When I first arrived at the Chapel nearly 10 years ago, the man who made me feel welcome here was Nick Reynolds. Over the next few years we lost count of the number of people who told us that the reason they stayed at the Chapel was because Nick had welcomed them.

Not only did Nick exercise a kind of super-host function, but he also served for many, many years on our PA team (i.e. sound and visuals). I used to play on the worship team, and it was always a joy having Nick on the desk at the back because he’d turn up early, smiling, chirpy, and ready to rock and roll.

Nick has recently left us to go to a more local church (he lives about three day’s journey away, somewhere between the Chapel and Mordor). It seemed appropriate to say a huge thank you (from myself, and the rest of the Leadership Team) for his years of service, and the fact that he welcomed so many new people into our church family. We’ll miss you, Nick!

“I believe if you can learn to order a coffee at Starbucks, you can learn theological language at church.” Ed Stetzer said this when he preached at the Chapel a couple of years ago, and he has a point.

Of course, on the one hand, we need to work hard to make ourselves understood so that even newcomers walking into church for the first time won’t get totally bewildered by the new language they’re hearing. Preachers, especially, have to think about ways to fill words with meaningful descriptions, metaphors, and analogies. They have to place themselves in the pew and listen to themselves speaking, so as to make sure they are understood.

On the other hand, there are riches of truth in the Bible that simply cannot be expressed if we jettison the language of theology. The particular word Stetzer was about to unpack when he made this comment was “imputation”. What a beautiful word, if you know what it means.

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