Month: March 2017

Ashton Under Lyne 17

The Methodist Church and URC in Greater Manchester and area are delighted to make msm available locally. We believe it will be a significant resource for building the Kingdom of God in this area. Individuals are most welcome, but we particularly hope that small groups from a church or fresh expression will come as this will deepen the impact of the course.

Who is it for?

  • Those exploring how to begin, sustain and grow a fresh expression of church;

  • Experienced pioneers who want to reflect on what they are doing;

  • Those wanting to learn qualities of Christian ministry;

  • Christians who want their churches to be more effective in mission;

  • All denominations, traditions and ages;

  • Urban, suburban and rural contexts.

Features of the course

  • Designed for busy Christians;

  • Delivered ecumenically;

  • Local and national teachers;

  • Reflection on your context and story;

  • Varied learning styles and resources;

  • Coaching, mentoring, learning networks;

  • Full materials and extra online material.

Modules include

  • Mission context;

  • The mission of God;

  • Vision, values and call;

  • Starting something new;

  • Listening for mission;

  • What is church?

  • Gospel and culture;

  • Team roles and behaviour;

  • Discipleship;

  • Evangelism;

  • Spirituality, worship and the sacraments;

  • Growing to maturity.

Your local course

The course leaders and teachers include Rod Hill and Stuart Radcliffe.

Course timetable and venue

  • Wednesday, 26th April 2017

  • Wednesday,24th May 2017

  • Saturday, 10th June 2017

  • Wednesday, 21st June 2017

  • Saturday, 8th July 2017

  • Wednesday, 27th September 2017

  • Wednesday, 25th October 2017

  • Saturday, 4th November 2017

  • Wednesday, 22nd November 2017

  • Wednesday, 24th January 2018

  • Wednesday 28th February 2018

  • Saturday, 31st March 2018

This year, the course will run on weeknights and Saturdays. Weeknights run from 19.30-21.30 Hurst Methodist Church, Curzon Road, Ashton-under-Lyne, OL6 9QZ. Saturdays run from 10.00-16.00 other local fresh expressions venues to be arranged.

 

Cost

£250.00 (For Methodist members within the Manchester & Stockport District this will be reduced to £100.00 and subsidies may be available through THE URC and other PARTNERS)

Download the flier and booking form below or book online.

Contact

Rod Hill rodney.hill@methodist.org.uk

 

Young Adults Outreach Co-Ordinator

Wolverhampton Pioneer Ministries (“WPM”) is a vibrant discipleship movement with a history of

growth based in the centre of Wolverhampton seeking to worship fully, love all and serve the city. They are looking for a Young Adult Outreach Co-ordinator to work as part of our team who is passionate about discipleship and mission with a heart to engage with young adults particularly those who are marginalised.

More details are on the attachment below which you can download.

Assistant Minister (BMO) with oversight of Missional Communities and Fresh Expressions

The Vision: Making disciples on mission with Jesus across South Lincolnshire.

St George’s Stamford is a larger Anglican church (500+) and looks to be both attractional and missional as we share the good news of God’s kingdom in Stamford and the surrounding countryside.

St George’s and the Diocese of Lincoln are looking to recruit an Associate Minister who has experience in growing and enabling Fresh Expressions and missional communities. We want to resource and enable new missional communities and Fresh Expressions in the places from where we currently gather people. The Mission Enabler will discover, equip and release missional leaders back into their local communities.

Whats in the Box?

There’s nothing like seeing a plan come together, so for the folk at Leicester Diocese who’ve been developing the Flexible Mission Shaped Ministry (MSM) training across the region it’ll be a sweet moment when three lay pioneers are licensed this year at the Cathedral. Theresa Morgan, Wendy Hardy and Ruth Leonards – part of a team who lead eleven30, a Fresh Expression which is just about to celebrate its 10th birthday –  have journeyed together through the training programme which aims to provide contextual and practical training to pioneers who are already involved in leadership. The model is based on the principles of coaching, and starts with the understanding that there is no one-size-fits-all approach which can meet the needs of pioneers and the ministries they lead. “Eleven30’s services start with a ‘What’s in the Box’ game to introduce a topic for the children,” says Theresa Morgan, “It’s a tool to move them from where they are beginning into deeper engagement.” Ooh, we feel an analogy coming on…

