Hope and Belonging - 10 Years of Safe Families in Scotland

This was a talk I gave at an event to celebrate 10 years of Safe Families. The event was at The Faith Mission on 26th October 2024.

Well, it’s great to see so many friends here today to join in this celebration of 10 years of hope and belonging for families.

As we look back and look forward, we wanted to do that with the people that had made all this possible, our staff, volunteers and supporters.

Looking back

Nearly 30 years ago I started my career in social work not very far from here in Howdenhall road.  I still remember my first shift in Howdenhall Secure Unit in November 1995.

We were working with some of the most damaged and traumatised children in Scotland.

Some of them were violent but most of them were just scared, lonely kids who were desperate for love and a sense of belonging.

I still remember taking 2-3 kids sledging on Christmas Day because they had no safe home to go to.

I remember thinking at the time ‘how is our system so dysfunctional that we allow children to get to the point where they need to be locked up in units that cost £5-6k per week?

Wouldn’t it be better for children, for society, for cost efficiency that we get involved with families earlier before the damage is done?

Why don’t we design services around what families need and want rather than waiting until children need to come into care?

Why don’t services conform to family’s needs rather silos and departments designed by accountants rather than practitioners?

So often we don’t step back and ask the simple question: what actually brings change?

How are people transformed?  What gives people hope?

When we are in crisis, when we are feeling low, we seek out the people we love don’t we?

Its connection that fuels hope. Its love that sustains and fortifies us.  Its community that makes us feel safe and supported.

Some of us need professional services, but most of the time we prefer informal support don’t we?  What if we could create a service like that?  

So, when I first heard about Safe Families, I didn’t need much persuading.

The question was, could it become a reality in Scotland?

In 2013 I was working for Bethany Christian Trust and I saw first hand what could be done in partnership with the local church to eradicate homelessness.  Partnership, collaboration, vision could create night shelters, deliver food on the streets, provide addiction services and support churches to offer hope in deprived communities.  What if we could partner with churches to offer hope and belonging to families?  And so, in October 2014 Safe Families was born.  If it wasn't born, its future was certainly cemented in a coffee shop at the top of Leith Street when Lyn Hair and I met and I asked her if she would come on as out first Senior Family Support Manager.

I want to pay tribute to Lyn today. I don’t think I’m exaggerating to say that if it wasn’t for Lyn, there would be no Safe Families in Scotland.  Lyn was our first family support worker, volunteer trainer, volunteer assessor, grant application writer, staff trainer and many, many other things.  Thanks Lyn, we appreciate all that you brought to Safe Families over so many years.

Over the last 10 years we have grown and developed.  Our big breakthrough was in 2018 with a big contract with CEC that lasted for 5 years.  That funding came to an end last year but we are delighted that in the middle of an incredibly challenging financial environment, we have got new funding in Edinburgh that will take us through to 2026.  Safe Families will be involved in family support hubs where families can get the help they need when they need it.

We have had the privilege of touching the lives of 100’s of families.

From October 2014 Safe Families in Scotland have:

• Received 1640 referrals

• Visited over 1000 families

• Connected 764 families to a volunteer

450 in Edinburgh

107 ML

81 EL

90 WL

• Hosted 47 families

• 1682 children have benefited

• 451 volunteers have supported a family

We are now in 9 local authorities in Scotland and around 55 around the UK.  Over the next year we will work with around 280 families in the course of one year across Scotland.  We are now in the Western Isles, the Lothians, Perth, Fife, Clackmannanshire, Aberdeenshire and we are in discussions with Stirling and there is in interest in the Borders and Falkirk.

As I have often said, Safe Families for me, is about ordinary people doing extraordinary things.  It’s about a volunteer knocking on a door where hope is in short supply, and offering love and connection.

And we see that in our outcomes:

· 95% of families have maintained or increased their social networks

· 93% have maintained or increased their happiness and wellbeing

· 92% have increased their confidence and self esteem

· 89% have maintained or increased their physical needs

· 91% reported that their family relationships had maintained or improved

· And 92% reported that their positive parenting had maintained or improved.

These outcomes are great but it’s the love and compassion behind these percentages that bring transformation to families.

Tomorrow, I’m speaking on Luke 10 – ‘who is my neighbour?’  Is your community just the people you like? Just the people who look like you?  Or are we called to stop and pick up the people who have been battered by others and have been left for dead.  The thing about a good Samaritan is that its messy. That’s why the Priest and the Levite walked past.  Its much easier to go to an elders meeting, or a finance committee or a Presbytery.  There are nice, neat agenda’s and there is a beginning and an end.

Safe Families is about the spare place at our table.  Radical hospitality with no strings attached.  It’s not just about offering a better service, its about creating a more compassionate society.  As Dr Thomas Guthrie often said, ‘an ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure.’

Many of you have loved the one in front of you so well.  Today is a chance to for us to say thank you and to celebrate together this milestone in the history of Safe Families.

We’ve had some amazing events over the years –

• Family Fun Days at Arniston House
• Our 5-year anniversary in the Scottish Parliament,
• Our Black-Tie event back in April at Inchyra.

We have. and continue to have some amazing staff who bring hope and belonging into the lives of families every day.

But when I look back on the last 10 years – the thing I want to celebrate the most is the unseen and the ordinary.

• The text to a struggling mum in her darkest moment during lockdown.

• The volunteer taking out a child who is struggling with crippling anxiety.

• The volunteers who take out the non-verbal neuro-diverse boy so his granny can have a couple of hours to herself.

• To the volunteer who helps a mum to empty rubbish bags that have been filled with dirty nappies form months.

• To the volunteer who still meets a mum months after the support has officially come to an end.

• The volunteer who takes the teenager with no confidence to the careers fayre.

Amazing acts of love and kindness that never hit the headlines and never results in publicity.

That for me is Safe Families, and that is what we are here ore celebrate today.  Somebody once said: ‘I’m not interested in whether you’ve stood with the great: I’m interested in whether you’ve sat with the broken.’

Thank for all of you who have done that so well.  Through your love, you have given 100's of children the most amazing memories in the midst of really tough times.  

As Fredrick Douglass once said: 'It is so much easier to build strong children than repair broken men' and I want to thank for all you have done to help children to thrive over the last 10 years.

Looking forward

Today as we stand at the crossroads of hopefully another 10 years, we are a new merged organisation with our friends from Home for Good.  Not only are we supporting families, but we are also seeking to find homes for young people who desperately need love and security.  Home for Good have excellent resources and training to encourage more people to foster, adopt or provide supported lodgings to teenagers.  If you are exploring fostering you can speak to the enquiry team here.  You can also sign up for an information event.

