Foundations

Tonight sees the start of Foundations.  A group of us will be gathering to look at what it means to follow Jesus.  It's open primarily to those who have recently accepted the invite to follow Jesus, but is open to anyone who would like to come and have a Christian MOT!

We have seen 9 people respond to the gospel so far this year which is fantastic.  God is moving amongst us.  However we are a church who don't just want to see converts, but we want to make disciples.  8 of those who have made a commitment are with us and the other is in Luxembourg walking in his new found freedom as a Jesus follower.

We will continue to pray that we see lives transformed by the grace and love of Jesus and that in years to come, there will be an army of people that will be able to thank God that they know him.

Great news

We really are in a season of grace to see people respond to the gospel.  This Sunday just gone, two more guys put their hands up to accept Jesus' invite to follow him. They talked it through  with couples from the church and these two would now say that Jesus is  their Lord and Saviour.  This is incredible.  That makes 8 so far this year and all but two of those are on Sunday mornings!

As we gather together to worship Him and hear His word preached.  As we talk about Jesus and introduce Him to friends or family, we are seeing that they will turn Him.  Let's be those who continue to invite people along to either get them started on their journey or to see them cross over that line of faith to following Jesus.  Some events coming up:

1) Saturday May 14th - this is a Quiz Night and meal and is a low key  introduction to church for our friends.  Booking is through Roy Avis as you need tickets for the event.  These are £3 a ticket and that will cover the cost of the 2 course meal.

2) Sunday June 19th - to celebrate Father's Day we are once again going large.  After the morning meeting we will be having a BBQ and sports on the field.  There will also be some inflatables for kids and adults!  This is an opportunity to invite people to church and then on to a fun family environment where our guests can relax in the sun (let's pray for that) and meet lot's of friendly people.

3) Any Sunday - we are seeing salvation on Sundays as people come along, encounter Jesus and turn to Him.  It might be that your friend would say yes to coming this Sunday and they would then continue to come. One of the responses n Sunday was from someone who has been on Alpha's, Freedom in Christ and in church for years.  The other was of a guy who has read a bit of the bible and was in church for the second time!   At the end of the day, it is God who saves, it is the Spirit who enables us to have faith to receive him after several years or two weeks.  The wages are the same - eternal life with Jesus, starting from the moment we turn to Him with all our hearts!

we have dreamed of being a church of campanologists (bell ringers) and we are starting to see something of that because of God's grace!

A great weekend

This past weekend was fantastic. On Saturday night we had our very first acoustic night.  110 people came and enjoyed three great bands and a chance to meet new people and further existing relationships.  The atmosphere and comments that I had after lead me to think that that this could be something that we would repeat.  The links here are to Vimeo where you can enjoy something of what went on: Abi Hope, The Bambury Tree and Gecko Collective.

However the weekend got better and better.  Sunday morning saw one response to the gospel.  A guy who had been coming regularly for a year, put his hand up during the end response and committed his life to Jesus.  It was fantastic.  To see his him and his mum afterwards hug was amazing and a real answer to prayer.

Then, if that wasn't enough, in the evening another first time response to the gospel.  Someone who has been coming to Alpha, came to the acoustic night then came to the evening meeting for the first time and gave their life to Jesus.  I spoke to her and as far as i could tell the Spirit had moved mightily in her and had definitely given her faith to put her hand up and step into a new life of forgiveness.  We came back to the church office and the salvation bell was wrung for the first time this year!!!

All in all a weekend to remember and one to praise our God for as he was the architect of all that happened.

Alpha week 2

So the second night of Alpha went well.  Many people from the previous week joined us again for tea, coffee, cake and chat.  There was once again a great buzz, with people from different nations and backgrounds gathering around the common interest of finding out more about Jesus.

Josh had spent much of Monday making sure the room was set up as well as it had been the week before and he did it admirably.  The team helped people with their questions and making people fell welcomed and loved.  It's great to see students and others coming in to serve Jesus by serving tables with teas and coffees,  Kathy Bond, Andrew Harris, Nitin Williams, Josie Atkinson, and Naissa Bougma take a bow, you were excellent.

