Taking up tennis might not seem an obvious first step toward showing the love of Christ to the world, but it makes perfect sense to Hamilton Smith, Rector of St. Thomas Anglican Church in Mt. Pleasant.
“If our main goal is to reach people who would never hear the gospel, we have to go where they are,” he said. “And we have to love them where they are without compromising the truth of the faith.”
To further press the point, he mentioned a movie.
“Have you seen the Netflix movie The Two Popes? It’s a great movie if you haven’t seen it. It’s about Benedict and Francis. They have a debate, not over compromising doctrines. Both hold the same theology – but over which doctrines they put forward into the world. Do we put forward doctrines that open us up to the world or do we put forward, or lead with, doctrines that close us off to the world?
A Post-Christian World
“We are now, whether we like it or not, firmly in the post-Christian world,” said Hamilton. “Post-Christianity has moved here from the northeast and midwest and west coast. Sixty percent of people that live in Mount Pleasant don’t go to church anywhere on a Sunday.”
So how do we reach the “nones”, those Hamilton says are indifferent to Christianity? Not the way we’ve always done it.
“The overall posture of Anglicanism, the deep cultural roots or patterns when it comes to people joining the church,” he said, “is ‘they’ll come to us.’”
That no longer works.
In the early 2000s Hamilton, his wife, Lizzie, and their first child, Charlotte, moved to England for three years where Hamilton studied theology at Oxford University and gained an education in living in a post-Christian world.
“One of the great things about going to seminary in England,” he said, “was that they were further along than we are. They’re deeply in the post-Christian world. And they’re looking for all kinds of creative ways to bring the world in, to not wait for the world to come to them.”
Hamilton is committed to going “into” the world, too.
Be an Ambassador
When crafting the mission statement for St. Thomas, the church he planted in 2013, he was intentional about using the word “ambassador.”
The mission statement reads,
We believe the Gospel changes everything! St. Thomas’ Church exists to raise up ambassadors of the Gospel where we live, work, play, and learn, and to extend Common Grace to our Community through authentic relationships, service, and beauty through the arts.
“I’ve got an hour-long course on why I chose ‘ambassadors,’ he says. “And why it’s a good metaphor for going out into the world.”
“To sum it up, ambassadors do four things:
“Number one, they represent their home country. We’re representatives of the Kingdom of God. But we’re stationed in a foreign land.
“The second thing is you become an expert in the country to which you’re sent. Get to know more about that country than the people who live there. Know their values and worldview, even though they’re different from your own.
“The third thing is you’re there to represent the interests of your home country, your sovereign. Bring the message of your home country (the Gospel) to your assigned country. But be sensitive to how your message is received. Talk to them as equals. Show them respect, not arrogance and condemnation.
“And then the fourth thing is ambassadors are the most useful in times of conflict. The world is constantly at war with God. And we bring a message of peace.”
In the Sunday liturgy at St. Thomas there’s a time for parishioners to pray for three people who do not know the love of Christ. “That’s woven into our ‘Prayers of the People,’” said Hamilton. “So those folks are constantly on our minds.”
Though he and his parishioners are committed to being ambassadors it hasn’t been easy. And growth at St. Thomas continues slowly. Yet they continue.
“If our main goal is to reach people who would never hear the gospel, we have to go where they are. And we have to love them where they are without compromising the truth of the faith,” he said.
Hamilton’s entire family looks for ways to engage with those outside the church.
“Both my kids went to public schools,” he said. “We would have discussions all the time about being ambassadors in that secular environment. Most of my kids’ friends were non-Christians. And we had some really rich conversations about that. A couple of them have come to Christ because of those relationships.
“When my daughter, Charlotte, was in high school she was the only Christian in her theater group, the only one. That group would never have encountered a Christian unless Charlotte was part of that. And through Charlotte, they encountered us, and through us, they felt loved, though many dimensions of their lives were not in keeping with the ethical demands of the Gospel. But we loved them over that.”
