August 2015 - Page 5 of 20

Emerging church, inherited problems! (Simon Sutcliffe)

Simon Sutcliffe finds inherited problems in the emerging church.

This is slightly tongue in cheek! But beneath it lurks an uncomfortable truth – if only I could see it properly. What a friend of mine calls the meta-narrative in the mist.

VentureFX Hanley shares a space called The Lounge with other agencies working within the city centre. It used to be a bank and is now kitted out with wood effect flooring, ambient lighting, an open kitchen, leather sofas and tub chairs. A group of us met to discuss how we might develop the space further. We looked at better lighting, better signage, a proper coffee maker, etc, but what was most pressing was to sort out two emerging (but not new) problems.

The first was to do with storage. It is great that the space is getting used more regularly and that is exactly what we want. However, where do the groups keep their stuff? All the usual questions were raised: 'Do they really need that stuff?', 'Can we not share resources and therefore not duplicate the same things in different cupboards?' and 'How can we maximise cupboard space using minimum wall space?' You know the questions.

The second was to do with the general look of the place. It is a lovely space, but without a dedicated cleaner it soon begins to look unloved. Again the same old questions were asked: 'Can we afford a cleaner?', 'Who might volunteer?' and 'Can user groups take more responsibility?' In the end we struck upon a great (yet not entirely new) idea. A Benedictine clean! St Benedict's rule offers a possible spirituality for work whereby work is a means to goodness of life. Benedict's rule is also moderate; a healthy work/life balance is essential and within that balance falls the place of prayer and worship, with monks often seen reciting the Psalter during work. So a group of us decided to pray and clean our way through The Lounge.

What is fascinating for me is how soon we come back to the problems of inherited models of church

What is fascinating (and scary) for me is how soon we come back to the problems of inherited models of church. It felt as if I was on a property committee of old whilst deciding what to do with the space that we now inhabit. I can't help but wonder if there is any escape from those things that used to frustrate me so much and led to me being where I currently am. I know this is about property, and re-read the first line of this post, but most people who are engaging in similar kinds of ministry will often speak of the same frustrations that belong to structure and organisation as well as some theological stuff too. Is this simply what it means to be in organised community with designated space? Or is there another way?

Sustaining pioneer ministry in Poole (Paul Bradbury)

Paul Bradbury discusses sustaining pioneer ministry in Poole.

Why have we decided to create something called Poole Missional Communities? I guess there are a number of reasons.

Since I started as Pioneer Minister in Poole in September 2008, three projects have emerged that increasingly have lives of their own – even though they share common values. We began Reconnect to draw together a community of people who wanted to live radically and missionally, as well as be intentional about community.

They were challenged to think and pray about how they could be missionaries in different contexts and use their gifts to connect with others. In the process of our listening in the first few months, I talked to people who didn't go to church – but many of them spoke of having an experience of God, of praying and meditating.

I felt it right to get into workplaces in Poole because if we were going to make new connections outside church then the workplace had to be part of it. About six months later, work:space began in the Barclays HQ building. It offers a space for quiet and silence and contemplation in the workplace and it now runs in the RNLI training college as well.

Wild Spirit developed from a kind of one-off pilgrimage with my mates into a weekend camp. This in turn became a series of events over the year aimed at giving men some space and adventure in the wilderness.

Underlying values – in particular, incarnational mission and forming community – are held by all these projects, so we began to wonder how to look after what seemed to be emerging.

Why have we decided to create something called Poole Missional Communities? There are a number of reasons…

Practically speaking, there was also the issue of sustaining the pioneer ministry that had been started. Funding from the diocese was to finish in August 2012 and we set up a working group to look at how to ensure it didn't all end there. It was then decided that we should set up a charity which could raise funds to support the development of the work. This was named to reflect the values that underpinned the work – hence Poole Missional Communities.

However, we very much wanted to remain integrated with Poole Deanery and be part of the life and mission there. Trustees for the charity are drawn from local churches, so there is integration at that level, and many people involved in work:space and Wild Spirit also worship in fellowships and congregations across the area.