If you are not involved on the night though, you can still play your part by praying.  First give thanks to God for:

· We had 18 guests, 15 of those were proper guests (8 people who don't yet follow Jesus) and 3 of those were people bringing guests.

· The table leaders

· 4 new guests

· Great conversations that are already taking place

Please pray for:

· Hearts and minds to be transformed by the Spirit

· People to return next week

· Those who couldn’t come this week to be able to come next week

· Relationships to be built

· Scott as he prepares for next week

· That new people will join us next week

· Salvation!!!

We are in partnership with our God and so we must be a people who pray and ask for Him to do all that He wants to do through our efforts.

Alpha@87

So Alpha starts in approximately 3 hours and 24 minutes and the creative set-up team are currently here making the place look fantastic.  It's amazing what some table clothes and imagination can do to a room that is essentially an office space.  I'll hopefully get some photos on over the next few days as long as some are taken!!!

We have already got some quite a few people who have said they are coming and a dedicated team of 11 who have said that they will serve week in and week out in order to make Alpha happen.

On top of that we also have a team that will be serving tea and coffee to tables and reeling off cake choices in a style reminiscent Sweeney and Todd's (the Reading pie shop, nothing more sinister!  If you've never been it's a must.)

Already there are inspiring RFCers making this happen because they are in faith that people will come along, meet new friends, have their minds and hearts challenged and ultimately come to know Jesus and a living relationship with Him.

The course runs for 10 weeks and is open to new comers for the first three weeks.  It's not too late to come yourself or bring someone with you.  Alternatively, please pray that we would be ringing the bell again and again in response to Jesus changing lives and brining a people to Himself.

A great story of the Holy Spirit doing what he alone can do

A few weeks ago a lady accompanied a couple from RFC on a Sunday morning.  As we sung our songs of praise to Jesus and heard the preach something was happening and as the call for salvation came, she was in tears and unable to say why.  That morning the Spirit started a work in her that three week later, when the call for salvation came again, resulted in her raising her hand and giving her life to Jesus.

The following Tuesday, at  the prayer meeting, she came along with the couple she had originally come with and they rang the bell to celebrate what God had done in her.  It was glorious to see another woman pulled from the clutches of darkness and now walking in the light of Jesus.

This Sunday I looked around to see if she was there and sure enough just behind me I saw her beaming smile as we worshipped Jesus as brother and sister.  Her words to me afterwards were of how much brighter life seems and how much happier she feels in herself, even though none of here personal circumstances have actually changed.

I love our God and I love the fact that we have the great joy of seeing lives being transformed by the grace and mercy of a living loving Saviour, Jesus Christ, by the power of his Spirit.

My prayer is this, that we would see many more people like this, whereby the Spirit does his work, enabling people to see their condition of brokenness to a point where people can do nothing but turn to Jesus as he calls them to follow him.

As we approach Christmas, pray that you would be someone who God uses at the Christmas party or at drinks with the neighbours or around the Christmas dinner table, to be the peace bringer and to be the joy giver and to be the grace bearer.  And maybe you too could be celebrating with a friend or family member as the bell is rung again to mark yet another sinner repenting and turning to Jesus.

Join us to celebrate with the ringing of the bell

We are in a season where God is moving amongst us.  This past Sunday, We had two responses to the good news of Jesus.  One of those is being followed up by a great couple in the church, The second walked out of the morning meeting knowing Jesus as his Lord and Saviour.  This is so exciting, and is the most wonderful of all miracles.

We will be ringing the bell on Thursday evening as we gather to pray and give thanks to God for all he is doing.  We will also continue to pray in earnest for salvation and an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, on a Tuesday evening, 8-9pm at the church offices.

Join me to pray because...