When Safe Families started in 2014 there were 15,500 looked after children in Scotland.  Today that number has reduced to 12,206.  It is great to see this number reduced, but for too many of our children we are still failing as a country.  20-30% of these children who are looked after will go on to be involved in the criminal justice system.

For the 3004 children who entered the care system in Scotland last year, around 700 of them are waiting for foster care, adoption and supported lodgings.  This is a huge opportunity for the church in Scotland to step forward.

Imagine if every church becomes a haven for families in crisis and a church where foster carers and adopters feel loved and supported by their church community?  Our vision is for a country where nobody feels alone because everyone deserves to belong.  We want to create relationship and connection so families experience love and hope in the midst of crisis.  

Over the last week we were looking at Matthew 10 when Jesus commissions the 12.  He said to his disciples ‘Freely you have received, freely give.’  We want to freely give as we seek to get alongside family who are desperate for hope and belonging in Scotland today.

We would love to expand our scope and reach, and we can only do that with partnering with more supporters, churches and local authorities.

Thank you for all you’ve done and as we look forward to the next 10 years, we would love for you to come on this journey with us.

Please spread the word to friends, to churches that together, we can make a difference.  As Martin Luther King often said 'lets, together, build a tunnel of love through the mountain of despair.'

For more information about Safe Families please click on this link.

If you would like to access some great training, sign up here.

Good News for the Poor - an interview with the Banner of Truth

This was an interview I recently gave at the Banner of Truth.  I chat a little about shinty, my background, how I came to Christ, my research and writing on Dr Thomas Guthrie and my work over the last 9 years with Safe Families.  If you want to know more about Safe Families and support the work please click on this Safe Families  

'His Pity was Ever Active'

This was a talk given at Duncan Street Baptist Church Men's Fellowship Edinburgh on 4th May 2024.

When Dr Guthrie died on 24th February 1873 the funeral was arranged for 4 days later on the 28th of February.

The procession stretched for a mile from the Grange Cemetery down to Salisbury Road where the Guthrie’s lived. There were over 30,000 lining the streets to say farewell to one of Scotland’s favourite sons.

But today his statue stands in Princes Street Gardens and thousands walk past every week without the faintest clue who he was or what he achieved under God for the cause of the gospel.

What I want to do this morning is whet your appetite for an incredibly inspiring figure from an exciting period of church history in Scotland.

Biographical sketches can sometimes crush and depress us. I don’t want to do that today.

Rather, I want to encourage you that Thomas Guthrie faced many of the same challenges you do, but he believed in the power of a big God and a beautiful Saviour.

Guthrie’s life and legacy is a vast subject so let me try and achieve 3 things this morning.

1. Let me give a very quick snapshot of his life.

2. Let me share a little about his incredible impact as a church planter, social reformer and preacher.

3. Let me draw 4 lessons from his life that can inspire and encourage us today.

A Brief Overview of Guthrie’s Life

Thomas Guthrie was born on 12th July 1803 in the Angus town of Brechin to David and Clemintine Guthrie.

He was born four years after the French Revolution and his childhood was in the shadow of the Napoleonic Wars.  As a 12-year-old Thomas Guthrie saw the 42nd Regiment of Highlanders marching in to Edinburgh after the battle of Waterloo in 1815.

He was the second youngest of 13 children - three died in infancy and of the remaining 10 who survived, there were 6 brothers and 3 sisters.

Sent off to Edinburgh university at the tender age of 12 he acknowledges in later life that this was far too young.

He studied four years of philosophy and literature and then a further 4 of theology.  He then studied for another 2 years: chemistry, anatomy and natural history. He attended the lectures of Dr Knox famous for the Burke and Hare murders.  This sparked a lifelong interest in medicine, and he used to prescribe medicine for minor ailments as a parish minister.

Despite clear ability, Guthrie had to wait 5 years to be called to a charge.  During this time, he went to the Sorbonne in France to study and he returned to work in his father’s bank. This allowed Guthrie to hone his preaching skills and to spend time working and getting to know the frustrations of everyday life.

Eventually Guthrie was called to Arbirlot in Angus in 1830 where he proved to be an innovative and diligent pastor for the next 7 years.

In 1837 he was called to Old Greyfriars Parish Church as a collegiate minister to Rev John Sym.

In 1840 he planted St John’s Parish Church in Victoria Street.  The congregation left at the disruption and worshiped in Nicholson Square while they were building Free St John’s which is now St Columba’s Free Church.

He is remembered for launching the Ragged School movement in 1847 after his elders took cold feet and pulled back from supporting it in Free St John's.  His book 'A Plea for Ragged School' was like 'a spark amongst combustibles' and his leadership and vision led to a nationwide and world wide movement.

He was a leader of the temperance movement and wrote the powerful book ‘The City its Sins and Sorrows’ in 1857 to call for radical change to the availability of ‘dram shops’ and ‘gin palaces’.

Guthrie raised an incredible £116,000 in 1845 to build over 700 manses after the disruption.  He was known as the 'Big Beggar Man' as he toured 13 synods and 58 Presbyteries.  

He struggled with a weak heart but continued to write and edit The Sunday Magazine well into his late 60’s after retiring from Free St John’s in 1864.

He died in February 1873. Some of his last words of himself were ‘a brand plucked from the burning.’

Guthrie the Church Planter

By the time Dr Guthrie came to Old Greyfriars in Edinburgh in 1837 he was already convinced of the need for church planting particularly amongst the poor although there is little that could have prepared him for his new parish. He says:

‘I can compare it to nothing else than the change from the green fields and woods and the light of nature to venturing into the darkness and blackness of the coal pit. Guthrie was already an advocate of the revived Parochial System: a church at the very doors of the poor, the church free to all without distinction, properly equipped schools, elders, deacons and district visitors to assist the minister in his pastoral work.’

His vision was for a new kind of church and work began on St John’s in Victoria Street in 1838. When Dr Guthrie entered his new pulpit on 19th November 1840, he could never have imagined that his tenure would be only 2 short years before the congregation would leave at the Disruption.

But in 1840 St John’s in Victoria Street become a beacon of hope for the poor. It was to be a new kind of church where the poor were welcome to hear the gospel without money and without price. Only the balcony continued to be rented out to the wealthier residents of Edinburgh and brought in a healthy income of £280 per year.

Thirty elders and fifteen deacons were allotted districts where they actively sought out non church goers and assisted the poor in practical ways. Dr Guthrie saw the church like a parish well and said: how often have I wished that the parish church was more like the parish well, a well of salvation where all might draw and drink. Finally, in St John’s this vision was realised.

