Another list - from John Stott

My last posted listed some friends of Spurgeon which has led to a couple of conversations.  I always find it interesting to see summary lists of friends, influences, books when people look back and identify what has really impacted them.

Another book that was so easy to read, because it has many photographic illustrations (!) all from its author John Stott, celebrated his 80th birthday.  He looked back over the teachers who had impacted him. He drew an imaginary circle round the globe, plotted sixteen stopping places on it and stopped at each to highlight people who have been his teachers.  He calls it: 'People my teachers'.

He explains that they are all historical and some lived in the distant past like the apostle Paul (Turkey), and St. David (Wales).  Others are in the near past like Festo Kivengere (Uganda) and Richard Wurmbrand (Romania).  Some he has known personally like Dr. Paul White (Australia), Bishop Bjorn Bue (Norway).  For others he has visited their graves as with Shackleton on South Georgia and Temple Gairdner in Cairo.  He writes that many have made impact on his life either by a book they have written or by their reputations which means that one way or another he can share a personal anecdote about each.

Also included are:  Gandhi (India), Lilly O'Hanlon and Hilda Steele (Nepal), Hudson Taylor (China), Allen Gardiner (S. America), Charles Darwin (Galapagos), D.L. Moody (the American student world), John Franklin ( seeking NW passage), Thomas Becket (Canterbury and Choughs).  Are there some surprises?  Gandhi? Darwin? He writes: 'All of them have a lesson or lessons to teach us'.

Of course the list is not exclusive.  He had a gift for making friends all over the world, but I love its range which helps to explain how he was nourished in his own leadership. How much we can learn from others - especially those in the past.

Spurgeon and friends

A friend wrote to me saying that my recent posts about C.H. Spurgeon had persuaded him to read more which opened up many themes about this great preacher.  And there are many!  Before I move on in further blog ramblings let me mention a book in my library: Spurgeon and his friendships by Cunningham Burley, who relied heavily upon the insights of Spurgeon's oldest son, also called Charles Spurgeon. 
The book claims that Spurgeon possessed the genius for making friends. A great personality yes, but he had the grace of receptivity.  He 'cheerfully admitted that he owed much of his ascendancy as a leader and author to the loyalty of his comrades and the love of his friends.'

The range of friends is listed under different headings.  Wonderfully it begins with Susannah his wife, and Charles and Thomas his sons.  In spite of all the pressures he genuinely valued his family as friends.  This is a good reminder for Father's Day this coming weekend.
Ministerial Friendships include Joseph Parker, Alexander McClaren, Dwight Moody and De Witt Talmage- it is challenging to see his warm open links with other great preachers of his day. How preachers should admire this when competitiveness and jealousy can  so easily prevent such friendships.  I have books on and by all these men and it is thrilling to think they were friends.
Philanthropic Friendships include William Booth, Lord Shaftesbury and George Muller.
Soul Kinships - John Ruskin, William Gladstone, Henry Ward Beecher, Robert Louis Stevenson...but also children.  Friendship with children marked out his ministry.
Dumb Companionships includes 'Dick' the cat, 'Punch' and 'Gyp' - his dogs.

Looking at this list and reflecting on these different headings leads to personal questions about my grace of receptivity and who might belong in my circle.  It really makes you think, doesn't it?

Political choices

Britain is embroiled in a general election.  Cambridge is a hotly contested seat with the two main parties exchanging members of parliament in the last election.  Unsurprisingly, we have been visited by both parties in person and have literature pushed through the door almost on a daily basis as Voting Day (June 8th) rapidly approaches.  On the national scene the party leaders have been fighting for our votes with competing manifestos and, as any you of reading this in the UK will be well aware, the resulting dynamics are complex (to put it mildly)!  There never has been an election like it, say some pundits.

William Temple, an Archbishop of Canterbury (died1944) who was renowned for his preaching and writing was especially concerned about supporting economic and social reform.  Today I was reading some of his comments:

Herd and Fellowship - The real defence of democracy is...that by calling upon people to exercise responsible judgment on the matters before the country at any time, you develop their personal qualities; you make them feel that they belong to one another in this corporate society, and so you tend to deepen and intensify personal fellowship. You are leading people forward from the relationship of the herd to that of real fellowship by the mere process of calling upon them to take their share in the government of the groups of which they are members.

Its sounds as though it comes from a different, altogether more reasonable era, doesn't it?.  Yet, the possibility of developing personal qualities by exercising political judgment, of ensuring we move out of a herd mentality sounds good. I need to record that I have been giving scrutiny to the local candidates with awareness that responsible judgment places great responsibility on me to think with a Christian mind.  As Temple writes elsewhere:

Political Test - Man is created for fellowship in the family of God: fellowship first with God, and through that with all God's other children. And that is the primary test that must be applied to every system that is constructed and every change in the system that is proposed.