With so much going well this year as a church, there is still one thing that I find hard - where are the people who are giving their lives to Jesus.  We have seen 10 people commit their lives to Jesus - 2 at the beginning of the year, 7 at Front Edge in May and 1 on the Alpha Day away in May.

I know that it is only God who can give salvation, but I so long to see more.  I am convinced that he has called us to be a church that sees people making responses to follow Jesus and I know we have seen it (would it surprise you to find out that I keep a spreadsheet!!!).  When I look at what is happening in other areas of the world and I read of what has happened in our country in the past, I cannot help but feel that there is more than we are seeing.

There is an element that we have to be taking every opportunity to invite people to hear about Jesus, to investigate his claims and to look at what Christianity is really about.  However I also know that there is a time for crying out to the Lord for him to come and do what only he can do.  Who knows how many the disciples would have seen respond in those early days, but I don't think they would have seen 3000 on the first day without the Spirit coming powerfully, bringing regeneration and faith to believe.

I am believing for days when celebrating spiritual new birth is a regular thing for us - not because we have put on the best events or Alpha courses (although we will endeavour to do that as well), but because we have sought the face of the Lord and have cried out on behalf of the lost in our town, because we have asked, seeked and knocked, expecting that the Spirit of God would come again in mighty convicting and life transforming power.

To this end why don't you come and join me this Tuesday, 21st Sept, 8pm - 9pm at the church offices and for the weeks following. We shall press in together and see what God is going to do.

Again! Again!

Only yesterday, I posted that we would be ringing the bell for Becky. Well last night at about 10pm I had a text message which read:

"Hi Scott, you can ring the bell now Andy&Karen"

This was a text message that filled me with great joy as it was announcing that my friend Andy had accepted the invite of Jesus to follow Him. This has been a great journey that I have travelled with Andy over the past year. He came to the first Alpha@CoffeeRepublic in April last year and has been a regular at church on a Sunday morning with his family. He did the foundations course in September but still couldn't make that step of faith. Now he has!!!

These are the text messages/ emails/ phone calls that I live for, they give life to me and I hope that reading this will give you courage and confidence to persevere in relationships and keep praying and let God work in someones life in his timing. Just be ready to rejoice when you see someone come to faith in Christ.

The bell to ring again

Last term we ran Alpha where we saw one young lady commit her life to following Jesus. This last weekend I also heard of another young lady, Becky, who whilst at home over Christmas realised that she too believed in Christ and she committed her life to following him also. This same young lady took part in communion for the first time on Sunday morning and was baptised in the Holy Spirit.

we shall therefore be having another bell ringing on Friday night at the prayer meeting to celebrate another saint being rescued from the darkness and being brought into the light.

This excites me so much and fuels my desire to see more lives changed. Not for me, but to bring glory to the Father through his Son, Jesus. It's what I want to see more of as we take our step of faith this Sunday in starting the evening meeting; as we continue with Alpha in April; and as men and women and children of RFC go out into the workplaces, schools, mum and toddler groups, university halls and houses, wherever it may be and shine bright for Jesus in word and deed.

I trust that this year we will once again be ringing the bell of salvation more than once a month, but with a greater frequency. If you have any stories of opportunities you have had in sharing your faith either through words or through actions please let me know either here or on my email.

God is good and so is his gospel that we steward, let's get it out there and see more Becky's welcomed into his kingdom and the church.

The bell rings again!!!

It is with joy that I write, after a months absence, to tell of a bell ringing in the church office. Alpha@CoffeeRepublic has just finished and it has been over the course of 10 weeks that we have seen our God do an amazing work in the life of one of the girls. She arrived on the first night on her own. She declared to me that she didn't think that she could be a Christian - not because of any anti belief system, but just because!

What then happened was, that she got involved into the social fabric of the church. She found that people just loved and accepted her for who she was. No hidden agendas or ulterior motives. She asked many questions and posted many objections. However over 5 weeks, her confidence was growing both in herself and in her new found friends. Twice she came close to accepting Jesus but something just held her back.

