Remembering Michael Green

Over the last few days, I have been reflecting on the life and ministry of Michael Green, as have many since his death was announced last Thursday, and I have been taken by surprise by realising how many times our paths crossed. The first was around the time that I came to personal faith myself, at ‘Mission 77’ in my home town in Orpington. I do not remember much of what was said, but I do remember very clearly the lively sung worship (I can even still recall one of the songs) which was quite a surprising to me as I was still a practising Catholic.

I realised how important some of his books were to me in my early years of thinking about faith—To Corinth with Love was one of the first things I read about Paul’s letters; Freed to Serve helped me to think about ordination; I read I Believe in Satan’s Downfall along with the other books in the series; I used The Empty Cross of Jesus in teaching, appreciating Michael’s insistence that the cross and resurrection cannot be separated; and I am the only person I know who has read any of his early academic work The Meaning of Salvation, which you can still buy! (Michael claimed that it was then the only comprehensive overview of the subject…)

As a student at Oxford, I attended St Aldate’s where Michael was Rector and it was there that I became a committed Anglican—ironically, because of realising the importance of liturgical worship! I kept notes from all the sermons (and still have them in a blue file in the loft), and can still remember several of Michael’s sermons and his powerful rhetoric. I can remember the beginning of his Fresher’s Sermon, and his preaching on the Holy Spirit, talking about the theory of what the Spirit is supposed to do, and the reality for many today, connected with ‘Now I now many of you are sitting there thinking to yourself—Michael Green you are a fool!’ He summed up the contrast between theory and practice with the memorable: ‘Got it all, have you? Well, where it is then?!’ And I can still remember his exposition of the story of the Prodigal Son during the University mission in my second year.


Michael was keen on working in partnership with others, wherever possible, and he jointly hosted sessions with Keith Weston, then Rector of the more conservative St Ebbe’s (the distinction between the two neighbouring churches remains much the same today) for those exploring ordination. Ten years later I found myself joining the first Springboard team on a mission week to Northwood. Sharing my own testimony at an evening event in someone’s home made me rethink why and how I had come to faith; I had the slightly surreal experience of being volunteered by Michael to lead some street drama; and I remember dinner with Michael at a host family where he insisted on doing the washing up and not being waited on. The experience didn’t turn me into an evangelist (though see Anthony Delaney’s experience below). But I learnt from Michael’s commitment, energy (which I think might have made him difficult to live with at times), humility, and his willingness both to trust others and to see them grow into fruitful ministry for themselves—as well as his unwavering commitment to seeing people come to faith.

I ended up not only studying at the College of which he had been Principal, appointed to oversee its move from the London College of Divinity to being St John’s College, Nottingham, but also later joining the staff there, and living in the house which Michael had lived in and from whose windows he shot rabbits. (By the time we were there, the field at the back of the house had become an executive housing estate, so no more shooting allowed.) Michael’s legacy to the Church and the gospel was enormous, and I suspect there are very few evangelical Anglicans of my generation who were not touched and influenced by his ministry.

Seventeen years ago, in his autobiography Adventure of Faith, he anticipated his own death with realism and joy:

One of the best insights about life after death came my way quite recently. For many years I was friends with Terry Winter, the Canadian evangelist who had a remarkable television ministry. I did three programmes with him shortly before he died suddenly and unexpectedly. His last programme was on resurrection and in it he said, ‘You will hear one day that Terry Winter is dead. Don’t you believe it. He will be more alive than ever’. That programme was aired, in its regular scheduling, two days after he died. I could not have expressed it as well as he did, but I share his confidence as I look to the ‘tomorrow’ of my own life.

I include below three further reflections, the first from Rod Symmons who was curate with Michael at St Aldate’s and later taught at Trinity College, Bristol and was Vicar of Redlands Parish Church. Then two shorter pieces, one from Stephen Travis who joined Michael on the staff at St John’s in 1970, and the other from Anthony Delaney, a student at St John’s in the 1990s who now leads Ivy Church in Manchester.


