Month: January 2013

The Gate Faith Community

Baptist minister James Karran is looking to develop a new monastic community at a Cardiff arts centre. He tells the story so far.

I used to be part of a fresh expression called Solace, a bar church in Cardiff that I started with Church Army officer Wendy Sanderson in 2007. Sadly, Solace came to an end four years later but what didn't come to an end was my vision of incarnational Christian communities that meet in pubs!

The idea of setting up a new monastic community was inspired by a retreat I went on to The Northumbria Community in August 2011 at a time when I was considering where God was leading me next. While there I was thoroughly impressed by the type of community they modelled: namely one defined by openness, acceptance – and, most of all – hospitality. It was this coupled with a long-standing desire of mine to see pubs and bars in Britain 'redeemed' from the bad reputation they currently have that led me to the concept of a new monastic community that was based in a pub or bar.

After the initial inspiration, I began prayerfully pushing doors and this led me to a conversation with the executive director of The Gate Arts Centre in Cardiff, Paul Hocking. Paul, a retired evangelical minister, shared the same vision for authentic, hospitable and incarnational Christian community. The idea of starting a new monastic community at The Gate emerged out of this conversation and the proverbial ball started rolling.

The Gate - cross and communionThe Gate is perfectly situated to be the soil in which a new monastic community could grow because it has all the key elements – a good reputation, people who regularly come in, existing Christian connections and a bar! There are also amazing opportunities for ministry amongst the groups already connected with the venue.

We had our first community meeting in September 2012 and there were five of us, none of whom really knew each other or had much of an idea of how this would work. All were Christians, but mainly Christians who had been wounded by – or else fallen away from – mainstream church in the past. Since then we have grown to 11 members; some are already followers of Jesus but others have never been to church in their life before. We are currently developing a rhythm of prayer and a 'way of life' for the community to live by, as well as learning in general what it means to be a community of spiritual pilgrims who come from diverse backgrounds.

Our meetings take place on Sunday afternoons at 4.30pm in the Cafe Bar of The Gate and they are always based around a meal. We each contribute an item of food and fit in elements of worship, prayer and reflection around our eating, laughing and chatting together. In this, the meetings resemble something of the Sedar meal of Jewish tradition. The meal element is extremely important and illustrates the emphasis on hospitality that we want to place. Jesus is the ultimate host, inviting us into the great celebration of his resurrection, and we want to incarnate this in the small corner of the world God has placed us in. In this way, the meal also becomes central to our understanding of outreach.

As a community we live by a code of three principles:

  • learn from Jesus as best we can – become an apprentice;

  • serve others selflessly – become a host;

  • never judge anyone for where they are on their own life journeys but to help them discover where God is leading them to next. – become a pilgrim.

The Gate - FeastThis whole venture is non-stipendiary so I have no regular income though I do run a tentmaking enterprise called Solace Ministries – as part of which I conduct religious and civil weddings, blessings and funerals. I am still exploring a vision in the longer term to see a new monastic community that is based in, owns and runs a cafe bar/pub. The 'abbey' or 'Monastery Pub' would be a home, hub and base for the community, providing a centre for meeting, mission and ministry. It would provide a centre to go out from and come home to.

A number of 'new monastic communities' in Britain are geographically dispersed but bound together by a common rule and set of core values. The community I envisage would be of this type. Some members would (by necessity) be geographically located in proximity to the 'abbey', but many others would be elsewhere and find their sense of identity through adopting the community's 'way of life', taking an avid and prayerful interest in the life of the community and 'returning home' to the abbey for family worship celebrations at certain important seasons during the year.

As well as the dispersed community, eventually local communities would be established around the country for localised accountability, prayer support and worship. These smaller communities, known as 'cellae', would be bound together and to the larger community by the way of life, but would also undertake pilgrimages to the abbey at certain times. Establishing these local discipleship communities would be the primary focus for the community's missionary activity.

Sermons: in or out? (Norman Ivison)

Norman Ivison asks whether sermons are in or out.

I must have visited over fifty fresh expressions of church in the last few years and in only a handful have I heard a sermon as part of the gathering for worship. That's not surprising. The emergence of post-modernism with its dislike of authority and meta-narrative, contemporary educational theory and real attempts to create contextual learning experiences, all cast the traditional monologue-sermon in a rather poor light.

