Facing the Canon with Archbishop John Sentamu

Archbishop I I'm intrigued and I'm sure many of our viewers are how what's your job description when I was appointed they give you a very long drop description feeling the whole of the air for things like being involved in a little minion Jameson in Church of England has bishops but I think the phrase I allowed most was at the bottom of the role as they defined it being a watchman for the law really I'm a watchman for the North for the sake of Christ ready yeah now you you were a lawyer before you became a priest and did you always know early on in your life that you would join the church well I mean I at the age of 10 I give my life to Christ and started telling everybody in my school about how they took and invite us in their lives and get to know him and I never stopped really telling everybody about Christ and at the age of 17 my father was a reader in the Church of Uganda and had master of primary school so at the age of 17 he said I think you should go and take some courses on how to conduct services on how to preach so from the age of 17 I started taking services because he had posted for churches to look after as a layman by the way that was busy and we saw some of our places growing really exponentially very very fast and then trained read law but I was always every weekend from the university as a student going to my friend Corey's up from him visiting different schools every weekend boarding school preaching about Christ and never never really I thought I'd be lame and continuing to preach very much like you really yes yeah and and I remember the first really big evangelistic aggressive ever addressed was in the western part of Uganda and kekkaishi when first docuventary was the bishop he had a 10-day mission and I was the actor acting out the gospel for heat but on the final day says to me John Sentinel you are preaching this morning I said what this is your final rally yes you are preaching this morning and I said what I said tell them your story that's all you need to do and let's do that my legs were shaking told them the story I simply said jesus loves you and he says come follow me and I stopped people started coming over the place yes and he said I told you I told you afterwards so anyway I left Uganda at the height of our means yes persecution of the church intending to do two years of theology at Cambridge to go back as a layman and continued my legal work but then at the end of my three years of doing my degree general womb was murdered yes yes and I had been Chancellor of his diocese so people said you can't come back you know you'd be killed as well and you on the list by the way so I stayed on and did a doctorate for three years at the end of it should I get heard and should I be a man should I do what and anyway I was in eventually ordained and the joy was that the person would nd he had confirmed it with Uganda as Bishop Leslie Brown so your daily meeting was also to my consecration yes definitely and then I took his funeral his wife's funeral it's a little so the nation was never never end up in fact I said something which every Christian need to be very careful when you talk on God is hearing he may answer it directly yes when Joan and Irwin was murdered I said Idi Amin you killed my friend I'll take his place and that's what I think like somebody not knowing what I was saying anyway so I never I've never plans of being a clergyman but I knew for sure that I want to talk about Christ to people absolutely the verse that all things work together for good it's interesting isn't it it doesn't say all things are good but God can somehow work them all for good in there now when you said archbishop when you were ten you you met Christ well what do you mean well it was at my birthday party and there was a mathematics teacher of over seconder school but I had been involved in the then organization called Crusaders this was a group which got young boys on their own and girls on their own taught them the faith with a bit of worship but a bit of real good teaching I mean I really got good teaching from a very early age about the Christian faith anyway this guy who was running out who said the class came to my birthday party so and and at the end he said you know you're having a birthday here but there's a bigger birthday than that so what do you mean well I never asked Christ really to be your friend have you ever welcomed him and said Jesus I'm giving you everything and I said I've never done that and go to church I pray every morning I read my Bible said no those things are important this should be the results of your friendship with Jesus yes no the other way around I said well what have I got to do said well just simply said Jesus I had my life to you so I said okay I'll try that this evening so I got night notice on my bed and I say but that guy said if I said Jesus hand you my life there'd be a big pat in heaven remember I'm 10 yes that's it and I counted me giving my life to Christ there's gonna be such a big part in heaven Wow so I simply nerved by my bed said of the prayer went to bed in the morning you know when I woke up I had to go and tell my mother of the wrong things that I had done nobody ever told me how to do this there was some new thing that had happened to me told my father who are the headmaster things that I have done wrong yes and in those days if you confessed to things that were wrong the cane was always near so in the school yeah confessing this I was given some caning then I got as I walked to with or for pain I realize actually that prayer was real Jesus taken my life and the confession obviously the felt free so free for absolutely boy I was so depleted that I am i you couldn't stop me I told my brothers my sisters because I want one of that in children my dad my mom and my dad would say because I was going on and on about how this new change in love with me he said stop preaching to the preacher God's hands