But when two members of King’s Church Hastings noticed this while out patrolling as Street Pastors, they were provoked to do something about it. They wanted to serve and bless these young people, some only 11 or 12 years of age, so they spoke to church leadership, prayed, gathered a team, hired a venue in the heart of the town centre and now run Chillz, a Friday night café, every week.
 
Chillz is supposed to open at 8pm, but usually teenagers will be waiting outside in the cold from 7pm so they open early. Typically they’ll see around 40 come in each week – some are regulars, some wander in a couple of times during the evening just to warm up with a hot chocolate before going back outside to drink alcohol with their friends, others pop in knowing it’s a safe place if they’re feeling sick or intimidated.
 
On the opposite side of town, a different group of people from the church are decorating candle-holders, making dragonfly sun-catchers and learning watercolour painting. Within a couple of weeks, they will sell what they make at the nearby hospice’s monthly fair – they’ve raised hundreds of pounds for the hospice in the last year and built a strong relationship with the people there.

Being the answer to a problem you’ve spotted in your local community is a key part of living as ‘salt and light’ in society. God has given you specific passions and talents that reflect His glory. How can you use them to serve your community today?
 

- What is the biggest area of need in your community?
- What God-given passions and talents could you be using to meet that need?

To mark the anniversary of Peabody, The Right Reverend Tom Butler, former Bishop of Southwark, gave an address at Westminster Abbey, celebrating the work of the organisation, and highlighting some of the needs and opportunities that remain for us today.
 
Some extracts from his message are below, and the full transcript is available on the Westminster Abbey website.

“Remember who you are and where you’ve come from.”

 
When my mother used to send me and my sister out to some important occasion she used to say to us, “Now remember who you are and where you come from.” The biblical prophets were won’t to say the same thing to the people of Israel as they sought to build settled, prosperous communities in the land they believed had been given to them by God. “Remember who you are and where you’ve come from. Remember that you haven’t always lived in your own land. Remember that you were slaves yourselves, exiles in Egypt, remember that for decades you were refugees, seeking asylum in a land where you could build new lives. And remember that you were given that chance, not so much through your own worth or your own efforts, but through the grace and goodness of Almighty God. “Remember who you are and where you’ve come from”, surely with that history, now that you have prosperity and power you should be particularly concerned for the welfare of the outcast and poor.” 
 

“It is very sad, but nothing can be done, it is a result of nature’s simplest laws.”

 
When rough sleeping was endemic in the early nineties I went walkabout late one winter’s night with an outreach worker from Thames Reach. We were making our way along Bankside. There was a fair bit of building going on and my companion knew that a favourite shelter for several rough sleepers was under the arch of a particular bridge. But apparently the local council knew this also and didn’t approve, so that very day they’d sent a couple of workman along, to board up the arch with a stout fence and a gate. 
 
The two or three men for whom the arch had been home, watched in resignation whilst the door was firmly closed and padlocked. Then just as the workers were leaving, job done, one of them came up to the men and slipped them a key to the padlock -  an act of gratuitous kindness. So as we arrived, there the men were, snug in their home underneath the arches, but now with locked-in security.
 
George Peabody 150 years ago made rather more adequate housing provision for many of the people of this city. Urban slums in East and South London, with bad sanitation and polluted water inevitably often had epidemics of sickness and disease. During one such outbreak a Times leader read, “It is very sad, but nothing can be done, it is a result of nature’s simplest laws.”
 
This was not good enough for George Peabody with his transatlantic “can-do” attitude.  He was one of the first in Britain to bring a more adequate solution to the problem of urban housing and homelessness by investing real money to address the challenge of providing decent, affordable housing for the urban poor.

George Peabody, having made a fortune in commerce and banking both in America and Britain, took up permanent residence in London in 1837, remaining here for the rest of his life. During his time in London he was well placed to observe at first hand the deplorable living conditions of many of its inhabitants and in 1862 he founded Peabody and gave half a million pounds to provide housing of a decent quality, with affordable rents for, to quote him, “the artisans and labouring poor of London”.
 
150 years on Peabody today continues with his vision of providing, not only good, warm, safe affordable dwellings, but homes with a real sense of purpose.
 
There are residents who are proud of the fact that their family members over three generations have been Peabody residents, but also today, as from the first, Peabody residents reflect the composition of the communities in which the estates are set, and because today London is one of the most diverse cities on earth, with its citizens representing virtually every race, language and culture, that same diversity is reflected in the composition of Peabody residents and in those who work for Peabody and support its aims. 
 
