Welcome to another year of Insights from Grace Theological College.
It may be helpful as we begin the year to refocus the purpose of the weekly e-mails you receive from us. They are one of the ways that we fulfil our mission to "equip, support and encourage godly servant leaders." By offering "bite-sized" reflections on significant truths we try to stimulate, encourage and help people involved in church leadership.
In defining our target audience as those involved in "church leadership" we have a broad group of people in mind. We are not thinking only of those who are pastors and elders - those who have what we might call "official" leadership roles in the church. We are also thinking of those who lead youth ministries, Bible studies, visitation and evangelism ministries in the church, and so on - in short, anyone who serves the church by providing leadership in some form or other.
Our aim is to provide such people with spiritual and practical insight on a range of significant issues relating to church life and leadership. For the most part that insight isn't our own. It is gleaned from others, usually from what they have written in books. There is no shortage of spiritual and practical wisdom in the literature available to us today. What most people need is quick access to it. And that is the service we aim to provide. By offering comments on extracts from writers old and new, we want to help people tap into the wisdom of the centuries and relate it to the needs of the church today.
We have chosen to begin this year with a series of insights based on John Stott's commentary on the New Testament book of 1Timothy. Stott, for many years Rector of All Souls Church in Langham Place, London, first began to preach and write on the Pastoral Epistles in the early 1970's. Since then he has become something of an authority for evangelical Christians on these books. His commentary on 1Timothy and Titus, subtitled "The Life of the Local Church" was published by IVP in 1996 as part of the Bible Speaks Today series. It contains a wealth of wisdom that we hope you will be able to apply to your church today.
Andrew Young
10th February 2005