Abstract
This book offers an engaging and wide-ranging analysis of issues with regard to the nature of ministry in the United Reformed Church. It is engaging in terms of the author addressing his own personal experience in ministry, and wide-ranging in terms of the other people whom he has interviewed and quoted, offered alongside what the URC has said and written on this topic over recent decades. It is also wide-ranging in terms of addressing issues in the church pre covid, from the point the research for this book started, during covid, and after covid, at the point which the book was published (chaps 7-9).
The book offers a series of ‘Reflections’ from this range of different angles, with each reflection followed by a series of questions for discussion. This makes it helpful for use both by individuals, thinking about their own understanding of ministry, and groups in and across churches, engaging together in reflection on the issues raised.
The title, The Fire Still Burns, reflects the author’s own movement from his previous, more depressing, but perhaps thought to be more realistic, title, ‘Running Out of Years’. There are those who see the United Reformed church nearing its end, due to the declining and ageing number of people in some congregations, with ministers spread more and more thinly between a range of different congregations. However, Scott’s thinking digs more deeply into the analysis of what is happening, and what the nature of ministry might be that could help to move the church forward to grow and develop.
In Reflection 4, he offers a brief analysis of numerical decline, from churches in which he has been involved in ministry, and also quoting wider URC statistics from 1972 to 1995. He makes the interesting point that ‘There is little evidence of consistency, coherence of strategic planning’ (p. 106). across the church as a whole. In Reflection 5 he looks at Pioneer Ministry – Theology and Practice, giving examples from a range of specific people involved in these areas, with an analysis of pros and cons of different models. In the Questions at the end of this chapter he includes ‘What from the past do you see as essential in the life of the Church today? What is negotiable? What is no longer valid?’ (p. 146). These questions draw people into reflecting on their specific experience and the challenges faced in their local community. Chapter 10, ‘Final conclusions’ points to the need to go beyond structures and organisation to ‘a call to renewed faith and trust in God as the source of all life.’ Scott argues that Ministry ‘is vital to the life and health of the Church’ (p. 227) and that the areas of Leadership (as seen in the Ministry of Word and Sacrament), Relationship and Learning need urgent attention in the life of the United Reformed Church.
I found this a helpful book, reviewing issues about church life and the nature of ordained ministry from a positive perspective, and unafraid to raise challenges.