The Old Testament prophets constantly reminded the people of who they were and where they’ve come from, and in this service Peabody is looking back to its founder and its heritage with thanksgiving and rightful pride, but it’s doing more than that. 
 
Earlier in this service a wreath was laid at the Peabody memorial. This reminded me of the French War Memorial which reads, “They don’t want our gratitude, they want to live on in our bravery.” So I suspect it would be for George Peabody, I can hear him saying in response to our plaudits, “Yes, yes, but what are you doing here and now to make the world of urban London a better place for all its citizens?”

The question isn’t just one for London, of course. What are you doing here and now to make your world - your family, your workplace, your village, your country - a better place for all its citizens?

Over the next few weeks we will be featuring some of the ideas written onto the Good Ideas Chalkboard at the Everything Conference, there are some brilliant ideas that could make a real difference to the lives of those around us, but none of them can be done by any one person, they’ll require collaboration. Keep watching this website and thinking seriously about which of the ideas God is putting on your heart to help with - or suggest your own. If you’ve got a Good Idea to benefit society, why not post it on our Facebook page? Who knows, the skills and connections you need could be waiting there for you.

For more information about the work of Peabody, visit the new website they’ve launched in celebration of their 150th Anniversary. Or for ideas of other opportunities to get involved in specific social action projects, visit Jubilee+ and browse their ‘Helping Others’ section.

- The circumstances and experiences God has put in our lives form and equip us for different tasks. Have you ever stopped to consider ‘who you are and where you’ve come from’? What insights does that give you into what God is preparing you to do?
- We love learning from the stories of heroes of the past. Who are your heroes? Is there anyone whose story we should be sharing on this site?

The Queen has invited the nation to eat lunch together as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations and the Big Jubilee Lunch on Sunday, 3 June, is part of the official festivities. A specially-written, televised Grace – a prayer of thanks – is to start the lunch. Churches have a key role at the heart of their communities to make this happen.
 
The Big Lunch is a very simple idea from the Eden Project. The aim is to get as many people as possible across the whole of the UK to have lunch with their neighbours in a simple act of community, friendship and fun. Last year around two million people took part. This year, the Eden Project has asked HOPE to help get churches involved, and a record number of people are expected to enjoy lunch together during the Diamond Jubilee weekend.
 
HOPE’s Executive Director, Roy Crowne, explains: “HOPE is a national movement working with churches of all denominations to encourage more mission, together, in words and action. The Big Jubilee Lunch is an unmissable opportunity for churches to make connections, building communities and taking the opportunity to share faith in words and actions. As followers of Jesus we should be in the business of community-building and sharing the hope we have with others.”

Keep it simple

The message from HOPE for church groups wanting to get involved in a Big Jubilee Lunch is: ‘Keep it simple! It’s not too late to plan a party to remember.’
 
Roy Crowne says, “Churches have a key role to help build a stronger sense of community; they are at the heart of nearly every town, village and city. You can hold your local event in a back garden or car park, a shopping precinct or school playground; you don’t have to close a street. Your lunch can be a simple bring-your-own picnic or barbecue; it doesn’t have to be a spit-roast or a banquet – though some churches and cathedrals are planning to take part with large-scale events catering for thousands with sponsorship from local businesses! Invite other churches and neighbourhood groups to plan the event with you; you’ll be amazed at how local people will join in if you take the first step.”
 
Churches can be involved in dozens of practical ways. Rachel Jordan, one of the HOPE leadership team and the National Adviser for Mission and Evangelism for the Church of England says: “The things you need are the things your church already has, like cups, cutlery, tables and chairs. All you have to do is to take them outside of your church building for one day of the year and share them with your community.”
 
Members of the Well Church in the Blackpool area joined neighbours to plan a street party to celebrate the Royal Wedding last year. The church provided 200 chairs and 25 long tables, the church’s games equipment, bunting, PA, helium balloons and a generator. On the day, the youth pastor organised games for the children and about 450 people joined the street party. As the church served their neighbourhood ‘without strings attached’, Senior Pastor Rick Oldland says, they gained the trust of the local community.
 
“The scale of the recent Royal Wedding celebrations all over the country proved that the public love street parties,” says Steve Clifford, Chair of HOPE and General Director of the Evangelical Alliance. “Communities really come together over a national celebration like this. In many places people were getting to know neighbours they had never spoken to before and creating a shared local spirit. Christians can be at the heart of all this.”

