Yet it's not impossible.

It just requires a bit more thought and creative effort than usual.

And in some ways that fits what the 18th century clergyman John Wesley came to see.

All his life he never curbed his enthusiasm for the gospel.

But he did modify many of his original opinions.

His best sermons are masterclasses. Two stand out for being heard in any era.

One he called The More Excellent Way, and the other was Catholic Spirit.

The gist of the message in each comes down to this.

Our interpretations of subject matter, like the Bible, are always open.

Our interpretations are, in fact, our opinions.

These may be well-formed, partly formed or uninformed.

The More Excellent Way and Catholic Spirit suggest our Christian faith enlarges the more

we inform our opinions.

So let's apply that to today's church.

A former Principal of Trinity Theological College, Rev Dr John Salmon, once wrote an

interesting - and very much informed - article on how we play with language.

He used the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein as a starting point.

He suggested that if we thought of G-O-D and R-U-N and put them together we ended up with

ground.

Paul Tillich famously suggested that f the idea of God in the 20th century was

to think of what was the ground of our being.

God was the ground of all being, including our being.

Now John Salmon, in my opinion, rather adroitly made the ground of being: God's run.

That's very much in the spirit of Wittgenstein.

And also Catholic Spirit.

John Wesley may not have been amused by the language game afoot,

but he would certainly have understood its importance and implications.

And made it part and parcel of the More Excellent Way.

Why's that?

Because all his life Wesley lived at the intersection of faith and life, theology and philosophy.

In a famous letter he takes one of his spiritual mentors, William Law to task.

Wesley gently admonishes Law for weaving faith and philosophy too much together.

In earlier times Law had taken Wesley to task for precisely the same:

straying too much into the territory of philosophy at the expense of practical faith.

So each was a little guilty of the same failing, but, of course it wasn't really a failing.

It was the inevitable consequence of living out of the ground, the God-run, of Catholic Spirit.

The inescapable fact is that Christian faith has to explain itself with the insights of

practical theology and philosophy.

The subject of Christianity is life,

all its heartbreaks, tragedies, triumphs and successes.

It's our explanation of what we are,

who we are and how we are in the context of life.

As Dr Salmon rightly said it's the God-run of our being.

I think that truth is cogent, expressed for the mood of our era, and allows for much experiment

in the Wesleyan sense.

It will continue to be heard in today and tomorrow's world.

By those with ears to listen.

Dr Salmon came from an academic background of philosophy of education.

He was steeped in it.

It was much needed in the Connexional life of New Zealand Methodism.

By bringing philosophy into critical interaction with faith today,

he set an agenda item that will prove vital for the future well-being of the church.

Let's have more language gaming in church.

Who knows what creative insights and possibilities it could bring.

Game-on.

See you next week as we explore more at the intersection of faith and philosophy.

And thanks for watching.