Archbishop you know was obviously has always been on you in some way I mean when you were born you were only four powerful because they were reserved I won't make it in the morning and but you know I'm one of those probably not many they call me dr. billing Billington who was sort of my delivery was the missionary doctor unfortunately he passed away some nine years ago now but he told my Paris and told me and I've seen the birth certificate that I was so full of blue stuff all around me now he just wondered whether actually would use a flute right so he took this leave and my death of birth is actually written in the blue fluid around my body breathing and it's still that still that I'm fainted them and he said this was just so extraordinary yes so I was what do you call a blue baby everything was not very very good so has it surprised you your journey both in faith and in where the Lord has led you and you now being the Archbishop of York as that come as a surprise well my children constantly remind me that whenever you are thinking wow isn't this great just do remember you were a little boy when he was born in the night or didn't him a lot of hope you were born in a village out in Uganda ten miles of soccer used to wear short trousers just remember that and the home you came from was a very humble dogs ever think anything bigger than that and and then they said to me look dad have you seen that have you seen have you seen that all tree as a yeah yes big isn't it it's been here thousands and thousands of years some of them say yeah remember this so tiny little match and I stood his ground absolutist that kind ofnot absalom Christ you stood her ground you're obviously juggling with lots of different responsibilities how do you kind of maintain kind of well-being and health emits so much and such a demanding schedule well when my 22nd birthday member to give me a Bible and a new front of it I put a pray in there there's a bringing of the day and I pray and begins and they say good morning God then I found God the father of his creation mustard on the Sun his Redemption and the Holy Spirit and I commit my life to the today for the day really read it out and then I've also got a night prayer which is good night God and you expressing things that may not have gone well during the day I think that I went well things were which are grateful and thankful and bring his mercy so those two prayers the front of my Bible guide me through the day and I try and pause during the death of a moment a moment of making sure that actually I'm still following Christ because it's very easy in the job I mean to just go ahead assuming he's going to catch up with you should be the other way around as me catching up with Christ absolutely or stopping when he stops yeah it's interesting isn't it Archbishop that two of the most unlikely people in the Bible lost Jesus his mother and stepfather and it's so easy isn't it that we we think he's with us but we've actually lost him now obviously you have a huge responsibility with the Church of England and a lot of people I would I think Archbishop are a little bit confused outside of the Church of England or people of no faith as to what does the Church of England stand for it appears a bit like a rugby huddle you know that a very important conversation is taking place but all you can see are backsides what what is the Church of England I think adds right at its foundation was really the book on prayer you read that book on prayer and it's message about God is absolutely clear it puts the worship of God at the hearts of every bit and if you want to know more about the Church of England don't read more of the reports or the documents or the debates spend some time actually going through the book on prayer and you will be amazed by how much Scripture is in that book really and it talks really of this wonderful God who loves us I mean the general Thanksgiving you know for our creation preservation and the blessings of this life but above all for the inestimable of the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ with the means of grace this is tough stuff so the Book of Common Prayer sets out actually what the Church of England has always actually stood for if that in an attic was a part of it and I would have thought that's where people really need to go the worship of God the service of neighbor and the serving of God really and it seems to me that we're probably where people get confused they don't realize that the church still has what I call seeing people being born to faith in Christ being helped to grow in Christ being discipled to be able to witness to Christ themselves and inviting their friends to join so yes it is definitely it's got its general szilard's got different debates within it but if you really went and found where people are genuinely worshiping God genuinely witnessing to God genuinely supporting one another to mature in Christ as they say whatever Christ is there's a church it's been said Archbishop that the church finger was birthed in adultery and Jesus said if the if the root is bad the fruit will be bad what would you say to that well I mean I think the debates between the Pope and Henry the 8th and Henry in the 8th who wanted to get up with divorce and so saw that kind of stuff but still at the heart of the debates really of the Reformation was really do we believe the Scriptures have the final authority in all matters of faith yes or not if you believe the scripture is actually determined then that renewal or Reformation not happen simply because I'm afraid the medieval church in many many ways was beginning to important doctrine which needs to be challenged now for example I believe that the mother of our Lord Mary has a special place in the life of all of us because the angel said you know she's a blessed woman among all women why because she was the mother of our Lord now I don't need a doctrine of her Immaculate Conception or how will you have been