Free party planning resources

HOPE has free community-building ideas, school lesson plans, plays and ideas for games to make your planning easy. Download the HOPE Jubilee video to inspire your church to get involved and register your Big Jubilee Lunch, so what you do locally is part of the national picture.

God Called Me to Move to the Trailer Park*

 
“God, I can’t do what I love and continue to work full-time.”
 
The day after Kim Dougherty prayed this in 2009, she found out that she and several other employees of Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois, were being laid off due to recession-based woes. Trinity’s director of student accounting, Dougherty had worked at the evangelical college for more than a decade.
 
Career coaches routinely counsel clients to consider a layoff an opportunity to reinvent themselves. But Dougherty wasn’t looking to discover a “second act” to her career.
 
She had all the inspiration she needed the moment she left her comfortable office each day. Evenings and weekends were packed with ministry to the marginalized and underserved in her community, mentoring children and teens; spearheading a county-wide food drive; and joining a volunteer group that provided short-term shelter to some of her county’s homeless.
 
And then there was the nearby trailer park. Dougherty had been providing practical assistance to a few low-income residents of Woodland Village Mobile Home Park in Wauconda, Illinois. “Many people in town do not realize the mobile home park is here,” Dougherty said. “Woodland Village is predominately white, with a growing Hispanic population. Many in the park are in transition - some trying to leave an abusive relationship, battling addictions, dealing with serious mental-health issues, or fighting to find a job in the wake of a felony conviction. Every person I met was determined to be independent and successful, but most couldn’t do so.”
 
Dougherty sensed God was calling her to a simple mission: become a good neighbor to her new friends at Woodland. “Relationships are a critical need in this community, though many would have trouble admitting it,” Dougherty said. “Many live isolated and lonely lives that make interacting with people a real challenge. They have few social skills, if any. What they need most is what they are least likely to pursue and least able to supply for themselves.”
 
Her choice seemed to many like a downgrade of her already simple lifestyle in the wake of an unexpected layoff, but Dougherty was convinced her next step was part of God’s call. She moved into the trailer park as a missionary.

You can read the rest of Kim’s story, and find out how simple acts of neighbourliness are making a difference in Michelle’s community, on the Christianity Today website. Perhaps the most important lesson Kim learned was that “the very experiences that may have disqualified her from institutional ministry leadership in some settings are what gave her credibility and authority among those she now served.”  Although she had spent several years pursuing a career in ‘full time Christian ministry’, it turned out that her experiences and passions were fitting her for another kind of ministry altogether.
 
At the recent Everything Conference, Os Guinness reminded us that while some do receive a clear and specific calling from the Lord to a particular place or task, for most of us the passions, gifts and circumstances God has put into our lives lead us in the path He wants us to take. That was certainly true for Kim, but what about you?

- Are there passions, gifts or circumstances in your life that you think God couldn’t use to bless others?
- Have you ever prayed a prayer like Kim’s and found God turning your life upside down? Why not share your story below; we’d love to hear it!
 
 
*This article appears as part of Christianity Today’s project “This Is Our City”. Copyright © 2012 Christianity Today. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Medellín, Columbia, was once known as the murder capital of the world, with gang violence fuelled by drug-trafficking and controlled by a deadly mafia. Crime and social breakdown were the trademarks of the city, and to many the situation must have seemed hopeless. Yet today Medellín is a popular tourist destination, having undergone what has been described as a ‘dramatic transformation’. The key? An improved transport system.
 
This report from the BBC in summer 2010 identifies a vastly-improved metro system and a cable car as central to the regeneration of the city. Both have made it easier for poorer residents to travel into the business centre from their favelas on the hills surrounding the city. “If the view isn’t spectacular enough for you,” comments the reporter, “You can always borrow poetry and literature from one of the Metro’s four libraries.” Tourists now visit the former no-go areas, while residents are able to travel much further afield to find work.

A succession of visionary local leaders set about removing the intimidation and violence that were part and parcel of the drug trade here. Their main aim was to connect the mountainside slums with the rest of the city.

   
After putting the Metro into place, Mayor Sergio Fajardo moved onto phase 2 of his plan: to ensure that the city’s most beautiful buildings were situated in the poorest areas. State of the art schools, parks, museums and libraries bring in the tourists, but also encourage aspiration in the slums’ young people, to such an extent that “Medellín has become an example of how urban transformation based on good architecture can reshape the mentality of its inhabitants.”
 