We organised an official launch event for Poole Missional Communities (PMC) because we wanted to give the wider church the opportunity to both hear about the work and get involved, either practically or in a more supportive role through prayer or giving.

The charity is being launched today (4th April) at St Mary's, Longfleet, by the leader of the Fresh Expressions team, Bishop Graham Cray, and the event is hosted by the Bishop of Sherborne, Dr Graham Kings. I think this a really good example of the mixed economy at work, with new structures being created to foster new life through the hard work and continued support of the more traditional structures.

I believe that partnership isn't just for the start-up phase but that PMC and the wider church will continue to be a synergy in mission for Poole.

Thoughts, failures and successes (Ben Gardner)

Ben Gardner is having thoughts on failures and successes.

Success is never final; failure is never fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts

Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill is one of my heroes. Despite his 'black dog' days of depression, he never gave up and continued to pursue what he believed was right and what was needed. I'm sure like many of us, Churchill learnt from his mistakes more than he did from his successes.

Leading a fresh expression of church is nothing like leading a nation into battle, but sometimes it can feel like it. There are days when you see growth, numerically and in the depth of relationships, discipleship, and then there are days when you ask yourself, 'What am I doing?'

Six months ago I was leading a fresh expression in the market town of Woodbridge in Suffolk. Named The Lounge, it was based in Costa Coffee. The birth of this church was not planned but a result of the relationships that the local church (St John's Woodbridge) had developed over the years with the Costa staff. The starting point of this church was relationship and listening to our 'non-customers' (those who did not attend a 'traditional' church).

The Lounge was a great success, it developed, people came and the events were of a good quality. However, I started to notice that many of our guests were Christians who were fed up with their traditional churches, desiring a community that seemed less structured and distant from the established church … even though The Lounge was born out of and accountable to a 'traditional' church. I also began to recognise that all the events and key relationships with The Lounge community and Costa staff orbited around me and the people I knew.

Leading a fresh expression of church is nothing like leading a nation into battle, but sometimes it can feel like it

Towards the end of my time in Woodbridge this became a fundamental problem … who was I going to pass the baton to? Who would continue the discussions, events and aid the discipleship of those that were beginning the journey with God and his church? Questions which all church leaders should ask themselves at the beginning of their ministry!

My obvious failure was the lack of investment that I placed in building a team from the beginning and to recognise that The Lounge was not engaging with the people that we had originally started it for. However, due to the great church that I was connected to, namely St John's, The Lounge continues to grow and develop as others have taken on that baton since I left. An Alpha course is now running at Costa and some of the staff are taking part – wonderful stuff, but the story could so easily have taken a very different turn.

Building a team and sharing ministry is essential when taking on a new church, ministry, a small group, etc. Jesus calls all of us to make disciples of all nations (Matthew 28.19). We are called to 'go' out in community, not on our own. My failure was to build team to help me listen to those we were reaching.

Winston Churchill could not have led this nation to victory if it wasn't for those around him and those that he shared leadership with.

Who is on your team? Have you thought about inviting others into leadership? Are you willing to let go and give others a chance at leading, hosting, teaching and contributing new ideas?

Why approving women bishops is important for fresh expressions (David Muir)

David Muir explains why approving women bishops is important for fresh expressions.

I have just come back from a 'Sacred Synod' in our diocese, as part of the national process of deliberation about the ordination of women to the episcopate. I almost didn't go because it's the kind of occasion that feels a million miles from pioneer work with the unchurched. But actually the outcome will speak volumes about what we think Christianity is all about, and how God relates to our world.

That's because the issue of whether we should have women as bishops is not really about how God sees women, or about how God sees the role of 'overseers' of his people. It's about how God relates to human beings at all. And the answer, clear in the pages of Holy Scripture, is that it's by exercising enormous grace.

Whether it's Abraham, clearly at ease with the idea of sacrificing a son, or conquering peoples slaughtering civilians to clear the area of idolatry, or a society's acceptance of slavery, or the low place of women in the life and leadership of a community, God graciously relates to humanity, even draws them into his purposes in the world, without thereby condoning every social, moral or political attitude they have.