Then last night 0n the walk back from the coffee bar, she said that she wanted to follow Jesus and she wanted to commit her life to him then and there. We got back to the office and stood with her as she prayed a prayer of commitment and then we prayed with her. Following this the bell was rung to celebrate once again with the heavenly realms as one sinner repented and turned to Him.

Let's continue to pray that we will have more stories like this - not just through Alpha but also through our own personal contact with people.

A trip to Ascot

This weekend B, Rachel and I are off down to Ascot for church on Sunday. I shall be preaching and laying hands on the sick trusting that God will do immeasurably more than I can ask or imagine by the power of His Spirit at work within me, in order to bring Him glory. It's as you go out on these adventures that you grow in your faith because you know that it's all about Jesus and nothing about you.

I know that Ascot Baptist are a great church who are working hard to share the gospel in it's purest form by being as relevant to the town that they live in. Phil Rogers who leads the church is a man who has trusted God for many years and is now seeing some breakthroughs in terms of salvation and healing. I love his faith and I love his zeal and I know that I have much to learn from men who have walked the walk for a lot longer than myself.

Sunday I trust will be an immense day once more, as God shows up and does what only He can - heal and save - and I know that we will once more look in in awe and wonder knowing that we do worship the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. Please pray for me as over the next day or two that I will speak clearly and that I will hear from God with regards to words of knowledge.

I hope to bring news of what God has done when I return from holiday in a weeks time.

Good news...

I never did finish blogging on my Lithuanian adventure and that now seems such a long time ago. On reflection it was an outstanding three days with a man whom I respect and admire, but more than that, a weekend where I saw afresh the vast reach of the global church of which i am part. To go to a place that geographically I couldn't put a pin, and to be welcomed so warmly, helped me to see beyond the end of my nose. I am definitely one who focuses on the things that are immediate!!!

Since, B and I spent the week at a youth camp, joining with Newfrontiers churches around the country. We saw young people inspired by hearing about their God and seeing him at work, as well as going out and helping local churches in their communities. As a church we took 12-16 year olds with us and saw three of those respond to the invitation to follow Jesus. We also saw three of them healed of varying ailments. What a joy it is to see 350+ youth respond to the gospel, especially knowing that 3 of them are people you can share the moment with.

However God is not constrained to do things just at big meetings. Even yesterday, Darren, a new friend of mine from the last Alpha course came in to the office and committed his life to Jesus. He rang the bell with the understanding that his God was rejoicing at his turning to follow Jesus.

It may be the Great British getaway time of year, but God is not on holiday and He is still revealing his love and grace to people in Reading and He has a people here ready to respond in leading those he has chosen into a new life, birthed by the Spirit, lived for Jesus, to bring glory to the Father.

Alpha@CoffeeRepublic: the countdown begins!

There is only 11 weeks to go until the start of the next Alpha course. We are looking to build on the success of the last course and see even more people come along to Coffee Republic to enjoy coffee, chat and the gospel.

On the last course we saw two people commit to following Jesus, others come and join us on a Sunday morning to serve and be part of the family; others are still searching but we will remain available to them in order to help them continue on the journey.

Alpha is not the only way that souls are won, but in our culture it seems to have an anointing on it and I for one will continue to promote and be part of these courses whilst people are still being saved. Who will I invite on the next course and who will you invite.

For more details on the course click here.

Salvation and healing!!!

Necks, depression, knees, legs growing and back pain - all of these are healing stories that came out on Sunday evening at our prayer meeting to thank Gods for all he did on Sunday. They are an accumulation of stories from the past couple of weeks as well as an older one. What this shows is that God is at work amongst us.

Granted not everyone who is prayed for is healed but we are seeing people regularly healed of various ailments. The more we pray, the more God does through his people by the power of his Spirit. You would think that this would be enough to rejoice about. However the real rejoicing came when we rang the bell three times. There were at least three responses to the good news of Jesus on Sunday morning with three more still to be identified. Each time we rang the bell we put up a cheer to God not a short cheer, but a long sustained one, joining with the celebration of heaven over each of these three sinners saved.

