and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead. By whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations for his name, among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ. To all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. First, I thank my God, through Jesus Christ, for you all, that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers, making request that by any means, now at length, I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you. For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established. that is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me. Now I would not have you ignorant, brethren, that oftentimes I purposed to come unto you, but was less hitherto, that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among the other Gentiles. I am debtor both to the Greeks and to the barbarians, both to the wise and to the unwise. So as much as in me is, I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is written, The just shall live by faith. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness, because that which may be known of God is manifest in them, for God hath showed it unto them. Well, this evening I'm beginning, and trusting God willing the Lord permits, to come again in December to do the second part of a presentation on the subject of the Alpha Course. The Alpha Course has been put forward as an evangelistic tool for our day to reach the unchurched of our generation. It has come from a charismatic Anglican church in West London, Holy Trinity Brompton, or popularly known as HDB, and is a course that perhaps many of you have now seen some of the advertisements concerning it that is very widespread. Using statistics published by HTV in their regular bulletin Alpha News, a conservative estimate of churches conducting the course was put at more than 200 at the end of 1993. By April 1994, the number of participating churches and Christian groups had jumped to over 400. By April 1995 it had gathered momentum significantly and had reached 1,200. This in turn being outstripped by exponential growth a year later to 4,000 groups. The most recent figure that I have puts the number of courses at 7,500 of which about 5,000 are taking place in the United Kingdom. The impact of Alpha is literally worldwide. I could list to you the countries which are now using the Alpha course, and I would be here a long time in explaining the numbers that there are. I think now virtually every continent on the Earth, some place or other, is doing one of these particular courses. You may have seen as you've travelled about London and elsewhere that there are billboards with advertisements about the Alpha course there. A million pounds has been spent in this publicity. You may also have seen in some of the local newspapers that advertisements have been taken out. I think in the London Standard, the Evening Standard last week, there was a three-page advertisement explaining something about the course, where it's happening, which churches are participating and how anybody reading that would be able to go along to one. leaflets have been put through doors and many churches have grouped together to organise an Alpha Course in one of their churches, that's four or five churches have grouped together, clubbed together to this end and are beginning their Alpha Courses all on the same night across the country. It is, then, something that is all around us. I'm just strolling down the road here. Before the meeting, I notice the Baptist church away from us here is staging an Alpha Course soon. And there are many, many other churches beside them. Well, why worry about it? It's happening out there, we might think. It's not happening here. It's not happening in many of the other churches that we know. Why worry about the Alpha Course? I think there are various reasons. The first I would give is this. It isn't going to go away. We can ignore it, or try to ignore it, but it is not going to go away, and its influence and its impact will continue. Because what it represents, what it stands for, I think will outlive the Alpha Course itself. But it is establishing a method of evangelism and techniques and various practices that I think, even if the name Alpha is forgotten, will live on. I think that because what Alpha has really done, as I will argue, is to draw together what now is almost taken for granted as being evangelism and mainstream evangelicalism. So it's not going to go away. We may not wish to know that much about it, or may think it's a problem that's out there and not in here, but it is not going to go away. We are not going to be able to ignore it. The second reason is this, that like it or not, it will affect some of us. we will have friends, family, people that we know who will be in one way or another involved in the Alpha Course. My wife Caroline is rather tired of hearing about the Alpha Course, I've been doing quite a lot of work on it over the last few years. But she went just the other day, we have a baby in the family now, under six months, and she went round to visit a friend just round the corner, non-Christian, And this non-Christian had also invited another neighbour who had a baby of the same age around to, as it were, make a nice little group and have a cup of coffee together. Well, this visitor then started talking enthusiastically about, yes, guess what, the Alpha Course and about how members of their family had been going on it and what wonderful things they'd been doing. So you can imagine Caroline came home pulling her hair out in distraction that the Alpha Course is everywhere. but perhaps some of