It's a brave blogger who dares criticise the sermon model though, and personally I love the challenge of preparing and delivering a well crafted sermon. In fact many see the conventional sermon as God-given, although I still need to be convinced that what passes for preaching in many churches is anything like the preaching and teaching we read about in the New Testament. Indeed, according to John Stott's I Believe in Preaching, the sermon is 'indispensable to Christianity'. David Day defends it too in a workbook for preachers, saying that whilst the monologue-sermon seems to be universally derided, the speech per se is not dead, citing the popularity of stand-up comedians.

But do traditional sermons make an impact? According to research done by staff and students at Durham University, many Christians look forward to the weekly sermon, but under 17% said they frequently changed the way they lived as a result of hearing one [The View from the Pew, CODEC/College of Preachers, 2009].

When I surveyed 34 fresh expressions of church, it became clear that a wide range of alternatives to the sermon was employed including group discussion, practical action, individual mentoring, and online learning. But to be honest, some of the teaching I experienced seemed rather superficial and one-dimensional, and felt as though it had been prepared at the last minute. I know you can say that about many more conventional churches too, but I guess I expected better from those really wanting to engage people who have never experienced church before. One leader admitted he woke up on Friday mornings with a heavy feeling in his stomach and a thought buzzing round his head: 'what am I going to say to the community this evening?' Transformational preaching and teaching seems to be in short supply both in conventional and fresh expressions of church.

I did though come across some excellent examples of a thought-through strategy to teaching and preaching. One city centre fresh expression based its modes of teaching on the four Honey and Mumford learning styles, based on those of educationalist David Kolb, as spelt out in his book Experiential Learning. He claims that people learn mainly:

  • by feeling rather than thinking, preferring to trust their hearts more than their head;

  • or by watching situations and impartially describing them, preferring to observe rather than experiment;

  • or by thinking more than feeling, preferring to use logic and ideas;

  • or by actively experimenting as a prime way of learning, preferring doing rather than observing.

That seemed a creative way of acknowledging that sermons don't work for everyone.

So before we throw the homiletical baby out with the pedagogical bathwater, we need to try very hard to find good alternative models to the traditional sermon, if we do believe this one-size-fits-all, tried and tested model, no longer works well for most people in our context. We also need to make sure that a balanced diet is offered. David Dunn-Wilson, in his book, A Mirror for the Church, says that every church should be teaching in six areas: the missional, pastoral, apologetic, ascetic, liturgical, and doctrinal. But it is so easy in a fresh expression, to major on the pastoral and missional and forget the rest.

So here is the challenge: tell us how you teach and preach in the fresh expression you are part of. How do you plan what you do and at the same time remain sensitive to the contemporary needs of your community? How do you measure the effectiveness of your teaching? How do you provide opportunity for interaction and discussion? If you engage mainly one-to-one, how can that be sustained as your community grows?

A Moveable Feast

Rev Jane Gerdsen, Missioner for fresh expressions in the Diocese of southern Ohio, tells of A Moveable Feast in Cincinnati.

It's a Wednesday night at 6.30pm and about 25 mostly young adults are gathered in a room in the back of a coffee shop, bringing dishes to share and talking informally in groups.

After a blessing for the food, we sit around a couple of tables to discuss hospitality: when have you been a host and when have you hosted others? We share stories of inviting friends to see us, of being welcomed into someone's home as a stranger, and wonder together what hospitality looks, tastes, and smells like. Following the dinner conversations, we gather in a circle and share what we had heard while at the table together.

We remember that God shows up in the most unexpected places, inviting us to feast on His word and presence in community – around the dinner table, in a coffee shop or in the sanctuary of an old church. We realise that the act of being the church, God’s community in our time, isn't limited to a place, or a day or a time – but is a way of life.

This is a Moveable Feast, an informal gathering to discuss God, spirituality, religion, faith, life, work, and culture. These gatherings can take place in people's homes, pubs, coffee shops, parks, studios, or other locations. Moveable Feast conversations are a place to ask questions and explore our faith lives in community.

Moveable Feast - tableIn collaboration with the Rev Beth Turner from the Diocese of Western North Carolina – who created and is currently hosting several feast communities in that diocese – we are experimenting and adapting their model for use here in southern Ohio. Beth's vision was for Eucharistic communities of practice, in her case aimed at young adults, but hosted by churches or older adults in their homes or other community gathering places. She agreed that I might try to host some feasts in Ohio.

