Start The Week

Ideas from Biblefresh

Some good ideas shared by Biblefresh include:

Running a photographic competition for the church and local community.

People were asked to illustrate bible verses with photos and submit them......This one was run by Teddington Baptist Church www.TeddingtonBaptist.org.uk and they ended up with some great photos.... (a handy bank of images at the end of it as well!)

 The photographer, David Fletcher, has sent this link to his photos on Flickr:

The Light: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjuxGaEL

There was news from Soul Survivor who have tried to help young people read the bible in a year with a daily blog.

I also thought the mini clips from Hodder and Stoughton publishers illustrating people's understanding of certain words were great! Check them out on facebook.com/thepowerofwords or watch the video below.

 

 

Creative Ideas from Bible Society

The Pitch

Have a passion for film making? Why not enter The Pitch competition. Do a 2 minute pitch for a short film based on the Bible. The winner gets £25K and support to produce it. For more information go to www.enterthepitch.com.

The People's Bible

At venues across the country, people will be able to write a pair of verses to join the occasion and make their mark in history. In the year of the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible, Bible Society aims to reconnect the British public with the Bible. 

The People’s Bible is a joint venture between Bible Society in England and Wales and the Scottish Bible Society. It will create a unique legacy for future generations.

It’s your chance to write the Bible by hand – starting at the book of Genesis, right through to the book of Revelation. You’ll get to write at least two verses. The project is unique because everyone who chooses to write a verse will be asked to do so with a digital pen. So there’ll be a new paper copy of the Bible and also an online archive of everyone’s verses you can show to your friends. 

The project will begin at Edinburgh Castle on 19th June 2011, the anniversary of the birth of King James VI/I at the castle in 1566. It will end at Westminster Abbey on 16th November 2011.

For more information go to www.thepeoplesbible.org.

Baby Boomers Mission Conference

23rd - 25th November 2011
High Leigh Conference Centre
£185 including meals and accommodation

Baby Boomers are people born between 1946 and 1964 and form a large population group that have just started retiring en masse in 2011.

They have been described as ‘the youngest group to hit 60’ and are generally healthy and energetic, far from considering themselves as old. They have a nostalgia for their past, have been at the forefront of many innovations, and have seen huge changes in moral values.

In Christian terms, many of them experienced Sunday School and received a basic Christian teaching at school. Since then, large numbers have dropped away from involvement with a
church and others have explored alternative spiritualities. Of those who have remained loyal, many express frustrations with church-life. Now is the time to address all these issues.

This conference about Baby Boomers will look at:
· how we can re-engage people who have residual Christian faith but have left church
· the ways of relating with those other spiritualities
· what church will look like to connect with this generation.

For more information and to book, download the flyer below.

Download BabyBoomerFlyer

Points of Conversation for Missioners Conference

A note from Richard Burton prior to the conference but this means we can think about it in advance and share ideas at Merville:

The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee is early June and she is asking everyone to organize a Big Sunday Lunch. This is too good an opportunity to miss. My hope is to encourage:

1.       Every church to arrange a community lunch on that Sunday with family activities. This would be a way of the church serving the community and encouraging community. Bouncy Castles need to be booked. The Big Lunch people have some great ideas such as the Big Bunting Challenge – see their website. The Big Lunch website also has simple downloads on Health and Safety, arranging food etc. They are preparing an information pack and will send us as many as we want.

2.       Every church to hold some form of special invitational service prior to the lunch. What sort of service I do not know yet but resources could be arranged. This could follow the Back to Church Sunday pattern.

Roy Crowne also wants our wisdom at the conference:

HOPE is creating 10 questions that will help make your church grow and he would like some of us to work on those with him. So let's start thinking creatively now......

Training Director Post

From Mark Russell:

Director of Education and Training
Sheffield, £43,786

Church Army is looking for an enthusiastic, dynamic and experienced person who will lead and develop learning for Church Army Evangelists, with the aim to expand delivery of evangelism courses at Sheffield and nationally.

The successful candidate will blend academic qualifications and management skills with an understanding of, and commitment to, what the Archbishop of Canterbury has called ‘a mixed economy church’. He/she will have a desire to see Evangelists equipped to work in pioneering situations in partnership with others.

This is an exciting time to be joining Church Army and leading the development of training. The post is open to both lay and ordained people.

For an application pack, see www.churcharmy.org.uk/jobs
Closing date: 24th June 2011
Interviews in Sheffieldd: 7th July 11.

