Here are various updates from ChristCentral church plants around the world. These are only a handful of the many stories that are happening across our family of churches. We hope to share other stories in the future.
The Ark Church, Barnsley
Jonathan and Heather from Ark Church Barnsley share the following update with us:
We're from Ark Church Barnsley and we're a church plant out of Ark Church Huddersfield. We've been going about 18 months or so now, and for most of that time we've had a monthly Sunday service, which is held in a local church down the road, whose building we use, and we also have a mid-week get-together in our home.
We feel so welcomed here in Barnsley, and I found great favour among places like the local social club, the school that our children go to, and also Rosehill Church, where we hold our service, and they've supported us with things that we've put on, and we've done the same for them.
This last summer we had a mission weekend, where with support from City Church Sheffield and Ark Church Huddersfield, we were able to get out on the streets in Dodworth, where we live, and Barnsley as well, to raise awareness of who we are, and to get to pray for people as well. It's given us a real sense of urgency, and a lot of prophetic has been around stepping up the pace, and that's leading into what we're doing next.
So to that end, we'd like some prayer:
1. for a kids' club that we started this week, and we had two children coming, as well as two of our own, and word is getting out that this is happening, and we're hoping to get many more over the coming weeks. So pray for that, and pray that actually lives will be changed through that.2. For more people, for you perhaps, to join us in Barnsley. Would you consider coming to Barnsley and being part of this church band? We have a wonderful core of people with us already. We're a smaller number, but we're great in enthusiasm, and we'd love more people to join us.3. For is our second Sunday service. So we're hoping to start that in just a week's time, and we want prayer that actually what we'll see is more people coming into the building, and more lives changed here in Barnsley.
Burton Family Church, Burton on Trent
Matt and Lou Waring share the following from Burton on Trent:
We have a real heart to serve our town, especially the Winshill area, sharing God’s love with those around us.
God has begun to open doors for us in the community where we meet, our weekly drop in ‘Hug A Mug’ provides a warm welcome and a hot drink, a piece of cake or a slice of toast for mums & toddlers, refugees, the elderly and the lonely and we’ve made friends in the process.
Through our clothes bank we support those most in need with essential clothing and also our listening service in the school where we meet, we support junior school aged children who are struggling offering them 30 minutes of quality time and a listening ear.
We’re also engaged with the parish council supporting their efforts to make Winshill a better place to live and ‘Be Blessed’ a local charity shop whose profits are given back to the community through grants
We’d love you to pray for three things:
1. For more people, especially younger people, to feel called to join us in church planting
2. For the people of Winshill and the surrounding areas to be open to the good news of the gospel
3. For members of Burton Family Church to experience more of God’s presence and to be filled with boldness in their faith
Chemnitz, Eastern Germany
Markus & Leah Weber share the following from Chemnitz:
We just wanted to give you a bit of an update from Chemnitz and how the church plan is going. So we got back after our summer holidays and everything kind of exploded. Lots has been happening, we've had lots of people joining in, people who hadn't been coming before are now coming regularly. Some people have joined the teams, we've got some people who are really fully on board and getting involved on Sunday mornings, which is sharing the load, which is really exciting. And we got too big for our living room, which is fantastic, so we've had to move into this house, which is the Green House, which is run by a local Christian charity and they've invited us to use it for the medium term, which is very exciting.
When you pray, could you please really focus on three things?
1. Pray for our Sunday morning meetings for the venue. So this house here is a short-term solution for now. We pray that we find a place where we can have a home and grow to a level where we have the capacity to run more public meetings. That might be here, if it is, the people from the charity need to hear that from God.
2. Pray for our team to grow together, for people to commit to being part of this and to become a more outward-looking, a missional church plant.
3. Last but not least, please pray for just the Chemnitz people, for people who've never really considered if there is a God or not, to meet Jesus and to become part of a church plant.
Yeah, here we go. Thank you very much for praying. God bless, guys. See you soon. Bye!
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
Mark & Debi Rushworth share an update about Welcome Church in Halifax:
We’ve recently moved from Fredericton, NB in Atlantic Canada to Halifax, NS to plant a church into the Dartmouth area of the city. Christ Central Fredericton our sending church has for a long time had a vision to see word and spirit churches established in the towns and cities of Atlantic Canada, the eastern coast of our huge country.
We’ve recently felt that God was calling us to gather a team and plant into the city of Halifax. We've begun to see people relocate here and join us over the summer and autumn.
So far we've been gathering in our home, but we know that we'll soon need another venue to meet in. When Dave and Rosie Fellingham came to join us a few weeks ago for our church meeting, we were amazed that a local restaurant allowed us to use their venue free of charge for us to meet in. This was such a sign of God's favour on us!
The motto of the City of Dartmouth is “through friendship we grow”, which came about because of all the people from different nations who came to the city. They hope that people will learn from each other's cultures and be friends rather than treating each other with suspicion and being in conflict. Of course, we know that it's only through Christ that this vision can be achieved because he's the one who breaks down all the dividing walls!
So, our vision as a church is aligned with that of Dartmouth, to see a church of many nationalities becoming friends with Christ and displaying his glory in the city. We're calling our church ‘Welcome Church’ because we want to be a church that welcomes everyone as they are, knowing that everyone will be changed as they encounter Christ!
Paul says in Romans 15 and verse 7, “therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you to the glory of God”. Jesus has welcomed us to the glory of God, and we want to be those who welcome each other in all of our diversity and who welcome others who don't yet know Christ into God's presence.
We'd love you to pray:
1. That God provides jobs and houses for those who want to relocate and join us.
2. That God will show us who he wants to connect us to in this city. Those who he wants to bring to know the love of Christ.
3. For a venue for us to meet in as we continue to grow