My first purpose was also to meet the needs of young adults I knew or met who were dissatisfied with church community. We had tried a few different things, emergent worship, pub theology, something I called a Sinner Dinner at a local YMCA but it seemed that:

  • pub theology limited us to people who liked to drink and wanted intellectual conversation;

  • a worship group self-selected around people who were drawn to creative worship but lacked a community building conversation piece.

Since we started in September last year we have hosted in different locations each time. The feasts have tended to be hosted by me as the missioner and I have partnered with a young adult to think of a location, theme, and how to structure the conversation.

But it is important to say that while created with – and for – young adults, A Moveable Feast is for all who are seeking a deeper relationship with God. Everyone is invited to participate and we hope the feasts will be intentionally intergenerational because Moveable Feasts hope to create 'communities of practice' and places for imagining a new way to be church.

So far our first few feast dinners have taken place in Cincinnati, but we are looking to find partners who would be interested in hosting a feast community in other places around the diocese. Feasts could be sponsored by a parish or a small group, but they are especially intended to foster community with people who are currently unaffiliated with a traditional church community.  The feasts are – at their simplest level – a dinner and conversation but they are also intentionally sacramental Eucharistic communities exploring how to engage God’s mission in the world.

Moveable Feast - groupBeth and I see these feast communities as possibly growing into 'church' or Christian 'communities of practice' (which is the language I have been using to hold space for people for whom church is problematic).  Some of our young adults are engaged in 'traditional church communities' but come to the feasts for the conversation and sense of community. We also have people who don't go to any church and probably won't. So, in that way, they are church in their own right.

We have been meeting once a month but I dream that they might meet more frequently. Many of our people are in multiple circles of relationships – intentional communities, neo-monastics, Bible study in a coffee shop, an emergent worship cohort, or other small groups. So this is currently filling one piece of a broader picture of fresh expressions. We will see what happens as to whether there is need or desire for these communities to grow or change going forward.

Moveable Feasts allow us to honour the sacramental nature of our tradition but they feel like dinner with friends. They have also pushed people to see 'church' as something that could happen anywhere not just in holy places. I think the conversation of consequence around a shared meal seems to fit a longing that hadn't been tapped by other groups.

At the moment I think we seem to be drawing de-churched people or people who attend church irregularly or are not entirely satisfied with their church communities for some reason. I hope that our fresh expression's work will result in us building relationships with people who have no connection to church at all. I feel the Spirit slowly pulling us deeper in that direction.

How do we measure ‘success’ in pioneer ministry? (Annie Kirke)

Annie Kirke asks how we measure 'success' in pioneer ministry.

I was one of the first group of Ordained Pioneer Ministers to train in London as part of a former partnership between Westminster Theological Centre, St Mellitus and Ridley Hall.

Advisers at my Bishops' Advisory Panel have since told me that they weren't sure if I had what it would take to pioneer.

They've also confessed that they weren't sure what it would take at all as they didn't then have the selection criteria for Ordained Pioneer Ministry that Graham Cray and others have since developed in relationship with Ministry Division of the Church of England. They only had criteria to select parish priests. They had to take a risk, a step of faith.

I was ordained priest in the diocese of London four years ago and, as I continue to follow the missionary spirit, I have been thinking about the three main things that I have learnt from my pioneering experience so far – things that I most want to take with me into the future:

  1. incarnational mission is rooted in practicing the Presence of God and being led by him;

  2. disciple-making involves practical, missional orthopraxy;

  3. incarnational mission involves the support of people of peace at the core of the established church.

Practicing the presence of God

In the first year of my pioneer post as I looked to develop missional communities in London, I faced so many questions, expectations, challenges and negative reactions from people – usually church leaders – as to what I was beginning to do. In comparison, most non-Christians were really excited by the prospect of missional communities!

When you stripped away the initial interest most church leaders had two questions:

  • how was what I hoped to do 'church?'

  • what were my metrics for measuring success?

In response to the first question, I find Jesus' Commission in Matthew 28 to his earliest followers to be a compelling argument for our focus as clergy today to be on disciple making that leads to church forming rather than planting churches to then make disciples.

Beneath the second question, it was clear that – to some – clergy success could be measured according to money, size of congregation or building. As a result, some clergy were burnt out and exhausted from literally competing – or being compared – with large, lively, urban, network churches which could be perceived to be the benchmark of success.

