Last week I managed to hold my first meeting of the day at the Tate Britain and so we took the opportunity to walk around the Turner Prize exhibition while we talked. The Prize, established in 1984, is awarded to a British artist under fifty for an outstanding exhibition or other presentation of their work in the twelve months preceding 9 May 2006. The four nominated artists are innovative, although I did not really ‘get’ the Phil Collins stuff. I loved Mark Titchner’s ‘How to Change Behaviour’which is mind captivating and displayed a strange mix of new technologies and old techniques. He likes to place conflicting ideas next to each other and leave us to make up our own mind.

I kind of wonder, upon reflection, if that is a task that we, as the church of God, should be doing? New technologies and old techniques are easy to see and are used a lot where projectors are used to display images while Psalms are chanted.. Presenting conflicting ideas and leaving people to make up their own minds seems a little riskier – but if we believe it is God, through the Holy Spirit, who convicts where is the real risk?

I wonder – do we need to trust God more?
Do we need to fully take on board the reality that the Holy Spirit convicts people?
Is it time to put less effort into convincing people to accept our brand of truth and allow God to do his stuff?
Time to present the simple God story and leave people to work out what that means for them?