Today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of John Stott. I am not simply blogging about that because I happen to work for one of the organisations which he founded. Rather I thought it was worth paying a personal tribute to someone whose writings have been a formative influence on my own theology and spirituality.
In a blog intended to help those in ministry I think it is good to be reminded of those who have gone before us and whose example can spur us on, and who we can learn from. In a world of so much bad news it is good to be reminded of good and positive examples in Christian leadership. There are so many figures in Christian History who have so much to teach us, and of those in recent years John Stott’s life has much we can learn from.
I grew up in house with John Stott’s books on the bookshelf. I can remember making use of the Ephesians commentary when I took some time to study that book for myself after my GSCE exams. I read and appreciated Issues Facing Christians Today, and especially the sense that with some hard work it was possible to apply the Bible to our contemporary world. I even read the Cross of Christ, in an edition we had at home which managed to shed pages at an alarming rate (IVP must have been saving money on book binding at the time I think).
I remember rereading the Cross of Christ on the train to and from Durham University and thoroughly appreciating the clear way in which Stott wrote of the cross, and of the breath of his work, and engagement with others. I loved the way that he sought not just to explain what the cross achieved, and how it achieved it, but also what the implications of that should be for us today as church communities and as individuals.
I think the Cross of Christ is particularly valuable for its clear and gracious presentation of the atonement, and specifically the concept of penal substitution. In many quarters this concept has been under attack for a while – but Stott’s presentation is winsome, and careful – showing clearly the unity of the Trinity in achieving our salvation. Caricatures of this doctrine as pitting Father against Son are avoided and instead we see what an act of love Christ’s death on the cross for us was, as God in Christ substituted himself for us to achieve our salvation. You can get the Cross of Christ from IVP here: https://ivpbooks.com/the-cross-of-christ.
There are so many key lessons that could be learnt from Stott’s life, but for me one of the most critical is surely that somehow we need to hold together the things that Stott managed to hold together. We need people who will both read Scripture carefully, listening attentively to what the Spirit is saying through the text to the church and the world and who will listen carefully to our culture, and our world, to understand its heart cry.
That is why we need the organisations Stott founded like LICC (London Institute for Contemporary Christianity) https://licc.org.uk/ who do so much work on helping Christians in the workplace engage the whole of life for Christ, and Langham Partnership – https://uk.langham.org/, who work to support pastors and scholars in the Majority World, equipping them to minister in their contexts.
If you want to read more it is well worth reading some of these reflections on John Stott’s life and work: https://johnstott100.org/blog/ (the Melba Maggay one is particularly good I thought).
One of the key lessons from many of the stories on that blog is humility – John Stott seemed to have a humility that enabled him to actually listen and learn from others from all over the world and all walks of life that is all too rare, even in Christian leaders. In this I think he learned from one of his heroes, the great Anglican Evangelical leader of the 19th Century, Charles Simeon, who said that the three great principals of the Christian life were: “humility, humility, and humility”
It takes humility to read the Bible well – to set aside our preconceptions of what we believe it says and listen to what the text is actually saying. It takes humility to listen to our world and hear where we have not lived well. It takes humility to relate those two things together. It takes humility to change, and to live differently. It takes humility to live well without expecting reward or recognition. It takes humility to call others to that path also, knowing that some will not respect or heed the call, and will think less well of us.
Reading and absorbing Stott’s works without heeding the call to humility will just puff us up. The call to humility should drive us back to our knees in dependence on the one who has called us to a life of love and service. In that life there are great resources to be found for different stages on the way in John Stott’s books and teachings – resources that will help to point us back to the Bible and back to God’s world to listen carefully to both and live out of that listening.
Joshua's Tree Rooted 