But I believe that when we measure 'success' in this way, we're leading and discipling poorly. Incarnational ministry requires a daily choice to lay down our lust for personal success and positional power for a relationship with the Son rooted in his example of complete humility and obedience to the Father through the power of the Spirit.

Does this mean we jettison the notion of evaluating our fruitfulness as God's missional people? Not at all! In The Permanent Revolution, Alan Hirsch rightly points out that the church that Jesus intended

…was specifically designed with built-in, self-generative capacities and was made for nothing less than world-transforming, lasting, and, yes, revolutionary impact.

World transforming and revolutionary impact – now those are new measurables worth considering! What about if we measure disciple-making and maturation and its transformational impact in the world not just amongst ourselves?

As new measurables for professed and unprofessed disciples I would suggest that we look for signs of a growing, mature faith in God, leading to a tangible Christ-likeness in attitude and behaviour. Further commitments would be to:

  • discovering how God has uniquely made and called each disciple to partner in his redeeming and renewing Kingdom work and obedience to pursuing this with the support of the body of Christ;

  • exercising faith in everyday life, making Christ known through words, works and wonders to demonstrate the presence of the Kingdom in homes, work places and community spaces;

  • practicing hospitality and table fellowship with neighbours, colleagues and local community – not just other Christians;

  • sharing possessions and money with those in need in both the body of Christ and the wider community

  • care of creation.

Practical missional orthopraxy

There is a generation of church-crawlers out there who may not be committed to any one Christian community but consuming at several. We can blame our consumer culture and mindset but as leaders we have to hold up the mirror to ourselves and ask, 'Have we created a consumer model in our church congregations?'

Many of us are working really hard at making our worship and teaching each Sunday as attractive and relevant as we possibly can without considering if this is exacerbating the consumer mentality of disciples.

The problem seems to be that biblical orthodoxy and orthopraxy have been divorced by our model of church. Jesus taught his disciples around a table, on mission, on the road or the hillside. In other words, mission accompanied teaching and vice versa.

As well as supporting pioneers of missional communities in London, I coordinate Westminster Churches Winter Shelter (WCWS) with six churches and the West London Day Centre. What happens in the shelter is what I've seen in missional communities when people's faith is lived out in community and service of other. As disciples model the servant-leadership and love of Christ, the guests imitate.

People of peace at the core of the established church

I think the 'new wine' that's emerging requires a new wineskin or an apostolic environment in which to thrive.

Therefore, pioneers need people of peace within the institutional corpus of the Church of England who understand and support what is required for this to develop and mature. I have been extremely fortunate over the last three years in the support that I have received from the Diocese of London. However as missional communities and new expressions of church emerge, I see the need for practical and financial support for sustainable incomes, affordable housing, social entrepreneurship and community focused initiatives which will build the apostolic environment necessary to continue.

Rowan Williams has said that God is renewing His church from the edges. I pray that, as he does, he will raise up men and women at the centre of the established church with the courage and imagination to pursue the resources needed to lay the pipelines for resources to flow from the centre to the edges and vice versa.

In turn, those of us on the edges have a responsibility to communicate and – at times – challenge the established church to release what is needed for the Kingdom to grow and to partner with the people of peace within it to see it accomplished.

Emmanuel Café Church – update Jan13

Emmanuel Café Church, launched in 2005, meets on Sunday evenings at Emmanuel Centre, Leeds University. Matt Ward is Lead Chaplain to the University and also oversees Café Church.

I'm on an open-ended contract here and I still feel that I'm in right place doing the right thing, but the Café Church all feels a bit fragile. In September 2012, the leavers were a group of people who had been involved from their first term so have been around for three years. It was a strong, cohesive group and it seemed that all of our long-standing members had gone.

However there are also a lot of people who have been here for a year or two years and they are also really important. We don't seem to have had a lot of new people coming in recently but, based on previous patterns, I'd say that maybe it takes people a term or two to find their way to us.

Emmanel Cafe Church - armThere's quite a mix of people who have previously been part of a church and others who have never had any links with church at all. Most of those without any church background come through conversations I have around the university, not necessarily when I'm working on Café Church.