While Thomas Chalmers may have been the great pioneer of church planting in the pre-Disruption Church of Scotland, Guthrie was one of his most zealous followers. Both men were in the vanguard of what Dr Cook of Belfast called a glorious enterprise of Christian aggressions upon the region of popular ignorance.

It is incredible to think that between 1835 and 1841 the Church of Scotland raised a staggering £300,000 and 222 churches were built. Men like Guthrie were not ‘hand ringers’ but men of action.

Let’s take encouragement from the words of Thomas Chalmers at a Church Extension meeting in 1838 where he commended the work that Guthrie was to undertake in St John’s Edinburgh: 

‘I know that my friend Dr Guthrie is a house-going minister, and I also know this is the patent way to create a church-going people. I trust that when this arrangement shall be exemplified in the Cowgate, and multiplied over Edinburgh, it will be found that – what no adjustment of political or civil wisdom has been able to effect – the harmonisation of all classes of society shall be at last effected through the medium of Gospel ministrations, and by the omnipotence of Gospel charity.’

Guthrie the Social Reformer

Dr Thomas Guthrie is famous for his 'Ragged Schools'. The schools went on to become a huge movement that saved thousands of children from a life of crime and abuse. But as with every great movement it had humble beginnings at Guthrie's newly built church in 1847. They had a huge room in the basement and the elders initially agreed to set up a ragged industrial feeding school for '20-30 waifs'. As time drew near for the launch the elders took fright and the project was abandoned. While Guthrie was cast down, and felt like a man who has 'launched a good sturdy boat, sees her before she has taken ten strokes from the shore seized by a mighty billow, flung back, and dashed to pieces on the strand.'

In 'Out of Harness' which are Sunday Magazine articles collected and published in 1883, Guthrie sees the Lord's providence in this initial disappointment.  He says 'Baffled in this direction another lay open to me.  I might leave the limits of St John's congregation, and of the Free Church, to launch out on the open sea; I might throw myself on the Christian public, irrespective of sect or party; for were these children saved, it was nothing to me to what church they might attach themselves, or whose arm plucked them from destruction.'

The first or ‘original’ ragged school in Edinburgh was established in 1847 in a small room on the Castle Hill. The main building that was eventually used is now part of Camera Obscura and the open bible can still be seen above the door with the words ‘Search the Scriptures’ (John 5 v 39) engraved on it.

The original Ragged School brought together different responses to the needs of these desperate children; education, regular meals, clothes, ‘industrial training’ and Christian instruction. All this was done in an environment of discipline and structure although there is never a sense that the schools were harsh or austere.

The ragged children who attended the school/s did not remain overnight but were in school for 12 hours in the summer and 11 hours in the winter. The day started at 8am with the rather painful sounding ‘ablutions’ and the children were dismissed at 7:15pm after supper. Guthrie describes the daily routine; ‘in the morning they are to break their fast on a diet of the plainest fare, - then march from their meal to their books; in the afternoon they are again to be provided with a dinner of the cheapest kind, - then back again to school; from which after supper, they return not to the walls of an hospital, but to their own homes. There, carrying with them a holy lesson, they may prove Christian missionaries to those dwellings of darkness and sin.'

Guthrie the Preacher

There is a famous story about Dr Thomas Guthrie when he was visiting the studio of an artist. An unfinished picture lay on an easel and Guthrie suggested one or two adjustments that might improve the painting. The artist responded: ‘Dr Guthrie, remember you are a preacher and not a painter.’ With his usual rapier wit Guthrie responded: ‘Beg your pardon, my good friend, I am a painter; only I paint in words, while you use brush and colours.’

While Guthrie’s enduring legacy is his work as a social reformer, his highest calling was always preaching. His colleague, Rev Dr Hanna, said of him: ‘No readier speaker ever stepped on a platform.’ Whatever Guthrie may have lacked in fine theology he made up for in passion and imagery. One anonymous writer said:

‘His oratory wanted none of the polish that distinguished Chalmers’ wild whirlwind bursts, or Hall’s grandly ascending periods, but it had qualities entirely of its own. More, perhaps, than any other preacher of his time, he had the power or knack of fixing truths on the memory. He sent them home as if they had been discharged from a battery, and fixed them there by a process peculiar to himself.’

Guthrie’s pattern of preparation was mainly to study in the early morning. After breakfast he would retire to the vestry where he could be heard rehearsing his sermon. He believed in ‘committing’ his sermon to memory and was scathing of ‘readers’ (those who rigidly read from a script). Like all great preachers, Guthrie spent many hours in preparation and believed ‘that God does not give excellence to men but as the reward of labour.’ Even once his sermons were finished he would revise them: ‘After my discourse was written, I spent hours in correcting it; latterly always for that purpose, keeping a blank page on my manuscript opposite a written one, cutting out dry bits, giving point to dull ones, making clear any obscurity, and narrative parts more graphic, throwing more pathos into appeals, and copying God in His works by adding the ornamental to the useful.’

Despite a deep grasp of truth as can be seen in his published sermons, Guthrie believed in simplicity in his sermons: ‘I used the simplest, plainest terms, avoiding anything vulgar, but always, where possible, employing the Saxon tongue – the mother tongue of my hearers. I studied the style of the addresses with the ancient and inspired prophets delivered to the people of Israel, and saw how, differing from the dry inquisitions or a naked statement of truths, they abound in metaphors, figures, and illustrations.’ As with his character, Guthrie blended a perfect mix of truth and love, passion and solemnity. As he says in a letter to Rev Laurie of Tulliallan: ‘The easier your manner, without losing the character of seriousness and solemnity, so much the better. Vigour and birr, without roaring and bellowing, are ever to be aimed at.’

What can we learn from Thomas Guthrie?

1. Vision - Guthrie had incredible vision. He literally, by God's grace, changed Scotland. His vision was not shaped by the challenges of 19th Century Scotland but rather shaped by the greatness of the God he served. He believed that the Christian gospel could save anyone and transform any community. While others saw homeless and ragged children as burdens or a nuisance, Guthrie saw in these street children the potential for moral and spiritual change. By the time of his death Guthrie had, along with many other social reformers, changed childhood. Rather than being seen as commodities, towards the end of the 19th Century, children were seen as those in need of protection and nurture. Partly as a result of lobbying from social reformers like Guthrie legislation was passed protecting children from working long hours in often dangerous situations.

The DNA of men like Thomas Guthrie and Thomas Chalmers is that they had a big vision. It wasn't a congregational vision or even a Free Church vision but a national vision. Through church extension, the Manse Fund, education and his incredible work with Ragged Schools, Guthrie gave us a great example of the need for a coherent Christian vision for Scotland.