Sunday night will sit in my memory for a long time. To hear testimony after testimony and to ring the bell three times felt like a glimpse of what God wants us to be as a church. A place where people can come to receive physical, emotional and spiritual healing.

Terry Hotchkiss spoke brilliantly on this on Sunday morning and would recommend you listen to it. If you were there on Sunday morning, then listen to it again and let the truth that he speaks change you and build your faith. (Link here)

The bell rung once more!!!

On Sunday morning a young lady who has been coming on a regular basis prayed a prayer of commitment. As I lead a prayer during a time of response she said it quietly under her breath. She then approached me before she left and she told me that she had said the prayer once before but had said it again this morning because she wants to follow Jesus.

This is wonderful news. Jesus came to die for us, to set us free and to make peace between us and the Father. He did this because of love. That is now two people for whom the bell hath tolled this year. My prayer is that many others will come to know the saving grace of Jesus and respond to him.

We must be those who are loving and compassionate - looking for the lost as the Father looks for the lost - and to fulfill this we must be those inviting people to meet Jesus out of relationship, by showing them the real Jesus of the bible, by telling our stories or simply by taking every opportunity that comes our way.

Being bell ringers is what we are about, let's be expectant that we will all have that thrill!!!

The joy of a father

I cannot stop speaking about my darling daughter. For some I guess I speak too much about her, but I want to tell the world about her. Every opportunity I get to tell some one and share my joy, I take it - and probably give more information than they are actually interested in.

As I realised this whilst standing in St Andrews bookshop a while ago, it made me think once more of Luke 15 and the parable of the lost sheep. It says that the shepherd lets people know about the finding of the sheep by calling to them and inviting them to rejoice with him. It then says that there will be more rejoicing over a sinner who repents - a person being born again.

The joy I feel about Rachel is only a shadow of the joy that our Father feels and expresses when someone gives their life to follow Jesus. When we rang the salvation bell for one 10 year old lad, we were just joining in that celebration. I long to hear that bell ring again or at least hear some stories of friends of our church moving closer to that time!

Campanology - RFC style

'Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.' Rev 7:10

Salvation does indeed belong to Jesus, but he has entrusted us with the gospel that we may declare and share it, speak and leak it, talk and walk it; our remit is to emit the love of Christ and the good news that he has given us.

This year we are going to be a church that does just that. On Sunday evening I outlined the vision for the evangelism strategy this year. We basically want to become a church of campanologists or more simply, bell ringers. I mentioned Luke 15 in my last post and the fact that we should be those who rejoice when one person is saved.

Over the coming year, as we see people saved and added to the kingdom, we shall ring a bell and join with the angels of heaven who rejoice. If you have the privilege of seeing someone saved around you then it will be your joy to come and ring the 'salvation bell' to celebrate what God has done.

To see Dorothy's face on Sunday night as she rung the bell was fantastic. It's not about a bell, but it is about acknowledging the miracle of salvation!

What are we going to do then?

It starts with us as individuals, having non-Christian friends, loving them, loving them enough to tell them our story and about Jesus, then actually telling them. Campanology RFC style, starts with us individually.

Cell groups also have a great responsibility: our cell groups need to be a place where we share stories of chance meetings, conversations, acts of service, praying for someone - this encourages, it strengthens and it starts to help us see that reaching out to people with the good news of Jesus is something all Christians can do. Use witness time to it's full potential this year and lets see cell groups taking corporate campanology lessons!

Cell clusters will work slightly different this year. They are to purposefully start building links into the communities where they are based. Whitley cells will work together to work into Whitley, Earley cells to Earley - you get the picture.

Finally we get to the church as one together. As well as supporting the church in doing the above three things, I shall spend a lot of time, with Sean, in making sure that Sunday mornings are meetings to which we can invite our friends. On top of this we will be looking to run Alpha twice this year in a venue like Starbucks, building on the success of Glo. The course will be slightly different in format and in style but I know that we will see people saved through it.