Rod Symmons writes: My first encounter with Michael was a handwritten letter addressed to me at my theological college inviting me to explore the possibility of becoming curate at St Aldate’s Church in Oxford. 

A few weeks later I arrived at the Rectory on a Friday afternoon for a weekend interview. Michael’s secretary greeted me at the door and showed me into the kitchen, where Michael was skinning a rabbit. I pretty quickly worked out that this was not going to be a traditional interview—or a traditional curacy! I worked with Michael for his final three and a half years at St Aldate’s. At times it was exhausting, but it was also richly rewarding and I will for ever be grateful for the opportunity of sharing those years with him. 

A Passionate Evangelist

Within a few days of my ordination Michael took me with him to a funeral he was taking at one of the colleges. He didn’t know the family—he was filling in for the chaplain who was on holiday—but he had formed a relationship with them preparing for the funeral and his address at the funeral included a perfectly crafted evangelistic appeal. He offered copies of The Day Death Died at the end and a good number of the congregation took them. 

This was typical of Michael—every conversation was an opportunity, whether planned or spontaneous. At the start of each autumn term he would preach the “Freshers’ Sermon” to a packed St Aldate’s with hundreds responding to the invitation to join a Beginners’ Group. In personal interviews he used a picture of the Light of the World that hung above the fireplace in his study to help a succession of visitors to find a living relationship with Christ. 

An Unconventional Pastor

Michael’s mind worked too fast to find it easy to just sit and chat with old ladies over a cup of tea, but he built a church that was deeply pastoral by identifying, releasing and affirming the gifts of others. He cared about people and he wanted them to be cared for. Michael was most at ease with university students, but he wanted the church to be representative of the whole city. 

He built structures that enabled the church to achieve that. Thirty years later, I look back on the Pastoral Team at St Aldate’s with immense affection—it was a group made up of pastoral staff and lay members of the congregation that was extraordinarily attentive to God and to the needs of the congregation. I discovered that Michael had a habit of setting off half an hour early to a meeting and visiting a family on the way. Sometimes this would lead to a pastoral conversation, sometimes he would pitch in and help with the washing up and sometimes he would read a child a bedtime story. He might have been a global figure on the Christian stage, but within the church he was a pastor to everyone.

A Humble Leader

Michael built a staff team of people with backgrounds and views that differed from his own. On average he probably had about 20 ideas a day, roughly 18 of which would be completely bonkers and the other two would be brilliant. The problem for Michael was that he had little idea which was which, but he trusted his team to tell him and he submitted his ideas for the church, the invitations to speak and write and (ultimately) his decision to move on from St Aldate’s to the wisdom of the team that he had assembled. 

On occasions he would unwittingly say things that caused offence to others. When he discovered that he had done this he was always mortified and would immediately unconditionally and sincerely apologise. It is a quality that was deeply endearing and meant that nobody I am aware of worked with Michael without loving him and having a strong loyalty to him. 

A Committed Disciple

Michael came to St Aldate’s from St John’s Nottingham with an immense reputation through his writing and speaking, but in his first sermon at St Aldate’s he wore ‘L Plates’ over his surplice to indicate that he was a learner. He had never led a church and he and the congregation were going to be on a journey. That spirit of learning reflected the fact that above everything else, Michael was a follower of Christ. He and Rosemary led a very simple life—he drove an old car until it died, they were incredibly hospitable (Rosemary produced industrial quantities of flapjack) but their kitchen furniture consisted of metal and canvas chairs that must have come from a church hall sometime in the 1960’s and I don’t think he troubled the many clothing stores within a stone’s throw of the Rectory a great deal with his custom. His income from writing was fed back into the church to employ staff colleagues. 

He preached a whole-hearted gospel and he lived it out. He moved from conversation into prayer and back again and his life was built on an unquestioning and uncompromising obedience to the Scriptures. In amongst the business of ministry Michael and Rosemary raised a remarkable family of children. Although they had all left school before I arrived, Beth and I got to know each of them at different times and hugely admired them. 