It can be very surprising to see how things develop. For instance, we have a student worker based at the chaplaincy office and she joined a knitting group. They weren't connected with us in any way but now they've asked her to do a Bible study for them in the café where they knit. To be honest I have mixed feelings because part of me wonders how this is sustainable because she's only with us for a year but, on the other hand, I'm thinking, 'How can I support this group and help it develop even though it's not part of Café Church?' The bottom line is that the whole thing is a risky enterprise which requires you to trust God all the time!

If I just look at numbers, Café Church is pretty small – around a dozen or so regulars – but then I look back over the last five years and think about how many of the people who have been involved with Café Church are either training for ministry or involved in ministry in different ways already. There is something that is transformational, way beyond the numbers attending.

Then I look at other churches in the area which have large-scale, band-led worship with 30 minute expository sermons and they regularly attract several hundred students. It would be the easiest thing in the world to say that we could do here what works 'over there' but that's not necessarily the right thing to do.

Emmanel cafe church - prayer requestsOther people may not see it that way because, as everywhere, resources and money is tight and I am often asked about numbers and finance and so on. That's the really difficult thing for me; namely how we actually make sense of 'measuring' things. We are in a culture that measures everything so it's no surprise that we are questioned about things like, 'How much giving do you generate?'

Looking at my wider work at the University, a senior manager here was discussing the introduction of Key Performance Indicators for chaplaincy. Thankfully she did also say that it was important to measure the right things for those Indicators, reflecting the quality of the engagement that we are able to have. To me, this is something around the work of the ministry itself. Look at the investment that Jesus makes with certain individuals, at times it seems out of all proportion to what you would expect and yet the transformation in their lives is total. It can be very difficult to work out that balance but it's important to try.

Café Church aims to equip young adults for their journey in faith and help them to continually draw on those resources. We give them the tools, not the answers. I work with a group of people who are very literate, very technically aware on the whole and very questioning so I have to engage with them in that way. It's knowing your community, trying to be with them and alongside them, and speak in their 'language'.

Emmanuel cafe church - quizAs part of encouraging them in discipleship, everyone shares in the leading of Café Church. By the end of a year everyone will have taken a lead at some point, it's a very deliberate thing. They are all capable of doing it and sometimes people really surprise you by what they bring. It's important that we are aware of each other's needs and those of the community around us but it is also good to remember that we are part of the wider Anglican Church. There is a reason why we have a lectionary, and some of that is really valuable for us.

As the leader of a community, the sort of approach we have at Café Church could feel quite threatening but I find it really refreshing – even though at times you have to very much think on your feet. It can be frustrating if you have done a lot of preparatory work but the conversations go off on a totally different tangent than you expected. It's then important to discern whether they've gone in a helpful direction or not!

(CEN) A last word, but not the end of the chapter

A new year and a time for taking stock. Bishop Graham Cray, Archbishops' Missioner and leader of the Fresh Expressions team, glances back at what has gone before and looks to the future in 2013 and beyond.

The Fresh Expressions national day conference, in late 2012, was a special time in many ways. Following the missionary Spirit – going forward with fresh expressions' gave us the opportunity to thank Archbishop Rowan for championing our cause. It also provided a place for him to give his last word to us while in office.

His address offered much to reflect on but he used the occasion in particular to reassert his conviction that

the church gets renewed from the edges, not the middle

and that fresh expressions were evidence of that renewal through mission.

He went on to reflect on the 'extraordinary life stories' which had been shared with him as he visited different fresh expressions of church.

For me one of the greatest privileges is the experience of sitting down and listening to how people got there. Someone who has rediscovered or discovered for the first time, Christian commitment, in all the turmoil in personal lives. Somehow, out of all that has come an act of trust, a willingness to belong, and to bring that story into the community.

He then took us on a journey into the heart of being the church.

There's a quiet revolution in how we're thinking the word church,

he said. From the beginning of the Christian mission the gospel, and so the church, was about belonging.

That we should belong together as a human family with him,

turning from our own inadequate ways of belonging, that actually exclude.

Why should people still be interested in the church? Because the church is what speaks to us about the possibility that all human beings can belong together by the grace and acceptance of God, if they'd only just… turn round, repent and believe, turn round and trust, look to the generosity of the God who created and redeemed you, look into the face of the stranger in a completely new way.

So what we've been looking at and thinking about in terms of fresh expressions (of church) is… belonging being created. People who thought they didn't matter, they weren't welcome, are discovering that they are; suddenly finding there's a challenge about community that only the Christian vision or the Christian community can help them with.

