I think the thing I miss most is performing marriages because marriage days are always very special. Marriage, like baptism, is in a sense anybody's bet on the great day. When the great day comes, day one if you like, everything essential for a good, happy and what we like sometimes to call a successful marriage, is in place. It gets off to a great start, doesn't it?

What about a year down the line or three years or six years? As the Beatles used to sing, and that certainly dates me a bit, "Will you still love me when I'm 64?" For every one disastrous marriage, I think there must be ten that have just been neglected to death. Remember Barbra Streisand's song, "You Don't Bring Me Flowers Any More?" You see marriage, like friendships and indeed like our faith in God, demands consistent, constant, daily renewal.

I think there are two key words in a good marriage, as there are two key words in good Christian discipleship. The word, "thank you" and the word, "sorry." Yes, thank you. You don't bring me flowers any more. Once you begin to take the other person for granted, then things begin to die. As every good school teacher will tell you, you don't get things right at the first shot. No, you have to go through many, many mistakes.

I just had another swimming lesson. I didn't learn to swim until I was fifty. There is no such thing as a theoretical swimmer. Believe me, if you are relying on someone to save your life, don't turn to me. I am a bad swimmer. I make lots of mistakes. I have learned those mistakes and become at home in those mistakes. My tutor and prompter has helped me to grow through some of them.

That is true with our faith in God; it is true in our relationships; it is true in marriage. To me, the amazing miracle of life is the patience of God. God is prepared to be patient with us through all of our mistakes, through those times when we really aren't much good to anybody at all. Patiently, He stays with us through all the mistakes, through all the half-truths, leading us slowly to the fullness of truth, fullness of trust and all in the fullness of time, through those times when you say, as you said about those early essays you wrote at college, "Well, that's not so bad." Then, it became quite good. Then, hopefully, it led to the best of all.

That is true in our Christian discipleship. We have to travel in our Christian discipleship. It is no good standing still. It said of those two disciples on the road to Emmaus when Jesus met them in St. Luke's gospel, "They stood still looking sad." Believe me, if ever you stand still in life, you will begin to look sad. You will look over your shoulder at the good old days. That, my friends, is death in marriage; it is death in life; it is death in Christian discipleship.

Sometimes I think we Christians, particularly the clergy, give the impression that real Christians, the saints if you like, have a kind of blinding flash of insight which we like to call conversion, a kind of Damascus Road experience. After all that, everything is okay. All live happily ever after.

Of course, life isn't like that at all and neither is the Christian faith. That is the reason I am so grateful to St. Mark, for example, for making the school of discipleship that he declared in his gospel. All four gospels, you remember, tell the story of the times when Jesus healed blind people. It is a recurring theme in all four gospels, but only in Mark's gospel do you find that extra story of the healing of the blind man who came to see, not in one blinding moment, but in a two-stop process.

Do you remember the story? It took place in a little village called Bethsaida. Some people brought a blind man to Jesus and begged him to touch him. He took the blind man by the hand, led him out of the village and when he spit on his eyes, and laid his hands upon him, Jesus asked him, "Do you see anything?"

He looked up and said, "I see men, but they are like trees walking."

Jesus laid his hands upon the man's eyes again and He looked intently and the man was restored and saw everything clearly. That is very interesting because, if you look also in St. Mark's gospel, you will note Mark puts that particular story in a particular context. Again, all four gospels tell the story of the feeding of a great crowd -- the miraculous feeding of the five thousand. In Mark, the story is told twice. Jesus first feeds five thousand; then, miraculously, he feeds four thousand. There are two accounts of the same kind of miracle.

Listen to the astounding thing that happened after the second miracle. The disciples got into a boat, but they had forgotten to take bread with them. They had only one loaf with them in the boat and Jesus cautioned them, saying, "Take heed. Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod."

They discussed it with one another, saying, "We have no bread." Being aware of it, Jesus said to them, "Why do you discuss the fact that you have no bread? Did you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes, do you not see and having ears, do you not hear? And do you not remember? When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand, how many baskets full of broken pieces did you take up?"

They said, rather timidly, "Twelve."

"And the seven for the four thousand? How many baskets full of broken pieces you take up?"

They said to Him, "Seven."

He said to them, "Do you not yet understand?"

Do you see that they are blind? They didn't understand it all at first. It is from there that Jesus goes on and heals the blind man with a second touch. It didn't all happen at once. We don't get it right all on day one.

The disciples simply could not see the full implications of a total trust in Jesus, dependence upon Him upon whom all things depend. You see, they didn't get it right the first time, a second time and not really right for a long time. That is true of you and me in both our life and relationships with people we care for and supremely, in our relationship with God, what we like to call our Christian faith.

I wish in some sense we didn't talk about being Christians. I wish we were still called disciples, or followers in the way, people who are growing through error into fuller truth and learning a fuller trust in God.

I want to conclude with a very favorite story of mine which, in a sense, illustrates this ability to get things right not because, "I've got it right," but because God has got it right with me. It is a lovely story. It tells of a little boy playing on the edge of a steep cliff and down below the cliff is the sea. There were some professional bird egg collectors just further along the cliff. The bird egg collectors wanted to get a particularly rare specimen of a particularly rare bird's egg. The nest was just over the edge of the cliff where they couldn't quite reach.