This was a rich season in the life of the church with a blend of evangelical preaching (enriched by scholarship) paired with an openness to the Holy Spirit in a broad charismatic renewal. In the 30 years since we left St Aldate’s our lives have continually crossed with people whose own lives were shaped by Michael’s ministry there. Throughout the 13 years I was on the faculty at Trinity College in Bristol, there was always someone who had been part of St Aldate’s at that time—including colleagues on faculty. (I also first met the editor of this blog when he was an undergraduate worshipping at St Aldate’s!)

I count it one the greatest privileges of my life to have worked with Michael and Rosemary and we are praying for Rosemary, Tim, Sarah, Jenny and Jonathan and their families as they travel through this season. I am praying too that those of us whose lives were shaped by his may have the courage to take up the baton and live lives that are as wholly committed to Christ as his was. 


Stephen Travis writes: I first met Michael Green at university, when he delivered three lectures which were to become his book Runaway World. They were a brilliant combination of apologetics and evangelism. which made a deep impression on many listeners.  A year or two later I was completing my PhD in theology, and looking for a job. I ventured a letter to Michael asking if he had any advice for me. To my surprise he suggested I should go to meet him and colleagues at the London College of Divinity where he taught, and was about to become Principal. On my arrival he immediately suggested a game of squash. He found me a shirt and shorts to wear, and then proceeded to beat me comprehensively. In due course they appointed me—a relatively inexperienced Methodist laymen—to teach the New Testament.

Michael was Principal for six years, overseeing the college’s move to Nottingham, now renamed St John’s College. Those first years in Nottingham were exciting days. Some old traditions died somewhere between Northwood and Nottingham, and new ones developed. Women were encouraged to study at the college, and afterwards worked in various forms of ministry. From time to time Michael would be away for a couple of weeks, leading missions in various distant countries. A consequence was that a year or two later men and women from the US, South Africa and Australia, attracted by the kind of ministry he embodied, would arrive as students.

Michael was a risk-taker, and most of the risks he took came off. Any that didn’t he would attribute to the Welsh blood in him. Under his leadership, St John’s was a liberating, risk-taking place. Rarely are the gifts of scholarship, writing and evangelism combined in such abundance in one person. I personally, and the church as a whole, have much to be grateful for as we remember him.


Anthony Delaney writes: During my training Michael came to do a mission at St John’s and took me under his wing somewhat. As an impoverished student I had no money to come to a course he put on later to train evangelists so he let me come and tape (old school) the talks instead. I fluffed taping his, but he let me off! I was so ashamed of how badly I had messed up but he insisted on thanking me effusively, saying something in Latin and then, ‘We couldn’t have done this without you’ – not true of course, but a measure of his grace.

I went on to be invited to be part of his team on more missions and saw how he could operate missionally across a variety of church tradition, by focusing on presenting Christ to all. At one mission in Northampton we were sent out to various pubs to befriend people and invite them to hear Michael preach. We’d talked to a man who said he’d be working that night but asked more questions about Jesus and eventually asked, ‘Can’t I just do it here?’ He gave his life to Christ. 

When we shared this at the team meeting next morning, I’ll never forget that Michael gasped out loud. I saw projectile tears burst from his eyes. It was as if this was the first time he had ever heard it happen. Despite seeing thousands come to faith through his ministry, he never lost the thrill of the greatest miracle – the lost sheep found.

Nor can I forget one stirring, stinging sermon on the church at Laodicea. Nobody ever described Michael as lukewarm, now he receives his reward for sharing the passionate love of Jesus as described in the letter to that church, “To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne”.


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19 thoughts on “Remembering Michael Green”

    • Yes, same as Steve. I recommend both to students still – they inspire students across church traditions. I think the scholarship in them is described as ‘winsome’.

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  1. Green’s little book ‘The Day Death Died’ was one of a number of Christian books I read when I was ‘becoming’ a Christian. One of the simple books that made a major impact on me at the time. I have no doubt the Lord used it.