bodily for me to give us such a place and I don't think you need those but they're part of one branch of the church from which we seem to have come out of so there were areas which require a debate and yes things may have begun wrongly but I just I just wonder whether we could have withstood actually yes the Reformation that's the standard I don't I don't think we would have stopped it but of course we but what happens over the Church of England it still remained a church for all English people yes and its establishment was to ensure not that he gets special privileges but rather that it continues to be a home for all English people that's why the parish system and the vicar thereof if they are good they will be serving everybody in the other car yeah they'll be telling everyone about Jesus Christ and they'll be inviting them to come and worship and even today many many people both within the church and outside of the church still what their children Baptizer still want to get married in church and still want to get buried in church very well so I mean I would have said that the beginnings of the Reformation and the beginnings of then what happened and of course we went through some terrible business of the dissolution of monasteries and a lot of buildings actually being gutted back from one another and I don't think that was actually a very very spiritual force but I want to suggest that the Church of England was always seen itself as being part of the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church why should we want to spirit bearing witness to Christ through the condoms yes advances of the church sure and also Scripture being quite actually determining nearly all matters for eternal salvation because if that's true then everybody needs suitable about scripture of course but sometimes archbishop it just appears confusing the Church of England that there's so much variety within it I mean not long ago you know a prominent Bishop said that he didn't believe Jesus rose from the dead and other bishops believe that he did rise from the dead and sometimes this confusion creates a lot of confusion in Britain don't think that Bishop if you're referring to the then Bishop of Durham yes he never said he didn't believe in the resurrection he actually said he believed in the resurrection so much so it was not a conjuring trick with burns in other words it isn't so much a body being resuscitated yeah there's something new that is actually open to Christ that resurrection was about that there was a physicality of it which you couldn't many ways describe because what happens we are told that John goes looks in the tomb and actually sees the grave clothes undisturbed that's which means that it is no resuscitation because the influences that would be completely the clothes be all over the place but it is as if Jesus hadn't actually been buried there was nothing there really and I happen to believe that Christ did rise from the dead which only exists because the resurrection yes had there been no resurrection there'll be no Church I still believe that there was this physicality in the sense he could be in the midst of a room and people see him and then he's gone yes how do you describe that and the trouble is that some Christians have used images and language which sound as if blood started tamping back in the body of Jesus it is that that Jenkins actually was questioning yes and quite rightly so I mean I'm questioning it too because I don't believe in a resuscitated body because it would mean you die again Christ rose from the dead Gaius yes his body was different because he he wall through walls absolutely yes when you say body walking through water what are we talking about course so you've got to still be in this brother all you say is that he could there will be the physical presence of Jesus but it is a physicality which we haven't a language to describe but do you think Archbishop's sometimes the Church of England doesn't always convey clearly what it believes and therefore it creates confusion report after report after report in fact of the Dave Jenyns there was that report what the Christian believe is the most clear yes doctrine of the creation of the redemption death and resurrection of our Lord and that only through him really people can find salvation and they're giving a near pouring of the Holy Spirit the trouble is if we start with that simple message people probably will be clearer where we are going yeah but there is a tendency sometimes to qualify yes and explain and to qualify actually only being incorporated into Christ makes us Christians yes now if that message is the one repeated again and again and again there's a possibility that people want to be as confused but I know you're a preacher very nice but I'm quite sure that you too have been misunderstood many times that's why God was the new words will cause trouble he came in human flesh yes he could have sent us a huge list a huge you know dogmatic book but he didn't his communication was in human flesh and language we could all understand that which we see in human flesh he's really very good and very man he grows you know he teaches he heals people he's crucified he dies his bed and he rises but it is poured out now that kind of God language of talking to us often isn't easy to convey but yes now and that's where the trouble really comes from yeah and the other difficult I think we got is that because the Church of England is very diverse in its question some of it is very diverse it can give the impression we are creating quite separate take aways yes where people can take bits there like this they don't like actually the essence of what it is to be the church every time I am at a confirmation at an ordination that across the question of a bishop at an Easter Christmas celebration I hear nothing actually which tells me that we haven't got the corner of the gospel in our belly yes I think the criticism can simply be not that we don't