John Stott

'Inside Story' by Roger Steer, is a highly readable, popular life of John Stott. I have reviewed it elsewhere but I would like to comment on a couple of places in it. Steer describes a meeting between Stott and Lloyd-Jones in December 1978: ‘Three times in their conversation, Lloyd-Jones spoke of his desire that the two of them could work together. “I wish we could be together, you and I. We belong together. Together we could make a terrific impact on the church and the country.” “But, Dr Lloyd-Jones, we are together,” John replied, “theologically, though not structurally.” “But we ought to be together…”’ For 18 years these two masters of expository preaching both ministered in central London about two miles apart, Dr Lloyd-Jones with his Westminster Fellowship, and John Stott with his Eclectic Society. Yet when we think of them together all we remember now is their disagreement at the Central Hall in 1966...

'"You can always hear John Stott at All Souls, even if he's not there," they used to say back in London, alluding to the way his curates soon began to sound like him in mannerisms and intonation.' I can verify the truthfulness of this from a few visits to All Souls in 1958. If you didn't see who was going to lead the prayers it was impossible to tell who it was; they all sounded exactly the same. On reflection that's just about the only thing I can remember now about those visits... there must be a moral here somewhere.

In view of this year's cold weather I was interested to come across some slides of the winter of 1963. This picture was taken in Poole, Dorset and looks as if the snow had been on the ground for some time. If my memory is correct, snow lasted from Boxing Day 1962 until well into March. There was a time was snow was simply great fun but the passing of the years makes a difference - at least it still looks very nice, especially out of the window.

Having just begun this blog I'll start with a book I just finished this morning, Fire from Heaven, by Paul Cook. This is an interesting and important account of revivals in England that have been largely overlooked. However, in one way the most important chapter is the final one in which he outlines what he means by revival. I think we still need a fuller account than this, but it is a valuable contribution and perhaps saves readers from jumping to wrong conclusions from the rest of the book.