Over the next few posts I shall unpack a bit more on each of these so watch this space but the overriding thing is that: yes-salvation belongs to our God, but let's get onto the part that we play in that and every time we see fruit lets celebrate it and become one of the RFC bell ringers.

Celebration... Jubilation...

Celebrations come in many different shapes and sizes. There is the 'full on party' celebration, there is the 'jump in the air as my team has just scored' celebration (I will probably be experiencing something like this in a few eeks time when BT arrives!), there is the 'quiet and sedate appreciation at the Oscars' celebration - I could go on but it would make this post too long!

What has got me thinking about this? Well I think that there are events that are really worth celebrating with a jump up and down type celebration, ones that allow us to become emotionally involved with the event that we just let ourselves go and reveal how we really feel. The death and resurrection of Christ is one of these and another is when one person turns to, and believes in Jesus. It's this second that has me buzzing. Last year we had cause to celebrate 2 such events that I am aware of. They are 2 fantastic trophies of God's grace, 2 who have a completely new life now, 2 that have hope, 2 that enjoy relationship with their Father in heaven. The only slight disappointment - only 2.

This year I want us as a church to be celebrating much more and on Sunday night I shall be unveiling one way in which we intend to do that.

Luke 15:3-7 say this:

"Then Jesus told them this parable: "Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and losses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbours together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.""

I am praying that our lives will be interrupted this year by celebrations of salvation as we see friends, family, work colleagues, neighbours, old school mates, turn to follow Jesus.

10 years on

Oct 1998 I meet a girl in a bar. She started me on a journey towards the greatest discovery of my life. In Jan 1999 after attending church for a couple of months, I embarked on a 10 week course called Alpha; food, a talk and discussion time made up the evening - very pleasant. Over the first two weeks I was to have my opinions of Christianity totally transformed. Jesus was not someone who should only be wheeled out at Christmas and Easter, not just a story, but real and alive.

This discovery radically changed my life. It wasn't something that I thought would be good to try for a bit as a self help system or something. I realised that if Jesus' tomb was empty (and no one had a credible reason as to why it wasn't) and that Jesus really did rise from the dead (all other explanations did not seem to make sense humanly) then Jesus must be someone that I should follow whole heartedly.

That was coming up for 10 years ago (Feb 3rd). My life was one of binge drinking and pleasure seeking for my own fulfillment, looking for ways of being liked and accepted, desperately seeking the approval of those I considered friends.

When I accepted Jesus' invitation to follow him on Feb 3rd 1999, I found the approval and the acceptance that I had craved. I found it liberating to be able to say no to the next drink in the round, to say no to the next dare. I started to have friends who liked me for being me and not for the amount I could neck in one drinking session. I started to let people speak into my life without being all defensive, because I knew that they were speaking out of love rather than trying to bully me or tear me down. I found that I could make mistakes and they were forgiven. When I got ill people would come and pray and would help.

I found my own attitude towards people changing. From being someone who would do something if there was something in it for him, I started to look for opportunities to help others, because they needed help. Church was not a place I had to go to once a week to somehow remove any guilt from my life rather it was a family of people who came together to give thanks and praise to Jesus, the one who made us a family through his sacrifice of love and had already removed the guilt.

The discovery of Jesus that I made in 1999 totally changed my world view, my self perception and my perception of others. Christianity isn't something I do, a Christian is who I am, I belong to Jesus, I'm his follower and I do all I do because he first loved me.

This year I would love to see more and more people have this same experience as me. The details will be different, but the essence the same. Helping people to discover the real Jesus amongst all the nonsense should be something that we as Christians strive to do at all costs. You know you really love a friend when you are willing to share the gospel with them because it is the only thing that will make sense of their lives.

I need to constantly challenge myself, in this my ten year anniversary of being a Christian, to introduce others to Jesus as Jesus was introduced to me.