Graham Cray comments on Quiet Days in an article published in the CEN on 1st July 2012.
Professor Eddie Gibbs of Fuller Theological Seminary once took a sabbatical from his work as an academic to be the Associate Rector of a parish in Beverley Hills where the congregation were primarily high powered business executives. He had to rethink all his mission strategies because what these people needed, to find Christ, was symbolism and silence. Steve Tilley's imaginative use of his home shows that this is just as relevant to other groups.
The central challenge for mission in Britain today is to make disciples, rather than just increase the number of church attenders. The chief obstacles the church faces in this task are the seductiveness of consumerism and the sheer pressure and stress of contemporary life. The opportunity to stop and to be still opens up the possibility of re-evaluating personal priorities, seeing beyond the superficiality of the consumer lifestyle and hearing the call of Christ. St Paul wrote,
But how are they to call on one in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in one of whom they have never heard?
Romans 10.14
Today, perhaps the only way they might hear, is when we offer the sort of hospitality that makes it possible to pause.