School of Theology 2019 | Metropolitan Tabernacle

The True Dynamism
of the
Local Church

The churches of Christ are increasingly being infiltrated by the mis-named ‘missional’ model of church organisation, that wilfully discards fundamental biblical obligations of Christian commitment, taking churches into deepening worldliness. A new generation is being beguiled by a wave of unscriptural innovations, making a stand for authentic evangelical life more vital than at any other time.

All the topics contributed directly to the building up of the individual congregation as an organism for soul-winning effectiveness, scriptural obedience and blessing in these perilous last times.

We welcomed as guest overseas speaker Dr David Beale, Professor of Historical Theology at Bob Jones University, USA, for over 35 years, together with Dr Nick Needham, Rev John Thackway, Pastor Chris Hand and Pastor Christopher Buss.

The Necessity of Dedicated, Persuasive Evangelistic Preaching

Dr Peter Masters

Dr Masters presented the biblical arguments in favour of regular evangelistic preaching as an essential and divinely central thread in ministry under the text ‘Woe is unto me if I preach not the Gospel’.

The Kind of Praise God Requires (1)

Dr Peter Masters

In a further two daytime addresses, Dr Masters reviewed the biblical reason for worship being kept distinctive and apart from worldly-entertainment genres of music (showing the absolute non moral-neutrality of music) and exposed the myths of the modern justification of compromise.

The Kind of Praise God Requires (2)

Dr Peter Masters

An Inspirational Survey of Persecuted Baptists of 17th-18th Centuries

Dr David Beale

Our guest overseas speaker was Dr David Beale, for 35 years Professor of Historical Theology at Bob Jones University, USA, whose principal subject was ‘From Keach to Carey’, the golden period of Baptist church expansion that saw the fall of hypercalvinism and the shaping and championing of the universal tender of salvation through Fuller, Sutcliff, Carey and others. Among reformed Baptists today more of their clarity and blessedness needs to be recovered.

From a Dead Calvinism to the Evangelistic Calvinism of Andrew Fuller and William Carey (1)

Dr David Beale

The first of two daytime sessions.

From a Dead Calvinism to the Evangelistic Calvinism of Andrew Fuller and William Carey (2)

Dr David Beale

The second of two daytime sessions.

Back to Scripture with Office Bearers and Church Structure (1)

Rev. John Thackway

A systematic overview of the office-bearing passages Rev Thackway provided in two addresses an overview of the office-bearing passages, including the qualifications, appointment, roles and characteristics of pastors, elders and deacons, and their immense value to the churches they serve.

Back to Scripture with Office Bearers and Church Structure (2)

Rev. John Thackway

Back to Scripture with Office Bearers and Church Structure (3)

Pastor Chris Hand

Pastoral passages for the biblical pattern for the local church Pastor Hand expounded in two addresses the pastoral passages showing the pattern for the local church, its structure, organisation, duties before the Lord and towards its members, and its government, with attention to the historic pitfalls including those proliferating today.

Back to Scripture with Office Bearers and Church Structure (4)

Pastor Chris Hand

Dramatic Historic Falls from Grace (1)

Dr Nick Needham

From Divine Revelation to Human Experience Dr Nick Needham brought two timely addresses, sounding an alert about the subtlety and swiftness of satanically-driven decline in the thinking and belief of evangelical churches once error enters in. The first of these tracked the course of Friedrich Schleiermacher, a nineteenth-century theologian, who began as an evangelical but became ‘the father of liberalism’. History repeats itself continuously.

Dramatic Historic Falls from Grace (2)

Dr Nick Needham

From Divine Revelation to Human Reason Dr Needham’s second address was a case study of the Free Church of Scotland from its formation in 1843 as the most conservative-evangelical Calvinistic denomination in Scotland, to its collapse into liberalism in a single generation. ‘Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.’

The Loss of the Working Church and its Restoration (2)

Pastor Ibrahim Ag Mohamed

A study of the working verbs of the New Testament Pastor Ibrahim expounded the ‘working’ verbs that call all believers to contribute to the service of the church family. In an age when a false view of church liberty has taken so many believers out of commitment to the Lord’s service, the working verbs cry out for renewed attention and reflection.

The Loss of the Working Church and its Restoration (1)

Pastor Christopher Buss

A survey of the texts and how to honour them Pastor Buss examined a frequently-buried aspect of church life, yet so prominent in godly evangelicalism of the past, namely, the operation of the working church, viewing the church as an organisation of willing activity for the Lord. He surveyed the texts and the means of honouring them within the voluntary principle.

Sunday School and Young People’s Workers’ Preparation Classes (1)

Afternoon Interval Sessions

Two sessions, each self-contained, covered the setting up of Sunday Schools and recruiting, the organisation of the Sunday School hour, the principles of teaching teens and younger children, the syllabus, supporting items (such as quizzes and prizes), safeguarding arrangements, and sample full lessons from both the Old and New Testaments. These were presented by experienced leaders of the Tabernacle Schools.