us have also found that we have met with people at work, people that we've encountered that are interested in the Alpha Course. They may ask us our opinion, what do we think about it, if they know that we're churchgoers. And we'll need to know how to answer them, or how to answer friends and family, members, people that we know in other churches who are doing the Alpha Course and who may be very excited about it, and may wonder why we're perhaps not quite so enthusiastic. I would also add as well that one could name FIEC churches and also Grace Baptist churches that are interested in and have dabbled in the Alpha Course. The third reason why we should worry, or at least be interested and concerned about the Alpha Course is this. As I suggested, it is becoming the mainstream view as to how to conduct evangelism. And this is a view which, if allowed, I believe, to prevail and to dominate, will eventually oust what I think is the true gospel. So there is something very, very vital that is at stake. But if this is allowed to continue and to flourish, it is going to be harder to recover the ground. There won't be anything left of gospel preaching in the country. It will have to be rediscovered again, because the number of places where it can be heard is dying out, and the number of places where the more alpha-style evangelism can be heard and seen is growing and expanding almost weekly. It raises a number of questions, which is why we have the reading from Romans chapter 1. What is the gospel? What is gospel preaching? What is evangelism? That is, the presentation of the gospel. What do we need to preach? And are we preaching it? Or, as Romans 1 verse 16 suggests, there are some that may be ashamed of the gospel and preaching something else. Is that what is happening today? It's not a new battle at all. It's a very old battle. If Alpha comes to nothing, this battle will be needing to be fought again and again and again, because it's had to be fought throughout Church history to defend the integrity of the Gospel against what look, on the surface at least, to be very plausible imitations, but for which, for all of that, are not the true Gospel. I believe, and I hope to show as we go along, that what's happened really is that the Alpha Course rose back from what is the true gospel. It's ashamed of it at heart. It doesn't want to present it, and presents us with something else which can look very similar, but is not quite it. So we have to ask some questions. One of the most obvious ones which I want to try to answer this evening is, what is the Alpha Course? What does it contain? Where do its emphases lie? How does it operate? And that will take up much of the time this evening in explaining that. We then need to evaluate its contents. Is it an adequate presentation of the Gospel? Is it the gospel at all, or is it something else? What line of evangelistic reasoning does it employ, and is that sufficient, or does it perhaps subtly, or not so subtly, convey a different message about God, the way of salvation, and the evidence that we have entered into new life in Christ? How does Alpha cope with these issues? So we'll begin to open up that subject today, and God willing, we'll look at that further on the next occasion of my visit here. One other very key issue is this, because I think the reason that a number of churches are adopting the Alpha Course is because they think that it, inverted commas, works. That it brings people in, that it does convert them, and that it has led to significant church growth. Interestingly enough, there are not many statistics around as to how many churches have grown through the Alpha Course, and I hear anecdotal evidence that a lot of people come in the front door, but then disappear out the back door, and that many churches have got no growth to talk of on this. But for the deficiencies and weaknesses that we might identify in the Alpha Course, is it converting people? Is it leading to the conversion of souls? After all, it is the evangelistic success which is the main reason that people are adopting the Alpha Course. And so it stands or falls mostly by that particular claim. It converts people, so the proponents of it say, like nothing else seen in recent history. And that thesis has seemed well nigh unassailable, and it seems almost like walking in front of a moving train to try to deny that, and that one's accused almost of bleeding the earth is flat to say that AlphaCourse does not convert people. So we have to assess, then, whether in fact the AlphaCourse is converting people or doing something else to them. Again, I don't really have to stress, do I, that this is an important issue. If the work of evangelism is being poorly or mistakenly conducted, we risk failing the Apostle Paul's injunctions in 1 Corinthians 3. He says there, according to the grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon. For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, haze, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try each one's work of what sort it is. 1 Corinthians 3 verses 10 to 13. It's out for building on solid foundations. Or is it more a case of wood, hay and stubble, that sadly, before the judgment seat of God, is going to be exposed as being shoddy work that will not stand scrutiny? One supporter of the Alpha cause has said that she confidently expects Alpha will change the face of Christianity in the United Kingdom. Should we be happy at that prospect, or should it fill us with alarm? Well, let's look first of all at the course itself. What is the course? What happens on it? We might have heard the name, seen the