Prayers for Mission Saddleworth

The mission week is now well and truly over. In the end it was a strange sort of a week. The odd thing about mission weeks and the like is that you find yourself immersed in a place for 7 days, beginning to feel its concerns, fear its dangers and temptations, despise its idols, see its tremendous potential, only to then pack up and return home.

As a result, intercessions and thanksgivings form the most obvious, easy, immediate way to stay connected to (God's) long-term mission in Saddleworth.

I give thanks for the fact that the gospel has established a foothold in the area. In the midst of some middle-class gospel-apathetic do-goodery God has established his Church. I pray that his people there will buck the trend (numerical decline) and go from strength to strength. May there always be faithful people in Saddleworth.

I also give thanks for those Church members who turned up, invited friends, and provided prayerful support for the mission. I pray that all three churches we visited will grasp a much clearer vision for serving Christ in the Church and in the village.

I also give thanks for being shown considerable hospitality, warmth of fellowship, and being allowed to share in the material goods (mainly homes and food) of many Church members across the seven days. I pray that such hospitality would become the bedrock of 'life-on-life' discipleship, creating a culture of mutual pastoral care, accountability and spiritual zeal.

I give thanks for the Christian influence in the schools. For the regular assemblies taken by the vicar, for the Christian teachers, for the Christian headmistress of one school in particular. I pray this influence would continue and grow, and bear fruit in conversion. I pray that over time this influence would blossom into fully-grown Christ-centred biblical-worldview education.

I give thanks for the chance to witness a little on the ground, (at times) mundane, non-urban gospel ministry. I give thanks for the chance to see the pitfalls, dangers, potential distractions, and the internal and external pressures which face many ministers in their charges. I pray for all the leaders of the family of God in Saddleworth, that they'd plough a straight line.

I pray against the devil and his schemes, against disunity and apathy, against the idols of 'the good-life' and of 'churchiness', against the idea that the only way is down, against false hopes and false paths to growth, and for Saddleworth's future in God's plan to glorify himself in the Son.

The story so far...

Since arriving on Sunday evening we've

- Done 1 open air service (brass band included), 4 assemblies (2 different schools), 1 PCC meeting, 1 visit to the old folk's home and 1 coffee morning.

- Been served meat and potato pie twice (thrice for Marian).

- Spoken about heaven, hell, mission (what is it?), forgiveness, the cross, resurrection, palm sunday, death ('what about x, who was a lovely person, but didn't believe, I can't believe they'll be in hell?' seems to be a common question).

So, if you get the chance, pray for bottle, grace, patience, wisdom, energy.

Saddleworth Mission 2008

Ever heard of Saddleworth in West Yorkshire? No? Me neither. At least not until I agreed to help my college tutor organise a mission with two parish churches there for this easter week.

As a result, I'll be there from tomorrow onwards, helping brothers and sisters in Christ take the good news of easter to their neighbours. The first event is an open air service complete with brass band (Brassed Off anyone?) at which I'm giving a brief Palm Sunday talk. The last events are services on Easter sunday. In between there's coffee mornings, school assemblies, and other events filled with eastery goodness.

If you get a chance, please pray for us (there's a team of 7 of us going from Oak Hill). If I get a chance I might blog on location about how it's going.

Church attendance in England

Statistics aren't everything. But they also aren't nothing.

This post prompted me to go and dig out the figures on church attendance from the last English Church Census. I found them here. They make for a sobering read in some ways.

6.3% of the population of England attend church regularly.

Of which 40% attend evangelical churches of some description.

Which means evangelicals make up about 2.5% of the population.

Which is 1,264,800 people. (And falling).

We could analyse this 2,5% even further, by looking at the way it breaks down into broad, mainstream and charismatic evangelicals. But that would be perhaps a little too controversial. As it stands the 2.5% figure is enough to be thinking about.

[Off the main point slightly: The only thing is, when your church is 500 people strong you don't really feel like 2.5% of the population. I'm not against bigger churches, I don't buy the 'smaller is better' mentality of some (though I think there are issues about church life and discipleship tied to considerations of size). But I do think that one of the negative side effects of being in a bigger church is that you don't feel the cold bite of the wind. When you're singing the praises of God with a few hundred other people every sunday you can feel like the gospel is doing better (numerically speaking) than it is. Does that contribute to our bouts of evangelistic apathy and naivety, to our spiritual weakness, to our prayerlessness?]

I do believe that Britain has a Christian future. But we've got to realise that it won't happen at this rate, until (by the grace of God) we make some changes.