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  2. It so happens that today, 11th February, is the 46th anniversary of a meeting in the Chemistry Lecture Theatre in Lensfield Rd where Michael Green was speaking. I was listening, heard knocking, and opened the door (c.f. “Light of the World”, above). I have reason to be eternally grateful for him (as well as Henry, who invited me to that meeting, and others who nurtured me in the faith).

    I have been reading some Eugene Peterson, and then Lamin Saneh. I will now need to read some Michael Green.

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  3. Given that David has just referred to the period 1972-3, I hope I can share the following given that it is ‘just’ a dream. There are some dreams that impress themselves upon one strongly, and seem veridical; and this is one.

    The date in the dream was 1972 (whereas I encountered Michael in 1984 and in some ways the spirit of the dream is more that of 1976 and ‘You Must Be Joking’). The narrative of the dream was unimportant (I expect Michael was on a University mission, though I saw him in the dream only in one-to-one or medium sized gatherings) – but its message impressed itself strongly. This was that he had the best arguments/perspectives around, which were superior to their competitors and bested others in debate. Together with what that meant in the spiritual realm in terms of breakthrough for the truth. In fact we seemed to be on the verge of a revolution in debate where Christianity got the upper hand. Some may say that this never happened as a matter of public record, but I think it actually has happened in smaller pockets that got less publicity, and will at any time go on happening if we pursue the same course. I say smaller, but of course his influence and that of his contemporaries and friends (the numbers of lives touched, and internationally) is incalculable, and for a while seemed like another case of Wesley/Whitefield.

    However, the reason for this was that he was not an ideologue or advocate guilty of special pleading. He emphasised always (1) witness and (2) evidence (the empirical approach): the 2 are closely linked. What I am pleading with people here is as follows. A high proportion of Christians are sometimes dishonest in the same way as ‘worldly’ people are dishonest – and they ought not to be. Christians can sometimes spin and bias the evidence to come to conclusions they want rather than are able to defend: can be ideologues. Don’t. It kills everything.

    I have to say that he was streets ahead of any rivals in his area. He was pithy because he could analyse so well that he could also summarise accurately and memorably. He was fresh and could not be fitted into any box. He had, by the grace of God, happened to find the right perspective, and everything flowed from there.

    Making everything defer to truth and evidence (and what alternative is there?) is second nature to me because lying/bias is a serious thing and affects the conscience. And I can defer to precious few modern-day mentors in this – but Michael stands out as clearly the best.

    J John compares him to Paul, and I would say that that is spot-on. And what an attractive individual (against some expectations) ‘Paul’ turns out to be. He applied Roland Allen ‘Missionary Methods: St Paul’s Or Ours?’ throughout his life and supplemented it greatly in his studies of Acts and Epistles and Evangelism. The various marvellous elements of Pauline evangelism – so different from the twentieth-century status quo, yet so much better and so exciting – rediscovered. Even the ‘facially part-monkey/part-angel and bald’ thing (Acts of Paul) was spot-on.

    St Aldate’s was (in ethos and message) a mature church because it had the multi-dimensional richness of true Christianity. Couldn’t be pigeonholed. Exegesis AND love AND humility (well-merited, of course!!) AND joy AND graciousness/gentlemanliness (one chapter from the influential Billy Graham’s ‘Peace With God’) AND the genuinely ‘good’ good news of forgiveness (*greatly* needed!!) for anything at all no matter how bad, AND the Holy Spirit, AND drama and the arts and worship AND attention to the proper perspective on social action AND actual social ‘active-ness’. Things were very exciting (think of the joyful processions to river baptisms), never stood still. He invited people into God’s presence by his own presence and speech – it could take a matter of seconds. And he could not walk 2 steps without bumping into someone and that would become a significant ministry encounter.