2. Truth - Like so many Christians who get involved in social action, Guthrie never lost his moorings when he become a social reformer. It is clear from his writings that he adhered to the bible as the word of God and remained confessionally Reformed throughout his ministry. He believed in the supremacy and centrality of preaching as the main method that God uses to save sinners. There is no evidence that he ever watered down his preaching or softened his stance on any major Christian doctrine as he became the figurehead for social reform in 19th Century Scotland.

3. Love - As a minister of the gospel, Guthrie embodied love. We are told in James that 'Pure religion and undefiled before God, even the Father, is this, to visit the fatherless, and widows in their adversity, and to keep himself unspotted from the world' James 1 v 27. The fruit of true Christianity is always love for the poor and the oppressed. Many people regard practical love for the poor as a deviation from the gospel. Nothing could be further from the truth. Guthrie's work with ragged children enhanced his message and gave his Christianity a reality and authenticity that made the gospel attractive to sinners. His love was on display throughout the week as he visited some of the worst closes and stairs in the Cowgate, Edinburgh. He was regularly broken by the sights that he saw. Love was the great motivation of his ministry.

This was the same for men like CH Spurgeon as Alex DiPrima says in his excellent book 'Spurgeon and the Poor; ‘Spurgeon believed gospel proclamation and social ministry ought to be inseparable in the work of the church. Good works of love and mercy toward the poor are the hands and feet of the gospel message. The Christian community should be marked by compassion for the poor, and this compassion should adorn the proclamation of the gospel.’ 

4. Hope - It was this combination of truth and love that gave Guthrie such hope for the communities he worked in and for the individuals he sought to reach. The gospel, when preached in all its fullness and freeness, should fill every sinner with a sense of hope that Christ died to reconcile them to a holy God. The church has gone though many periods when this message has been lost or when she has lost confidence in the power of this gospel to reach the darkest and most hopeless parts of our communities. Guthrie (among others) gave the Free Church the belief that the gospel, accompanied by education for the poor and the practical outworking of love through the local church could redeem the darkest and most hopeless communities.

As we said at the start Guthrie’s funeral took place on 28th February 1873.  230 children from the Ragged School attended his funeral and one little girl was overheard saying ‘he was all the father I ever knew.’

Dr Candlish took his funeral and preached on Hebrews 9 v 27, 28. He said;

‘Men of talents, men of abilities, men of learning, are not uncommon. Men powerful in thought are often raised up: but genius, real poetic genius, like Guthrie’s come but once in many generations. We shall not look upon his like soon, if ever. Nor was it genius alone that distinguished him. The warm heart and the ready hand; the heart to feel, and the hand to work. No sentimental dreamer or mooning idealist was he. His pity was ever active.’

May we know some of that 'active pity' as we seek to win Scotland for Christ.  

Fully Known and Fully Loved

Over the last weekend we have celebrated the Lords Supper.  This is always a special time in the experience of every believer.  We are reminded in a very visual way of Christ's sacrifice on the cross - how His body was broken and His blood shed.  In our own Free Church tradition there is often a reluctance to come forward to the Lord's Table.  While this can lead to some believers never publically professing, it has, certainly in the past, meant that people take this step seriously and conscientiously.  As John Kennedy said of Highland Christianity: 'They were grave not gloomy. They had the light cheerfulness of broken hearts.  They did not, like others take it for granted that they were "the Lord's," they could not, like others speak peace to themselves; but, unlike many others, they were dependent on the Lord for their hope and joy.' 

Kirsteen and I were delighted over the weekend that our oldest son was given the strength to profess Christ publically for the first time.  I have often wondered why James hasn't done this before but we never pushed him and hoped that in time, he would be given the strength.  Parenting is like a long distance endurance race.  Often you feel exhausted and alone.  Often you feel that you are having little impact.  Then occasionally you are reminded that all your prayers, and all the times you had family worship with squirming kids who were long past their bed time, all the late nights holding a little hand through a cot, all the bed time stories all count for something.  Of course we love our children regardless of whether they profess or not, but to see my own son seated at the Lords Table brought a tear to my eye today. The Lord has very graciously allowed James to overlook a very imperfect example from his father and look to the Lord who alone saves.

In his Memoirs Dr Thomas Guthrie talks about one of his parishioners, a weaver named 'James Dundas' who lived on the north-west boundary of the Arbirlot Parish.  Guthrie claims Dundas lived an isolated existence and had no society (beyond his wife) but that of God and nature.  Like others in rural Scotland at that time Dundas was known as a bit of a poet and known for 'lofty thoughts, and a singularly vivid imagination.' 

Guthrie relates a story about Dundas and a loss of assurance on a Communion Sabbath; 'He rose, bowed down by a sense of sin, in great distress of mind; he would go to the church that day, but being a man of a very tender conscience, he hesitated about going to the Lords table; deep was answering to deep at the noise of God's waterspouts, and all God's billows and waves were going over him; he was walking in darkness, and had no light.  In this state he proceeded to put himself in order for church, and while washing his hands, one by one, he heard a voice say, "Cannot I, in my blood, as easily wash your soul, as that water wash your hands?" "Now Minister," he said, in telling me this, "I do not say there was a real voice, yet I heard it very distinctly, word for word, as you now hear me.  I felt a load taken off my mind, and went to the Table and sat under Christ's shadow with great delight" (Memoir and Autobiography, 1896, p 115).   

We were reminded by Chris Davidson this morning from Psalm 139 of a God who relentlessly pursues sinners.  As deep as sin goes, grace goes deeper.  Where sin abounds grace much more abounds.  The Lord's Table reminds us of a God who has not just come to earth to save us, but a God who has gone to the cross.  At the Cross we see a Saviour who loves us more than we can ever imagine.  This morning Chris quoted Tim Keller who said on his book about marriage; 'To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretence, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.'  Surely this is what the Lord's Supper is all about - to be known in all our sin and yet loved by our Saviour is surely the greatest love of all.

 

The Widow of Zarephath and the Power of Littles

The Bible is full of stories of very ordinary people being used to do extraordinary things. One of these is the widow of Zarephath in 1 Kings 17.  The Prophet Elijah asks her for 'a little water in a vessel, that I may drink'. This is remarkable because the country is in the middle of a drought.  Elijah has just been at the brook Cherith which has dried up.  Water was in short supply. Elijah then asks the widow 'to bring me a morsel of bread in your hand'. The widow would have every right to object and explain that she was at the absolute end of her resources, but she doesn't.  The little she has she goes to make for the prophet.  It turns out it is literally all she has and once she has made it she intends to die with her son.  What little the widow has she gives freely to sustain the work of the Lord.  Her sacrifice and service are total - she gives everything.  But her faithfulness is rewarded and God through Elijah multiplies what little she has. 