Experiences of Ministry Survey & Church Growth

Do you want to know what proportion of clergy nationally regularly run nurture courses and how their practice relates to perceptions of spiritual and numerical growth? Well we're getting closer to an answer to these questions and more.

Last month I drew attention to the Experiences of Ministry Survey, see further www.experiencesofministry.org. We have received over 1,800 responses to date. A big THANK YOU to those of you who have completed the survey or encouraged others to do so (especially those of you who have put the link and comment in a blog or diocesan newsletter). A reminder email will be going out to 'Crockford's' clergy on the 20th June and the survey will close on the 16th July. We're fairly confident about generating a nationally representative sample. However, if you'd value feedback at a diocesan level please do continue to encourage clergy in your dioceses to respond to the email and complete the survey.

Just to whet your appetite 27% of respondents so far regularly run nurture courses. What does this say to us about mission and ministry priorities? If you want to find out more (and how this number relates to growth) put either the 19th or 20th September in your diaries when I'll be feeding back results with Dr Mike Clinton our research partner at King's College London. To book a place tim.ling@churchofengland.org (more details to follow).

All good wishes

Tim

Dr Tim Ling

National Adviser, Continuing Ministerial Development
Ministry Division
http://www.experiencesofministry.org

The Archbishops' Council
Church House
Great Smith Street
London SW1P 3AZ
Direct Dial Telephone Number 020 7898 1408

A Poem

A poem from John Wright:

REPENTANCE

No cloud to grace the sky, no rain in sight
What brought us to this very sorry plight?
For those who wonder why it is so dry
Look no further for the reason why.
It’s simply when a nation kicks God out
He sends, in love, a very dreadful drought
In mercy thus He calls us to repent
So praise the Lord, this drought is heaven sent!

John Wright
4.5.2011.

The Word on the Wing by Alison Morgan

ReSource is delighted to announce the publication of Alison Morgan’s new book, The Word on the Wind: renewing confidence in the gospel. A sequel to The Wild Gospel, The Word on the Wind carries a foreword by Rowan Williams and an introduction by Martin Cavender. The official launch will take place at the Newcastle Diocese’s forthcoming clergy conference next month. For more information or to order a copy, please see www.resource-arm.net/pub.html#book

-          “A hugely important book. Encouraging, uplifting and inspiring, it offers a vision of how each one of us can regain and maintain our confidence in the Gospel” – Dr Paula Gooder

-           “Alison Morgan’s writing is so winsome that it’s easy to be caught up in the beauty of what she’s saying before you realise she’s just smacked you between the eyes with a piece of two-by-four. This new book presents a deeply radical message in the most eloquent and seductive manner. You’ve been warned!” – Michael Frost, author of The Shaping of Things to Come

-          “The Word on the Wind is prayer that has been distilled by a powerful and poetic mind. Never abstract and never shallow, it brings the fountain-fresh water of the Spirit to an age that’s dry, and sick of dusty answers.” –  Bishop Paul Bayes

-          “Alison Morgan yearns to help others step into all God has for them, and this book will do just that. Peppered with stories of changed lives, this book will inspire and challenge.  You gotta read it!” Mark Russell, Church Army

If you haven’t seen it, we would also like to commend to you ReSource’s new evangelism course by Roger Morgan, Beautiful Lives – sharing our faith with friends and neighbours. Based on Roger’s many years of experience in mission and evangelism, this is a group course which helps church members develop the confidence to share their faith naturally and effectively. 1 Peter 3.2-4 speaks of the beauty and reverence which should characterise our lives as Christians, and Roger believes that it is beautiful lives, lived in the power of the Holy Spirit, which lead others to faith. The course is contained in a Leader’s Manual, with a separate group member’s booklet containing notes and simple homework exercises. It consists of 8 sessions, offered in a user friendly format with plenty of interaction and discussion, and points towards an accessible, locally planned invitation event to be held after the completion of the course. People who have tried it so far have been astonished to find themselves holding unforced, friendly conversations with non-Christians about their faith – usually in response to their questions! For more information please see www.resource-arm.net/pub.html#courses

Creative Mission by Rona Orme

Creative Mission by Rona Orme
ISBN 9-781841-018065
£8.99, Published by Bible Reading Fellowship

A review from Barry Hill:

Brilliantly simple, straightforward and highly practical.  Rona Orme, Children’s Missioner in Peterborough Diocese, has produced a book packed full with a feast of ideas suitable for children, young families and adults.  It’s rare to find a book where so many ideas can be taken straight from the page to a group or service and yet Rona manages it with dozens of ideas to suit both Christian festivals (all the ones you’d expect plus some that have been a little forgotten like Lammastide), weird internet days (like national apple day), milestones (like back to school, and the start of holidays) and various other important days (like Red Nose Day, World Book Day, Prisons Week and World Toilet Day).  There are even ideas to accompany what people might be thinking of at any given time, for example an idea suited to X Factor/Strictly Come Dancing!