posters, but what would go on if we were to pop our heads around the corner and see what an Alpha course is about? Well, the foundations of the Alpha course were originally laid in 1977 through the work of Charles Marman. He was a worker at Holy Trinity Bromson and sought to devise a course to look at the basics of the Christian faith in a way that would be helpful to new Christians. After his initial input, Alpha gradually evolved from there. And one of the key figures in this, and the main architect of the Alpha course as it now exists, is Nicky Gumbel, who is currently a curate at Holy Trinity Brompton. Indeed, it was through Gumbel's vision and work that Alpha grew to have the impact that it has today. In terms of its concept and design, Alpha is really quite straightforward. It is a series of 15 talks given over a period of approximately 10 weeks. The talks are all on set topics and can be delivered either by a speaker just using the written materials that the Alpha Course provides, or by using specially produced videos or tapes that relate the course content. In fact, two thirds of the participating churches use the videos when they do their presentation of the Alpha Course, so they can have a video up there and then the talk takes place. All of the material is based upon a book, which is entitled Questions of Life, which, if you will, is the textbook of the course. If you look at the videos, it's based upon the book, and if anybody were to do a sort of presentation like I'm doing it now, they'd virtually be reading the book verbatim and conveying that. Well, these set talks take place on an evening during midweek, and where the manpower exists, the talk itself is preceded by a supper provided by church members for people who have been invited to attend the course. There is variety, some churches are able to offer more elaborate things than others, smaller churches and larger churches differ in what they are able to provide. But if we take as our model Holy Trinity Brompton, the flankship of the Alpha course, the evening after the supper continues then with some notices and perhaps a short time of worship. They also put in their publicity that it is always helpful to have a joke to begin as well. All of this part is kept deliberately short at the beginning of the course, but then the element of singing increases as the course goes along, And as the course progresses, there's more and more the introduction of more modern, chorus-y kind of songs. Then the talk. This lasts about 45 minutes. And after that, there's coffee and biscuits. And following this, people then break down into small groups of ideally 12 people to discuss issues which were raised in the talk that they've seen, and to ask questions. The groups are led by church members, although, it's interesting this, non-Christians may be employed as helpers in these groups and answer questions. All in all, a great premium is put upon interaction, and the whole environment is meant to enable people to ask whatever questions they have without feeling embarrassed, the end phrase being it's cringe-free, it's non-threatening. For those in leadership, there are manuals for them to follow and to learn from, and there are courses for those who leave small groups, giving them the sort of questions they might like to ask, to open up conversations. And much stress is laid upon the fact that these groups should not be too much led from the front, that people should be free to say what they want, that opinions are to be treated with respect, and that really, in a sense, nobody is to be argued with or too quickly opposed or stopped in their tracks. People are given space to say and to express what they feel and think. There are also in these leadership guides practical hints and helps about how to approach people and on what we might call interpersonal skills. Besides these helps for course and small group leaders, those who participate on the course also have a course book and that summarises each of the talks that they hear and contains some of the lengthier quotations and gives them the space to make notes. There are recommended books besides the textbook, Questions of Life, and those on the alpha course are pointed to, among others, books by John Stott, C.S. Lewis, Steve Chalk, Nicky Cruz, Joyce Huggett, Jackie Pullinger, and the late John Wimber. Well, what are these lessons then? They have these set talks that last 45 minutes. What do they learn during these? Obviously, we can't go through each of them with a fine-toothed comb, but let's have a look at their general outline, but especially note the evangelistic material. Well, the evangelistic element takes place in the first three weeks, so the first three talks that people go along to are basically the evangelistic part. When Alpha works as it is ideally meant to, the first point of contact that anybody has with the Course is at a special supper, to which they have been invited to a topic called Christianity, Boring, Untrue and Irrelevant. This is where Alpha opens up. and what it does here is it rehearses some of the problems and maladies of late 20th century life, predominantly life as we know it here in the West. We're introduced, if you will, through modern man's search for meaning, and we're told that man lives in a confused, dark and often meaningless world. People are told when they come on this that mankind needs a relationship with God, the absence of which will leave them with a hunger or a sense of emptiness. As a result of not knowing God, who alone can meet these needs which Alpha identifies, people try to fill this emptiness in various unsatisfactory