What can we learn from the widow of Zarephath?

Sometimes Jesus calls very ordinary people to do extraordinary things.  

Sometimes we feel we can do little or nothing in the service of God.  How could God use us?  But God often uses 'ordinary people'.  Think of Hagar, David, Gideon, Ruth, Mary and the disciples.  They weren't people of great talents, great resources or great power.  Yet God used them.  Sometimes God does raise up great people but generally he calls very ordinary people to carry out his purposes, and sometimes ordinary people can do amazing things. 

The Widow of Zarephaph sustained Elijah with the last of her food. Ruth stuck by her mother in law and became the mother of Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of David. Look at the geology in Matthew 1 and see how God uses some of the most unlikely people in the lineage of Jesus.  

This was always Dr Thomas Guthrie's view. When he planted St John's Parish Church in 1840 he organised his congregation so that everyone had a job to do and his great motto was 'something for everyone to do and everyone engaged on something'.  As Guthrie said: 'If the world is ever conquered for our Lord, it is not by ministers, nor by office-bearers, nor by the great, and noble and mighty, but by every member of Christ's body being a working member; doing his work; filling his own sphere; holding his own post; and saying to Jesus, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?"

A few weeks ago I walked in to a home where I met a woman in a challenging situation. She was about to have a baby and already had 3 sons under 7.  She had no money, little food and she was very short on hope. Her sons spoke little English.  Within a few days, the charity I work for, Safe Families for Children Scotland, had introduced volunteers who hosted her children while staff took her to hospital to have her baby.  When she returned home the local church was waiting with a bunch of flowers, some bags of food and for the next 4 weeks they organised a rota system to deliver a hot meal every night to the family. It was nothing short of Christian hospitality in action.  There was no fanfare or social media, just ordinary people showing extraordinary love.  

The Widow of Zarephath and her Son by Abraham van Dijck

God often calls people who have few resources to give what they have.

The widow of Zarephath was the last person most of us would have chosen to ask for assistance.  She was the poorest of the poor.  She had next to nothing.  Isn't it amazing how God often asks those of us who don't have much to give what we have?  Think of the widow in Mark 12 who put two copper coins in the offering.  God uses her as the great example of true Christianity as opposed to the hypocrisy of the Pharisees who 'devour widows houses and for a pretence make long prayers.'  The woman who gave what little she had is given as a shining example of what faith looks like as opposed to the religious power brokers who had everything.

Maybe we think we don't have much, but God call us to give what little we have.  All of us have time, love, talents and most of us have a home and a car.  What if we used these things to God's glory?  What if we invited somebody who is lonely for lunch?  What if we visited somebody who is isolated?  What if we volunteered with Safe Families for Children and took a child overnight to give an exhausted family a break?  What if we hosted a fellowship in our home?  God isn't calling us to make excuses, he is calling us to give what little we have in His service.

Maybe you are frightened about giving away the little you have.  What did Elijah say to the widow? 'Do not fear'.  Elijah gave her a promise that though her own resources would soon be exhausted, God's resources are infinite.  God calls us to prioritise the needy.  In Bible terms this is the widow, the orphan, the stranger and the poor.  Why?  Well because this group have nothing to offer us in return. The evidence of God's undeserved grace in our lives is that we show grace to those who have nothing to give us in return.  This was the opposite of the Scribes and the Pharisees who made great show of their religious service. As C.H, Spurgeon says 'Compassion is a great gospel duty, and it must be hearty and practical. When we see a man in distress, we must not pass him by as the Priest and the Levite did, for thus we shall show that our religion is only skin deep, and has never affected our hearts. We must pity, go near and befriend.' 

God multiplies our offering when we give sacrificially

God can take our meagre talents and multiply them for His glory.  Think of the wee boy in John 6 when Jesus fed the 5000.  The disciples could only see the problem.  It would cost 8 months salary to feed everyone. But what about Jesus?  He was moved with compassion on the multitude. Jesus took two loaves and 5 barley loaves and fed thousands. Jesus multiplied an offering that was given in service and sacrifice.  He took the ordinary, multiplied it and made it extraordinary.

What if God could take our time, our home, our car and our love and use it to help a person or family in need?  What if Christians could act together to share the good news, love the poor and build the kingdom of God? This is what Chalmers and Guthrie believed and why they had such an impact on Scotland.  As Guthrie said: 'Separate the atoms that form a hammer, and in that state of minute division they would fall on a stone with no more effect than snowflakes.  Wield them into a solid mass, and swung around by the quarryman's brawny arm, they descend on the rock like a thunderbolt.' 

We have seen this so often in history.  When Christians work together they can have a huge impact on society.  The power of littles can come together and achieve so much more than we can on our own.  We must partner with others who are passionate for the gospel of Jesus, who stand on the authority of Scripture and who have a heart for the poor and marginalised.  As Guthrie says in 'The City its Sins and Sorrows': 'Let each select their own manageable field of Christian work.  Let us thus embrace the whole city, and cover its nakedness, although, with different denominations at work, it should be robed, like Joseph in a coat of many colours.'  

The Widow of Zarephath shows us what can be done with very little.  God can, and does, use the ordinary and can multiply our scant resources for His glory.  We need to obey His call to love the poor and marginalised and give what little we can: 'Fear not little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom.  Sell your possessions, and give to the needy.' Luke 12 v 32, 33.

The Prophet Elijah with the widow of Zarephath and her Son by Abraham van Dijck

Philanthropy grows best in the Soil of Christianity

Philanthropy is not a casual product; it is not a mere outcome of a zeitgeist, or fashion of the age; its roots are deep in the soil of Christianity; it cannot pick up a living either from Paganism, or Agnosticism, or Secularism, or any other system cut off from the influence of the love of Christ.

This is one of the first paragraphs in William Garden Blaikie’s Leaders in Modern Philanthropy published in 1884.  What follows is a barnstorming tour of all the great Christian philanthropists from John Howard, William Wilberforce, Elizabeth Fry, Andrew Reed, Thomas Chalmers, Thomas Guthrie, David Livingstone, William Burns, John Patterson, Agnes Salt and many others.  The claim that some make that Dr Thomas Guthrie was some kind of lone voice in 19^th century Scotland is simply not supported by facts.  Guthrie built on the work of Sheriff Watson in Aberdeen and John Pounds in England.  His work was taken up by many particularly Lord Shaftesbury in England.  He was part of a wider movement that rediscovered evangelical theology and roused a sleeping church to the Biblical mandate of fighting for justice and showing mercy to the marginalised.  Their work sprang from their theology.

