Category: Joy Adams

Fresh expressions make strategic sense: The Terminus Café

This story illustrates the principles of Fresh expressions make strategic sense in the Guide.

The Terminus CaféIn 2000, a Methodist church on an estate in Sheffield went on to the streets with a questionnaire asking their neighbours what mattered to them and what the church could do to help.

The majority of people didn't recognise that the church could play a role and were surprised at the question,

recalls Joy Adams, a Methodist minister on the Low Edges estate.

The church discovered that the most pressing local needs were litter picking, a drop-in centre for the elderly and youth activities. It also realised that any response would need to come from all the local churches and so it formed an ecumenical prayer group.

At the same time, local shopkeepers were keen to lease their premises to the churches for community ventures. Recognising an opportunity, the churches set up The Terminus Café.

From the start we worked in partnership with the different agencies on the estate,

says Joy.

We said right at the beginning we are four churches working together to open a safe place and we are motivated by God's love.

'When you are open with people, they're open with you, we've found.'

When you are open with people, they're open with you, we've found.

As part of her training, Joy had been getting to know local families struggling with drug problems. Now with the café open it became

apparent that a charity shop was very necessary on a poor estate,

so a section of the café was made available for this.

The café is self-financing and opens three days a week, plus Tuesday evenings for young people only. Its Christian remit is made clear by a monthly service, 'Worship at the Terminus' at 4.30 on a Thursday afternoon. Bible study groups happen in series of four or five at varying times and venues to suit the differing needs of local residents. About nine people attend each time, not all of them the same on each course.

Café staff open and close the day with prayer, which is visible through the window. In 2004, as a result of witnessing this, visitors began to ask for prayer. A prayer board is now situated in a discreet part of the café and one-to-one prayer is available under strict guidelines.

Joy tells of a young man with special needs who volunteers at the café and regularly attends a Bible study. Having been bullied at school he found consolation in a Christian faith, but became less active as he got older. Visits to the café reawakened his faith.

She also tells of two recovering alcoholics who have both become Christians through attending the café, but still struggle with their addictions. One of them has described the café as 'somewhere you can go no matter how bad you feel and always be accepted'.

God is always reminding us of the word 'unconditional',

says Joy.

God seeks to transform society: The Terminus Café

Terminus Café - frontThis story illustrates the principles of God seeks to transform society in the Guide.

A Methodist church on an estate in Sheffield in 2000 went on to the streets with a questionnaire asking their neighbours what mattered to them and what the church could do to help.

The majority of people didn’t recognise that the church could play a role and were surprised at the question,

recalls Joy Adams, a Methodist minister on the Low Edges estate.

The church discovered that the most pressing local needs were litter picking, a drop-in centre for the elderly and youth activities. It also realised that any response would need to come from all the local churches and so formed an ecumenical prayer group.

At the same time, local shopkeepers were keen to lease their premises to the churches for community ventures. Recognising an opportunity, the churches set up The Terminus Café.

From the start we worked in partnership with the different agencies on the estate,

says Joy.

We said right at the start that we are four churches working together to open a safe place and we are motivated by God’s love.

When you are open with people, they’re open with you, we’ve found.

‘I feel safe when the café is open’

The café is self-financing, includes a charity shop, and opens three days a week to around 60 visitors a day. Its Christian remit is made clear by a monthly service, ‘Worship at the Terminus’ at 4.30 on a Thursday afternoon. Bible study groups happen in series of four or five at varying times and venues to suit the differing needs of local residents.

When the idea of the service was first mooted, it was greeted with ‘shock’, Joy says. Low Edges is notorious for anti-social behaviour and drugs.

Café staff open and close the day with prayer which is visible through the window. In 2004, as a result of witnessing this, visitors began to ask for prayer. A prayer board is now situated in a discreet part of the café and one-to-one prayer is available under strict guidelines.

Volunteers now staff the café from across the church and community, and The Terminus Initiative has been created to cover the café, an asylum seekers befriending service and a Credit Union.

Other café initiatives include a Tuesday night youth café where young people can hang out and play computer games.

Terminus - women's clubWhen assessors for the Duke of York Community Awards visited The Terminus, they asked its neighbours for their opinion. The Sikh shopkeeper, next door but one, replied,

These are the best neighbours I’ve ever had and I feel safe when the café is open.