“From the time I was a child, it was clear to me what aesthetics meant as a tool for social transformation, as a message of inclusion,” Fajardo explained in an interview with architect Giancarlo Mazzanti, “Underneath it all is the most important word in all of those urban interventions in which architecture plays an important role: dignity… The poor are habitually given crumbs, but our proposal was to give them the very best. We had to break away and show another way.”
 
The whole article is well-worth a read, as it gives a fascinating insight into the heart of a man who sought social justice for the poorest of his city, and set processes in motion which are well on the way to achieving that goal.
 
Farjado’s tenure as mayor ended in 2007, but his legacy lives on, and this Christmas the poor of the Comuna 13 district were given a new gift – a series of outdoor escalators scaling the 384m (1,260ft) hillside and saving them a climb equivalent to 28 flights of stairs - daunting enough at the best of times, but soul-destroying to face at the end of a long day’s work.
 
Medellín’s leaders have been tough on crime and on criminals, but they have recognised that reducing crime-rates is about far more than simply fighting crime. It requires taking a good, hard look at the bigger picture and making changes across the board, often to things which seem to have little immediate bearing on the issues in hand.
 
The transformation of a community requires every inhabitant of that community to be treated – and regarded – as a valuable participant in its flourishing. A giant escalator may not be the answer to every city’s problems, but it meets the needs of Comuna 13. What is the big need in your community? What could you do to meet that need, and to restore dignity and hope to those who need it the most?

Gathering with 800 other Christians at the Everything conference in London in March reassured me that there are lots of people just like me, eager to find out more about how to be salt and light in the settings in which God has placed us, wanting to make a difference and influence the little bit of world that’s around us Monday to Friday.
 
A packed programme started with worshipping Jesus, before David Stroud spoke excellently about seeking the peace and prosperity of our nation. His interactive session got us talking to the people around us about where there is a lack of ‘shalom’ in our communities and how the church can help society to flourish. Keynote speaker Andy Crouch, the Pennsylvania-based author of Culture Making, delivered three talks over the course of the day, with the highlight for me being his thought-provoking first session where he talked about the fact that Christians are often known for what they are against, rather than what they are for. Memorably utilising verbs beginning with the letter C, Andy challenged us that, rather than condemning, critiquing, copying or consuming culture, Christians should be known for cultivating and creating it.
 
The conference was peppered with real life stories of people and churches doing exactly that. Script-writer Rhydian Brook, whose 2010 film Africa United was described by The Telegraph as “moving, funny…a road movie with a difference”, was interviewed on stage. And we heard from Matt Hatch about members of Mosaic Church in Leeds – musicians performing at open mic nights, a stand-up comedian who tells jokes about not having sex before marriage, a freelance TV producer who raises awareness of social justice issues, and many other ordinary people who are playing their part in shaping culture.
 
But it was one of the videos that has remained with me daily in the couple of weeks since the Everything conference: a film featuring Renewal Church, Solihull Pastor David Carr’s provocation to be so engaged with our communities that they would notice straight away if we closed our doors. The friends with me at the conference were also struck by this footage, particularly how the church so effectively worked with public services such as the police and healthcare. The Everything conference challenged me, changed some of my thinking and inspired me to actively seek out what I can do to influence the culture around me, particularly in my field of work. If every delegate left feeling the same way, there’s no doubt that our communities – and our nation – will be changed.

In this talk from Newday 2011, Tim Frisby shares about how to put our theology into practice and make a difference in our communities. He looks at the causes of poverty, God’s heart for the poor, and how we can make our neighbourhoods a better place.

Click here to listen to the talk, and follow along with his interactive presentation below.

The church, he explains, has a much-needed role in society:

‘It exists […] to do and be for the world what Jesus had been for his contemporaries: to bring healing and hope, to rescue people trapped in their own folly and sin, to straighten out the distorted pictures of reality that every age manages to produce, and to enable people to live by, and in, God’s true reality. It exists not to rescue people from the world but to rescue them for the world: to see lives transformed by the gospel so that people can discover a new depth and resonance of what it means to be human, precisely by looking beyond themselves to God, to the beauties and glories of his creation, and to their neighbours, particularly those in need. The Church does this through liturgy and laughter; through music and drug-rehabilitation programmes; through prayer and protest marches; through preaching and campaigning; through soaking itself in the Bible and immersing itself in the needs of the world. When God wants to change the world, he doesn’t send in the tanks (as many, including many critics, think he should). He sends in the meek; and by the time the world realises what’s going on, the meek have set up clinics and schools, taught people to read and to sing, and given them a hope, meaning and purpose which secular modernism (which gave us, after all, Passchendaele and Auschwitz as well as modern medicine and space travel) has failed to provide.’