believe the real basic message of the Christian faith is it somehow some unknown reason I don't celebrate it we're not excited about it is so real you know I just want everybody to get to know you so you're very you're very optimistic and positive about the future yes I'm a prisoner of hope because you see if Christ died and rose again because God loved the world he gave His Son then my faith in the end has to believe that this God and his project of redemption and new heaven and a new earth surely will happen because it will happen I'm not going to be put off by the seemingly frustrating because my faith is not in the circumstances now yes it is in a living Christ who has conquered death you know that man went velum back you know anybody who's been to hell and back Wow he's worth believing in I know there's a there's a lovely question Archbishop in the book of micah which i'm sure you're familiar with and the question is what does god want us to do and then it gives us the answer in one sentence to do justice to love kindness and to walk humbly with God in all the years that I've known you and the the work of ministry that you undertake it seems to me that you you embody those three criteria of walking humbly with God of being kind and generous and doing justice that would you agree that those three things have been part of your life thinking and ministry you can't ask Christ show me your foot mark that I may put my foot in and you genuinely tried to follow him knowing that the guidance is by the Holy Spirit and knowing Christ is praying for you as he prayed for everybody else and don't be caught up in what he was about yes he wanted us to know the father he wanted us actually to be very hard boys we walk through this our God he wanted us to do justice and it's his miracles and his acts of mass were just obvious that is committed to justice you know and and if that is true you can't be caught up with this man of Nazareth and then actually find even for sinners like me a bid will rub off a big because he's just infectious I mean yes Jesus is the most dangerous disease to catch if I may put it that way because once you catch it you pass it to others he's the most infectious person on reality then I know enough so you couldn't you couldn't do it Michael five six s.res yes what would you say Archbishop twenty-one who's seeing our interview and hearing us now what would you say to anyone who is struggling with their journey of faith I think now des said to them and I've had some of my ups and downs not with my belief in Christ that hasn't happened to me I have never doubted actually that Jesus is the savior that I need that Jesus is not just for me but for every human person in the world because there you can find life you can find forgiveness you can find hope and you can be reconciled yourself yes God that what I've lived without it my real problem is because I've had a lot of illnesses and and I've gone through quite a lot of trying moments the question has been dear God please why can't you spread it out more evenly yeah why do I seem to be getting the biggest blows all the time you know you know these friends of yours God seem to have it rough you know and many Saints I've actually said similar things you know Jesus with friends there were you treat your friends no one a word about a few of them that's my question it's not about do I believe I've ever doubted about so anybody who is struggling first of all is this Jesus real when I consider you do what I did I did try and ask him to embrace you and to love you and forgive you you will be surprised what happens because you will for the first time begin to never if you're struggling with questions of love forgiveness or guilt some people you know us full of guilt and your body bite you could not take it away yourself ask Jesus you can salut something if you were burdened by breakfast in all of this does it really work out well find a friend find a friend who for whom this is true let them pray with you let them encourage you and then finally I would say to anybody who is finding it really pretty difficult and bridges rough actually God is closer to you that your own breath Archbishop could we conclude our little conversation with a blessing which is what's your favorite blessing that you often offer various services there too but I'll give you the one that tends to come to mind most of the time it says may God the Holy Trinity make you strong in love and faith and hope defend you in every side and guide you in peace until the blessing of God Almighty Father Son and Holy Spirit be with you no Archbishop John thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us thank you hi I'm Jay John I support compassion and compassion supports facing the Canon please enjoy the film changing the world begins with a child this is Moses he lives with his foster mother Mary she found him left for dead as a newborn baby on a garbage dump his life is very different today as he now receives support from a compassion project in a local church compassion offers each child they serve the opportunity to learn about Jesus and receive regular Christian training educational opportunities and help health care hygiene training and supplementary food were needed together all this empowers Moses to take his place in the church and the community and to show others the way to break the cycle of poverty it takes just 21 pounds a month to change the story for a child like Moses if you want to change the world it begins with a child it begins with you and it can begin now you

Channel: Facing the Canon

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Keywords: facing the canon, facing, the, canon, archbishop of york, archbishop john sentamu, john sentamu, john, sentamu, archbishop, j.john, jjohn, j john, interview, bible, Christianity, Christian, Holy Spirit, Jesus, God, Lord

Id: NfyG7MbUDRE

Length: 30min 50sec (1850 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 13 2013