ways. And what Alpha then does is to present Christianity as the antidote to this. Here is man lost in a world that's dark, confused, wandering around, no meaning, no understanding of what really goes on. And here is Christianity offered as something that offers a better quality of life than the alternatives of living in this lost and confusing world. It tells people there is something better that is available to them, and seeks to persuade us that we're missing out on it until we can see to the force of others' argument. So into this existential loneliness and sadness, this meaningless world in which we live, Christ's death is offered as the solution for the ills and evils of this present world. It's presented, it is true, as a great self-sacrifice, comparable, although far superior, to acts of self-sacrifice witnessed in World War II, of which Alpha cites various examples. And we're told of the Lord's death in this way. Jesus died, I quote, not just for one man, but for every single individual in the world. If you or I had been the only person in the world, Jesus Christ would have died instead of us to remove our guilt. When our guilt is removed, we have a new life. But this kind of reasoning occurs again and again during the evangelistic part of the course. It's there in week one, but it also comes in week three, and on the video it seems to be there all the time. You see, catching the work of Christ in these terms, we immediately stumble across a difficulty right at the outset, a difficulty that bogs the Alpha Course from the beginning right through to the end. For us, as Reformed believers, the Alpha Course is not remotely Reformed in its presentation or understanding. Instead, it is distinctly Arminian. Its understanding of Christ's death and his achievements upon the cross is not precise at all. He did not die for the elect in the Alpha Course, but for everyone. This has huge ramifications for Alpha's understanding of the Atonement, as we shall see later. It also gives us a clue as to the sort of God that Alpha would have us to believe in, and what sort of problem Alpha believes that sin is, and what its cure is. But anyway, Course 1, the first week, doesn't really tell us, as we'll see later, very much about God. But despite that, it has us at the end of that week praying the sinner's prayer. A prayer of commitment is offered, and any who feel ready to accept the gospel at that point are invited to do so, despite the fact they've been told virtually nothing. Right at the outset, the very issues which we'll be centring upon later in the evaluation are there to be seen. So if people have come to this first course, Christianity, boring, untrue and irrelevant, if they like then what they have seen and experienced, they sign up then for the rest of the Alpha course. And so from that point on, they're then on the Alpha course. Week 2 looks at the question, Who is Jesus? And really this begins where Week 1 left off. So we find that the Lord is portrayed as the one who can give satisfaction to us and a relationship with God. Secular psychologists are brought in as witnesses for the defence, and here's a quotation. It says, There is a deep hunger within the human heart. The leading psychologists of the 20th century have all recognised this. Freud said, people are hungry for love. Jung said, people are hungry for security. Adler said, people are hungry for significance. Jesus said, I am the bread of life. In other words, if you want your hunger satisfied, come to me. We recognise that what we saw in week one is again a feature that colours the whole approach of alpha. The message of the Christian faith is basically set forth to us here as having the ability to provide solutions for our emotional problems in society today. It's there to meet our needs and solve our problems. It quotes all those various psychologists, not all of whom you might have heard of, but probably Freud you have and perhaps Jung, but they were people that said that, well, we have different emotional needs and these need to be met in different ways. And Alfred says that's what Christianity does. It meets those needs that you've got. If you've got that sort of hunger, that sort of desire for significance, that desire for love, then Christianity is the thing. Jesus is the bread of life. He gives you this sort of meeting of needs that's there. This part of the course is in fact staunchly defended by the supporters of the course as displaying its orthodox credentials. Of course, it's true. The Lord's claims to deity are unambiguously defended. There is no doubt that they are. There's no hint of some of the other errors that you find abroad in charismatic churches which confuse and muddy the whole issue about who Jesus is. Finally, the facts of the resurrection are reviewed, and efforts to explain them away put firmly in their place. C.S. Lewis is used quite extensively, the historical Christ is set forth, no doubt about it, and whatever else we might say about Alpha, it does refer to the scripture and used biblical texts. Well, week two closes at that point. The central evangelistic thrust proper comes in week three, and this is of course entitled, Why Did Jesus Die? Having established the reality of the Lord Jesus Christ in week two, and having demonstrated the linchpin truth of his resurrection, the Course now tries to explain the key fact why he died. This is the most important evangelistic lesson that Alpha contains. Again, it is appealed to by those who try to ward off the criticisms made about the Course, who say, well look, it is cross-centred after all, the cross is mentioned. And true enough, sin