It’s rare to find a book that can work so naturally in many different environments.  I could imagine many of the ideas working as well in a large town or city centre church as in a Messy Church or toddler group of half a dozen.  Rona draws on her experience in rural mission (she wrote a book on rural mission with children a few years ago) with ideas that translate well to smaller rural groups, and also her role in service leading (she is a Reader in the Church of England) with ideas suitable as the foundation of am All Age service.  Now working with the development of a Fresh Expression in a school on a new suburban estate, one could imagine many of her ideas translating seamlessly into a Fresh Expression of Church.

Most ideas come complete with where to go for more resources plus internet links for additional info.  They all come with Bible links which could be explored further in the context of a service or extended teaching time.  Not all the work is done for the reader in developing the Bible passages in every one of the fifty plus ideas, but activities do emerge from the Bible passage(s) providing a helpful and normally easy springboard for those contexts where additional teaching is needed. 

In what is already a crowded marketplace of print and online resources, Creative Mission stands out as accessible for many contexts and experiences as well as full of ideas ready to go as they are.

Archdeacon's Visit

Here is a new way of running an archdeacon's visitation from Michael Mitton of Derby Diocese!

You will see from the photo that the whole event was in cafe style. The programme started with a vox pop of what people thought a churchwarden was (very humorous in parts!), a scripture reading on salt illustrated by a film clip, an interview with a local churchwarden, a couple of songs, one illustrated with beautiful pics.  The Archdeacon wove her charge and commissioning of wardens very skilfully.  Talking to people on the way out, there was definite interest and generally very positive comments.  My sense that the main value of this event was to inspire wardens to think in imaginative ways for mission, and to give permission for experimentation.

Experience to share?

If you have experience in this area please do get in touch with Howard:

I am working as a stipendiary lay worker with the 15 churches of Warrington Deanery in Liverpool Diocese.  I do not have any real peers who understand working with a Deanery/large group, but are not ordained.  I have only been in post since January and would be delighted to discuss some experiences with any others out there who may be in a similar position, and who could perhaps share some insights and perspectives.

God bless,
Howard Leatherbarrow
Church Growth Facilitator, Warrington Deanery
cgf-warrington@hotmail.co.uk
07557132262

Children's Spirituality Event

From Mary Hawes:

For those of you who live within striking distance of Richmond, there is an opportunity to come to a day with Dr Rebecca Nye, the country's leading expert on children's spirituality (and author of the CHP book 'Children's Spirituality - what it is and why it matters').

It will be an excellent day, so please do pass this on to anyone in your church who might be interested. It will be very practical, not just a load of theory.

Saturday 25th June
10am - 4pm
St. John the Divine  Church, Richmond.

Sessions include:
- Recognising Spirituality in Childhood
- Supporting Children’s Spirituality at Home and Church
- Godly Play Workshop
- Adult Spirituality and Becoming Like a Child

For more details and to book download the flyer below.

Download Rebecca Nye Flyer

CNI Newsletter

The latest newsletter from Christian Nightlife Initiatives is now out and includes the latest from:

- Hartlepool Street Angels
- Pentecost Festival
- Week of Prayer
- Christians Against Poverty
- Redeeming Our Communities

and much more! You can download the newletter below.

Download CNI Newsletter June 2011

Outlook Trust Newsletter

Torch Relay

From the More Than Gold Team:

A highlight in the build up to the 2012 Games is the official Torch Relay starting about three months beforethe opening ceremony. The relay sees the torch carried throughout many towns and cities across the UK.

The first 74 towns and cities to be visited by the London 2012 Torch Relay have been announced. I want to let you know what this means for you and your church.

The places named are where evening events will take place to celebrate the Olympic Flame. The expectation of the Games organising committee is that there will be a spectacular welcome.  This could involve entertainment, shows and concerts with a local flavour.

Helping churches get ready
To help churches get ready for this great opportunity, More Than Gold is creating a local task force in each town where the relay is to stop.

This group will help run community events that support the official celebrations. The aim is to have the churches and More Than Gold’s partner agencies working to put the church at the centre of the plans and celebrations that take place.

Working with your Local Authority
What makes this especially important is that most Local Authorities are stretched so far as their budgets and resources are concerned.

