News, views, and other stories
(August 2007)

Wigtown, nestling a few miles to the south of Newton Stewart, in deepest Galloway, is not only the traditional centre of the former burgh of Wigtownshire, but is home to the graves of the Covenanters who were martyred in 1685 by being tied to a stake in Wigtown Bay and is perhaps more identifiable today as Scotland’s National Book Town (there are probably more bookshops in the sleepy town than restaurants!). A key part of the community of Wigtown is the warm and welcoming Baptist Church. Since 1994, Rev Stephen McGarva has been the Pastor there (Stephen and I used to be ‘buddies’ in the YF in Ayr Baptist Church years ago), so for that reason alone, it was a delight to have the opportunity on 17th June 2007 of preaching in the church where Stephen is Pastor : a small church, but a small church with a generous heart!

Leaving home in Newton Mearns at 8:00 am on a quiet and sunny Sunday morning in June, we trundled down the M77/A77 to Ayr, heading down past Dalmellington and Loch Doon till we reached New Galloway, where a scenic drive through the Galloway Forest Park (where we saw quite a few deer!) brought us to Newton Stewart. Just after 10:00 a.m., we arrived in Wigtown : a quiet little town on a Sunday morning with only a few people going for their Sunday paper!

Until a few years ago, the church used to meet in the Town Hall (it looks a bit like the town hall out of Trumpton!!), but then through the vision and commitment of the church, they not only bought the old school building, but have developed it and built on to it, to create a lovely, warm and friendly Baptist Church. When you consider that the population of Wigtown and surrounding environs of Bladnoch & Kirkinner is about 900, and the church attracts about 50 on a Sunday morning, it is therefore impacting over 5% of the local community, and therefore is well placed to continue to reach out in mission, as they already have done through various Baptist Union ‘Step Out’ missions, with the assistance of their youth worker, Caroline Ferguson.

Preaching in Wigtown Baptist Church affords a lovely view out the window towards the hills near Kirkcudbright as well as the flat plains running out towards the Solway Firth! However, we looked that morning at ‘Decisions’ from Joshua 1 and of how Joshua and the Israelite people faced a time of decision as they prepared to cross the Jordan. My sermon headings (I confess an allergy to alliterations) were that God creates anticipation, God calls for consecration, God confirms His invitation and God delights in preparation!

After preaching at Wigtown Baptist Church, we drove out just a few miles to the quiet hamlet of Bladnoch, home to the famous Bladnoch Distillery, and enjoyed a lovely carvery lunch in the Bladnoch Inn. We recommend it!

With the sun out after lunch, a gentle drive across ‘The Machars’ took us to Port William, where we enjoyed the cracking views across to the Mull of Galloway and, in the distance, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man, with a ‘mileage signpost’ telling us the distance we were from various points.

Next port of call was the Isle of Whithorn, on the southernmost tip of ‘The Machars’, where we enjoyed a lovely afternoon relaxing in the sun, watching the activities at the lazy little harbour, and a walk up to the ruins of the old church where St Ninian landed : the ‘cradle of Christianity’! There’s also a monument there to the young fishermen who lost their lives in the ‘Solway Harvester’ tragedy.

Back to Wigtown at 6:00 pm for the evening service, where I preached on ‘Dreams’, and God’s dream and purpose for each individual life, starting with the story of Larry Walters who flew on garden chair with weather balloons attached and declared afterwards that he’d only done it because it was his “lifelong dream to fly”! My text for the evening was taken from Philippians 3:14 of how Paul had a goal in life and pressed on towards it, and my sermon headings were don’t imitate, but dedicate; don’t reject, but protect; don’t lose it, but use it; don’t isolate but associate, and don’t procrastinate, but activate! By adopting a much more informal, café style approach, the evening service attracts a good number of older, and particularly younger people alike, and in a small town such as Wigtown, is a testimony to God’s favour and faithfulness.

So pray for Wigtown Baptist Church, for Stephen, and for its’ witness in Scotland’s book town, that it will be the means whereby people will read ‘the Book’ that will really change their lives!

Inverness training weekend

From Phil Magee

I had heard of the preaching training days which the Baptist College was organising for lay people who had a gift for preaching but Glasgow was a few miles from Dingwall. So I was quite pleased when I heard that Rev. Stuart Blythe (Lecturer and Development officer at the Scottish Baptist College) would be coming to Inverness to do a day and a half of training at the beginning of March. The event was held at Culduthel Christian Centre (Holm Evangelical Church. Fourteen of us were able to get along from various churches in the Inverness area including: Alness Baptist, Inverness Baptist, Culloden Baptist, Dingwall Baptist Church.

As we looked at preaching, Stuart said that there were three key things to do in preachings and that was:

• Have you got some thing to say?
• How will you say it?
• Then say it!

Stuart took us through some of stages from the preparation to when we get us to preach. This included looking at Mark 4 and Jesus who calmed the storm. Interactively, we sought to look at the passage and asking ourselves what it is saying, and ask ourselves if there is anything in the passage that we do not know about. We should be prepared to use resources such as commentaries to help us to gain a greater understanding of the passage.

Stuart has a real desire to apply the truth of God’s Word where people are at using his vast resource of stories.

We all came away finding that we had been stretched as we looked at ways of developing our preaching. We look forward to such an event coming to Inverness area again.

You may well be in the same position as us in Inverness not staying near the central belt or not readily able to go to Glasgow. These weekends have happened in other areas and I’m sure Stuart would be happy to come to your area for a weekend. If you are interested in such you can either get in contact with Stuart Blythe at the Scottish Baptist College or Glen Cartwright (General Secretary of SBLPA).