Rev W.G. Blackie

Despite the UK’s departure from its Christian heritage, much of our society remains rooted in the Bible.  The idea that we are all equal in the sight of the law, the idea of education for all, the concept of compassion for the poor are inextricably linked to a Biblical view of humanity.  If you don’t think this is important look closely at other society’s and see the radical difference.  The foundational Christian belief that man is made in the image of God has radical implications for the way we treat our fellow man, particularly those who need special protection and care.  Christianity teaches that everyone has dignity and worth.  It also teaches that anyone can be redeemed from their fallen/sinful state.  Man’s fundamental problem is not poverty, housing or power, it is sin (Matthew 15 v 15-20).  The addict, the wife beater, the thief can all be redeemed and transformed by the grace of God.  Christianity is about grace, hope and most of all love.  It is religion of redemption and second chances.

But much more than personal transformation, Christianity places on the believer ‘a strong dynamic impulse to diffuse the love which had fallen so warmly on themselves’ (Blaikie).  Our Saviour, ‘the friend of publicans and sinners’ is our ultimate example.  Jesus taught repeatedly about the need to love the poor in parables such as the Good Samaritan.  His teaching in Matthew 25 on the sheep and the goats couldn’t be clearer.  He defined true greatness: ‘the servant of all being the greatest of all.’  Remember that Jesus was speaking at a time when the order of the Roman empire masked a barbarous culture. Gladiatorial sports slaughtered tens of thousands for nothing but the amusement of the baying mob.  Slavery was commonplace and women were often used as sexual play things.  Yes, there were occasional spurts of compassion when an amphitheatre collapsed but there was no systematic relief of the poor.  It was a hierarchical society where groups and classes were systematically oppressed and kept down.  A bit like modern Britain.

It was as the New Testament church grew and spread throughout the Roman Empire that Christianity’s counter cultural message of love for the poor began to change societies.  As Blaikie says: ‘In the course of time, barbarous sports disappeared; slavery was abolished or greatly modified; laws that bore hard on the weaker sex were amended; the care of the poor became one of the great lessons of the Church.’  This is not to say that the church did not frequently go wrong.  Often the methods of showing love became exaggerated and distorted.  The alms giving in the mediaeval church became more about the abuse of power than equipping the poor to become self-reliant.   The reformation was a great return to Biblical Christianity and while it was a time of great conflict it also saw a return to Biblical philanthropy and care for the poor.  It encouraged education and saw the start of schools, colleges and universities.  The Bible was not only given to the common man but he was also taught how to read it.  This why William Tyndale became a hunted terrorist.  His English New Testament was a threat because it challenged the power of a corrupt church.

So far so good.  Even the most cynical atheist would surely acknowledge that Christian philanthropy has done great good.  But let’s be honest, there have been many inspiring philanthropists who haven’t had an ounce of love for God.  It is wonderful to read of philanthropists such as Andrew Carnegie building libraries, donating ornate organs and building palaces of peace.  My family home in Sutherland has many monuments to the generosity of Carnegie.  We celebrate every effort that is made to relieve the poor and change society for the better whether in Christs name or not.  Nobody can deny that many charities have sprung up with little or no Christian inspiration.  But history shows us that all too often the greatest social reformers have been compelled by a zeal for God that leads to an enduring love for his neighbour.  They inspire followers who, if not always sharing in their theology, agree with their goals and are willing to follow their example.  Often secular philanthropists (such as Carnegie) are blessed with great fortunes and influence but it takes an exceptional love to persevere in championing the poor without wealth or power.  It is one thing for an inspiring political leader to rise up but unless it is underpinned with the theology of Christian compassion, how long will it last?

Dr Thomas Guthrie

Men like Thomas Guthrie and William Wilberforce inspired a movement rooted firmly in Micah 6 v 8.  They called the church and nation to love justice, show mercy and walk humbly with the God of the Bible.  They wrote, they spoke, they preached, they persuaded and they campaigned for change to the way the poor were treated.  The work went on long after they were dead.  Their work changed whole communities, changed laws and changed the direction of our nation.  When Guthrie died in 1873 not only was education about to be offered to all, but thanks to Christian social reformers children were finally being offered protection and care instead of exploitation.  Men like Guthrie and Wilberforce were hated and opposed because they challenged the powerful vested interests in the alcohol and slave industry respectively.  But through all the challenges, they had an unquenchable hope in the redeeming gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.  A hope that the most visionary and noble secularist can’t offer.  This is why secularism soon turns to pessimism.  As Blaikie says;

Secularism may try to keep up its spirits, it may imagine a happy future, it may revel in a dream of a golden age.  But as it builds its castle in the air, its neighbour, Pessimism, will make short and rude work of the flimsy edifice.  Say what you will, and do what you may, says Pessimism, the ship is drifting inevitably on the rocks.  Your dream that one day selfishness will be overcome, are the phantoms of a misguided imagination; your notion that abundance of light is all that is needed to cure the evils of society, is like the fancy of keeping back the Atlantic with a mop.  If you really understood the problem, you would see that the moral disorder of the world is infinitely too deep for any human remedy to remove it; and, since we know of no other, there is nothing for us but to flounder on from one blunder to another, and from one crime to another, till mankind works out its own extinction; or, happy catastrophe! The globe on which we dwell is shattered by collision with some other planet, or drawn into the furnace of the sin.

It is the Christian gospel that has been the great agent of change in human history.  Has the church at times been corrupt?  Absolutely.  Has it at times disregarded the poor and even abused them.  Unfortunately, it has.  But what has been the fruit of the revival of true Christianity?  It has always been love, particularly for the poor.  The spirit of self-seeking is supplanted by the spirit of service and love.  Vice is replaced by virtue.  When men love God in sincerity, they will love their neighbour, particularly the poor and the outcast.  The church at its best lives by that early ‘mission statement’ in James 1 v 27 ‘Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.’  As Thomas Guthrie said about the kind of Christianity that brings transformation to communities;

We want a religion that, not dressed for Sundays and walking on stilts, descends into common and everyday life; is friendly, not selfish; courteous, not boorish; generous, not miserly; sanctified, not sour; that loves justice more than gain; and fears God more than man; to quote another's words - "a religion that keeps husbands from being spiteful, or wives fretful; that keeps mothers patient, and children pleasant; that bears heavily not only on the 'exceeding sinfulness of sin,' but on the exceeding rascality of lying and stealing; that banishes small measures from counters, sand from sugar, and water from milk-cans - the faith, in short, whose root is in Christ, and whose fruit is works.