The Church vs. The World
The difference in ethics and values often keeps Christians from engaging authentically with the world.
“One fear is that ‘if I’m around non-Christians, I’ll be corrupted, or my family will’,” said Hamilton. “It’s the whole ‘like-minded’ phrase.”
But the answer to that is “no.”
“The locus of sin is not outside of yourself,” said Hamilton. “That’s what the pharisees thought. The locus of sin is in our own hearts.”
It doesn’t mean we embrace the mindset of the culture.
“In our culture, the heart of life is to live a full life,” said Hamilton. “I’m stealing all this language from Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age. To the world, what makes our lives full is what’s called ‘expressive individualism.’ I’m free to express myself so that I am the center of the world. Therefore, you need to understand me. The only people who have any authority in my life are people who have taken the time to understand me.
Sympathy or Empathy?
“You hear it all the time, empathy, empathy, empathy. We’ve got to define these terms because a lot of people say, ‘just show empathy.’ But what does that mean? Empathy, as I am defining it here, is changing your theology to affirm the person’s feelings.
“Jesus never did that. What he did is sympathize. He can sympathize with us. “He knows what it means to be a human being. He knows what it means to physically suffer. He knows what it means to emotionally suffer. He knows what it means to be tempted by human sin. And he knows what it means to be tempted by the devil.
“So rather than start from the standpoint of ‘The Four Spiritual Laws,’ you start with, ‘Hey, have you ever thought about the fact that Jesus knows what it means to go through what you’re going through?’ Let’s start there – with Jesus.
“That’s not the totality of the message. That’s not the fullness of the Gospel, but it’s a place to start a conversation. Jesus understands. And that connects with people who are self-absorbed, and believe, ‘if you don’t understand me, you have no authority in my life.’”
Intentionally Push into the World
To understand people, though, you have to build a relationship of trust. And to do that you have to be where non-Christians are.
“Did I tell you I’m playing tennis now?” asked Hamilton. “Not only because I’m 15 pounds overweight, but with my kids out of school, off in college, I needed another outlet into the non-Christian world. There was nowhere in my world where I was going to engage non-Christians on a daily basis. So, I chose tennis. And it wasn’t a Christian tennis league. The goal was not to find a safe place. The whole goal is to intentionally push into the world to love it.”
The relationships have their funny moments. His tennis mates joke about his being a pastor and apologize for “dropping the F-bomb.” When the group of about 30 held a March Madness (basketball) bracket, they laughed when Hamilton joked, whoever won should tithe to him. He’s grabbed beers with them and, as friendships have developed, serious moments have led to deeper conversations.
“Just last night I had a conversation with a guy who’s a non-churchgoer about abortion. He’d never really had anyone dispassionately value his viewpoint, listen to what he had to say. And afterward he was genuinely curious to know what I thought. Now, we’ve been playing tennis together for probably two-and-a-half months. It took that long, just us hitting the tennis ball around and joking, to develop a friendship and for me to earn the right to be heard.”
Advice to Remember
Before Hamilton planted St. Thomas, when he was still on the staff of St. Michael’s Church but beginning to plan a launch, he received advice from the late Bishop Alex Dickson that has continued—since that time—to stick in his mind.
“He said, ‘Hamilton when you go up there to Mount Pleasant, don’t go start a church. Reach the lost.’
“Isn’t that a wonderful summary of all the things we’ve talked about?” Hamilton remarked. “I think for so long, church planting has been, ‘Let’s start a church in a place where there’s no Anglican church so we can make Anglicans there.’ But what if, instead, our main goal was, ‘Hey, let’s go and reach the lost?’ That totally changes how you approach it.
“I think about that all the time. ‘Don’t start a church. Go and reach the lost.’”
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Recommended Reading:
The Counterfeit Gods by Tim Keller; How Not to be Secular: Reading Charles Taylor by James KA Smith; the 39 Articles (BCP)
By Joy Hunter.
This article first appeared in the Summer 2025 edition of the Jubilate Deo. View the Jubilate Deo.