Now the elderly of Low Edges have a place to go, the young people have an event just for them, and while litter is still evident, anti-social behaviour has reduced in the area.

Where it does happen, the local police approach the Terminus for help.

The Terminus Initiative – update

The Initiative, on the Lowedges estate in Sheffield, was set up in 2002 through a partnership of four local churches – Greenhill Methodist Church, St Peter's CofE, The Michael URC and South Sheffield Evangelical Church. Revd Joy Adams, Methodist minister with responsibility for oversight of the Initiative, explains how things are developing.

Our community café at the bus terminus shops on Lowedges Road offers a safe Christian environment where everyone is welcome and respected. It's a very popular place now. As well as offering light meals and drinks, we also sell good quality second hand clothes and goods; practical help where possible and prayer support when requested. A weekly youth café, on Tuesday evenings, is also now building up relationships with young people in the community.

The Terminus Initiative is a model of the Big Society, without compromising what we believe. We never set ourselves up as a fresh expression of church as such; it has always been a partnership between four very different churches, committed to integrating new Christians and enquirers into those churches.

In this past year we have intentionally promoted the spiritual side of the Initiative – and over the last 12-18months there has been a definite development as we overhear conversations in the café along the lines of, 'this is my church' and 'I don't go to church, I go to the Terminus Café'. We are now exploring what that means for us as an Initiative and how we need to be developing in future.

We have a ministry with asylum seekers and refugees as well as being designated a Healthy Living Centre with the NHS Primary Care Trust, The PCT meets the physical health needs whilst we meet the spiritual. One result of this is our running Essence, a course in spirituality. We publicised it by asking, 'How would you like to improve your spiritual health?' There have been several takers for the course which is running through November and December.

We have both Christians and non-Christians as volunteers and there are signs of a real move among non-Christians to want to know more about why we do what we do. A wonderful 'sideline' to this is that some of our volunteers from the estate, after gaining skills and confidence at the Initiative, have now found work. The Initiative itself has certainly grown. The café is really flourishing and is a vital part of the community; it literally is the Initiative's shop window. At one stage we had an artist-in-residence for six months and she has been fantastic in contributing to a new look for the venue. She also designed a prayer tree and, although we have always had a prayer board for prayer requests, the tree is really popular.

All of the churches involved in this have been very supportive. It has been so important right from the start to work together and the ministers of the churches have been so generous – there has never been any sense of 'this is my patch'. These ministers – with churchmanship ranging from offshoot of house church to Anglo Catholic – regularly met together for prayer long before the Terminus Initiative was set up. They had recognised their differences but kept on praying together and that has been such a blessing. We continue to keep Jesus at the centre of everything and the majority of the events are not on church sites. On seeing what has happened as a result of that, the faith of the various church communities involved has also been built up.

All of this good news happens to coincide with some major financial challenges in the coming year: from April 2011 we have no assurance at all that our current partnership with the Primary Care Trust will continue and, even if it does, what shape that may take. Also, we only have 50% of funding for our Manager post for 2011 so far. Both of these issues will have a major impact on the services we provide for our community.

If we are not careful, external changes – like economic downturn – can negatively affect the way we think which in turn affects our attitude and behaviour. The words of the hymn 'May the mind of Christ my Saviour be in me day by day' is a reminder to keep focusing on God and simply try to keep in step with what He is doing here.

It is hard to believe that we are in our ninth year. When we look back, God has provided incredibly – and that reassures us for the future.

The Terminus Initiative

Methodist pioneering minister Joy Adams explains how her fresh expression of church began life in a butchers shop in the local bus terminus. The result was the Terminus Initiative – an ecumenical Christian community.

The Terminus Initiative started out as a community café in an ex-butcher’s shop at a bus terminus. From the beginning we sought to be a loving response to the needs of the local 'Lowedges' Estate community in Sheffield.

Terminus - AGMIt was initially conceived out of unmet needs of a 'mission audit' completed by a local Methodist Church. To complete this, we went out into the estate to ask questions about what people thought the needs were. The most significant finding of the survey, was that local people thought the church was irrelevant and had nothing to contribute. One of the greatest needs that people did identify was the need for a drop-in for older people to be able to come to meet people and socialise in safety, and also a place for younger people. At that time the estate was known for being a rough place with problems with drugs and anti-social behaviour. This coincided with an offer from the owner of the butcher's shop to the Methodist church, to use it for something to help the community. I was asked if I would assist in the exploration of potential solutions to the meeting of these needs and sought other agencies to see if there were any opportunities for partnerships to be able to take on the shop for mission and ministry. So the vision for a community café gradually emerged.

