Some REALLY new stuff

We were supposed to have lunch with Rev. Bonnie Appleton, who is responsible for Parish Development and Evangelism for the Diocese of Guildford, but it didn't work out. But Bonnie was good enough to send us a really helpful email about things that are going on in Guildford, plus some of her thoughts on where the Church ought to be going. Here's what she wrote (pay particular attention to the second last paragraph in bold type):

We have several really interesting fresh expressions happening in Guildford. You can see most of them on the diocesan website www.cofeguildford.org.uk (put Fresh Expressions into the search part and the list should come up.) You may want to look at some particular websites. More out of the ordinary ones are 'rezurgence' - www.rezurgence.com - more than just a website but web based and BMX bikers log in to find the next BMX competition where they meet up to pray, support and worship together. This work is now developing further with a van than is equipped with tools and leaders go round helping kids mend their bikes and do evangelism whilst they are doing this.

Songs of Rage www.songsofrage.co.uk - outreach to the music community that is turning into a Fresh Expression.

Very new is a kind of community arts and worship centre in Ash Vale where the Vicar of the local Anglican church is very arty. There's been a combination of things happening - he arrived about 18 months ago; the local Methodist Church closed and they didn't know what to do with the building and they asked Neil. He's now in the process of engaging with the community and they are putting on films for different groups - e.g. black and white old films for the elderly washed down with a cup of tea and cake, more modern stuff in the evening for the youngsters etc. They are about to start some worship there but the main concern is to engage with the wider community who love the idea. Eventually they hope to have artists in residence who will engage with the community and with worship - all very alternative! No website as yet - it's too new and the vicar is about to go on a 10 day motorbike tour with some local bikers to Uganda. They're going to film the trip and bring it back to show the community and hopefully make links.

There are a couple of café churches but they're quite different. One is basically a relaxed evening service sitting around tables with nuts and crisps on the table and the other offers food, alternative opportunities to engage with Jesus, some worship for those who want it, challenges and opportunities to pray.

There are lots of Messy Churches springing up - but they all seem very different. I had hoped to get to the Messy Church baptism at Lightwater on Sunday but just couldn't do it in the end - same problem as you - trying to get myself into too many places at once!

I still feel that too many churchgoers are in a 'church bubble'. Many think the Church is the centre of the universe and haven't realised that most people in our country think of the Church as dying or dead and certainly on the margins of what's going on! Irrelevant - is what most would say. But trying to get long-committed Christians to recognise this and to do something about it is very very difficult. Our churches have few children and young people and we're very sparse when it comes to those in their 20s and 30s or even 40s! Those churches doing really well tend to have a lot of transfer growth (Christians from other churches) but not many conversions. I think most conversions come from the smaller churches some of whom are much more aware that they need to do evangelism - but it's too little too late. If we do evangelism at all well it is with those who used to come to church as children and dropped away. The fact that we have so few children in our churches now means that the church community now is the poorer because people tend to become more inward and backward looking without children ('the good old days' syndrome.)I wrote a dissertation last year on the importance of children to our churches now and in the future. In 1900 55% of the children in Great Britain attended a church, by 2000 only 4% of children attended a church. If we only do evangelism with those who used to come to church then in 20 or 30 years the Church in England will be on its last legs or even deceased! Dramatic I know, and I hope it won't get to that stage, but it might!What we need to learn to do in this country is engage with those who know nothing about God. This is where some of the Fresh Expressions are working out of the box.

We need to do more of this.I hope that this gives you a flavour of what's going on. Do also read my essay on the difference between a real Fresh Expression and an outreach project in an inherited church. You'll find it on the website. You'll find out what I really think from that.I hope the rest of your trip goes well.

Every blessingBonnie

Messy Church

Something we had heard about and were really anxious to see was Messy Church. It's an approach to family ministry that started in Portsmouth and has spread widely in England.

Messy Church takes place outside Sunday morning. It includes people of all ages. Most churches have it on weekdays, usually once or twice a month. They begin with crafts and other activities, followed by a time of worship for all ages and then a meal. It centres around hospitality, creativity and celebration. Typically, Messy Church will start around 4 p.m. and end by 6-6:30.

