31.07.2004
Don’t leave Accra empty-handed, Alliance president urges delegates
Make the big decisions, don’t postpone them, Taiwanese theologian Choan-seng Song urged Reformed church delegates in Accra, Ghana, July 30.
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Song was preaching in the opening worship service of the general council of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches (WARC). His sermon was the curtain-raiser to the discussions and decisions of the meeting which lasts until August 12.
“Can we allow ourselves to leave this place empty-handed?” Song told the over 2,000-strong congregation, including some 400 delegates from Alliance member churches.
Such meetings suffer from the cliché of being all talk and no action. Song, who is the Alliance’s outgoing president, may have had this in mind when he said: “The truth is, you are saved by turning the end of time into your present time.”
The president pitted the call to “celebrate the fullness of life” against the real suffering in the world. Compassion, justice and hope are key ingredients of life lived to the full, Song said echoing the biblical assurance that “faith, hope, love abide”.
They are needed in the present era when “the three powerful forces of markets, democracy and ethnic hatred are working at cross-purposes”.
Deal with the bread-and-butter issues of life on earth and avoid pie-in-the-sky religion, Song told the delegates. “Instead of struggling to speak in tongues, strive for God’s will on earth and practice the reign of God in your community.”
Christians call on God to “give us this day our daily bread”, Song said referring to the Lord’s Prayer, the principal prayer used by all Christians in common worship. For Reformed Christians to taste life in its fullness, “we have to enable ourselves and others to taste bread and rice every day”.
Discerning God’s will is the key issue for the Reformed Christians gathered in Accra. But it will not be easy. There is no short cut to achieving life in fullness, Song said. “We cannot get to it by waving a magic wand, losing ourselves in ritual ecstasy or soothing religious talk.”
Speak fearlessly like the prophets of old
The president’s pleas were echoed by government minister Courage Quashigah, who spoke in the service on behalf of Ghana’s president, John Kufuor.
Sounding at times like an evangelist, Quashigah declared that “politics is the fulfillment of the [Christian] scriptures”. And prophecy is still a task for the church.
“Speak to us fearlessly like the prophets of old and put us back on the right path when we stray,” he urged the Reformed Christians from over 100 countries.
The minister spoke of democracy as “modern politics in its acceptable form”. Ghana is gearing up for multi-party parliamentary elections in December 2004. They are the third such poll since the country returned to democracy in 1992.
President John Kufuor, who was originally slated to speak in the worship service,
was tied up with talks to end the deadlock in the Ivory Coast peace process.
Andreas Havinga, July 31 2004
