Evangelicals Now reports services to offer prayers for same-sex partnerships have led to Rico Tice, founder of Christianity Explored, leaving the Church of England. He now worships at the International Presbyterian Church (IPC), Ealing.
Evangelicals have been leaving the Church of England for centuries. There is one sense nothing new in someone deciding that what is still the official church of my home country is just too compromised to remain a part of it. Meanwhile some evangelicals will still continue to feel that they are called to be faithful to Christ whilst remaining in the Anglican Church.
Back in 1966 Lloyd-Jones and Stott publiclly prompted a division among Evangelicals on the subject of whether we should come out of mixed denominations where people have wildly different approaches to the Bible, and many key doctrines of the faith. Some of what Lloyd-Jones said is perhaps relevant today:
“Can we deny the charge that we, as evangelical Christians, have been less interested in the question of church unity than anyone else? Are we content, as evangelicals, to go on being nothing but an evangelical wing of a church? Are you content with a kind of paper church, with a formula that people interpret in their own way, you being just an evangelical wing in this comprehensive, national, territorial church?
What is the Christian church? That is the question. You cannot discuss church unity unless you are clear in your mind as to what the church is. Now here is the great divide. The ecumenical people put fellowship before doctrine. We are evangelicals; we put doctrine before fellowship . . .
The church, surely, is not a paper definition. I am sorry, I cannot accept the view that the church consists of articles or of a confession of faith. A church does not consist of the Thirty-Nine Articles. A church does not consist of the Westminster Confession of Faith…A church consists of living people.
You and I are evangelicals. We are agreed about these essentials of the faith, and yet we are divided from one another. We meet like this, I know, in an occasional conference, but we spend most of our time apart from one another, and joined to and united with people who deny and are opposed to these essential matters of salvation. We spend our time with them. We have visible unity with them. Now, I say, that is sinful.”
Let me therefore make an appeal to you evangelical people here present this evening. What reasons have we for not coming together? I think we ought to be able to give an answer to that question.” Cited online
At the event John Stott strongly disagreed with this argument and in the rest of his ministry he focussed on hugely increasing the number of evangelical ministers in the Church of England, which did indeed happen. So if these two great figures disagree on this matter, why should we be surprised if people today disagree too?
What is remarkable is that Rico Tice has been a prominent figure in the C of E, having worked as the senior minister of Evangelism at All Souls Langham Place, previously the home of John Stott and later Hugh Palmer.
Other prominent Anglicans have also expressed disquiet about the decision to allow C of E churches to offer a service of blessing for same sex couples, although stopping short of marrying them. All Souls and St Helen’s have both decided to withhold funds from the central church coffers due to this issue. Leaders from Holy Trinity Brompton also expressed their concern in a public letter. It remains unclear what the implications will be for the Church of England and Anglicanism globally of the decision to allow vicars to offer services of prayers to bless same-sex unions.
It seems to me that nobody will be happy long-term with the compromise as on the one hand a same-sex blessing is not a marriage and so those wanting a church wedding with their gay partner will not feel this has gone far enough. But for some conservative evangelicals the decision seems to be something of a step too far by their Church Authorities.
For those of us who have never been a member of an Anglican Church these arguments can seem glacially slow (apparently the decision came after an eight year process of consultation!) and perhaps irrelevant. But every denomination will eventually have to be explicit about what they believe about this issue. This is because there is a growing movement of people who identify as Christians, and in some cases evangelicals, who disagree with the traditional teaching of the church that Christian marriage can only be between a woman and a man.
Rico Tice has explained his personal position in an interview with Evangelicals Now:
Last October I was one of six evangelical leaders of parachurch organisations with connections to the Church of England who wrote to Justin Welby and all the bishops explaining our deep ‘heaviness of heart, soul and mind’ about the church’s onward trajectory toward affirming same-sex marriage, specifically the new Prayers of Love and Faith. We called upon the archbishop to resist the influence of cultural values when they are in opposition to those of the Bible, and did this because it was harming our ability to work with orthodox people from other denominations – how could they trust us? We received no substantive response from him, and that was a key moment in my decision to leave . . . the sad fact is that the Church of England has left Anglicanism. READ MORE
The article explains more about Rico’s move to the Presbyterians, and that he intends to continue his Evangelistic Ministry. What is less clear is if he will continue to lead Christianity Explored which, whilst founded at All Souls has grown far beyond the boundaries of the C of E.
Christianity Explored is an evangelistic course which focuses on taking enquirers through Mark’s Gospel. In this sample video Rico Tice explains that ‘identity, mission, and call’ are the three main themes of this Gospel. He says that they are found in almost every verse, and form the core of the Christian message.
Rico explains that Mark 8:27-35 summarises this. Here is the passage in the NLT (subheadings added)
Identity
Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.”
Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him.
Mission
He then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter. “Get behind me, Satan!” he said. “You do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.”
Call
Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life[b] will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? 37 Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his Father’s glory with the holy angels.”
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