pastor who has ever asked, "What in the world am I supposed to be doing?" I came away energized, strengthened in my core calling and better prepared to bear fruit for Christ. In fact, it's so good that I want every leader and pastoral intern in our church to read it!
David Helm, Pastor, Holy Trinity Church, Chicago, Illinois, USA

It is impossible to read The Trellis and the Vine without having your cherished ministry assumptions profoundly challenged. In your hands is a God-glorifying, scripturally-soaked re-evaluation of Christian ministry. It will untangle the anomaly of being a Christian without a radical missionary heart. It will identify the plethora of ministry structures that owe more to cultural pragmatism than the Bible. And above all, it will inspire us to serve the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood.
Richard Chin, National Director, Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students, Sydney, Australia

God makes ministers in the midst of his church. It is in the context of the faithful local church that ministers are best taught, shaped and equipped. The Trellis and the Vine is a superb guide to preparing pastors and ministers for Christ's church. It comes from a ministry so deeply committed to the recovery of biblical truth and the cause of the gospel. The wisdom in this little book is invaluable. My advice: Keep a good stack on hand at all times, and put this book to good use.
R. Albert Mohler, Jr., President, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, Louisville, Kentucky, USA

This book empathizes with the confusion that many pastors have when they allow themselves to lose focus on Jesus' goal for ministry, namely, to make disciple-makers. But it doesn't leave the pastor there in the cloud of desperation; it gives him the courage to trust in his Master's strategy again. And take courage: Jesus' strategy was able to reach countries as far as my own.
Cristóbal Cerón, General Coordinator, Gimnasio (MTS), Chile

There is no need greater (in the happy resurgence of robust, gospel-centred churches in the English-speaking world) than for us to think biblically and wisely about how we live and minister together in our congregations. All manner of folk are offering us their opinions as to how we ought to do this in this reforming era (in which some, if not many, rightly see the weaknesses of the ministry and methodology of the last fifty years, but whose prescriptions for remedy fall short of the standards of Scripture and wisdom). Yes, let's rethink what we are to do and be together as the church, but let's do it biblically, and with the wisdom of biblical discernment and pastoral experience. So I announce with joy that I have new conversation partners as I am asking myself, under the authority of God and Scripture, questions about the structure and ministry of my congregation: "Why are we doing what we are doing? Are we focusing on the right things? Is the gospel central? Are we making disciples? Has 'administry' trumped ministry? Is our corporate life and mission biblically shaped?" And more. As I ask these things, I am so deeply helped and heartened and humbled and corrected by the fidelity and wisdom of Colin Marshall and Tony Payne's profound little book that I can't but commend it to you.
Ligon Duncan, Senior Minister, First Presbyterian Church, Jackson, Mississippi, USA (Past Moderator, General Assembly, Presbyterian Church in America)

This book is the perfect example of good theology driving practice. Col's many years of experience in recruiting and training pastors shines through on every page. Scattered with helpful personal examples, this book is a crucial read for people seeking to grapple with the biblical principles of gospel growth.
Paul Dale, Senior Pastor, Church by the Bridge, Sydney, Australia

The Trellis and the Vine is a must-read for every minister of the gospel. The principles in this book will revolutionize the way many of us do ministry, and help us to encourage and grow the next generation of gospel workers. So often we are caught up in building and maintaining our 'trellis' (ministry structure), and we forget that Christian ministry is all about the 'vine'?-the people. Thank you for this clear, Bible-centred approach to the most important task in the world.
Ainsley Poulos, Equip Women Ministries, Sydney, Australia

The Trellis and the Vine is a dangerous book to read. It demolishes precious and much-loved idols like these: "If we just have the right vision and mission statement, they will come ... If we just have the right vibe, they will come ... If we just have the right speaker ... the right band ... the right building ..." The Trellis and the Vine reminds the church that Jesus says the exact opposite. Jesus tells us to be great commission-aries and to "Go ... make disciples of all nations". The Trellis and the Vine is the best book I have read about mobilizing all Christians to be great commission-aries. It will turn church-shoppers into servants, consumers into producers, and disciples into disciple-makers.
Ben Pfahlert Director, Ministry Training Strategy (MTS), Sydney, Australia