 
 
The whole article is worth a read. Check it out, and share your thoughts and reflections below… but here are just a couple of key quotes for your delectation:

‘Snapshots from my time in Durham tell a true story of what the Church is there for. The foot-and-mouth crisis strikes the Dales, and the local vicar is the only person the desperate farmers know they can trust. A local authority begs the Church to take over a failing school, and within months, when I visit, a teenage boy tells me, ‘Well, sir, it’s amazing: the teachers come to lessons on time now.’ Miners’ leaders speak of the massive coal stocks still lying there unused, and we campaign, in the Lords and elsewhere, for the new technology that can release it. The new vicar at a city-centre church, dead on its feet a few years ago, apologises that the weekday service is a few minutes late in starting; he has been helping a young, frightened asylum-seeker whose case is coming up the next day. In one old mining community, so many shops had closed that the bank shut as well; the local churches have taken it over, and run it as a credit union, a literacy training centre and a day centre for the very old and the very young. In a world where ‘family’ means ‘the people in the neighbouring streets who are there for you when you need them’, I ask a young adult what’s different now she’s become a worshipping member of the Church, and she replies, ‘It’s like having a great big second family.’ The Church, said William Temple, is the only society in the world that exists for the benefit of its non-members. I have to report that this vision is alive and well, and that the Church of England, though not its only local expression, is in the middle of it.’

‘This is the real ‘Big Society’. It’s always been there; it hasn’t gone away. Check out the volunteers in the prison, in the hospice, in charity shops. It’s remarkable how many of them are practising Christians. They aren’t volunteering because the government has told them we can’t afford to pay for such work any more. They do it because of Jesus. Often they aren’t very articulate about this. They just find, in their bones, that they need and want to help, especially when things are really dire. But if you trace this awareness to its source, you’ll find, as often as not, that the lines lead back to a parish church or near equivalent, to the regular reading of the Bible, to the life of prayer and sacrament and fellowship. To the regular saying and singing of prayers and hymns that announce, however surprising or shocking it may be to our sceptical world, that God is God, that Jesus is Lord, that the Holy Spirit is alive and well and active in a community near you.’

Through all the noisy blame there has been one reason which rings most true for me. ‘We are reaping what we have sown,’ was a friend’s comment. We have raised a fatherless generation and a fatherless generation is what we have. One which is disenchanted with the idea of authority, disenfranchised with the ideals of mutual respect, and has therefore disassociated themselves from the established social model.

What’s to be done?

Along with many brothers I work with young people. I don’t believe that there are many schools or youth centres in the country where a Christian does not work. And like many, my heart has been broken over the fatherless children I have worked with, some abandoned, others in mourning, all desperate for a father’s hand. 
 
We are arguably the only people who know fatherhood in its truest sense. Through Christ, the way, the truth, and the life, we have come to The Father. We are in a unique position to show this generation that a father, who wields ultimate authority, who holds His arms out ready to accept, who finds a place for the hopeless and the dissolute alike, does exist. So, how do we point to the father in our workplace?

Set Boundaries

Any teacher worth their salt knows how to set boundaries, rules, guidelines to get a class to listen, to learn. But only Christians’ moral compass is being set in line with the laws of The Father. Therefore set boundaries that go beyond the classroom, set boundaries for life. As the proverb goes, ‘Train a child up in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.’
 
Train young people in morality, respect, love, not just classroom behaviour. A previous group of boys I taught were in the awful habit of jeering rather than cheering others successes. It would have been easy to change behaviour, to set rules, enforced with clear consequences, much harder to change attitudes, but this had to be the aim.

Be the ears that they lack

Two parents equals four ears, one parent equals two ears. As professionals working in a sector having every penny squeezed out of it, our time is more precious than ever but I would urge you to be interruptible. I work with a class of thirty children and, like many, I know each individual’s story. I know which ones are fatherless, which are seeking asylum, whose parents lie in a hospital bed, and I try, not always successfully to be the ears that they need whenever they need them.
 
