“I Have Finished My Course”: Interviews of Eighteen Retired Ministers

“All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances.”
(As You Like It 2.7.139-141)

Keith Batstone and Alun Ebenezer took these Shakespearean lines as the theme for a series of videos which aired on Heath Evangelical Church’s YouTube Channel in early 2021. For these films, Batstone and Ebenezer conducted live interviews with eighteen retired British ministers, including Basil Howlett, Neville Rees, Alun McNabb, John Blanchard, Teify Ebenezer, Ian Hamilton, Geoff Thomas, Bill Hughes, Eryl Davies, Bruce Powell, Andrew Davies, Peter Milsom, Stuart Olyott, Maurice Roberts, Mike Mellor, Iain H. Murray, Philip Eveson, and Austin Walker. Due to the COVID-19 lockdown, the men could not meet in person, so they chose to speak to each other digitally from the comfort of their own homes using basic computer technology. For four months, approximately seven thousand people tuned in each Sunday night at 8:15 to watch a 45-minute episode, bearing with the occasional internet delays, telephone rings, and animal noises captured in these videos.

Two years after the completion of the interviews, Batstone and Ebenezer published an adaptation of the series in book form, thanks to Rhonda Frost’s transcriptions. The book, Before They Leave the Stage: Interviews with Eighteen Men of God, loses much of the emotion conveyed in the videos, but it removes the distracting background noises and technological glitches. The editors also delete some material but add new information. The book furthermore provides black-and-white screenshots of each minister, puts first-person narrations into the third person, and includes an introduction and conclusion by Batstone. Each chapter, like the original episodes, details a minister’s conversion, call to the ministry, highs and lows of his ministry, influential books and people, and the need of the hour as he saw it.

Several common themes emerge from these testimonies. First, several of the ministers mention that they valued godly fellowship in the ministry. All of them note Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ impact on their lives. Some had personal interactions with him, while others simply read his books or heard him speak. Secondly, quite of few of these men battled with liberalism, either while in higher education or later in their churches. A number came out of theologically-compromised denominations* such as the Baptist Union, just as Charles Spurgeon did decades before.

Thirdly, many discuss the importance of prayer and preaching. Roberts, a former editor of The Banner of Truth Magazine, mentions that he would pray often “that the Lord would give him suitable subjects to write about. He always bore in mind that he must speak to people’s hearts as well as their heads” (187). Olyott likewise says that “part of my ministerial duty is to pray for every single person individually [in my congregation], as far as is possible, before I preach” (179). He also explains that

[s]ermons are not to be prepared in the study but, to use a Puritan expression, “sermons are prepared in the closet.” The “closet” is the place where you engage with God. Open before you is the text of scripture which you’re studying, but you’re having dealings with God as to how He would have this particular passage of scripture preached to this particular people on this particular occasion. (178)

When preaching to his audiences, Olyott never assumed a “‘literacy model,’ where a man preaches in detail through parts of Scripture and leaves his congregation to read up the rest for themselves… . [H]e felt in his preaching he must sacrifice some depth and go for breadth, in order to preach the whole Bible.” He did this by preaching through books of the Bible by paragraph and by preaching topically so that audiences could see the main ideas (176-177).

Regarding the style of preaching, Olyott adopted a “simple, serious and vivid model” (177). Walker utilized a similar manner that

young and old could understand … He believes that if a minister can learn to preach to young children and to old people then they will not have any problems communicating to anybody else. He would encourage young ministers to take Sunday School classes and learn to get into the hearts and consciences and minds of children. (233)

Hughes similarly suggests that the application of a sermon should be directed to “the different age groups in [a minister’s] congregation” (104). Mellor gives a special caveat about style. He recommends that pastors should preach the truth according to their own God-given personality. He believes that

it takes a while to find out who you are and have the courage to be who you are without looking over your shoulder. Even being a part of this [interview] series with these other men, there was a temptation to be someone that you are not. (201)

Olyott says: “The purpose of every sermon … [ought to be] that men and women and boys and girls should pray. If all a sermon does is inform the mind, it isn’t a sermon, it’s a lecture” (179). Mellor counsels minsters to be patient with their congregations, as “people need time to change. You cannot just preach one sermon and think, ‘They’ve got it now’ ” (202). Hughes remembers hearing George Philip once tell him that he should “preach the Word for ten years before starting to look for results” (100). Powell learned though, that should a minister experience a revival, he should not “live off experiences; he must live on truth as personified in Christ, feed on the bread of life” (127).

Much more could be said, but in the main, Batstone and Ebenezer should be applauded for their labors to interview seasoned ministers before they leave the stage. Young pastors especially should watch or read these interviews so that they can glean wisdom from those who, like the Apostle Paul, “have fought the good fight, … have finished [their] course, [and] … have kept the faith” (2 Tim. 4:7).