So we get communities of faith which in key ways do reflect his character but which were never perfect, not even in their perception of perfection, not even when their life is recorded in Holy Scripture. Their life cannot be a prescriptive pattern for ours.

How does God relate to a society which has championed the rights of women and drawn them into the highest leadership?

God is forming communities of faith within 21st Century British society. He calls those communities to be different, in ways that reflect and reveal his holy character within our particular human cultural setting. But he does not call us to be the same as the peoples he has related to before, as if they were entirely shaped into his will already. If we copy our forefathers in that kind of way, we become merely a people apart, separated from society around in a kind of time warp, a culture trap, with distinctives that for that very reason fail to reveal the heart and character of God in our particular setting.

This is vital for fresh expressions of church. How does God relate to a society which has championed the rights of women and drawn them into the highest leadership? How God revealed himself within societies that kept women out of high office, both in society and in the church, is not the point. The point is: what will best reveal the holy character of God in our setting? If Christians involved in fresh expressions of church don't really get this, then whatever we do on the ground is just window-dressing for culture-warp Christianity that does not understand the depth of grace that is revealed to us in Holy Scripture.

Order of Companionable Priest (Gordon Banks)

Gordon Banks wonders why we don't have an Order of Companionable Priest.

During my early days of public ministry as a Community Evangelist I led a house group in a set of studies over six weeks. At the end of our journey we thought it would be good to end with a social and the Eucharist. Up until this point the priest had left it all to me whilst giving it his full support.

However to enable us to celebrate the Eucharist he needed to become involved in order to celebrate. Being moderately catholic he came and wore cassock and stole and led us through a simple Eucharist in the home where we had been meeting.

For me it was one of those seminal moments as I realised that we had not drafted in the vicar to 'do the magic' but as a priest in the Church of God he reminded us as a gathering that we belonged to the One, Holy and Catholic Church. We, as a small intimate group, were not the church but a part of it, with the priest coming amongst us – particularly, I would dare to suggest, as he was robed – symbolically helping to put our 'study and journey' into a bigger context.

Historically of course lay communities of sisters and nuns would have had a male priest come amongst them in order to offer Eucharistic ministry. Not wanting to get into the debate of male or female priest I think the important point is that a priest is a visible reminder of the One, Holy and Catholic Church. An ordained priest is not geographically or specifically located in one place or amongst only one community.

Perhaps where we might have gone astray is in thinking that priesthood, at least in Anglican terms of reference, most often is axiomatically equated with leadership. John Tiller's sadly neglected report, A Strategy for the Church's Ministry (CIO Publishing, 1983), would have gone a long way to help us consider this concept.

If we had an Order of Companionable Priest, they could walk alongside the fresh expression offering a sacramental ministry as and when it was felt appropriate by the emerging community

There are those who argue that a church can only become church as and when it celebrates the sacraments. For the Church of England this requires an ordained priest. Therefore what does this say about lay-led fresh expressions of church? That the lay leader can only take them so far down to the road to being recognised as church?

However if we had an Order of Companionable Priest, they could walk alongside the fresh expression offering a sacramental ministry as and when it was felt appropriate by the emerging community. Apart from having a role alongside fresh expressions, a Companionable Priest could be available to cover vacancies or to walk alongside another priest who might be having a tough time and who for that moment needs a 'Barnabas'.

Having a Companionable Priest honours lay leadership and also serves to remind the emerging community that it is part of the One, Holy and Catholic Church.

Liturgy: how not to compromise our ‘messiness’ (Lucy Moore)

Lucy Moore wonders how to incorporate liturgy without compromising messiness.

The question of appropriate liturgies, usually for a proposed Messy Communion, often comes up at training days for Messy Church.

There's a divided reaction. The Anglicans take on a hunted air, while those of other denominations just look smug or slightly baffled that such a question should be any sort of a problem. I was chewing floorboards at the question raised at General Synod about Messy Church, which was not along the lines of 'How can we encourage and equip churches in this growth area?', but 'Has the Liturgical Commission considered whether it should produce guidelines or materials which would enable those leading Messy Church events to bring the worship into line with the principles behind Common Worship?'