A few months ago I had the opportunity to go after the 1 and leave the 99. A usually tough young man come into class in tears, his story is one of recent loss, his father returning to their home country without the rest of the family, so I left the class, (I still don’t know what they got up to!) he needed my ears.

A place to belong

With the breakdown of family many lack what is an intrinsic human need placed in us by The Father. As the redeemed we’ve found ultimate acceptance and belonging in the arms of our loving daddy. We, rightly, have restrictions, as adults working with children, in the ways we can show love. Within these restrictions we must do all we can to welcome, to accept, to include. 
 
We all work with children who abuse us sometimes, swear at us, are violent, aggressive, show us nothing but disdain and hostility. At one time we were at enmity with God, we spat in the face of His goodness, turned our backs, yet His love endured. ‘Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,’ Christ says, just as he did.

In all this

 
Finally, in all this, take every opportunity to talk about your faith. In a secular setting, these opportunities can be limited; make the most of every one. ‘How will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching.’ The Father is the answer for this fatherless generation. We must be light, both shining something of true fathering and guiding a way to The Father.

At some point during Monday night, a website and twitter feed entitled ‘riotcleanup’ were created. By mid-afternoon @riotcleanup had over 70,000 followers, and 600 people were waiting in Clapham for police to open the roads and allow them to swoop in and sweep up.
 
Even more heartening, though, was the fact that at the top of Twitter’s ‘trending’ list, showing what key words are being most used across the micro-blogging site worldwide, the hashtag #prayforlondon sat at the top of the list for most of the day. That means that every time anyone anywhere in the world logged on to twitter’s home page, the call to pray for the UK’s capital city was in the most prominent position.

Christian groups and charities were also taking advantage of the social media networks to circulate suggestions for how to pray and how to give practical help: some sent out appeals for clothes they could give to those whose homes had been burned out; others suggested baking goodies for the hard-working police and fire crews; still others publicised prayer vigils being held across the city.
 
Looking at the scenes on TV and the internet, it would be possible to think that the UK had descended into anarchy. Violence and destruction seemed to rule the streets, yet when dawn broke, good people, who cared about their neighbourhoods, were ready and willing to put their compassion into action. This is the famous sociological ‘Broken Windows Theory’ on a grand scale.
 
Simply put, the theory, posited by George L. Kelling and James Q. Wilson in Atlantic Magazine nearly 30 years ago, states that if a neighbourhood is such that broken windows remain broken and graffiti remains disfiguring the walls, then it will not take long before more windows are broken, more graffiti appears, and vandalism generally increases. If, however, windows are fixed, walls are cleaned up and the area is generally well-tended, it will remain well-tended and will feel both a safer and a more pleasant place to live.
 
Londoners and residents of other cities across the UK could have hidden indoors, battening down the hatches and sheltering from the storm. They could have called on the local councils to clear up the mess. In taking the responsibility and making a stand, though, they have chosen to reclaim their streets and not surrender them to violence and destruction.
 
When the world looks darkest, it is important that we not lose hope, but focus on the good that remains, and allow our light to shine brightly.
 
However you choose to respond, remember to stay safe, and to work with the local authorities to help and not hinder their work.

“I was working in a school in a deprived area of Dorset, specialising in behavioural and pastoral support. In 2004, I was asked by the head teacher to enquire about parenting courses that we could offer to families within the school.
 
I attended a parenting course along with Karen Todd, a friend who had for many years volunteered with children, young people and families in various churches to which she had belonged. We decided to adopt the course to run in the school, and shortly after decided to make some changes to make it more current and user friendly.
 
Following the success of the first course, the local education partnership of 27 schools asked if we would run courses for other staff in the locality and train them to lead courses in each of their schools. Having found the material to be rather antiquated, we started to put together a programme of our own ideas and suggested to the partnership about designing a new course. The CEO of the partnership saw the potential of the embryonic material and introduced us to The Innovation Unit, which at the time was linked to the government department for Children, Schools and Families.
 
As we shared our enthusiasm for families with the Innovation Unit, we were encouraged by the response. As a result of that first meeting we were asked to develop a new British universal parenting programme that could be easy to access, easy to lead and easy to participate in. The Innovation Unit offered to fund the writing of the course and assigned a consultant to support us throughout the process.
 
