The brief summary of our morale would be that we are both full of hope and very conscious of our need of grace. In the last few weeks, we have outgrown our sitting-room, so that the church all but demanded that we find somewhere else to meet; we have met in two public venues; I am about to start meeting weekly with a non-Christian who is very involved in what we are doing; and even this week several more people have expressed an interest in joining us.
Sundays
Our services are settling into a pattern. People still enjoy brunch at 10.30, and the formal meeting starts at 11am. We are working hard at the preaching and the rest of the service, and Bruce Benedict has been invaluable in bringing his theological acumen, his musical gifts, and his experience in this area to bear. He has a great gift for helping people to understand the ways in which different parts of the service function for us as a group before God. We have also started celebrating the Lord's supper fortnightly, taking the opportunity to explain one aspect of it each time. It has been a great blessing to me to share it with this group of people who have committed themselves so strongly to what we are doing. We currently number around sixteen regulars. A non-Christian friend felt that five or so more people would mean that she could come without feeling exposed, and we are praying that we will soon reach a stage where we feel comfortable enough with our meetings to advertise them publicly.
Other Meetings
The men meet early every Tuesday morning for a time of teaching and prayer. I am keen that it should be seen as integral to male leadership in the church that the men are first committed to praying for the church. The great encouragement here has been to see how quickly the prayers have developed from being personal requests to being focused on our involvement with Camden. The prayer for these men is that out of them will come a group of godly servant leaders. Meanwhile, the women are meeting on a Thursday evening to study the Bible, pray, and enjoy
fellowship. Inevitably, time feels short to fulfil all of these goals and the reality is that different aspects get more attention on different weeks. They are also in the process of working out how best to use the Bible-study part of the evening. We have a number of people meeting one on one, with Christians that we hope to see become leaders, with young Christians, and with one non-believer. This is, perhaps, the unseen heart of the work.
Outreach
The men head weekly to a couple of pubs in Camden, where we are becoming part of the local scene and getting to know people. While fruit from this process is inevitably slow, it sets an agenda for the church that we are here for the people of Camden who would never set foot in a church, and members of the church are starting to develop other avenues to meet people.
Our hope is always that a group of Christians will be with a group of non-Christians, so that the
Christians have support and so that the pressure is not always on one individual to be the inviter, the witness, the apologist, and so on. I was very encouraged on fireworks night that one of our number got a group of us to climb Primrose Hill to meet a group of non-Christian friends. (One of these has since joined us at church on a Sunday.) All of our outreach feels at the very embryonic stage, though it is exciting to see how committed to it people are.
Finances
As things stand, we estimate that we have £18,000 left to raise for the year, out of a budget of over £110,000. To meet that, we have a number of applications that are in process. My hope is that we will not need to touch the ambassador fund in order to meet our commitments, which would enable all of the ambassador fund to go towards projects that are just starting up. Of the applications that we have in process, a number could cover the shortfall individually. Please pray both for the shortfall and also that money that has been promised will not be delayed in coming in.
No comments:
Post a Comment