Cue weeping and gnashing of teeth.

The answer given suggested that as the Liturgical Commission was in touch with Messy Church, it was fine not to make us compromise our messiness. I did get in touch with the Liturgical Commission some years ago to see if there could be permission to try out different communion liturgies. It was then that I (a lifelong Anglican) learned that what makes Anglicans Anglican is our liturgy: a revelation to me.

Here is an opportunity to grow liturgies appropriate and meaningful to the new congregation

Liturgy means 'the people's work'. Its roots are linked to the words for 'public service'. When a bishop recently led a Messy Church confirmation service, it caused the diocese to see that this different congregation needs a different form of liturgy from one eminently suitable for services in cathedrals. The church then has a choice: either she decrees that the new form of church has got it wrong in its attitude to church behaviour and must learn to conform to existing liturgies on formal occasions at least (or do without them altogether 'until it learns some manners'), or she sees an opportunity to grow liturgies appropriate and meaningful to the new congregation.

This does not entail dumbing anything down. It involves reimagining what liturgy can do at its best: providing 'portable poetry' that seeps out at home, at school and at work, in our contented bathtime warblings and our arrow prayers of despair – the articulation of porous grace osmosing from the gathered church into everyday life to make a difference to whole communities.

It might also mean encouraging local churches to recognise the best liturgy for their own idiosyncratic congregation. In other words, become a resource rather than a requirement. This is the sort of liturgy I could get excited about.

Are fresh expressions radical enough? (Matt Stone)

Matt Stone asks whether fresh expressions are radical enough.

Fresh expressions are designed to be fishing nets. They are the central thrust of the church's mission to reach the growing unchurched population – those who are unlikely to just wander through the church doors for an occasional service, and who may not yet be ready for an Alpha Course.

Whilst there are many fresh expressions that are reaching out to the unchurched very well, many others seem to attract more churchgoers and those with a previous church connection. This is not necessarily a bad thing, because we need to close the back door of the church and not just open the front one. But what's the reasoning for why some expressions don't attract those very much outside the church radar? What can we do about it?

Could it be because of their format? Could they still be too much like church services? As Dave Male argues in Evaluating Fresh Expressions (edited by L Nelstrop & M Percy, Canterbury Press, 2008), 'The danger of starting with church worship … is that it works well for those looking to reconnect with church culture but does not hold much attraction for those with no previous experience of church.'

One Eucharistic fresh expression I visited last year still assumes a familiarity with the Eucharist. It still meets in a church, is structured around a liturgy, and is participative only in the sense that one drinks the bread and wine. Another fresh expression is a service that meets on church premises, albeit with food and a contemporary worship style. There is still a sermon, an offertory, and the chairs are arranged in rows around the screen and worship group.

Whilst I believe that worship, scripture and the sacraments are vital ingredients of church life and faith, I wonder whether some fresh expressions could be more radical in the way they present, or engage with, these elements. Yes, they are often more context-driven and missionary in intent than traditional forms of church, but if the unchurched are to be reached, are they radical enough? Are we still thinking in a churchy mindset?

I wonder whether part of the problem is the domestication of fresh expressions. Some fresh expressions are simply former children's work programmes or other outreach or alternative services that have been renamed, restyled or repackaged. They are not always that 'fresh'! Have we adopted a 'mission-flavoured' rather than mission-shaped approach?

Fresh expressions in Liverpool’s Narnia? (Annie Spiers)

Annie Spiers looks for fresh expressions in Liverpool's Narnia.

In Another Place is a group that came together six years ago to take the good news outside church walls through large, creative arts projects – and lots of other things. The name and inspiration came from Anthony Gormley's Another Place installation of iron men statues at Crosby beach, Merseyside, where our first performances were produced.

Today we continue to work in collaboration with community organisations, offering a gospel choir, schools and puppet teams, a group for 18-30s, and a festivals and exhibitions team. This all helps to bring alive our mission statement of 'Christians and community working together, inspired by our love for God and the people around us'.