Eleven30 is a Fresh Expression based in Syston, Leicester, and is primarily aimed at young children and their families (photo above). Set-up in response to a local need for a model of church which met the needs and lifestyles of young families, the bi-monthly meetings are now led by a lay team who plan and deliver the worship, creative activities and social times. The team were already skilled in organising and leading the sessions, but flexible MSM provided an opportunity for them to receive training and support in the missional and spiritual aspects of leading the Fresh Expression.

“What is distinctive about flexible MSM training,” explains Matt Pitt, Pioneer Development Worker, “is that the model allows us to respond to the needs of the pioneers where they are at that moment. We’re not training them in a standard programme which may or may not be relevant in five years time, but working alongside them to understand their current situation and helping them to ask the questions that will help them get to where they need to be.” This approach, rooted in coaching practice, is one strategic method that Leicester Diocese are adopting as they work towards their vision to see as many Fresh Expressions as inherited churches thriving in the region by 2030. “It’s a model for multiplication”, says Pete Atkins, Team Coordinator at Fresh Expressions HQ, “Coaching is a valuable tool to develop Pioneers, and the Leicester example shows how it can be used to develop sustainable ministries.”

Ah yes – sustainability, that hallowed end-goal for Fresh Expression ministries. Flexible MSM training has the long-view built firmly into its methodology, and eleven30 provides a great little snapshot of how they do that. Matt spent a year spent alongside eleven30’s leadership team, providing monthly coaching sessions covering topics such as Spiritual Discernment and Listening for Mission. He was supported in this work by pioneers from another area, alongside encouraging the team to begin to identify the next generation of leaders from within their own community. This flow between learning from experienced practitioners whilst identifying potential in new pioneers is key, as is the continued commitment to training the soon-to-be licensed lay leaders in order that they can deliver the flexible MSM programme to others. In these ways sustainability is kept central – leaders are identified, trained, and then trained to identify and train others.

“The training deepened my knowledge and understanding”, says Theresa. “It gave us space as a team to look with outsider’s eyes, and think ‘outside the box’ about where we’re heading”. And as eleven30 prepare to celebrate a decade of local pioneering ministry, we look forward with them to seeing what else emerges as they

13% of Methodists attend Fresh Expressions? We can’t resist a figure like that…

There’s nothing like a pie chart to get our Fresh Expression hearts a-fluttering. Data – lots of it – facts and figures, slices and colours showing trends and declines. Ooh, we love it… Suffice to say, when confronted with a set of pie charts and line graphs recently showing numbers and attendance of Methodists engaging with Fresh Expressions it didn’t take long before we were reaching for our calculators and thinking caps – what do these figures show us, and what does it mean for Fresh Expressions in 2017?

Time to hit you with some numbers. In 2015 the average weekly attendance of Methodists at Fresh Expressions was around 30,000 – showing an increase of nearly 5,000 people since 2012. That means that 12-13% of all Methodists attending a weekly form of worshipping community are in Fresh Expressions… and that means that this is a statistic worth paying attention to. If such a sizeable and growing number of Methodists are engaged in Fresh Expressions what can we learn as a movement as we seek to provide resources and share learning?

This is a question that Graham Horsley, Methodist Fresh Expressions Missioner, says the church is rising to; “We now face the positive challenge of integrating new ways of being church into our existing circuits. We’re seeking to maximise the effectiveness of both traditional and new ways of being church, and help them to complement one another.”

Of course, these figures – juicy as they are – come with the inevitable health warning that Fresh Expressions are largely self-defining, and to some degree the numbers can be skewed by this lack of clarity. However, there is certainly an upward trend in overall numbers of (self-declared) Fresh Expression ministries within the Methodist Church as well as numbers of those attending, and knowing and sharing these key trends is important. They point to the growing desire to connect with expressions of church which resonate contextually, theologically and in practical ways – and the continuing need for movements such as Fresh Expressions to provide support as established churches rise to this positive challenge. 