We attended Messy Church on June 21 at All Saints Lightwater, west of London. Ruth Kidd coordinates the childrens' ministry at All Saints. We arrived in time to help her with set-up. The Scripture story they were using was Philip and the Ethiopian (tactfully avoiding the inevitable question: "What's a eunuch.") So, there were long sheets of paper and plastic bins with water soluble paint the kids could step in and make footprints, an inflatable pool with water for baptism, candle making, making a chariot out of a paper cup, decorating a paper tie for Father's Day, colouring she

ets and a few other activities.

It so happened that there was a baptism on Sunday of an 8 year old boy named Jack. Martin Sheldon, the vicar, told us they'd never done a baptism at Messy Church, so didn't quite know what to expect. I think he was preparing us for the possibility that it might be, well, messy.

By the time we started at 4 p.m. there were about 40 people present, including some family members who were there for the baptism. Kids and parents/grandparents dove into the activities enthusiastically. At 5 we went into the church for the wildest baptism service I'd ever been part of. Martin did a great job adapting the liturgy so that it was family friendly, and Ruth told the story of Philip and the Ethiopian with impromptu help from kids acting out not only their roles, but the horse pulling the chariot. It was super high energy worship.

Then back to the hall for a wonderful meal of curried chicken.

Lucy Moore, the originator of Messy Church stresses that it's about mission. Messy Church has had great success in drawing in families who would not normally be at the regular Sunday service. It's for people "at the messy edges of the church," she says, "and the messy edges of life -- people the church has often overlooked."

Fresh Expressions

Fresh Expressions is the name given to a joint undertaking by the Church of England and the Methodist Church to encourage new forms of church, especially with groups not currently involved in church. It's really a coming together of about 25 years of emerging experiments in the midst of the passing of the traditional church in Britain.

The Fresh Expressions website was one of our main sources of information as we planned this trip. It both inspired us and gave us ideas of where to go and what to see.

Yesterday we went to Basingstoke, about 45 minutes west of London, for a Fresh Expressions Vision Day, put on by the Diocese of Winchester. The day was led by Zoe Hart and Steve Pittis who are both employed by the Diocese in the area of mission.

One of the things that struck us first is how vibrant evangelical Christianity still is in the Church of England. The opening worship was heart-felt and focused on the Holy Spirit. But it's evangelicalism in the warm and expansive British sense, not in the least sectarian or closed.

Too much to put into one blog posting, but here are a few highlights.

Fresh Expressions is NOT a strategy to manage the church in decline, they said, but an attempt to "catch up" to what the HOly Spirit is already doing in the church. This was illustrated by some local stories, such as "The Living Room," a church for students in Southhampton, or Legacy XS, a church for skate-boarders, or "The Tube Station," an outreach to surfers in Cornwall.

Fresh Expressions initiatives have a strong missional focus. In other words, they aren't meant to simply service the needs and wants of current members, but to reach people "off the church's radar." At the same time, Fresh Expressions values the continuing traditional forms of church in a kind of "mixed economy" approach, to quote Rowan Williams.

We were impressed by the theological grounding. Fresh Expressions reimagines church in differing cultural forms because God takes culture seriously. A key text is Eugene Peterson's translation of John 1:14: "The Word became flesh and moved into the neighbourhood."

Church has three basic orientations in our culture. First, attractional -- "Come and join us." This still works for some, but fewer all the time.

Second is "Engaged" -- "Go and then come." Go out and build relationships with people who can then be drawn into the church.

Third is "Emerging" -- "Go and stay." This is the cutting edge of Fresh Expression, developing church in places and among people who are currently beyond the bounds of any discernable church.

Steve described 7 Core Values that undergird Fresh Expressions:
* They are mission shaped communities.
* They involve creative experimentation and overcoming fear of failure and risk.
* They are culturally relevant and culturally engaged.
* They bring about transformation in people.
* They make disciples.
* They require sacrifice.
* They promote unity in the midst of diversity.

It's estimated that about a third of Anglican Churches in Britian have begun some kind of fresh expression, and there are around 160 Fresh Expression initiatives in the Methodist Church.