This stimulating new book on biblical training will challenge some cherished methodologies. Tony and Col, though, are able to unsettle and critique with sympathy and understanding. Their observations are always judicious and never judgemental. Every page pulsates with a desire for the growth of the gospel and the maturing of the church. This is not the work of quick-fix pragmatists or armchair theologians, but the product of thirty years of effective ministry practice and reflection. It deserves to be widely read and discussed by all who are serious about every-person ministry in the church. It will be a set text at BCV!
Michael Raiter Principal, The Bible College of Victoria, Australia

Archbishop Rowan William's address at the Willebrand's Symposium underlines striking and worrying concerns regarding recent movements of some conservatives in the Anglican communion toward Rome. The Anglican church seems embattled on both right and the left. On the left, discussions about ordination of practicing homosexual bishops, women bishops, and homosexual "marriage" threaten to pull the church into the left side of the abyss. But on the right, there is an equally dangerous peril--conservative wings of the communion offered 'a home' in the Roman Catholic Church.

Why would conservative movement to Rome be as "equally dangerous a peril" as the church drifting leftward into liberal positions on women's ordination, homosexuality, and marriage? In short, both positions lose their grip on the gospel. On the one hand, there is an obvious abandonment of the gospel in favor of unbiblical sexual ethics and church order clearly contrary to Scripture. On the other hand, there is what should be seen as the obvious abandonment of the gospel of justification by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, apart from any works.

Let me offer an example of the latter from the opening of the Archbishop's address at Willebrand. Williams references discussions the Roman Catholic Church has had since Vatican II with various other churches and what he sees as the legacy of those discussions "justly and happily celebrated" in the day's events. He writes:

The strong convergence in these agreements about what the Church of God really is, is very striking. The various agreed statements of the churches stress that the Church is a community, in which human beings are made sons and daughters of God, and reconciled both with God and one another. The Church celebrates this through the sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion in which God acts upon us to transform us 'in communion'. More detailed questions about ordained ministry and other issues have been framed in this context.

That's a really interesting summary definition of the Church, and an ominous omission of what, in fact, creates the Church. Is she not constituted by those in saving relationship and union with Christ? And, precisely, how is that salvation and union wrought? The Archbishop's statement suggests--by what it does not say as much as by what it does say--that the Church is created by the sacraments "in which God acts upon us to transform us 'in communion'." Hmmm.... That's mighty slippery language that completely blanks the cross.

One might read these comments are "loose" statements, not meant as precise or clarifying comments, the way people might talk at the barbershop or their kids' soccer match. But this is not a barber shop or soccer match, and Archbishop Williams is no armchair theologian speaking loosely. What he considers important he states more clearly in the following paragraphs:

Therefore the major question that remains is whether in the light of that depth of agreement the issues that still divide us have the same weight – issues about authority in the Church, about primacy (especially the unique position of the pope), and the relations between the local churches and the universal church in making decisions (about matters like the ordination of women, for instance). Are they theological questions in the same sense as the bigger issues on which there is already clear agreement? And if they are, how exactly is it that they make a difference to our basic understanding of salvation and communion? But if they are not, why do they still stand in the way of fuller visible unity? Can there, for example, be a model of unity as a communion of churches which have different attitudes to how the papal primacy is expressed?

The central question is whether and how we can properly tell the difference between 'second order' and 'first order' issues. When so very much agreement has been firmly established in first-order matters about the identity and mission of the Church, is it really justifiable to treat other issues as equally vital for its health and integrity?"

It's staggering to think that the head of the Anglican communion could relegate the matter of authority to secondary importance, questioning whether it's even a "theological" issue in the same sense as "the bigger issues" already agreed on; namely, that "the Church" is "transformed in communion" by the sacraments. Really. The sacraments are more important theological issues than the cross, justification, grace and faith, authority, papal primacy, and so on? The sacraments are first order issues, while justification is second order?

One suspects that if that's the case it's because a comprise agreement has already been reached by some, and it's agreement itself that establishes order. Wherever there can be agreement, there must then be a first order issue. If there is no agreement, then obviously it's second order.