William Wilberforce

Chalmers and Guthrie on the 'Charity of Kindness'

What is charity?  Is it just the widespread and indiscriminate distribution of money? How effective has this been over the last 50-60 years in our own country?  Is there a connection between poverty and morality?  Well as we saw in a previous article 'Dr Guthrie and the Blind Organist', Guthrie believed that the effect of the gospel which should create self denial, frugality (thriftiness, carefulness) and discipline could have a significant effect on a poor household.  Guthrie believed that there could be exceptions to this rule but generally speaking he held to the principle of Psalm 36 v 25: 'All my life I have not seen the righteous left forsaken, or begging for food.'  As he says: ‘I have made extensive enquiries; and feel perfect confidence in asserting that foresight and frugality would place our people, save in a few exceptional cases, beyond the reach of want or the need of charity.  It is the want of these that makes Poor Laws necessary – if they are necessary.’

Like all great social reformers Guthrie challenged sin as much as encouraging virtue.  He was like William Wilberforce who fought on the one hand against slavery but on the other fought for a reformation of manners.  We have a slightly idealised view of the Victorian era.  The reality was that as Eric Metaxas says in his biography of Wilberforce, Victorian society was particularly 'brutal, decadent, violent and vulgar.'  Like Wilberforce, Guthrie fought on various fronts to see a better society.  The simple provision of mercy was never enough for Guthrie, he sought a complete reformation of society at a moral and spiritual level.  It was a natural progression for Dr Guthrie to go on to become a fighter for temperance because he saw the huge damage that alcohol did among the working classes.  It was a development of his earlier views while still at Arbirlot (1830-37) where he established a savings bank.  As he says in his Memoirs: [this bank] ‘was a great success; training up the young to those habits of foresight, self-denial, and prudence, which are handmaids to virtue, and, though not religion, are nearly allied to it.’  Guthrie maintained that while we should fight the injustice of poverty at every turn, as he did, poverty can be compounded by addiction.

In his Second Plea for Ragged Schools Guthrie addresses himself to those who have, as yet, given nothing to the cause of Ragged Schools.  He quotes the verse in Proverbs 19 v 17: ‘He that lendeth to the poor, lendeth to the Lord, and he will repay.’  He then says: ‘The money which is lavished on sturdy beggars on the wasteful slaves of vice, on the reckless and improvident, you have no right to expect payment of.  These are not the poor.  On the contrary, they plunder the poor, and prey on poverty; and hardening men’s hearts by their frauds, inprovidence, crimes, and detected impostures, against the claims of real poverty, they deserve not charity, by chastisement.’  He continues: ‘It is a scandal and a shame that such devouring locusts are permitted to infest our city, and swarm in its streets.  The vices of a system which the police strangely tolerate, and our charity unwisely maintains, are visible in the blotched and brazened features of those thriving solicitors.  The very breath with which they whine for charity smells of the dram shop.’   To me this is the problem we have today with a faceless and bureaucratic welfare system.  Far from helping many people it traps them in a cycle of poverty where they simply exist rather than being given the help they need to realise their full potential.  While is seems harsh to our 21st Century sensitivities to hear Guthrie saying that a particular group are 'not the poor', he would have been the first to help those addicted to alcohol if they genuinely sought help.  Far from writing them off, Guthrie was seeking to bring them to their senses by not indulging their addiction.

Rev Thomas Chalmers

It was Thomas Chalmers who proved with the revived 'Parochial' or 'Territorial' system that voluntary charity could almost always achieve greater results than state welfare.  This was because it was local, more personal, better tailored to people’s needs and more flexible to changes. When Thomas Chalmers was appointed to St John’s Parish, Glasgow in 1819 he agreed along with the Town Council that all new cases of destitution would be met out of the church funds.  Thomas Chalmers divided the Parish into 25 areas and appointed an elder and deacon to minister to both the spiritual and temporal needs of each area.  The instructions were few but clear:

‘When one applies for admittance through the deacon upon our funds, the first thing to be inquired into is, if there be any kind of work that he can yet do so as either to keep him altogether off, or as to make a partial allowance serve for his necessities; the second, what his relatives are willing to do for him; third whether he is a hearer in any dissenting place of worship, and whether its session will contribute to his relief.’  

Along with the introduction of Sunday Schools and widespread education it is little wonder that the rate of Poor Relief was drastically reduced in the Parish of St John’s. As Rev William Hannah says:

‘The drunken were told to give up their drunkenness, and that until they did so their case would not even be considered; the idle were told to set instantly to work, and if they complained that work could not be gotten, by kindly applications to employers, they were helped to obtain it; a vast number of primary applications melted into nothing under the pressure of a searching investigation.’  

After three years of this experiment, and despite St John’s accepting all the poor who had been on the sessional role of all three parishes that made up St John’s, the whole cost of ‘pauperism’ reduced from £1400 per year to £280.  As Chalmers says in his works: ‘our proposal was not met with an incredulity which was all but universal.’

Dr Guthrie and Rev Chalmers didn’t believe in ‘casual charity’ but in charity that offered hope and transformation.  This is why they both believed so passionately in the parochial or territorial system.  This is why Guthrie so passionately furthered the cause of Ragged Schools.  His aim was not just to relieve the suffering of ragged children but to offer them a new life.  

Psalm 41 commands us to ‘wisely consider the case of the poor’ not simply to franchise our responsibilities to the state.  Poverty is not just caused by a lack of money so our response can never be simplistic.  Poverty involves much more than financial poverty - it involves marginalisation, isolation, stigmatisation and being disenfranchised from others in society.  Chalmers and Guthrie show us that poverty relief must be personal, robust, bespoke, generous, enduring and always with an eye on long term transformation.  As Chalmers said in the General Assembly of 1822: ‘a safe and easy navigation has been ascertained from the charity of law to the charity of kindness; and, therefore, be it now reviled, or be it disregarded as it may, we have no doubt upon our spirits, whether we look to the depraving pauperism or to the burdened agriculture of our land, that the days are soon coming when men, looking for a way of escape from these sore evils, will be glad to our own enterprise, and be fain to follow it.’

Given the rampant poverty that we have today, might this be a moment when we look to experiments like St John's and perhaps think of a better way than the indiscriminate distribution of money? Benefits can be suspended almost on a whim and people are left utterly destitute.  Wouldn't a more personal, compassionate system, delivered in partnership with faith based, Third Sector Charities make for a better system?  Wouldn't it be better to be honest about the challenges people have (such as addiction) and offer them real help rather than ignoring it for years?  Shouldn't we provide the charity of kindness rather than the charity of law?