Because of this they would welcome the help of the churches in their area. In some places it may even be possible for the local churches to be the prime organiser or main partner in a Community Festival.

The help churches could contribute includes;

Creative and performing arts –offering their own talent or bringing it in from elsewhere.
Hospitality – from free food to being part of the One Million Cups of Water programme.
Volunteers – everything from clearing the rubbish, crowd control, to specialist advice and help.

How you can play your part?
To be a part of this task force please email info@morethangold.org.uk with your name, church, town and contact details so that we can network with you and get you in touch with others in your area.

The Torch will visit East Midlands: Derby, Leicester, Lincoln, Nottingham, East of England: Cambridge, Chelmsford, Ipswich, Luton, Norwich, Peterborough, London: Bexley, Ealing, Haringey, Waltham Forest, Wandsworth, Westminster, Northern Ireland: Belfast, Derry~Londonderry, Newry, Portrush, North East: Alnwick, Durham, Middlesbrough, Newcastle, North West: Blackpool, Bolton, Bowness-on-Windermere, Carlisle, Chester, Isle of Man, Liverpool, Manchester, Scotland: Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Inverness, Isle of Lewis, Orkney, Shetland, South East,:Brighton and Hove, Dover, Guernsey, Jersey, Hastings, Maidstone, Oxford, Portsmouth, Reading, Southampton, South West: Bournemouth, Bristol, Cheltenham, Exeter, Land's End, Plymouth, Salisbury, Taunton, Weymouth and Portland, Wales: Aberystwyth, Bangor, Cardiff, Swansea, West Midlands: Birmingham, Coventry, Stoke-on-Trent,  Worcester, Yorkshire and Humber, Cleethorpes, Hull, Leeds, Sheffield and York.

 

The Big Welcome

 

Toddler Prayer Day

From Ian Bunce:

An alliance of Christian denominations and agencies are calling on churches to take part in the first ever prayer day for toddler groups on 5 June 2011.

1277 are encouraging Christians to pray for those that attend and help out at their church toddler group and to celebrate the valuable work they are doing.  They are also suggesting churches seek ways to better resource and incorporate toddler groups into their life and mission.   Sunday 5 June has been chosen as it is the last day of National Family Week.

Organisations part of 1277, named after the average number of days between a child’s birth and the start of formal education, include the Church of England, the Catholic Church in England and Wales, The Methodist Church, The United Reformed Church, Baptist Union of Great Britain, Scripture Union, Mother’s Union, Care for the Family and the Salvation Army. The vision of the alliance is to enable ‘universal access to distinctive, excellent, safe, Christian toddler groups which are demonstrating God’s love at the heart of their communities’.

You can download the full press release and poster below.

Download 1277 Press release (2)

Download National Prayer Day Poster

Table Talk - Changing the Landscape

At various points during Changing the Landscape (6th May 2011, Oxford), some of the major challenges facing those involved in fresh expressions of church were discussed.These include issues of sustainability, funding and lay leadership. To read the full summary download the one-page document below.

Download Changing the Landscape 2011 - table talk

 Audio and video material from the conference can be downloaded at www.freshexpressions.org.uk/changingthelandscape

Resourcing Mission Vacancy

From the (Resource) Strategy & Developemnt Unit:

We are currently recruiting for a Senior Strategy Officer focused on Resourcing Mission. The role will focus on supporting diocesan growth and resource allocation strategies and actively engaging with senior diocesan leadership teams to identify needs and opportunities and generate solutions. We are looking for someone with strong change management experience and an understanding of the mission and structure of the Church of England. For full details go to http://www.churchofengland.org/about-us/vacancies/nci-vacancies/senior-strategy-officer.aspx.

Resourcing Mission Bulletin

The latest issue of the Resourcing Mission Bulletin was published last week on the Church of England website by the (Resource) Strategy and Development Unit of the Archbishops’ Council and Church Commissioners. The bulletin contains the following papers:

Strategic Resource Allocation in the Church of England by Philip James, Head of the (Resource) Strategy and Development Unit

Improving Spending Decisions by the staff of the (Resource) Strategy and Development Unit        

Diocese of Carlisle: Parish Offering System by the staff of the (Resource) Strategy and Development Unit in consultation with Derek Hurton, Carlisle Diocesan Secretary

Believe in Change: the Rapid Parish Development Programme Approach to Transforming Churches by the Revd Canon Nick Ralph, Social Responsibility Adviser, diocese of Portsmouth

The Church’s Mission in New Housing and Other Development Areas Report by the staff of the (Resource) Strategy and Development Unit

Click here to download these papers.