is put forward by name as being the main problem facing man. Sin, that is, when it is defined by what we do and by the sorts of evil which we find in our hearts. That's quite significant, we'll come back to that later. The perfect life of Christ is held up as the example to prove how far we should fall short of that life, that standard that God has set. And everyone is chargeable with being a sinner, for none of us are perfect as Christ is. So as reasonable people on the Alpha Course, we would be forced to admit that we were indeed sinners, and conclude that we would have to do something about that. The course goes on to try to explain what causes sin, and it says this, I quote, the root cause of sin is a broken relationship with God. Well, how precisely a broken relationship with God can be the root cause of sin, or what that relationship is about in the first place is not explained. But instead, Alpha asks, I think, a rather interesting question. It goes on like this, I quote, sometimes people say, if we are all in the same boat, does it really matter? The answer is that it does matter, because of the consequences of sin in our lives. Now that's interesting, and for this reason. What it is saying there is that here is sin, which is a broken relationship with God. Why is that important? Why should we worry about that? Well, we should worry because of the consequences for us. Sin matters, according to the Course, because it has consequences for us. So we might imagine that if it did not have consequences for us, there would be no need to worry about sin any further. So we're persuaded by this that the Course would have us believe that sin is to be thought of primarily in its consequences for us. Well it's true enough there are plenty of consequences of sin in our lives and it lists these in the Course as being the polluting effect of sin making us unclean, the addictive power of sin making us slaves to sin, the penalty for sin that we're going to receive from God, and the effects of sin making a petition between us and God. But it's very revealing that it doesn't talk about the Godward aspect and meaning of sin. What does sin mean to God? Instead, sin is defined purely in terms of us and our self-interest, that it's got consequences for us, it has messed up our lives, it makes us slaves to something, it separates us from God, it's put a position between us and God and rendered us in some way or other liable to a penalty. But what is sin as viewed by God? How does it relate, as it were, to him? How does he regard it? Is it simply a matter of consequences? Is it simply a case that it makes our lives in a mess and we're captive to it? According to Arthur, sin matters because it matters to us rather than because it also matters to God. We'll come back to that later. But anyway, Christ's death then is then brought alongside as the antidote to this condition that man is in, and his achievements on the cross are related to the undoing of those consequences of sin that I mentioned a moment ago. As in week one, this is done through the administration of self-sacrifice drawn from the pages of World War II history. Christ's death upon the cross is proof of self-sacrifice and therefore of love. It is love that is willing to suffer to undo the consequences of our sin. That established, Alpha then moves on to conclude the section. Following an appeal based upon the great love of Christ in dying upon the cross, and the need to make it personal for ourselves, supported by the conversion testimony of the late John Wimber, the founder of the vineyard movement, a charismatic movement in the States, people are again invited to prayer of commitment, and with this, the third week, and therefore the evangelistic part of Alpha, is completed. Well, very briefly now, Lessons 4 to 7 deal with pastoral issues, and that is now the way that the course moves on. Week 5 looks at the Bible, and that is asserted as being the supreme authority for what we do, and various other matters of a largely pastoral nature are dealt with in these weeks. However, we do also learn in Week 5, the lesson on the Bible, that there are other methods of revelation too. I quote, God also speaks to people directly by his spirit, through prophecy, dreams, visions and through other people. And here another general comment is in order. This is one of the early indications of Alpha's overtly charismatic content, something which becomes more and more pronounced as the course goes on. It shouldn't surprise us, in fact the course makes no effort to conceal it. The church that Alpha emanates from, Holy Trinity Brompton, is well known for its charismatic teachings and worship. It has in the past championed the cause of the late John Wimber, leader of the ultra-charismatic vineyard movement. It has played host to the infamous Kansas City Prophets, renowned for their occult methods and their failed prophecies. It was also home to the late Toronto Blessing, and proved to be a willing export centre of this bogus experience to other churches. Alpha is thoroughly and unashamedly charismatic. Charismatic emphases and the extolling of charismatic experiences run throughout the whole of the course. They're unavoidable. The course content and many of the recommended books are charismatic to the core. Anyone determined to use the course, but to try to remove all these books from the reading list or fill it out from it, all the various charismatic parts to get down to the true bones of it, would have a hard job in doing it. They'd also have to doctor all the manuals that there are, because those are charismatic too, and have to explain