 

Meanwhile, the Methodist statisticians are continuing to dig further into their numbers through qualitative research which will shed further light on the emerging situation. The fruits of this work won’t be available until 2018, but us Fresh Expression stat-watch geeks will be watching with interest to see what new findings emerge, and – crucially – what we can do to resource the developing work. 

Article by Hannah Skinner

Glasgow17

Imagine Church for those who don't do Church is the challenging title of the next Glasgow Fresh Expressions Vision Event on 22 April 2017.

Speakers

David McCarthy, Martin Fair Sara Deeks 

Cost

£12 including refreshments, please bring your own lunch.

Programme

Sessions 1-3 feature interactive learning with presentations, interviews, stories, activities and questions.

10.30 Registration and refreshments

10.45 Welcomes and worship

11.00 Session 1

What is happening and why it is important: How fresh expressions of church are changing the landscape.

12.10 Break

12.20 Session 2

Values and how fresh expressions of church are developing and can develop in your context.

13.30 Lunch

14.00 Local story feature 14.15 Seminar

Listening for Mission

15.05 Session 3 Where next?

16.00 End

Book or contact

For more information or to book:

Sara Deeks

sdeeks@churchofscotland.org.uk

Gold on Tour

Sharing the stories of Fresh Expressions is what we do, but sharing good news of Fresh Expressions is what we LOVE to do. When the jungle drums brought news that Wolverhampton Pioneer Ministry (WPM) was awarded a Gold award for their work last November we were rightly made up for them, but also wanted to find out what they’re doing that other Fresh Expressions can learn from.

“For those of us involved in leading WPM, the Gold award from the Christian Funders Forum was a totally unexpected – but very lovely – recognition of the work we do here,” says Deborah Walton, WPM’s leader. “However, for the young people who are part of our community it means much more. Many of them have never received such encouragement or appreciation before, and so this has been a special moment for us as a wider organisation. It is a great confidence boost to people who have received a lot of knock-backs through life.” This sense of community ‘ownership’ of the award has been outworked in several ways. A service of celebration followed by a Ceilidh gave community leaders and members a chance to mark the moment together, but since then – in a creative and contextual plan that perhaps sums up the embedded practice of WPM – the Gold award has gone on tour. “The award is travelling at the moment,” Deborah told us. “Everyone is having a week with it – its currently working its way around a block of flats!”

This tour is not to give everyone their own little moment of glory, but represents the desire at the heart of WPM to ensure that their work has longevity – that there is a legacy which goes beyond this moment and leads to a life-long relationship between young adults and wider structures of church. WPM has now been established for ten years, and this has been an intentional development in its practice. Whilst the Sunday night meeting, ‘Vitalise’, used to see high attendance figures, there was awareness amongst leadership that these young people were mostly drawn from existing church links. “Our mission has always been to those on margins,” says Deborah, “young adults who don’t have support structures in place and who may have had a rough time through life.” Whilst Vitalise numbers have reduced, the community gathering is now comprised significantly of people with no previous church background – and through WPM’s Bluefish Chaplaincy around 400 young adults a week are engaged with and supported.

The challenge that this shift creates is how to embed sustainability into the ministry; young adults grow up, and if they have only ever engaged with one style of church how will they find a longer-term home in the inherited church? WPM are working actively to remove barriers between young adults they work with and wider church experience. “It’s about bridging the gap”, says Deborah, “thinking about discipleship as a life-long journey and building familiarity with inherited church.” Monthly services led by local clergy help build this wider sense of community, and moments to mark belonging within different denominations begin what the team hope will prove to be long-term relationships.

This commitment to long-term discipleship is a distinctive and intentional aspect to WPM’s work, and is perhaps what was recognised through the Gold award. As the trophy continues to tour we are excited to see how things evolve as this pioneering work is sustained and nurtured. The Gold award is a great moment – and we hope that it brings encouragement in every living room its visits – but the work is ongoing and points to a future that will sustain its community members for the long-term. 

Story by Hannah Skinner