Dr Guthrie and the Blind Organist

When Dr Guthrie came to Edinburgh in 1837, he was appalled by the sights he saw in the Cowgate.  Day after day he would visit squalled tenements where he would find horrific poverty and little interest in the gospel.  Even those with some income often squandered what they had in the ‘dram houses’ or tippling shops’ which Guthrie did so much to shut down.  As he said on one occasion: ‘Nobody can know the misery I suffered amid those scenes of human wretchedness, woe, want and sin.’  It was out of these experiences that Guthrie would emerge as the ‘Apostle of the Ragged School Movement’ and the ‘Apostle of Temperance’.  So what were Guthrie’s views on poverty?  How did he think poverty could be alleviated or even cured?  How does this compare with the rather narrow modern day debate which is almost exclusively financial?

In his ‘Sketches of the Cowgate’ which were reprinted in ‘Out of Harness’ Guthrie tells the story of a house he visited which was like a traveller lighting on an oasis in desert sands.  Unlike the houses he usually visited that were filthy, this house was clean and bright: ‘The door opened on an apartment lighted by windows whole and clean, neither patched with paper, nor stuffed with rags, nor crusted with dirt like bottles of old wine; a floor white with washing, and sprinkled with yellow sand, stretched to the fireplace, where the flames reflected from shining brasses, danced merrily in the grate over a well-swept hearth-stone.’  Guthrie, as always, uses very vivid language to tell the tale.  He was seeking to contrast what normally greeted him when a door was opened in the Cowgate.  The couple were members of his own church and he was delighted to find such a well presented home.

As Guthrie writes about this visit 25 years later (probably for the Sunday Magazine), he remembers how convinced he was that it was a God fearing home: ‘It was a Bethel; God was in the place; and though, like the patriarch, I was in a sort of wilderness, this pleasant sight was a reality – no vision, like the ladder and angels of his dream.’  The house that Guthrie had entered was that of the ‘blind organist’.  Every day this man sat at the top of the Mound grinding a barrel organ.  His face was horrendously scarred by small-pox and he was blind, no small disadvantages in Victorian Scotland.  If there was any house where dirt might have been excused and the signs of poverty expected it would have been in this house.  Yet as Guthrie says: ‘it was remarkable by their absence.’ What was the difference between him and his neighbours?  Well Guthrie gives us the comparison:

·         They never went to church; he did.

·         They had no respect for the Sabbath; he kept it holy to the Lord.

·         They had no religion; he was a man of devout habits.

·         They indulged their vices; he practised the virtues of Christianity

As Guthrie says: ‘So even in the world, his religion was of more advantage to him than their eyes were to them.  It made him careful, and frugal, and temperate.’  As Guthrie left the home he said he desired to chalk on the wall of that house for his neighbours to see: ‘read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest.’

 

Surely the blind organist proves to us that ‘Godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come’ (1 Timothy 4 v 8).  Of course there are exceptions to any rule but generally speaking those who live a godly life can say with the Psalmist: ‘I have been young and now am old, yet I have never saw the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging bread’ (Psalm 37 v 25).  To make this a rule without exception would be unwise.  We are certainly not claiming that those who fear God will not experience poverty.  This would go against many Biblical examples including Christ himself.  As Guthrie says of the exceptions to this rule: ‘All good people are not wise.  There may be devotion without discretion; saint-ship, but little common sense; and an examination of those cases where piety is associated with poverty and does not succeed in this world, will often discover the peculiarities of the circumstances.’  What we are seeking to argue is that if there are limited resources, godliness, as in the case of the blind organist, can certainly make these resources go much further.  A house where there is alcohol and drug addiction, gambling and poor budgeting is a place where poverty will undoubtedly be exacerbated.

Guthrie certainly believed that, despite the exceptions to the rule, the house where God was worshiped, would more often than not be a house where though there might be poverty, there was enough to live on.  There may be several reasons for this but surely the main one is that Christianity teaches a man self-denial.  As Guthrie says: ‘this virtue lies at the foundation of success in every business and pursuit…’  He continues: ‘It teaches him to say, No! – to sacrifice his passions to his interests; and abstain from those indulgences which, wasting time, squandering money, impairing health, injuring character, lead to the results that, though often attributed to misfortune, are usually due to misconduct.’  Guthrie wasn’t naïve to the injustice that many workers suffered despite working their fingers to the bone: ‘Alas! That many of our working people should doom themselves to toil on till they sink into the grave; or till, amid privations and infirmities that gather about their grey heads like clouds around a setting sun, they have to accept the bitter bread of charity, and at an age when transplanting suits them as ill as it suits a hoary tree, are torn up by the roots and removed to the dreary walls of a Poor House, - to be nursed, when dying, by hirelings, and thrust, when dead, into a pauper’s grave.’  While showing mercy throughout his ministry Guthrie fought injustice at every turn, as we to are commanded to do.  He was certainly not blind to the exploitation that was rampant in Victorian Scotland, but he believed that a difficult situation could be made much worse if meagre wages were squandered on drink.

The second aspect that makes poverty less likely in a Christian is that he is willing to work.  Idleness and sloth are condemned throughout scripture.  As 2 Thesselonians 3 v 10 reminds us ‘If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.’  Now of course this is not saying that if there is no work available it is wrong to accept help and charity, it is saying that if work is available but somebody choses rather to do nothing, our system should not encourage this.  One of the key aspects of the Ragged Schools was that the children were taught a trade so they could go on to work and earn a wage.  Guthrie sought to break generational poverty by giving young people a trade so they could be delivered from the cycle of poverty and charity. As he says in a speech to the Evangelical Alliance in 1867: ‘From a hundred prisoners, there may be 99 who come into prison by drink.  Now, give Bible and porridge, and the bottle will be put away.  But we give them still more than the Bible and soup – bread for the soul and body.  We try to make them men and women.  They are trained to industrial occupations; and formed to several professions in order to become good handicrafts; often they are sent to the colonies.’  In other words, the Ragged Schools offered these young men and women a new life as well as the simple basics they lacked.  

The Blind Organist reminds us that while we may come across people with many disadvantages, self denial, hard work and ingenuity can go a long way in transforming a situation. This is in no way to underestimate the devastating effects of poverty.  Those experiencing poverty and marginalisation appreciate financial help but most of all they need acceptance and community which the church is able to offer in abundance.  Even more than that they need to transforming power of the the gospel that can set them free from the sin that traps so many in a cycle of deprivation and destruction.

In our next article we'll see how both Thomas Guthrie and Thomas Chalmers worked to eradicate poverty in the Parish System sometimes referred to as the 'Parochial System.'