In 2009 we 'visited' Narnia for the first time, staging a walk-through presentation of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe in a church hall. During its three week run we were visited by more than 3,000 people – with 25 performers and 40 stewards on duty throughout the three weeks. Over 100 others were involved behind the scenes.

Two years on and we decided to repeat the experience on a somewhat larger scale … the manager of Liverpool city centre landmark, St George's Hall, had been inspired by our previous Narnia and asked us to stage it at the historic venue. The Great Hall is 169 feet long and 74 feet wide!

Hundreds of volunteers from churches across the city, and some from no church background at all, have been involved in making this happen. In fact, the two-week show goes on, running until Saturday (19th February) and bringing in thousands of people to walk through the wardrobe and share in the experience.

So far, so good – and any fresh expressions practitioner would be more than welcome to come and see for themselves how we deal with building, and sustaining, this extraordinary community of people of all abilities and backgrounds. But what happens when we dismantle the false 'sky' we've had to install and one of our team of White Witches goes back to being a teacher? What happens to that community, that team, and those with questions about Aslan?

At the moment we are not a fresh expression of church, but In Another Place could definitely be heading in that direction. The activities we routinely run all year round are open doors for those affected by our large-scale events – which always contain the Christian message – to find out more.

This year 500 people have been involved in Narnia, including some 100 adults with additional needs, all having a go at creative arts, acting, stewarding, construction, and much more. The performance team is also substantial with ten actors for each of the five acting parts and countless Dryads, statues, and general support staff.

What's the next step? It depends entirely on the outcome of this event. But we have already seen clear results from staging such community activities, with people taking on more and more responsibility than they would have done previously. The sheer scale of recreating Narnia in the middle of a major tourist attraction, for instance, has meant that many individuals have had to rise to the challenge – and they have done it brilliantly.

In Another Place is a group that came together six years ago to take the good news outside church walls through large, creative arts projects

Numerous churches provided financial support for this event, and many have provided the catering to keep the team going. Money has also come from various trusts and individuals, and a large amount from ticket sales income. Prayer is vital and an email prayer bulletin goes out daily to people across the city, and beyond, to detail specific prayer requests based on the events of that day.

Many of our helping hands have indicated interest to participate in future events, and we have seen most volunteers – of 'churchy' backgrounds or not – touched by the scale of the project and the determination to make it a success driven by our Christian faith.

Visitors are told of the Aslan/Jesus allegory and they have the opportunity to write a prayer/wish/dream on a snowflake at the end of the experience. A stall also offers CS Lewis books. We do not offer specific opportunities to find out more about the story and its Christian links, but if people were to mention that, we would of course answer them.

We have lots of ideas for future large-scale events, but nothing concrete will be decided until the madness of The Narnia Experience has passed! As for lessons learnt along the way, I would say that detailed planning is essential – even when you think you have done enough, there will almost certainly be something you've missed.

But also we've learnt to trust that God will provide everything we need. This has been a huge leap of faith, but faith comes with reward – as we continue to see day after day through the wardrobe in Liverpool.

A populous church is a healthy church? (Toby Cohen)

Toby Cohen asks whether a populous church is a healthy church.

It is ironic that the fresh expressions movement is used by the church as a fig leaf when attendance figures again reveal declining involvement in 'traditional' forms of church. Fresh expressions would certainly appear to be the answer to the church's predicament, but only if it pays greater attention to the movement's witness.

For a journalist, the fresh expressions movement is both exciting and frustrating. It provides great feature pieces and quirky short news articles but seldom claims the headlines. As a decentralised entity, it does not announce schisms, pronounce on social ills, or denounce distant bishops. When it does register on the news radar, it is usually at the point it becomes tangible with the church body in such matters as debates about funding, underlying ideology, or the work of Bishop Graham Cray. This nature spares the movement from many of the headaches which dog the traditional church, but it also demonstrates what many regard as a highly authentic form of Christianity.