    Michael was hearteningly sympathetic to atheists, having been one. (Tom Wright has often called out the bad habit of referring to ‘God’ as though the meaning of ‘God’ were obvious, rather than the existence of God, if true, being a staggering thing, and one that would need to be investigated/ascertained.) There is a lot of practical atheism around; and there is also a lot of the attitude that we would be amazed if ‘all this’ actually turned out to be essentially true. Yet within what Michael brought and showed to us, we came into a perspective where we actually found we did believe Christianity to be true and to be the key of making sense of things (similar to C S Lewis – as by the sun’s rising I see not just the sun but everything else). Now (and again this was seen by Lewis) the main divide is (not between conservatives and liberals, catholics and protestants but) between those who think it is true and those who don’t – and this is currently playing itself out in church and society more than ever.

    Denominationalism fell away in Aldates-led ecumenical local missions to be caught up into active New Testament Christianity. (We referred to the Meths, the Bappoes, the Penties and so on. Didn’t regard denominationalism too seriously, nor too negatively.) The book on this (Forgotten Dynamite) is correct in its title. ‘Forgotten’ because its sales were appalling. ‘Dynamite’ because its message was dynamite.

    The thing about leadership being constantly finding someone who deserves praise and giving it (which Bruce Gillingham highlighted) – that also has him to a T.

    His exegesis was not a closed system. He matched up the words in the text with the familiar realities that were being spoken about, so that reality not text always came first. So few have grasped this principle, and I believe we should. And how he (rightly) reverenced and prioritised the text itself too.

    I hope some people will read what I have written here. His life and ministry is one of those that would massively repay study. (I realised ruefully that there are no areas where I surpass him – but several where he was streets ahead of most of us.) While the church has become ideological rather than evidential it has therefore fallen on a day of small things. Don’t forget Michael’s legacy. Never abandon the way of Evidence. Witness/Testimony. Truthfulness. It is even one principle of good comedy that being upfront about the truth brings joy.

    Many have come to the same conclusion about life, that the important thing is that there is only one of it and it is the most amazing uninvited gift. (The nature of the life hereafter is based on what takes place here.) Michael’s secret too was that he realised
    that there is only one life
    that therefore (by reasonable reasoning) he wanted to live it all for God
    (and how short it is, when we think about it – so we should take every single opportunity, even from a hospital bed – and can never stop, even leading University missions at 87…).
    Thus he never let a service go by without preaching the main gospel message, and thought that evangelistic ‘guest’ services should happen more rather than less often. He made the main thing the main thing.

    Michael having died in harness, I remember the Sunday his dad (ordained for 79 years) turned 100. He referred to the fact only in a throwaway subordinate clause (not that he didn’t fully appreciate how momentous it was) because everything was very subordinate indeed to ‘the main thing’ which he preached (and he never needed amplification) with his every breath.

    He said that we could easily be in danger of missing seeing the way things were because this was seen only by living an extreme all-out surrendered life: that was the position from which things fell into place and made sense. (E.g., people are utterly and ultimately precious, and the same goes for life itself. No half measures, for they would not be true to reality.)

    The Olivia Channon tragedy 1986: Michael must have been the only vicar who said that the drug taking was a really bad thing (the convention is to bypass truth and speak only consoling words of the dead) and that if any of us went down the same route, the same thing would be in danger of happening.

    In fact I have never seen anyone look so stern as he was (a) on the verge of preaching to new undergraduates, (b) on hearing of someone making a shipwreck of the awesome life they have been granted. He understood the weight in terms of lives and souls of (a). This kind of great sternness is the other side of the coin of great love: both fully appreciate who and what is at stake.

    Do read this. Many thanks.

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  4. Michael Green was invited to New Zealand in 1976 to speak at a nation NZCMS Spring School. Before we met in Wellington, Michael stayed with us (my father was General Secretary of NZCMS). Dad lent him an old red jersey to take on a (trout) fishing trip before the Spring School started. There was some consternation for him and Mum when Michael stood up to speak at the Spring School wearing the jersey – I note a comment above re clothing!