It was essential to understand 'why the church matters', because otherwise 'we won't grasp the opportunities' when God has given us 'any number of open doors'.

This was a last word, but no means the end of the chapter. In a poignant moment, the Archbishop was prayed for by the President of the Methodist Conference, Mark Wakelin; Moderator of the URC General Assembly, Val Morrison; and a group of young adults from re:generation, a Methodist fresh expression of church in Romford. The baton was passing from one generation to another.

Martyn Atkins, General Secretary of the Methodist Church, had been in discussion with the Archbishop on behalf of the Methodist Church right at the beginning of the Fresh Expressions story, ensuring that the initiative would always be ecumenical. The Archbishop commented how

we've learned in this process that God does not pay denominational subscriptions.

Looking to the future, Martyn acknowledged that

fresh expressions have rescued the church in numerical decline… and the introspection and desperation that come about from that.

He added,

I don't buy the narrative that fresh expressions is simply a knee-jerk reaction to how you get more bums on seats, rather I see it as an impulse of the missionary Spirit that rescues is from the introspection of certain kinds of ecclesial thinking.

He also called for an 'evolving and real theological narrative' which addressed the inherited church and fresh expressions in equal terms.

We must move in the future, at a level of proper theological engagement, from the approach of some people, that the whole of inherited church is all right, to be defended without question, and anything that is seen in their eyes to detract from that needs to be held up to the light every five minutes or uprooted every two years to see whether or not it is growing. Or indeed, to be knocked around the head to be asked if it can still stand up straight!

Fresh Expressions is to continue its work well beyond 2014. New ecumenical partners are joining. Longer standing ones are identifying the work that is needed and the international network is expanding. The team will continue to network pioneers, gather learning, publish stories, and provide the training needed across the country.

As the Archbishop said,

God is giving us any number of opportunities.

The challenge for the future is not so much the scale of the task, great though that is, but being open to all the

occasions when we have the extraordinary privilege of being invited into people's lives, into their needs, their hopes and bring their this amazing vision of a universal belonging centred on the one who went from the centre of reality to the edge of human life and beyond. And in so doing made the whole creation new.

This distinctive chapter of the mission of God through the church in our land has many more pages waiting to be written.

You can watch and listen to full video and audio clips from all the contributors to Following the missionary Spirit.

No Holds Barred

Stuart Radcliffe is minister to two Methodist/URC churches in Cheshire. He tells how Heaton Moor United Church, Stockport, is linking with the local pub to develop community links.

It all started when we were thinking about how we could make a difference in our community to remind people that we love them – and God loves them.

In some communities, the way the church can work to meet people's needs is pretty obvious. It is very different where we are in Manchester. Yes there are high levels of deprivation in areas on either side of us but we are actually in lovely, green suburbia where – on the face of things – people are not too badly off at all. Whilst there are those who have the daily struggle to make ends meet, many set off to highly paid jobs in the morning and come home much later that day to their very desirable, four-bed detached homes.

But the thought kept coming to me that appearances were deceptive and that people had lots of problems behind their front doors. On the face of it, they are going out to work and getting a nice salary but they can pay a very high price for those demanding jobs with enormous stress levels. Our question was, 'How can we as a church recognise those stresses and make it clear that we care for the people living with those anxieties?'

No Holds Barred - coffeeAt that point we were two churches, Heaton Moor Methodist Church and The Heatons United Reformed Church. We wanted to do something for people during Holy Week so we went out to where they were and gave out coffee and hot cross buns, to those on their way to the railway station. We also gave them a little booklet about Easter and a leaflet explaining why we were doing it. The URC building was about 50 yards away from the station and it was an easy way to break into the busyness of people's lives.

It also made quite an impact on the church members who took part because they understood that they too could start to 'do' evangelism simply by saying, 'Would you like a free coffee?' From that initial idea, working with the community where they are, much has happened and grown. It has been marvellous to share stories and build relationships.

Two years on and we had become one church, Heaton Moor United Church, but the same question remained as to how we might best reach out into our community. The answer came when a few of us including my colleague Rev Richard Parkes were in a local pub, The Plough, and we came up with the idea of having Beer and Carols. Pub landlord Ian was really supportive and so members of the church gathered in the pub and – in between rounds of Ian's festive quiz and fancy dress – we sang praise to God in carols. The result was that I had more conversations about faith than I'd had for months and we also raised £200 for Christian Aid.

