The core of church planting from the Big Apple

Hi everyone! I just wanted to make a post to say, we've arrived safely in New York.  Well we're actually in New Jersey but from where I'm sitting we have amazing views of NY.  I am looking over the Hudson and can see a lot of the cityscape including the Empire State building (as well as other landmarks we don't know yet).  We're staying in a new apartment building called 70 Greene.  It's much nicer than we expected and on the 43rd floor! But I'm not in NY for the stunning views and high rise apartments.

"On this earth we don't have a city that lasts forever, but we are waiting for such a city." Hebrews 13:14 

As I look over the city I am realising in a new way that planting a new church here is a completely different challenge to planting one in East London.  So why come here?  I hope to find the core of what it takes to plant a church in any major city.  That's what the Fall Intensive is all about.  The people are different, the houses are different and the economies are different... But the Jesus & His gospel is aways the same.

Redeemer is a church based in NYC with lead Pastor Tim Keller.  They have not only helped plant churches in many of the diverse communities in NY but have also done the same in many churches across the world.  I believe what I will learn here will help me trust in Jesus more and help me with vision and practical tools to plant our little church back in Bonny Downs (the best community in the world!).

At the same time however, I don't want to get sucked into the dream that "plans" or "strategies" are what you need to really plant a church.  I've heard all sorts of different ideas for what you "need" to plant a church and every time they offer success if you follow them properly.  However, the bottom line is not "strategy" is the saviour of church planting...  Jesus is the only saviour!  

That's what Redeemer is all about and that's why I'm here! 

BenAboutLondon

City to City's Fall intensive for Church Planters

Church Planting Around the Globe from Redeemer City to City on Vimeo.

In less than two weeks my small family are heading off to the Big Apple.  I will be attending City to City's, Fall Intensive training programme for Church Planters.  Although I have been in ministry for about 10 years now I have never had any real training on how to plant a Church.  I feel this is long over due.

While I love what I am a part of in London I often feel like I'm just about keeping my head above water.  I sometimes struggle seeing a way forward.  By going to New York I hope not only to learn things so I may have more wisdom in future plans but also to seek sound advice and council from experienced people and those in the same boat to myself.  New York may be a long way to go for a London boy but I'm praying that getting some distance will also help me to see things from a fresh God perspective.

"For you are my rock and my fortress; and for your name's sake you lead me and guide me!" Psalm 31:3 

The course is based around Tim Keller's vision of Gospel centred Church planting in major world cities and will cover the following subjects:

• Gospel Theology
• Grace Renewal
• City Vision
• Integrative Ministry
• Church and Culture
• Gospel Preaching
• Contextual Mission
• Church Planting
• Movement Dynamics

Those all sound pretty fancy (I normally prefer to use words with one or two syllables) so I need to get my study brain back on before I go.

Emelie, Gabriel and I will be sharing an apartment in New Jersey with another couple attending the course.  It will be quite intense training for me (hense Fall Intensive) but I am more worried about Em.  While Emelie is really excited to go, she is a bit scared about being in a big city with a baby, without the support that she gets from her church family.  Please pray for all three of us in this.

I'll leave you with this vision of Tim Keller's that has greatly inspired me over the past few years.

Redeemer City to City from Redeemer City to City on Vimeo.

Thanks for your prayers,

BenAboutLondon

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Bonny Downs Church - World Cup Football Festival

Our World Cup may be over but Jesus is Forever!

Well the dreams of World Cup win for England are over for another 4 years but my World Cup was anything but boring.  As you may know we had planned a big event around the opening England vs. USA game on June the 11th.  Well it was an amazing success!

We were praying for 1000 people to come throughout the day and in fact we had well over 2000 people come along.  We served 1500 servings at our free BBQ and had a team of table talkers ready to meet and greet people as they say down to eat.  Right up until the day we didn't know how many teams we would have for the five-a-side tournament but in the end we had plenty of teams and lots of fun.

It took a lot of crazy planning and fund raising to afford the big screen but it was well worth it in the end.  You could see the screen from the Barking Road and it drew many people in who we have never met before.  For the main event (screening the England vs. USA match) we had around 400 people stay and watch with us.

After the event a local police sergeant came to speak with me and was absolutely amazed that there were no incidents of any kind.  No fights, nothing stolen, no complaints and zero unrulely behaviour!  He couldn't believe it for a football event of this size.  I told him, "We had help from the man upstairs." He laughed.

Numbers are nice but not everything.  The vision of this event was to deepen old relationships and to start new ones and to cast our nets wider and find people God is working in and start introducing them to Jesus.

Through the day over 2000 invites to church were handed out to people who had a really a great time.  My prayer is that those people will now not only know about the Church on their doorstep but will be glad we're around.  Hundreds of people had one to one conversations with our table talkers (who didn't just talk around tables).  My prayer is that they would be brave enough now they've met a real bona-fide Christian - and seen that we don't have three heads - to one day to cross the threshold of a church!


It will take a long time to figure what the total impact from this event will be.  But already little glimpses are starting to come clear.  Here is one example.  Yesterday I was out on Serving Sunday offering to do odd jobs for people on behalf of the church.  One Muslim family seemed very sceptical about me until I mentioned the Fun Day and immediately the door was opened and now I have a gardening job booked there next week!  The door to this home was opened by our Fun Day.  Please pray with us that many more will be opened and Jesus' name will be honoured.