    Hi addresses were memorable – lively, thorough in exegesis and alive with humour. 1976 was a point in time when NZ evangelicals were coming to terms with the Charismatic Movement and Michael made the latter seem to be a simple coming alive of the Acts of the Apostles in the 20th century! I still remember him commenting on Acts 13 and prophets and teachers being together in the Antioch prayer group: (something like) when that happens today there won’t be any difficulties keeping control …”because you will be there!!”

    A brilliant person in all sorts of ways. I was 16 in 1976 and only later did I come to appreciate that Michael was not only a lively, colourful speaker but also a first class theologian.

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  5. Having been on the staff at Aldates now 21years, I have had the privilege to meet, listen, minister with Michael on many occasions. He was a legend in his own lifetime – famous for making Jesus famous. The first time we met I said rather nervously & ridiculously “Michael Green, your a name on my book shelf” – he replied “you have the best job in the church of England, (I was new Oxford Pastorate Chaplain based at St Aldates) I was told he had considered applying for it even though he was in his mid 60’s. I once rang him once about a pastoral problem – the next day he rang back -“its all sorted, I spoke with those concerned” and he had! On the occasion when I was an asst missioner for an OICCU Mission, he sent me an email stating simply “go for the jugular”. He rebuked me for taking my spectacles off too many times when preaching and shouted “JUST KEEP THEM ON”. When I began to grow a beard he said “what is that on your face?”… “a Beard” I replied – he walked off. He would often come to Aldates on Fresher’s Sunday and sit at the front. The thought of young fresh faced undergrads hearing the gospel preached was the most thrilling thing in the world to him. He did me the greatest honour of writing a forward to my first book – his forward means more to me than what I wrote.

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  6. When I lived in Tamworth, Staffordshire, Michael and Rosemary came with the Springboard team for a highly enlightening and successful mission. His depth of knowledge, passion to share the gospel and sheer good humour made this a mission to remember and I will remember the conversations we had about mission, evangelism and serving God as a priest. As has been said before, it was never about Michael and all about Jesus. His books have educated, inspired and given fresh insight to many and his writing will inform many generations to come. He has left a deep, lasting heritage and I for one am thankful to God for him.

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  7. Like Anthony above I too remember that sermon on Laodicea! I also remember a 50 minute one on the gift of prophecy where Micheal offered some criteria for testing utterances too. A young student then got up and demonstrated how NOT to do it illustrating Micheal’s points perfectly! Had he been listening? Anyway that service ended for me and for the great man with some raucous laughter. Some friends of mine called Hilary and Gwillam looked a little edgy – Gwillam was a little cool towards the whole charismatic thing and Hilary wasn’t – this was serious for them as they were contemplating marriage. I offered to pray for them and felt the Spirit asking me to pray in tongues! I was reticent for obvious reasons but just knew I had to. To my shock Gwillam came out with some beautiful words which sounded like they were from Proverbs or Ecclesiastes. They felt better and decided to stay. Gwillam said he must look up those verses in the bible he must have remembered them from somewhere. My answer was “Look until you’re blue in the face mate – you won’t find them in scripture! His face was a picture with a kind of “I’ve just been had” look. “That was the interpretation wasn’t it?” he exclaimed! Hilary by this time was dancing up and down the south aisle so Michael came across to see what all the fun was about! We did laugh!!

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  8. Like many others I owe a debt to Michael’s writing: The Meaning of Salvation and Evangelism in the Early Church are still on my shelves and get an outing from time to time and as I glance across the study I notice his Tyndale Commentary on 2 Peter and Jude.

    His humility has been mentioned; I would add a mention of his warm humanity. The only time (I think) I met Michael personally was playing cricket against him when he was Principal at LCD and I was a student at LBC. I still recall his gracious and affirming response when I trapped him lbw.

    I also recall his equally gracious response some years later when I asked his permission to quote him in a piece I was writing.

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    • ‘I still recall his gracious and affirming response when I trapped him lbw.’ I’ll bet you do!! We shall leave it to the reader’s imagination to think what your response was in turn…!