Terminus - Joy AdamsI was one of the founding members of the initiative, as I was involved with it in the early days of my training for Methodist ministry. I quickly discerned that God was asking me to stay with the Terminus Initiative, which at the time was completely against the usual expectation of Methodist itinerant ministry. So I kept this discernment to myself (not even telling my husband) waiting for it to be confirmed by someone else to test it. Within a few weeks, our Superintendent Minister at the time, Ian Bell, asked me if I would consider staying on and co-ordinating the Initiative, but that there would be no money for a stipend. As I had retired early on a pension from the National Health Service, I decided I could cope, and committed to it.

Terminus - prayer dayThe Terminus Initiative is now in its eighth year. The café is open three days a week, targeting different groups in need, and the premises are used by other community groups when the café is closed. The Terminus Initiative, with its other projects, has supported asylum seekers, refugees, drug users, people with alcohol addictions, people with mental health needs, young people, and older people. In fact there are many social activities going on all the time including discussions/Bible studies, and prayer underpins it all.

Terminus - Women's conversation clubIn the many partnerships we have, we focus on the spiritual needs of those who come into the Terminus building. We hope that the work of the Initiative has challenged people's perception of the church as 'irrelevant', replacing negative stereotypes with a greater respect for Christianity and the Church. We have seen many people seeking to explore the Christian faith coming out of the community and loving service they have experienced at the Terminus. Many of these people have gone on to discipleship groups of the partner churches, as we seek to be a committed local 'mixed economy' of church finding unity of purpose in mission.

The Terminus Initiative is a good example of what can be done regarding fresh expressions of church, when local churches work together and get their hands dirty.

Terminus - TedTed's story

Having been brought up in the Methodist Church, at the age of 15 I decided there was no such thing as a 'God'. My life from then was based on the scientific method. Proof and disproof were at the roots of my beliefs and actions. There was no room for things that could not be recognised by any of the physical senses. There was no room for faith in how I made my life decisions. For 50 years I conducted my life according to those principles, even though I rarely made a sound decision in all that time.

In 2006 I moved to a new home. Two weeks after moving in I went into hospital for a hip replacement. When I came out I was alone and unable to move very well. I did my weekly shopping on the internet. I saw no one, I felt down and lonely. So much so that one day I decided to hobble up to the local shops where I found the Terminus Café. Over the following weeks and months I made lots of new friends. I was still an atheist at this time even though most of the people with whom I had become friendly were Christians.

Towards Christmas 2007 I was asked if I would like to go to the Terminus Café Christmas Party to be held at a local church. I enjoyed the party, even if I felt a little uncomfortable during prayers. After the meal, I met someone who told me that on Tuesday afternoons a Fellowship meeting was held in the church. It was a friendly event lasting about an hour.

I began attending the Fellowship meetings early in 2008, at first with some apprehension but after a month or so I began to relax and I noticed I was starting to enjoy the songs we sung. The prayers began to be less of a problem for me and I began taking notice of the message the speakers were offering. A lady in the Fellowship group told me she was to be baptised and asked me to support her by coming to the service. I hadn't been to a church service in 50 years but said I would attend, which I did.

During the service a thought struck me – I remember it clearly. 'My way of thinking should apply to how I explain God's universe'. It then dawned on me that I had become a Christian. God's universe is his creation and he has given me the privilege of being able to understand little bits of it! The little bits of the universe that I understand have helped me to make my living and now I can use that understanding to give praise to God for the magnificence of his creation.

It has taken many years of study to reach a mature view of those parts of the universe that I know a little bit about. Whereas, I have accepted Jesus as my Saviour, as a child would accept by faith all that a parent has told them. Faith is hope in the future. Hope by faith is how I have gained an inner joy and contentment believing that my life has been saved by Jesus' sacrifice on the cross. I have turned from my sins to my Lord God, having been proud and following my own path. Now I ask him to guide me, to show me the way I must go to walk in Jesus' footsteps.