David Spriggs: Changing the World

You can’t go far without seeing one, and you can’t buy much without it having used one. I am referring to ‘containers’ those huge metal boxes that you see stacked at dock sides and rushing down the motorways on flat bed lorries. It was yesterday that I first heard what an impact they have had on the world – until then although I’ve seen them around, I hadn’t realised how important they are. According to the radio programme I was listening too as I drove home (thankfully not stuck behind a container lorry) they have had as great an impact as the IT revolution. |PIC1|Mind you, it’s not simply the containers themselves, it’s a whole integrated transport system, trains and lorries, cranes for handling them, special ships for their sea passage by the hundred and so on right to the end of the supply chain. Instead of 50,000 dockers in New York, they now require only 2,500, and working conditions have greatly improved. . Goods, like bottles of wine, shoes or furniture are handled far less times. So, the transport time as well as direct costs are vastly reduced. Theft has been greatly reduced as well. Factories can be located far away from the docks and even in other countries. Without them globalisation as we know it would not have been possible. And all I thought until yesterday when I saw one was ‘what an ugly nuisance to be stuck behind’ or on a good day ‘there go more articles to purchase’!. Now I know these rather despised objects have changed our world.

Which brings me to my favourite subject – the Bible. Most homes in our country have one, but it isn’t highly prized by most, in fact it’s far less likely to be read than the Ikea catalogue! Most people regard the Bible as archaic and boring. Many regard it as an ugly nuisance – with all its demands and commands. A lot consider it is confusing, finding it very difficult to make sense of, even when it is in a newer translation, because where are you supposed to start and how do you find the right bit to help you, should you want to do so.

In fact, of course, it’s the book that has probably changed the world more than any other. You needn’t take my word for it.

Through this bible...English became the ruling tongue of two world empires...The bible has had more impact on the ideology of the last four centuries than any other creed, manifesto or dogma....The publication of the bible in English and its reach...enabled there to be common debate and discussion. This undoubtedly helped lay the ground for democracy. (Melvyn Bragg, 12 books that changed the world, Hodder and Stoughton 2006, page 272).

If we stay with this quote for a minute it has remarkable parallels to the container story I outlined above. Take just two factors Bragg mentions, the spread of the English language and the establishment of democracy. Without them globalisation as we know it would hardly be possible. Often it is English which enables people from different countries to communicate, because their birth language might be Mandarin or Welsh, Urdu or French, but frequently they will all speak English. Often it is democracy and the commercial enterprises it has spawned which enable the interchange of goods, cultures and peoples which is part at least of the globalisation process.

But like the containers it’s not simply the objects themselves it’s the whole systems that have grown up around the Bible that count. Much of our music, art, law, education and politics owe inestimable amounts to the Bible. Many of our finest institutions and customs have grown out of the lifetimes’ work of people who have been shaped and influenced by the Bible in profound ways. Yet like the one to whom ultimately the Bible witnesses, it is despised and rejected! What a tragedy.

This is where ever Christian today comes in. We are all part of that complex system which gives effect to the Bible. At Bible Society we speak of ‘A credible church needing a credible Bible and a credible Bible needing a credible church’. We are passionate about seeking to get the Bible back into the heart of our ‘Britishness’ to use a current phrase. We want to see a world where the wisdom and inspiration of the Bible is nourishing every individual and each community. We have undertaken several fascinating experiments to see how this might be accomplished. One of the early ventures was with Vogue Magazine. We wondered whether they would reject our overture out of hand. They were cautious to begin with but were soon engaged at a deep level. We held Bible Studies with their creative team who became extremely captivated by the parables of Jesus. One of them even admitted that fashion had lost its soul and wondered if it might be the Bible which could help them find it again. The outcome was that they published a fashion shoot retelling the story of the ‘prodigal daughter’, completely in their style, mainly photographs not words, beautifully constructed scenes and so on but through this projecting into many a doctor’s waiting room as well as tens of thousands of homes some of the key moments of that story.

We are encouraged to think that people’s negative stereotyping of the Bible can be changed. But we know it will take far more than we at Bible Society alone can contribute. It will require every Christian to become part of an integrated system so that together we are living out the reality of the Bible, the good news of God’s grace in Jesus Christ, and so impacting people all around us all the time with the sense that this book which changed the world once can, change us all and our world again. Our world, as well as each individual in it, needs saving by God. This book is his chosen vessel for renewing the church and transforming the world, not by itself, but by a Spirit empowered body of believers who take it seriously and offer it creatively and authentically to the world.

|PIC2|David Spriggs


David Spriggs is a Local Baptist Minister for 20 years; Previously headed up the Evangelism Department of the Evangelical Alliance; Now working for Bible Society in various roles relating to the place of the Bible in the mission of the church in England and Wales, currently Bible and Church Consultant; Author of several books, and many articles mainly on church leadership and growth, prayer and spirituality, the Bible; Writes regularly for a number of daily Bible reading notes publishers, including, BRF, CWR, IBRA, SU and Living Light. For more information about the Bible Society please click www.biblesociety.org.uk