One of the real blessings of this trip is the number of amazing people we have met, people who are passionate for the Gospel, many of them in denominational positions of leadership. I had a fantastic conversation with Paul Thaxter who is the Transcultural Mission Director for the Church Mission Society. He knows an amazing amount about how to engage with different cutlures. We're going to have lunch with him on Monday in Oxford.

The Sanctuary

I found a community called The Sanctuary that meets in the Methodist Central Hall -- right across the road from Westminster Abbey, actually -- on Thursdays, which was our good fortune. The Methodist Central Hall is this massive domed structure, built in 1912, quite obviously to demonstrate to the Church of England that they weren't the only show in town.


The Sanctuary, though, is a group of mostly 20s and 30s that meet in the chapel of this building.

When we go there, we were welcomed by a young lady called Matilda and a young man called James. There was tea, coffee and light snacks. Jonathan Green, the pastor, wasn't there tonight because his wife Felicity was going into labour with their first child. But James filled us in on the origins of The Sanctuary.

Jonathan came to work with the congregation that meets at the Central Hall, with responsibility for youth and young adults. He started The Sanctuary a few years ago with, I'm told, Felicity and one other person. Today, there's a community of over 100 young adults who come and go, with an average of 30 showing up each week for worship. This night I counted 25 including us.

The worship was not what you'd call experimental. We sang some standard worship songs -- Blessed Be Your Name, As the Deer -- with a grand piano and flute accompaniment. Jonathan didn't know till the last minute that he wasn't going to be there, so a member of the community read his sermon, which was part of a series on rest and recreation. It was really thoughtful, starting with a reference to Abraham Joshua Heschel's work on the Sabbath. The point was that as Christians we need to develop the spiritual discipline of rest and leisure, and learn to see our "holidays" as "holy days."

There was some good discussion afterwards about the challenge of living a balanced life of work, rest and prayer in our culture. Many young people come to The Sanctuary directly from work where they are immersed in the frantic pace of central London.

As I said, there was absolutely nothing glitzy or gimmicky about the gathering, but we came away with a feeling of authentic community.

One interesting feature of The Sanctuary is that there are about 25 people who participate in leadership -- music, setting up, hospitality, Power Point, praying, preaching. Every time someone does something, they are given points. Ordinarily, you would think this was some kind of competition to see who could accumulate the most. In fact, it's just the opposite. When you get to 6 points, you have to take a break from leading for at least a week.

This was quite a contrast to evensong at Westminster Abbey, but another fascinating expression of church in the heart of the city.

Who needs congregations?

A growing number of people in the UK consider themselves committed Christians but are not part of any congregation. It's not just because they can't find one they like, but because they believe that traditional congregational life actually impedes faithfulness.

We had lunch with Mike Love and Tim Jones who both work for the Leeds Christian Community Trust -- a non-profit organization that provides seed funding to new initiatives, some Christian, some not. Mike was once a pastor, but became convinced that 99% of what was happening in his church had very little to do with the Kingdom of God or with forming disciples. British churches launched a "Decade of Evangelism" in the 199os, the the result was that church attendance delcined from 14% to less than 10%. In other words, the church as it has existed for so long has lost the ability to connect with people -- in fact, is a barrier to people hearing and living the Gospel. So, he basically shut his church down and released his congregation to live lives of dispersed faithfulness. Both he and Tim see their Christian witness in almost entirely incarnational terms, being expressed through the relationships they form and the groups they are a part of. Neither "goes to church," but both regard themselves as committed Christians.

I have to admit I was challenged by their radical vision of Christianity. But we both had some misgivings. We've observed that the "post-congregational" people we've met have all been shaped and formed in a congregational setting. They have picked up the narratives, practices, core beliefs and "ethos" of Christianity. The question is, without a gathered, discipling, teaching church, how with the NEXT generation even know what the Gospel is?

Rowan Williams has coined the phrase "mixed economy" to describe what is going on in the church today -- traditional forms and fresh expressions co-existing side-by-side and each influencing the other. That's what we're spending a lot of time reflecting on -- what that "mixed economy" will look like in this time of great ferment and transition.