It's not difficult to tell that if Williams' definition of first and second order issues prevails, the Roman Catholic Church's definition of the Church and justification have already carried the day. Apparently Williams believes that treating justification as equal in importance is... well... not justified.

The Archbishop is serious about visible and institutional unity. He thinks there are some trends that might adjust ecumenical conversations downward, but the goal of visible, institutional unity remains. It would seem that the repeated casualty in historical and contemporary ecumenical discussions is the gospel itself. The one giant opposing issue unresolved in these discussions, side-stepped with sophisticated theological chatter and noise, is the gospel. It is marvelous that the central message of the faith is the central point of disagreement among those who value community.

But we're not surprised because those who champion "community" the loudest are often those who demonstrate little love for "the truth." If truth creates community, the tent of unity appears smaller but the stakes are driven deeper into the bedrock of God's salvation. Where community "creates" truth, the tent seems larger but it floats aloft in the winds of compromise and novelty.

Take, for example, Williams' meditation on the limits of ecumenical unity imposed by the issue of papal primacy. How do you establish institutional or visible unity where one communion maintains centralized and juridical papal primacy and another does not? Williams argues that we should take a:

look back to Cardinal Willebrands' celebrated sermon in Cambridge in 1970 which spoke (using the language of Dom Emmanuel Lanne) of a diversity of types of communion, each one defined not so much juridically or institutionally as in terms of lasting loyalty, shared theological method and devotional ethos. The underlying idea seems to be that a restored universal communion would be genuinely a 'community of communities' and a 'communion of communions' – not necessarily a single juridically united body – and therefore one which did indeed assume that, while there was a recognition of a primatial ministry, this was not absolutely bound to a view of primacy as a centralized juridical office.

Again, the emphasis on community espoused here rests upon "lasting loyalty, shared theological method and devotional ethos," not the truth of the gospel, the faith once and for all delivered unto the saints. A "community of communities and a communion of communions" somehow magically allow centralized papal authority to happily co-exist with other polities and views of authority. If that were ever possible, we might expect that the reformation would never have happened to begin with.

Williams alludes to doubts of his own, though they're not grave enough for the Archbishop to oppose the drift of conservatives in his communion toward Rome and the Apostolic Constitution under which conservative Anglicans may be welcomed into Roman arms. Williams writes:

The recent announcement of an Apostolic Constitution making provision for former Anglicans shows some marks of the recognition that diversity of ethos does not in itself compromise the unity of the Catholic Church, even within the bounds of the historic Western patriarchate. But it should be obvious that it does not seek to do what we have been sketching: it does not build in any formal recognition of existing ministries or units of oversight or methods of independent decision-making, but remains at the level of spiritual and liturgical culture, as we might say. As such, it is an imaginative pastoral response to the needs of some; but it does not break any fresh ecclesiological ground. It remains to be seen whether the flexibility suggested in the Constitution might ever lead to something less like a 'chaplaincy' and more like a church gathered around a bishop.

Williams' statement reads like an exercise in voluntary, willful schizophrenia. If the Constitution doesn't grant to the "community of communities" parallel methods of oversight and decision making but little more than autonomy in "spiritual and liturgical culture" and something like a chaplaincy for those moving to Rome, why as the leader of the communion would you support it?

For its part, Rome doesn't seem to yield one square inch of theological turf. And, honestly, I can't blame her. If she believes she holds the truth, why abandon it for a yarn as fuzzy as "community of communities"? The RCC leadership demonstrates more integrity with its theological positions than Anglican leadership does with her own, whether within or outside Anglican communion. For example, ordination of women is an open question for Anglican communions doing theology along the lines of Williams' understanding of the church and authority. But that's not an open question for Rome, and the Roman Catholic Church's steadfastness threatens Williams' vision for unity. He writes:

To take the most obvious instance in the relations between the Roman Catholic and Anglican churches at present, the local decision to ordain women as priests – and as bishops in some contexts – is presented by Roman Catholic theologians as one that in effect makes the Anglican Communion simply less recognisably a body 'doing the same Catholic thing'.