why they're not doing week 16 or whichever week that they were going to leave out from it. The Alpha course is thoroughly charismatic to the core. Week 6 looks at prayer, week 7 tackles the issue of guidance, and then lessons 8-11 are compressed together and take place during the weekend away. This is another critical part of the course. The exact point at which the weekend away takes place does vary, but usually it's held at this particular point. And what happens here is that charismatic experience is explicitly introduced into the course. Most of the teaching there is on the Holy Spirit. and Alpha's handling of the issue of tongues and other experiences is absolutely typical of what takes place in charismatic churches today. Bodily sensations, tinglings, swoonings, trances, ecstasies, hysterical laughter, and in the aftermath of the Toronto Blessing, just about anything else, is allowed for and attributed to the Holy Spirit. The Weekend Away concludes with a lesson called How Can I Make the Most of the Rest of My Life? and that is the part of the course which people refer to as being the most critical in their coming to what they believe is their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And later on, the God Willing will be coming back to look at that part in more detail. Lessons 12-15 deal with more pastoral and practical guidance and issues such as Does God Heal Today? which again are charismatically handled, are dealt with. Well, we've had to rush this part, but that is the course in a nutshell. Many parts of it are quite unremarkable. Much of the pastoral section is reasonably sound and useful. There are some good quotations that are used, lots of Bible references. It does uphold orthodox views of Christ. It more than mentions the cross. And it is intent on instilling good moral practice, especially in the matter of relationships with members of the opposite sex. Consequently, the admirers and champions of Alpha comprise a veritable who's who of Evangelicals. Among them we find George Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, David Hope, the Archbishop of York, R.T. Kendall, Alasdair McGrath, Louis Palau, J.R. Packer, Wayne Broodham, the late John Wimber, and most of the leaders of the UK charismatic movement such as Gerald Coates, Roger Forster, and Terry Virgo. The Evangelical Alliance is also a supporter of the Alpha Course. In fact, a recent report by the Evangelical Alliance into the ingredients for successful evangelism, based upon the survey they conducted amongst constituent churches, found the Alpha Course to be a most congenial method, relying as it does upon the use of small groups and relationship building. Interestingly, 69% of Evangelical Alliance churches use alpha, 69%, and this rises to 75% if you take into account those who at the time of the survey were anticipating that they would use it in the future. Well that's the descriptive part completed, there's a lot more we could have said, but we now move on to examine rather more closely, is this evangelistic material in particular adequate? Well, first of all, it has to be said, in the light of the ringing endorsements of Alpha, that it is something of an anti-climax to have to say that the amount of material that is recognisably evangelistic is actually very, very small. We might have picked this up as we were going along. In fact, just three out of the 15 lessons are, in any sense, remotely evangelistic. And this is really quite strange. Remember, it is the evangelistic success of the course which usually draws the favorable comment from users and observers of the course. So it's puzzling that the proportion of the course devoted to making the gospel comprehensible to the unconverted is in reality extremely small. If we were looking for the relentless pursuit of sinners to win them to Christ, or constant appeals, we would look in vain. They're not there. In fact, after week three, the whole tack about her changes course. So by week four, the topic has moved on to that of assurance. It's entitled, How can I be sure of my faith? Alpha believes that in the first three weeks of the course, enough faith, as it were, has been imparted to us that we've got something that we need to be sure of in the first place. The attitude is one of an inclusive, now we're all Christians together, and the problems discussed are mostly those that would apply to Christians. Indeed, if you read the book Questions of Life, Nicky Gumbel's style then perceptively changes, and now he lets us into the secrets and struggles of his own Christian experience. So we have to see from this that there is the potential here for people to be seriously misled. They are in danger of being assured of something that they never had in the first place. If ever there was a danger of building with wood, hay and stubble, it was this. Really, its understanding of what is conversion hinges upon praying the prayer at the end of week three. This sort of prayer of commitment, if you've done that, that's it, the matter is clinched and sealed. People are told at the time that this is the thing to do if they're not really sure whether they're Christians or not, that this will do it for them, this will bring them in. And from then on, Alpha assumes that having prayed that prayer, you now have faith, and that all after that is a matter of assuring you that you're a Christian, and setting you then on the course towards the pastoral guidance that it has in the weeks that follow. There's nothing in week four to test whether true repentance and saving faith have been experienced by any of the people on the course. There's