Thanks for all your prayers,


BenAboutLondon

Jesus wins at the World Cup - part 2

England are playing the USA on their opening World Cup game next week and I predict a 2-1 victory to England!  It'll be a tough game but I think we have what it takes (even without Beckham).  But seriously whoever wins our church is hoping to see a victory in building bridges and reaching our local community.  A few months ago I posted a blog about a World Cup Family Funday we were praying to run.    I'm happy to say that all the money, help and almost all the volunteers we needed to run the day have been provided.  God has brought us help though More Than Gold, the Mustard Seed Foundation, Transform Newham, and even Barclay's bank.  Even our promotion of the even has been really blessed.  The other day we had free advertising on BBC News. No one knows how they heard about it but we're glad they did.  

"Finally, brothers, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may speed ahead and be honored, as happened among you!" 2Thessalonians 3:1

They think it's all over... Well it isn't yet!  There is still a loads more to do.  Please pray with us:

• Praise God - for all the answers to prayer and miracles so far.
• Leaflet distribution - please pray we get the rest of the leaflets out.
• 1000 people - please pray in faith with us that we can reach 1000 people through the day.
• More teams - pray that we get more teams for the five-a-side tournament.
• Table talkers - For the people who will be sitting round the tables at the BBQ meeting and greeting people and talking about life and faith.
• Volunteers - please pray the final volunteers are found.
• Safety - please pray for our team of security so that the whole day goes without any issues.
• All the rest - All the little things that need to get sorted by the day that are too numerous to mention.
• God's glory - that He would be put first in everything on the day!

Thank you for joining with us!

BenAboutLondon

What does your Wordle say about you?

The other day I was introduced to a site called Wordle that you can create these cool word images.  The even cooler thing is that you can link it through your blog and it will create a Wordle based on you most commonly used words.

"My mouth will speak the praise of the LORD, and let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever."  Psalm 145:21 

So I thought it would be interesting to see what I really blog about.  The bigger words are the most common words I use, the smaller they get the less they are used.

My top 5 are:
   1) People
   2) Jesus
   3) Church
   4) God
   5) Community


I'd like Jesus to be No.1! So I'd better talk about Him more. Maybe London should be at least on the top 10 as that's my Blog title.  Give it a try you may surprized what "Your Wordle says about you".

BenAboutLondon

Five things becoming a Dad and church planting have in common

As you may know by now I just became a Dad for the first time.  Gabriel Jonathan Clark was born on the 7th of May at 0023 weighing 4.04 kilos.  It's been a wonderful experience so far with feeding, burping, nappy changing, washing, cuddling, power napping and laughing being the basic routine in my life.  I can't wait to see how he will grow up but at the same time I want to seize every second and stare at him!

"God gave them his blessing and said: Have a lot of children!" Genesis 1:28 

I'm sure that just like when I got married, as this new venture develops God will have new important lessons to teach me about my relationship with Him.  I can't wait to learn them.  As I was thinking about caring for Gabriel I started to think about how starting a church plant and being a Dad have their similarities.  Here are 5 of them:

1) You are never prepared by the time it starts!

No matter how much you think you're prepared there is always more you should have done, read or planned.  You can't see everything that will happen and there will always be curve balls thrown your way.  The lesson is prepare, prepare and prepare some more but don't be fooled, you are not prepared enough. 

2) You knew it would be hard but it is much harder than you thought!

I heard lots of people tell me being a Dad is tough and I should get the rest in while I could.  Believe me I listened to their warnings as I knew it would be no walk in the park.  But now I'm doing it those sleepless nights are way harder to deal with than I ever imagined.  I knew when I got into church planting that over 70% fail and that it'd be tough but the reality has been harder than I ever dreamed.  I sometimes think if God had really told me what it would have been really like, would I have started in the first place?

3) There's plenty of advice out there but in the end you have to decide what's best!

People always have advice on where you're going wrong, what you need to do and what your priorities should be.  There is plenty of helpful advice offered that is great and well appreciated. On the other hand though there is a lot of rubbish.  Even if people have never done it themselves, met you, your child or visited your church they know exactly where you're going wrong.  In the end though it's mainly just opinion.  There is no clear manual to being a Dad or church planting (even though there are plenty of books that claim to be just that) and you have to use prayer and common sense to really figure it out.

4) It has to depend on someone!

Gabriel can't do much at the moment. He can cry really well, sleep, stare and wriggle.  Oh and today he demonstrated that he could projectile poop, quite a sight I'll tell you!  At this point in Gabriel's life he needs his parents to do everything.  We need to feed him, change him, dress him and protect him.  If we didn't do it he would just die.  One of the tough things I've found in the early days of church planting is that no matter how much we planned if I wasn't there one week things didn't go well.  Now a few years on it can work quite well without me for a while.  But the dream is that some day soon as leaders grow and develop the church will leave home and be able to stand on its own two feet.  For now I'm there for them both and I want them to know they can rely on me.

5) It's a messy job with amazing rewards!

I was warned before Gabriel came that I'd soon become obsessed with poop.  That I'd talk with complete strangers about it's colour, texture and frequency.  Oh and that I share those disgusting stories about poo and pee flying everywhere as you try and change a nappy.  I was convinced they were wrong... They weren't.  I'll spare you the details but to put it bluntly you have to deal with a lot of poo.  The reward of holding your clean baby after a nightmare experience is awsome!  Just holding him and smelling him is amazing!  In a small church plant things don't often run smoothly and it can be very stressful.  With not many people to call on you have to do most of the work yourself (yes even cleaning the toilets).  And on top of that you are helping people through tough times.  However, when you see someone growing in their faith or falling in love with the Bible for the first time all the messy jobs are worth it.

That was just my five.  Can you think of any more?  Drop them in the comments below.

BenAboutLondon