Here, I say, "Three cheers for Rome!" While perhaps not popular, I'd say it's better for conservative Anglicans to bite the bullet and embrace Rome wholeheartedly than to remain an ostensible part of the "Protestant" fold in a communion abandoning biblical authority and the gospel that saves. The more you look at some quarters of the Anglican church, the more one has to agree that it's not "doing the same Catholic thing." It's doing something completely different than biblical Christianity. At least those moving to Rome would move to a communion where clarity holds and keeps the main issues the main issues.

In his conclusion, Williams makes my point:

Once again, I am asking how far continuing disunion and non-recognition are justified, theologically justified in the context of the overall ecclesial vision, when there are signs that some degree of diversity in practice need not, after all, prescribe an indefinite separation. I do not pretend to be offering a new paradigm of ecumenical encounter, far from it. ... At what point do we have to recognise that surviving institutional and even canonical separations or incompatibilities are overtaken by the authoritative direction of genuinely theological consensus, so that they can survive only by appealing to the ghost of ecclesiological positivism?

What exactly is "the authoritative direction of genuinely theological consensus"? Is that what happens when you get enough people simply agreeing to a position, a kind of democratically-determined sanity and truth? If so, that'll never do.

Williams goes on to state:

All I have been attempting to say here is that the ecumenical glass is genuinely half-full – and then to ask about the character of the unfinished business between us. For many of us who are not Roman Catholics, the question we want to put, in a grateful and fraternal spirit, is whether this unfinished business is as fundamentally church-dividing as our Roman Catholic friends generally assume and maintain.

It would seem that among all those who believe in truth and that truth is not determined by consensus, yes, the business of Protestant-Catholic unity is unfinished and church-dividing. Until we all hold the same gospel, there can be no deep, lasting or real unity. For it is the message that saves and the Savior of that message that creates the Church of His calling. Everyone in the "community of communities" had better make sure they know this message and this Savior. We don't get a vote or a community caucus on judgment day. Those who do not love the truth perish while those who obey the gospel of our Lord enter life (2 Thessalonians).

What do you say: Is the Anglican-Roman Catholic discussion of unity helpful? Is union possible?

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I'm reading through John Hammett's Biblical Foundations for Baptist Churches: A Contemporary Ecclesiology. In chapter 1, Hammett surveys the Scripture's popular imagery of the church as the people of God, the body of Christ, and the temple of the Spirit. As I was reading the section on the temple of the Spirit this morning, this paragraph struck a real chord:

There is another reason why many churches have a problem holding their living stones together. We call the church the temple of the Spirit because the Spirit is the mortar that holds the stones together. The church is not to be held together by social bonds such as being of the same race or class or income, but by the spiritual bond of a common possession of the Holy Spirit. Church growth strategists tell us that churches grow fastest when they target people most like those already in the church. They are no doubt right; people are usually attracted to those with similar backgrounds and lifestyles. But the New Testament is clear that the church must not become a club of one type of people but a community that transcends those things that divide people in society. In Paul's day, the call was to transcend the barriers between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, and find unity in Christ (Gal. 3:28). Today's barriers include race (white, black, Hispanic), social class (rich, middle class, poor), and even age (young families, senior adults). Contemporary churches need a greater reliance on the Spirit and a deeper experience of his gift of fellowship if they are to be temples fitly joined together.

I love that last line: "Contemporary churches need a greater reliance on the Spirit and a deeper experience of his gift of fellowship if they are to be temples fitly joined together." Yet one more way we see our need for the presence of God the Holy Spirit in our corporate and personal lives. Yet one more excellent way for us to pray for our local churches--a fresh outpouring of God's Spirit Who cements together the living stones from every quarry until we're fashioned into a spiritual temple suitable for His glorious indwelling.

God has poured His Spirit into our hearts. Such an obviously-stated biblical truth with an extraordinary, ineffable implication and reality for us. God with us--indeed in us!

Finally, someone has said it! Well... they weren't wrong about everything. But a good dose of seeing our heroes soft underbellies is good for our own humility and growth.

And something can be learned from the "other guy," too.