nothing to check whether there's been conviction of sin, or real grasp of the need for divine mercy, or an understanding that Christ and he alone can save. All that the council are weak for is believe the promises of God's word that it applies to you and stick with that. And that of course can be downright misleading if people are not converted in the first place. So it's curious. A course claiming to be an evangelistic success actually has very little space or understanding devoted to the gospel and to evangelistic reasoning. We can amplify this further. In fact, it risks misleading people because Alfred Hart is muddled in its aims. It's by its own admission for non-Christians, and new Christians, and young Christians, and those who want to brush up on the basics of their faith. It's trying to meet all of these needs at once. And it's not always clear who it is actually talking to. That at one moment it seems to be talking to us as if we're non-Christians, and the next as if we're Christians, and it's rather muddled in who it is actually addressing. So we find, for example, when it talks about the Holy Spirit, that having assumed that you must be a Christian if you've got that far, all of its reasoning then, irrespective of whether we're Christians or not, assumes that we've made it and that we're there. So it tells us this about the Holy Spirit. God wants to fill every one of us with his Spirit. Some people are longing for this, some are not sure that they want it, in which case they do not really have a thirst. If you do not have a thirst for more of the Spirit's fullness, why not pray for such a thirst? God takes us as we are. When we thirst and ask, God will give us the free gift of the water of life. it's all very inclusive, it assumes that you are a Christian. And even if one goes along for the sake of an argument here with the charismatic reasoning that you have this conversion and then a subsequent experience, if you hadn't been converted in the first place, it's trying as it were to baptise its members into this baptism in the Spirit, irrespective of whether they're converted or not. To try and persuade a non-Christian to receive the Spirit would be a contradiction in terms. How could they? They haven't put their faith in Christ yet. Yet this is the advice that is given on the Alpha course. So, when we ask the question, how can I be filled with the Spirit? Alpha answers this. If you would like to be filled with the Spirit, you might like to find someone who would pray with you. If you don't have anyone who would be able to pray for you, there is nothing to stop you from praying on your own. The invitation is thrown wide open. If you want to be filled with the Spirit, then you can, according to this. Nothing to stop you praying for yourselves and to receive the gift of tongues. The fact that we may not actually be converted doesn't seem to come into the equation at all. And a non-Christian could easily respond to that invitation, start speaking in tongues and conclude that they must therefore be a Christian. And those who are the course leaders on the course would have no reason to doubt that claim. It is highly muddled, even using the standard terminology of Pentecostal charismatic theology. Only Christians who know Christ can truly thirst for the filling of the Spirit. Non-Christians need conversion, not to be filled with the Spirit. While more perceptive course leaders may be allied to that problem, many would perhaps not make that mistake of assuming automatically that the person has become a Christian after week three. but they'd have to work it out for themselves, because it's in none of the leadership manuals. There is no training given to anybody to understand when a person is under conviction of sin, whether they've truly repented or truly put their faith in Christ. Everything just presses ahead on the assumption that once you've prayed the prayer, you're all now on board, and it's left to the ingenuity of a course leader, because the materials give them no guidance on that matter. The central problem with Alpha is a relatively simple one, and it causes a whole host of related problems. Ultimately, its message is not about God, it is essentially about us. But we'll have to defer until our next meeting, God willing, to examine that a little bit further, to see how, where we have already discussed those points, this relates to that ultimate problem. It's not God-centred, it's man-centred. Can we just stop for a moment, just to see if anybody has got questions for clarification? Yes, indeed. We'll try and press into the next session, but just to see if there's any matters people would be able to pick up on the way up. I don't think they actually answer the question that they set out to. They set out to answer the question, why did Christ die? They have a few circles around it, but they can't quite get at the heart of it, which is, of course, that he had to die to satisfy the demands of the law that requires that sin, the wages of sin, is death. Instead it tries to offer Christ's work on the cross as being a gesture of love, that this was some great sort of gesture of love that he did. And he uses the cross, I think wrongly, to try to persuade us that God isn't sort of boring and dull and unloving. But look, he's done this, he must be loving, so believe in him. This is his great gesture of love. And the cross becomes like a kind of visual illustration to try to put out the bad idea that God is somehow a judge or that God is a God of wrath. And instead tries to present to us a God of love who must be a God of love because he sent his son to die upon the