Last week I was lucky to attend New Word Alive Week 1 as a steward. This meant I paid the princely sum of zero pounds sterling to attend the great conference and only had to do a few hours of work each day. Win.
Loads of people have already blogged on New Word Alive. I may have missed the boat in offering a general review of the conference, but I thought I’d share five highlights of being a steward at week 1 of the conference!
Five Highlights
1. The great teaching. I was fortunate enough to be stewarding in the Great Marquee for the Morning Bible Readings and the Evening Celebrations, which meant that I got to hear all the great teaching that went on in there. Particular highlights were Vaughan Roberts on 1 Corinthians, Krish Kandiah on the parable of the Good Samaritan and Don Carson on the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus.
2. The fun we had on the stewarding team. April Fools jokes on the radios, changing our names on our badges, Texas T-shirts, hanging out on the beach…. the list goes on. It was a fun week!
3. The worship. Stuart Townend and Phatfish led us and we refused to let them stop on Thursday evening (fortunately my night off in the Great Marquee!)
4. Seeing Christians from many denominational backgrounds and traditions come together, setting aside minor differences and uniting around the gospel.
5. Catching up on sleep. It’s been a hectic term and having the afternoon off was much appreciated!
One disappointment
And finally, one disappointment. For a conference that aimed to unite people around core beliefs I perceived that there was still a bit of suspicion and segregation.
I’m sure it was mostly a result of the fact that because it was the “student” week a lot of Christian Unions came as groups, but I did see a few instances when people were already seated and then moved when someone different in age came and sat down next to them. There might have been valid reasons for moving, but it sure felt a bit weird having a conference that united different people around the same core beliefs and then people separating themselves off like this.
And then handing out a newspaper that proclaimed New Word Alive as the premier conservative evangelical conference in the country doesn’t really help to make our charismatic brothers and sisters feel welcome.
They’re minor quibbles. And I’m sure they’ll be ironed out in the future. Having one week which everyone attends next year will certainly help and I reckon we’ll all learn to get along better as New Word Alive continues. But I guess we could all make an effort to go out of our way and be really accommodating and loving towards people that are different to us, be it in age, background or theology.
Looking forward to next year
I’m really really really looking forward to next year, when I am hoping to be able to pop back from Athens to attend with my church and hear some more great teaching. Apparently Wayne Grudem has been confirmed, along with Jerry Bridges and Becky Pippert – should be great!
One step at a time.
Posted by dave bish | April 8, 2009, 4:55 pmye it can be a shame when Christians come a Christian conference but don’t behave like it at times. But then it’s funny how we’re sometimes surprised that Christians are sinners – given that the church is the community that admits they’re sinners. there’s always room to change thought isn’t there – something for everyone to pray for each other.
also just wondering – does ‘conservative evangelical’ exclude charismatics? i just take it to mean that we’re evangelicals who conserve the truth of the gospel – which is what everyone at NWA was doing. but i’m probably wrong. je ne sais pas.
glad you enjoyed it on the whole though – stewarding was awesome, wasn’t it!
Posted by gethin | April 16, 2009, 1:01 amGethin, I think you’re right when you talk about ‘conservative evangelical’ not necessarily excluding charismatics. For example, see Adrian Warnock (a blogger who I am sure you are aware of, who is certainly a charismatic) questioning whether ‘conservative evangelical’ is a good description of his theological position (http://adrianwarnock.com/2009/02/is-this-conservative-evangelical-blog.html) – he doesn’t come to a fixed conclusion but the implication is that is sort of is.
As Adrian points out, it seems as though the meaning of ‘conservative’ is changing now that the meaning of ‘evangelicalism’ seems to be widening. So, calling myself a charismatic, I would be happy to call myself a charismatic conservative evangelical. Problem is, then it gets a bit messy.
Posted by Josh Thorp | April 29, 2009, 3:23 pm