They asked the little boy -- they were prepared to give him a dollar or two -- if he would let them lower him with a rope over the edge of the cliff so that he could scramble down and get the bird's egg. The little boy looked at the cliff; he looked at the sea below; he looked at their faces; he looked at the rope. After a moment he said, "Okay, as long as daddy holds the rope. Okay, as long as daddy holds the rope."

God has got hold of us most securely. What we need is to continually re-take hold of Him who first took hold of us.

I have learned in my daily discipleship as a Christian, the need each day to grow in the life of the Holy Spirit. Yesterday's faith is no good to me today, my friends. It is no good saying, "Well, I was ordained a bishop in 1975, as the youngest bishop." That is no earthly use to me today in 1992. I need daily to increase in His Holy Spirit more and more. I need daily to learn that simple trust in Him and have my eyes opened, not just in a blinding flash once upon a time, but each day all the time for the whole of time until the end of time, until I finally see Him face to face.

St. Paul, who should know all about these kind of things because he certainly didn't get it right from day one, despite his Damascus Road blinding conversion, says, "Now we see through a glass darkly, then face to face." Yes, I think I need as a Christian disciple to pray increasingly that each day God will open my eyes afresh and deepen that relationship of trust which began with Him in my baptism when I was just a squealing little bramp and didn't even know what was beginning to happen to me. Daily increase in His Holy Spirit more and more. All Christians need to be daily renewed and strengthened in the power of the spirit of Jesus Christ.

A prayer which I have found particularly helpful in my own discipleship is an old prayer. It is the prayer of St. Richard of Chichester, a medieval bishop. It is a prayer which many of you may know and I would like to conclude by saying that prayer with you now.

                Thanks be to thee,
                My Lord Jesus Christ,
                For all the benefits which thou hast won for me,
                For all the pains and insults which thou hast borne for me,
                Oh, most merciful redeemer, friend and brother,
                May I know you more clearly,
                Love you more dearly,
                And follow you more nearly,
                Day by day. Amen.

Orley Herron: Michael, we had a wonderful discussion about so many topics before this television program. I think it would be interesting for the viewers to know that you were a piano soloist with the London Philharmonic. You are a wonderful writer and widely read across the country. You travel world-wide and were just appointed as personal advisor for evangelism to the Archbishop of Canterbury, a new assignment.

As you have traveled world-wide and you have looked at the church in a variety of countries, what do you think is going to happen to the church in the next five to ten years?

Michael Marshall: You are right, I have had the privilege of traveling and seeing a lot of the church. I would say that it is a tale of two churches, to use a phrase of Charles Dickens. There is a dying church and that is very, very evident in many places, particularly in America, my own country and in Western Europe. And there is a vibrant, living church, a renewed church which God is raising up in other parts of the world. It is very exciting to see these two movements in parallel. The picture one gets is a little bit contradictory in places, but I would like to concentrate on the good news. That is what I am in business for and so are you.

Eighteen months ago I went to visit the church in Russia. There you see a church which is white-hot, having come out of systematic persecution since 1917. The churches are full but they are full of people who are really turned on by the worship of God and by the praise of God. Young and old, married couples, etc., and many young people crowd into those churches. That is a very exciting thing to see.

I see also in this country and in England another kind of church emerging. You see, I think a lot of the so-called big churches at the present moment are going to die if they are simply relying on putting on a good show. It is the house churches that are growing. It is the people who are following the spiritual life who are finding depth in Christianity who will survive this century.

A lovely phrase of John Stott, who I know has appeared on this program, says, "Sermonettes make Christianettes and Christianettes won't survive the century." Nice little Christians won't survive the century, only sturdy men and women who have built up in a gospel-centered faith are going to survive the century. God is raising those people up. I see a very, very remarkable resurrection of the church in our day, but it won't be the same kind of church.

Herron: In just a minute, tell us what you think are the ingredients to good worship.

Marshall: You and I were born to worship. We are compulsive worshippers -- all people are. Why was I created? I was created in order to worship God and enjoy Him forever, or as it says in the marvelous play, Equus, if you don't worship, you will shrink.

One of the signs of good worship is when we transcend ourselves, when we become ecstatic, when we are lifted out of ourselves. Worship has to be substantial; it has to be colorful; it has to be profound; it must have a strong element of music in it. There has never been any renewal of worship in the two thousand years of Christianity which was not expressed through music. The Word must be preached with power. Where that happens, people are moved; they are moved from the church into the kingdom.

Herron: In your new assignment, Michael, what do you think you are going to be doing with the Archbishop of Canterbury and your assignment for evangelism?

Marshall: I think my main work will be to encourage both clergy and laity in renewal of faith. As I was saying in my talk a few moments ago, we daily need to be renewed and it is the renewal of our church which will equip the church for powerful evangelism.

Herron: We certainly wish you well and pray God's blessing be upon you. We hope when you come back to America, you will join us here.