Easter Encouragements

It's nearly a year since we moved where we meet as a church to Hayfield Lane Primary School.  It has not been at times an easy year, change is never easy as a church and it is often costly.  The area we have moved to is not an easy area to do church in, there is lots of hostility to 'church' because of deep seated events in the past and wrong perceptions of what church is and who can and can't go.  At times the last year has been among the hardest I have ever known in ministry.

Yet Sunday was one of my favourite Sundays in ministry and not just because it was Easter Sunday but because of the evidence that gradual progress is being made for the gospel in the community we love.  It was with a sense of nervousness and hope that we set church out on Sunday morning for about 80.  The toddler group and coffee morning we have started have begun to see us reach a very needy community and provide opportunities for us to love those around us.  Football club has helped us begin to get to know some of the dads of families around about us.  And as we had invited people quite a few had said they would come.

Imagine our joy when as the service started we had nearly 30 visitors from the community we believe God has called us to, and we were putting out extra chairs.  God had answered all our prayers and broken down some of the barriers people had to coming to church.  I'd love to be able to tell of 30 people repenting and turning to Jesus but that hasn't happened yet.  But what we did see was people hearing the gospel for the first time, people experiencing a church which loved them and their children and an opportunity to connect church with community.

God was so good and gracious to us in bringing people to hear the gospel, in the service of church members who loved and welcomed others very different from them, in the bravery of one giving her testimony, in the hard work of others to BBQ and plan egg hunts, and in God's provision of good weather.  We are praying that God would continue to work to water gospel seeds so these people come to faith.