It may surprise some of you but England and Scotland, as they were way back in the 5th and 6th centuries, were evangelised by Irish missionaries. It’s a long story which cannot be given proper justice within the confines of this editorial. Suffice to say, though, that a youth from England was captured by Irish raiders and kept in slavery for six years. On his eventual release and return to England, he became a Christian and would later become known as Saint Patrick of Ireland. He went up from England at the leading of Holy Spirit to bring the gospel to Ireland. The call to do so came in a vision that completely changed his life.
Patrick established a missionary movement in Ireland and many, many came to faith – thousands were baptized. Monasteries were set up and monks were trained for mission. As author and blogger Michael Frost notes, “… their monasteries weren’t the cold stone castles of the later Medieval period, but Christian villages, places of agriculture and study, safety and conviviality.”
First and foremost, though, the Celtic believers were missionaries – very passionate, missionaries. When the abbot felt a monk was ready for missionary service – after years of learning and disciplined training – they would be sent out to take the gospel to the lost. Again Frost, “The missionary monks were commissioned by their village and placed in a coracle – a small, circular boat made of wicker, covered with a watertight material – and were pushed out from shore with the prayer that the Lord of the wind and the waves would take them to the very people He wanted them to save.”
These coracles were used by fisherman at the time and were propelled with a paddle, but the missionary monks set adrift were not given any paddle. No! Wherever their coracle ran aground whether that was in Cornwall or even further down the west coast, or even north to Norway on the other side of the British Isles, that would be exactly where these ancient missionaries would commence their mission work. “They preached the gospel and established monastery-type villages like the ones from which they’d come.”
It is a striking picture, isn’t it?
What kind of a mission strategy is that? Pretty risky. Not much of a mission plan some would think, and it would probably be laughed down at denominational headquarters these days as lacking sophistication and common sense! Just blown where the Spirit of God would have them go – that was it. Yet, this was pure missional genius. You see, it is God who sets the agenda for mission from start to finish – and England, Scotland and Wales were evangelised because of these passionate Celtic missionaries determined to trust God and the leading of the Spirit – without a paddle. That’s the historical record, folks.
When Nicodemus approached Jesus one night, Jesus said to him, …
John 3:8 (NET)
“The wind blows wherever it will, and you hear the sound it makes, but do not know where it comes from and where it is going.
So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
We can hear the noise the wind makes. Jesus says here that the born again can hear the blowing of the Spirit of God and, just as if they could see and hear the wind and set sails to catch it, so it is with the wind of the Spirit. We can hear it – or learn to – and catch it!
What would it mean for us to set our sail, so to speak, so that it catches the wind of Holy Spirit, who would then send our coracle where He wants it to go? Maybe not in a literal coracle, but into our neighbourhoods and cities. That’s risky, yes, but increasingly in the missional season into which we are entering, we will need to trust the wind of Holy Spirit more and more, and rely less and less on our own assessments, judgements and strategies. There are no roadmaps or navigational charts for where we are going. But the Spirit knows the way. And this was what Jesus was saying to Nicodemus who just could not understand. A new era of the kingdom was coming, and the Pharisees had no charts or maps for that, just the rules and regulations of the old covenant. It was never going to be enough.
One other curious thing about Saint Patrick I discovered, when reading about him years ago, was that he was somewhat embarrassed about his Latin and theological understanding – it wasn’t as good as the highly educated bishops and clergy of Europe! He was self-conscious about it. But he had what most of them never had, and that was the wind of the Spirit in his sails.
Imagine that!
You are loved.
Ps Milton
Sources:
Michael Frost’s BLOG (2018)
Dr. Martin Robinson, “To Win the West”