Thursday 26 January 2012

Alister Chapman Interview on John Stott


Alister Chapman’s book on John Stott has just come out – Godly Ambition: John Stott and the Evangelical Movement (Oxford: OUP, 2012).


There is a 20-minute video (here) of Chapman being interviewed by Peter Sanlon at Oak Hill Theological College.


At one point, Chapman says:


‘One of the things I really admire about Stott is that he had a vision when he went to All Souls in 1950 to reach the entire parish. By the end of the 50s, he realised they were having a very negligible impact on the working classes of the parish. What I find so impressive is the way that Stott at that point didn’t just shrug his shoulders and say, “Oh well, it doesn’t really matter, the church is packed on a Sunday morning and we’ve got hundreds of highly educated people coming.” He saw this as a big problem, and he worked hard to try to find ways to reach out to these people who hadn’t been to university, who were in his parish, who he wanted to see converted.’

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