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  9. A great Christian leader. He was at Aldates when I was a student at Ebbes. Helped us conservative evangelicals to think biblically about the Holy Spirit and helped charismatic evangelicals to think biblically! How we must work today to maintain in Christ that gospel unity and contending together! Loved sport and a laugh … before a big rugby match he sent me a lovely note that I still have quoting Psalm 147 v 10 ‘The Lord delighteth not in a man’s legs.’ And I will say it because others might not … also from a generation of great Christian leaders from the Iwerne camps … Stott, Lucas, Green, Watson and many more. ‘By their fruits you will know them’.

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    • I will say it too.

      Goodness knows what relevance John Smyth 1978-82 has to anything pre-1978. Zero.

      Nor to the vast majority (including those right at the very heart of Iwerne like Mark Ruston) who were completely oblivious as to what Smyth was actually doing even at the time, and in most cases afterwards too.

      Those who deny the obvious – that Iwerne was by and large a first-rate crucible of character – are a bit like journalists who are not interested in the 99% of facts they have never bothered to familiarise themselves with, only in endlessly recycling the salacious 1% that satisfies them carnally and (they think) gets them off the hook morally (brings everyone down to their level, including those whose standards they are not interested in matching but whom they are still happy to hit when they are down).

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  10. Christopher,
    If you have comments about John Smyth, then please save them for a more appropriate time and place, and not here, in this celebration of one of the great Christian leaders of the 20th century.

    Like Ian, I also found faith in my home town of Orpington, but about 15 years earlier, under the ministry of the great Canon Herbert Taylor, a now largely forgotten character who, among other things in his long and fruitful ministry, founded the Pathfinder movement and all its various spin-offs including CPAS. His first confirmation class, on arriving in his first (and last) incumbency had two keen young lads called Michael Baughen and Michael Saward in it, two who also had a great impact in their ministries, particularly on the dynamism of Anglican Worship.

    The great legacy of Michael Green and of Herbert Taylor, and many others of the next generation, has been the continuing ministry of the word of God throughout the C of E. Their mind was always on the next generation, and how it would hear the good news of Jesus, and who would be there to ensure that it happened.

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    • Michael was on record as saying and repeating that Bash of the camps was the greatest influence on his life. All of us are thoroughly indebted to a man who has forever impacted us among thousands of others; what he received, he received from many wells of which he put Iwerne no.1; that (and many parallel testimonies from his own generation and others) ought to guide our assessment of Iwerne. By their fruits we shall know them, as we all agree: and really good fruit points back to and yet again affirms Iwerne as a really godly ‘seminary’.

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  11. I was privileged to lunch with Michael and Rosemary when I was researching Christian lay learning in the part of East London where I then lived. Their gracious listening, questioning and responding to looking at what one S.U. colleague described as ‘bible reading aids for the illiterate’ was a great encouragement to me. Rosemary observed the warning to those ‘search the scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life;’ being particularly relevant to inappropriate methods with those many non-book people I was with. The ensuing discussion was utterly missional and radical thinking about my context – what Michael described in his dedication in his ‘To Corinth with love’ which he gave me ‘ ‘for John, as he labours in modern Corinth….’

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  12. As a student in Oxford in the 1990s, I remember hearing Micheal Green speak on a few different occasions. The first one was a university sermon at St. Mary’s. His passion for God and compassion for people deeply touched me, a fresher at the time from China. Ever since then, if Micheal Green was speaking, I would try my best to attend, and bring a few friends along.

    Micheal was a great preacher, but what impressed me the most was his prayer, when he shared his heart openly with God. One time, he conducted a devotion at the Keble College Chapel, where I loved to take my friends to see the “Light of the World”. We don’t remember much of what he said, but his prayer is still echoing loud and clear in our hearts: “Father, comfort us when we are disturbed, and disturb us when we are too comfortable.” My Chinese and Jewish friends were absolutely amazed at his simple eloquence, brave honesty and humble sincerity, which provided some perfect topics for our punting trips on the Cherwell.

    Micheal, thank you for being a great example of being a Christian in today’s world. Rest In Peace!

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