cross. Of course there's truth in that, but he had to die because he was satisfying the law of God. That's why I was saying that sin matters because it has consequences, it were Godhood, because the wages of sin is death. Christ had to die because of that, but it never tells us that on the course. It's instead a sort of, this is a great gesture of love and that's all, nothing else more than that. Any other questions? We've had to proceed quite briskly through the 15 weeks or so of it there, but is there anything else that you wanted to ask? Have you ever had conversations with anyone who's been through the Alpha Course and has been disappointed by it? I have. In fact, just the night before last, somebody was speaking to me from the Swindon area, and they had been on the Alpha Course and thought this was, you know, perhaps a great thing to go on. But their observations of it were that, say at the Holy Spirit weekend or day, whatever they had, it was all highly manipulated and the leaders were sort of going through the motions of falling over and doing all these things that they do to try to get everybody else to do it. They also, he observed when he was on the course there, that it gave people a real high, but then they sort of dropped down during the week and they were needing to get to the next alpha course, they needed to get back up on that high again and enjoy the sort of warmth of the small group feeling. So he had some interesting observations on it. Another comment I heard from somebody who knew a friend who had been on the Alpha Course and had a rather traumatic experience when they're praying for these things to happen and had vowed that they would never, never again darken the door of a church as a result of having been on one of these Alpha Course weekends. So we've had some anecdotal evidence like that, that not everybody's enjoying it or happy with it. Is there any evidence that people have been truly connected to these objects? I've yet to see any. I have been following the Alpha story for about five years now. When it first began to emerge I thought, this needs watching. And I used to accumulate all the materials that came from Holy Trinity Brompton. And you get, quite often, they publish these testimonies of people that supposedly have been converted on the course. But when you look at those testimonies, you're left wondering just really what happened to the person. Because the ingredients of a real understanding of what Christ has done, or their need for mercy from God, just are not there. And instead there are other things that are present that really boil down to this self-centredness rather than God-centredness. So I have yet to see any. I've corresponded with people who've run the Alpha courses and assure me that they're seeing great conversions and the rest of it, and said, well, tell me, where do these take place? Is it your weekend away, or where does it happen? At one stage, I think it was 88% of people who did the Alpha course were converted at the Holy Spirit so-called weekend. And I think that's quite alarming, because they, as we'll see next time, they're actually basing their conclusions that they're a Christian on the fact that they fell over, or that they laughed, or that some strange experience or phenomena happened. And at that stage, I'd say it was 88% of people who did the Alpha course and thought they'd found God as a result of it, put it down to the weekend. And I think it's probably about the same still. But these churches that I've asked if they would tell me, well, how you're doing it is different, Not one has actually replied to tell me, and that's, well, it's months back now, I've written to them, but they haven't replied. So I haven't seen any evidence. Some day I'll work with, her daughter went on to the article, and she was really pleased to see it, because she said, she will go down to my service, and she said, it's sort of exciting, what is it? And she said, it's really for young people, and they don't want to go to a traditional service, to get them used to going to church? Yes, yes. I think it highlights the place that there is for evangelistic bible studies and for places where people can ask questions, yes. I think where it fails is that it doesn't offer the right leadership of those discussions. It's far too free and easy and freewheeling everywhere. It doesn't correct enough where there's nonsense that's being promoted. And what it also does, it brings everything down. I mentioned that you often start with a joke and that really pervades it. The written material is better than the videos, but the videos really, it's just a joke a minute. Some of the better written material has actually been sacrificed in order to bring in space for more jokes and things. So you've got various anecdotes and all sorts of funny stories and that, which have their place in an after-dinner speech, maybe, but not really an evangelistic course. So there is a place for evangelistic bible studies, there is a place for things with meals and things where people come to which is not a worship service. Where it misses it still is that the tone and the style of it is still too irreverent. Nevertheless, you have to conduct the thing and lead it properly. Otherwise, it's just going to be a sloppy free-for-all and a joke a minute. And really, that's what Alpha looks like. Let's say, if you saw the videos of it, you get this audience of people. It is. It's like an after-dinner show or something like that. They're all sitting there, hanging on every word that comes. And it really just doesn't have the atmosphere or the seriousness of the message