No Holds Barred - singingWhat could we do next? Our thoughts turned again to Easter but we no longer had the building by the station for distributing coffees. However The Plough was in a perfect position. All we had to do was persuade Ian to open up at 6am, allow us to give away coffee and receive nothing in return!

Amazingly, Ian agreed and so from Monday to Thursday of Holy Week we met at the pub from very early morning and gave away coffee and hot cross buns and booklets about the Easter story. Social media also had a role to play and we let people know what we were doing via Twitter. I'd just started the church Twitter account and people picked up on three keywords that I used: Heaton Moor, Community, Caring.

That meant what we were doing was picked up by a lot of people doing things in our area about community or caring. At that time the messages were being tweeted to 3,500 people; they are now retweeted to about 7,000 people because we have hit the right networks – these included local radio which picked up on the momentum of church doing something good in the community.

I chatted to Ian about how we might continue to develop these growing links with community. The Plough already hosted a knitting group, Spanish lessons and the history society. I said, 'How about a monthly discussion meeting' and he said, 'what night do you want to do it on?! I want people to come in here and feel that they are sitting in their own lounge, the more we can offer them the better'.

No Holds Barred - carolsThat group is called No Holds Barred and it involves talking over a variety of issues with a Christian input but in a very informal way. We also put the discussion starter details on all the tables in the pub, not just the area we're sitting in, so that people can still consider some of the issues even if they don't join us.

It stands on its own as a specific community. In December the evening was called, 'I wish it could be Christmas every day? How do I cope with Christmas at a time of financial austerity?' Past meetings have seen us look at prayer through the story of footballer Fabrice Muamba who survived a heart attack and we have also discussed trust as a result of the Jimmy Savile investigations.

Some months there have been 10 to 12 people taking part and other times there have been four of us, we've just got to keep at it. We have also had other events, such as a curry and comedy night at the pub. I think we need to give it two years before we assess what happens next. If it's to continue to grow it will look very different than church as we know it today.

We have to think how we can be relevant in our service to people. Maybe they will then see a purpose and later a meaning as to why we do what we do. I have learned a lot from the pub landlord because we Christians need to recognise that the church doesn't have exclusivity in wanting to serve people. I know it's a matter of good business practice for Ian but he also wants to provide a place where the community can come together in different ways. I think sometimes people respect us more as churches in the area when we join in with what others are already doing, such as the local traders' association. We offered to do some carol singing for them and they were really pleased.

For the first two years of my time here, all I seemed to do was have cups of coffee with people. Now I know why. It's because you become friends with them and now, after almost six years, those relationships have started to pay off. The thing is you have to make yourself available. It does mean you can't go for a quiet drink in the local pub any more because people want to chat to you about different things but that's great! It just means you have to go outside the area if you want a quiet might out.

No Holds Barred - antlersI'm always reluctant to put 'labels' on something like No Holds Barred because it's organic and I don't know where it's going to lead. If it leads us to a fresh expression meeting in the pub I'd be delighted and I'd love that to be the direction that it takes. What I'm starting to learn is that I get more out of it by letting it go where it wants to go but I have no intention of it being an 'outreach' to get people in to our standard church services. That's not its purpose; we have been quite clear with our church about that and they're very supportive of that.

If somebody said they wanted to get more involved in my traditional church community as a result of coming to No Holds Barred then that's fine but the group doesn't exist to be a gateway to 'proper' church. I would say, 'You are more than welcome to come but it's nothing like this.' We have to get away from any idea that we are creating things that will appeal to people in a postmodern way but what we are really asking them to do is to sign on the dotted line and be part of traditional church.

There are lots of questions around fresh expressions but I think financial support is going to become increasingly important. At the moment fresh expressions are predominantly being funded by the established church but there has to be a point where fresh expressions fund themselves in order to continue.

I'm on the FEAST (Fresh Expressions Area Strategy Team) for Greater Manchester and I went on the mission shaped ministry course locally. One of the key things I learned from that was that we have got permission to fail. That means we don't say, 'it didn't work' but instead ask, 'What's the next thing? Just keep at it.' It's also very important to keep open to stopping some things as well as starting them. I'm enjoying doing stuff our way but it's important to discover what will work for you.