Sad but important news...

Word Alive is a conference that has been a great blessing to thousands of Christians over the last 14 years.  A good number of people at Rock and other Cambridge churches have benefited over this period.  For most of this time Word Alive has operated as a partnership between Spring Harvest, UCCF and Keswick.  This partnership has broken up for the reasons given in the press release below.  

Press Release begins:

23 April 2007
Response from UCCF to the SPRING HARVEST decision to end the World Alive Bible teaching week after 14 years

"FOR the past 14 years, the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship and Keswick Ministries have been delighted to partner Spring Harvest in organising Word Alive, one of Europe's top Bible Study weeks with a vibrant student track aimed at young people. Widely recognised, orthodox Bible teaching has been the hallmark of the event.

In 2003, the Revd Steve Chalke, one of the Spring Harvest Event Leadership Team, and a member of their Council of Management (trustees), wrote The Lost Message of Jesus. In it, he promoted unorthodox views over the nature of the Atonement, and hit national media headlines over his controversial and graphic description of Penal Substitution.

The Word Alive committee, of which UCCF is a part, believed such views to be contrary to orthodox Biblical teaching and as such, decided that the Revd Steve Chalke could not teach from a Word Alive platform.

The Evangelical Alliance (EA) held a Theological Forum at which various theologians debated with the Revd Steve Chalke. As a result, that organisation decided to change its constitution to clarify where the EA Council of Management stood on the issue. In May 2006 Spring Harvest advised the leadership of Word Alive that the Revd Steve Chalke was able to sign up to the new and revised EA constitution and therefore requested he be allowed to preach from the Word Alive platform in 2007. This request was refused as Mr Chalke had publicly confirmed he had not changed his personal theological views.

In September 2007 (sic) the Word Alive Committee were called to a meeting by Spring Harvest and told that as they would not include the Revd Steve Chalke, the 14-year partnership was at an end. Spring Harvest said they regretted they were putting a personality ahead of partnership. Spring Harvest announced it would be promoting its own student-based week at Minehead in 'week one', resourced by Fusion, of which the Revd Steve Chalke is on the Council of Reference.

Our decision to allow only orthodox Christian teaching from Word Alive platforms, and Spring Harvest's subsequent decision has caused enormous pain and regret. However, UCCF believes it can no longer work with those whose understanding of the nature of the gospel and the distinctive of the atonement is so different to theirs, and mainstream evangelicals in the UK and across the world.

There comes a point when loyalty to the gospel, as we believe it to be clearly set out
in Scripture, and the drive for unity with others can come into conflict, and we have reached that point.

Meanwhile, a new 'Word Alive' event, organised jointly by Keswick Ministries and UCCF has been planned for 7-11 April 2008 at Pwllheli, where speakers already confirmed include John Piper, Terry Virgo and Don Carson. There will be an increased capacity and further details will be released shortly.

Rumours circulating that the break-up of the partnership was down to Word Alive's refusal to accept women speakers is totally refuted. UCCF regularly has women speakers on its platforms, and it is a matter of public fact that Keswick does too. The key issue is Spring Harvest's corporate support for one of its own trustees, the Revd Steve Chalke, over Biblical orthodoxy on such a central issue as Atonement." End of press release

As you can see, it appears that the Word Alive Committee have been told that the partnership cannot continue because they will not allow Steve Chalke, who has refused to publicly repent of his denial of the doctrine of penal substitution, to speak at Word Alive.  Steve Chalke remains a part of the leadership team of Spring Harvest and a licensed minister within the Baptist Union (without any public censure at present) despite the public pronouncement of the EA that they disagree with his position.  There is no doubt that his ministry has been very much blessed by the Lord over many years and many good things have been achieved by the Lord through Steve but after the publication of The Lost Message of Jesus, and his refusal to retract any of what was written, the decision of the Word Alive committee to stand firm on this issue is undoubtedly the correct one.  Christians may disagree on many issues but discernment must always be exercised as to which issues are of secondary importance and which (relatively few) are of primary importance.  Issues of salvation are of eternal importance and thus to deny the means by which people are saved from God's righteous judgement and freely given eternal life in Christ is about as serious as it gets. 

This is all very sad but we need to respond by standing with those who defend the truth and praying for them and also praying for genuine brothers and sisters who are in error on such a central gospel issue.  We do want to work and pray for unity among all true believers and are aware that Jesus Himself prayed for this.  His words remain both inspirational and instructive - after praying for the apostles, He prayed for unity among all "those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one..." John 17:20,21 (ESV).  Dividing from others on issues of secondary importance is very wrong but 'unity' with those who deny the word of the apostles is not unity at all, nor is it something for which the Lord Jesus prayed.

If you want to think more about these issues then we have copies of the excellent new book "Pierced for our Transgressions" available to buy but in the meantime many will already have John Stott's 'Cross of Christ' where he examines several different pictures of the cross and shows why penal substitution is so central and so wonderfully God-exalting!  For more details on the new book and a fine article by Garry Williams have a look at Oak Hill College's website. 

On a more positive note, Word Alive will continue next year with an excellent programme of Bible Teaching, worship songs, fellowship, prayer and training tracks and more details can be found here.  If you'd be interested in going please let Al MacInnes know...