Evangelicals are usually keen to cast off the shackles of institutionalised forms of church in a bid to return to a faith they describe as more biblical. But there is one common habit which seems to be a remnant of the patriarchal established church. That is, to believe that a populous church is a healthy church.

It's hard to imagine a scenario where the number of people involved in church activities isn't of interest. But a church must be suspicious of itself when it simply looks at attendance figures and finds reason to be boastful or anxious. It is particularly dangerous for people who are part of a less well-attended church in one part of the world and want to associate themselves with large groups in another.

A church must be suspicious of itself when it simply looks at attendance figures and finds reason to be boastful or anxious

I remember a talk 18 months ago with The Economist editor John Micklethwait, co-author of God is Back, and Evangelical Alliance theologian Justin Thacker. It seemed they pictured God as a Victorian schoolboy parading his battalions, returning to us at the end of time to do a head count of the different people united by an arbitrary term. Yes, forms of Christianity are thriving in some developing parts of the world. So are intolerance and violence.

Devotion to the mixed economy mantra is a noble characteristic in many fresh expressions people. But what gets so many of us excited is the fresh expressions attitude that it's what you're doing in the first instance that counts, not how many people you're doing it with. And not what you might do next. There is a relationship between those of course, but it seems the church would particularly benefit from adopting more of that fresh expressions ethos at this time.

We need to show what God is like (Ann M Smith)

Ann M Smith reminds us that we need to show what God is like.

One can find out how to do almost anything on the internet. There is actually a site called exactly that. It offers information amongst other things on how to teach an old dog new tricks, service your car, cook, write a will, get a divorce, and – should you ever need to know – raise mealy worms. Now I have not checked out the information, but there are, of course no guarantees that what you might discover on such a website actually works.

In the gospel there is a very simple 'how to' about evangelism that gives a demonstration of what God calls us to do. Two of John's disciples overhear a conversation in which John the Baptist proclaims, 'Look! The Lamb of God!' It is enough to pique their curiosity. They follow Jesus. Jesus talks to them and finally invites them to see where he is staying. It is an invitation they immediately accept. But it does not stop there. Andrew, one of the two disciples, heads off to find his brother. He can hardly wait to share his experience.

What can we learn from these simple 'how to's? Many people are calling for a return to faith in God. They are reeling from the brokenness of the world and ask deep faith questions about life and about life to come.

It makes it a fruitful time for the Christian church, a time of opportunity and one in which we should have increasing relevance. And yet often we don't. We remain stuck in old ways of doing things. We should be reaching out to the seekers and the unchurched in our society and finding ways to meet their spiritual needs.

The gospel does not simply tell us that we are called to discipleship. It demonstrates it for us. It gives us a wonderful model to follow. The first thing, the very first thing that Andrew does when he is introduced to Jesus is to take his brother to see him. How do we make it natural to share our faith in our workplace and in our community?

This is a fruitful time for the Christian church, a time of opportunity and one in which we should have increasing relevance. And yet often we don't. We remain stuck in old ways of doing things.

What really counts is that Jesus Christ calls us to this tradition. Either we are in a terrible rut, or God is calling us to do something about it. We are called to discipleship, to share our faith, to have an impact on society but most of us just say that it is an impossible task. We become so immobilised by anger or fear or insecurity that we cannot do anything to bring about change. But surely if we are creative, we can do something to improve conditions.

But there is more to discipleship, isn't there? We need to show people what God is like. And truly it may not happen as it has in the past. People who have no memory of church or what impact faith can have in one's life will look for fulfillment in other ways. We may need to explore new ways of being church – fresh expressions of church – and it is possible we may discover that those fresh expressions of church are already happening here. Wherever we are.

The question still remains, how do we get across to people what God means in our lives? John knew Jesus because the Spirit remained on him. And that same Spirit is given to us. It remains with us, strengthening, guiding and leading us on to experience more and more of God. We in turn share it with others.

About your own call, you wouldn't be a part of the church if you weren't called. So know that you can make a difference and do something about it – whatever type of church, or fresh expression of church, you are in. Share with others what God is like, what God has done in your life. Live out your calling. And do not worry about how to do it.