What started out to be simply serving our local community in an area we felt passionate about was rapidly growing into something way bigger than we could possibly have imagined. This was a huge privilege and we saw God’s favour time and time again as more doors and opportunities opened to us.
 
Throughout the process of writing the materials, we were both very aware of God’s provision and blessing over them. As we prayed together about the course, we felt keen to develop the materials to be used in a number of settings. We wanted to see God’s heart for family penetrate into all aspects of community and felt it was right to make the resource available for mainstream use, rather than just for the church.
 
After we made that decision, we were at a meeting finalising the course, and were unexpectedly joined by the Extended Services Coordinator for Dorset County Council. After a short flick through the materials, she offered to buy into the initial print-run and wanted to provide course materials for all 175 schools in Dorset.
 
Suddenly, every week brought a new development. As the materials were nearing completion, the excitement of launching the product was met with the reality of needing to start a business in order to train people to facilitate the course. We had regularly consulted with parents and professionals and the strongest message that came through was how easily people felt judged as being ‘bad parents’ if they needed to go on a parenting course. For this reason, we chose a name to reflect a more positive reaction to improving family life and to represent all those involved in the family. Fusion - Skills and Strategies for the Family was launched in April 2008.
 
Initially the course was mainly used in the education sector, with some children’s centres and private organisations also adopting it. We have so far seen success in schools, family centres and churches in parts of Dorset, Somerset and Cambridgeshire with approximately 300 facilitators trained to lead Fusion.
 
The course has been welcomed as an outreach tool in some churches, as a means of engaging the local community. One church is using the course with their toddler group parents, whilst another course is being run as a gateway into the community with plans to offer Alpha as a follow up to Fusion.
 
Whilst delivering Fusion courses facilitators have told us that ‘they have found a natural supportive community has formed between the participants on the course which often leads to a desire to continue to meet together’. In one church this was demonstrated by a group of women regularly meeting for a ladies Alpha course having previously attended a parenting course together.
 
Our passion is to see families supported, and we believe that the church is the best place to do this as families can experience God’s love in a practical way.
 
In 2009 Jeff Moss (Lead Elder, Taunton Family Church) introduced us to Ranjit and Cynthia Rodrigues from Goa. The couple trialled a Fusion course in their home and shared that it was the first time they had had so many different religions represented in their home. They were excited about the relationships they were growing and the opportunities this could lead to in sharing more of their faith. They are able to build relationship with people they would never normally have an opportunity to.
 
We were also privileged to meet key leaders who oversee churches in Kenya, and were invited to work with them in developing a similar course in their nation.
 
Now we are in the process of writing a second British course called Resolution - Skills and Strategies for Families with Teenagers.  We have been able to train up others and now have a team working with us. With some big changes facing us this year we eagerly await what God will do next.”
 
For more information go to www.betterparents.co.uk or email katy@betterparents.co.uk or karen@betterparents.co.uk

Bombs decimated communities, endless murders made even the word ‘why’ written on the floral tributes seem like a waste of letters.  These dark acts needed to be charted, explored, condemned…
 
But what of the stories of hope? How have they impacted our heritage, our collective conscience? I believe these stories also need to be told.

 
We need to hear these sorts of stories. We need to know that hope has actually always been at work: We’ve maybe just failed in publicising it.
 
I love this quote from Jesus:

“You’re here to be light, bringing out the God colours in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket, do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand - shine!” (Matt 5 – The Message)

 
And this, in essence, is the heartbeat of Tell It In Colour.
   
I’d love you to meet Margaret from Poleglass. Margaret is ‘The Good News Lady’ to me. I absolutely love her story. She arrived here in 1987 from England and was convinced that this place wasn’t as bad as had been portrayed to her. So for over 20 years now she has been faithfully cutting out and collating any good news stories she sees in the local papers.  She then compiles little ‘good news’ booklets and sends them to friends around the world. What a legend. What a voice of hope.
 
Stories of hope like ‘The Good News Lady’ can be found on our website www.tellitincolour.com. As well as showcasing these stories online we’ve also hosted a series of storytelling nights in coffee shops and other venues across Belfast where various contributors speak out these stories. A recent exciting development has been the expansion of Tell It In Colour to incorporate artists, photographers and musicians who are keen to communicate hope through each of these creative strands.
 
Our dream is that these hope stories could spark a cultural revolution here; that they would call out the best in communities - not the worst - and inspire people to live out their own stories of hope. Our prayer is that these stories, emanating from hopeful lives, will reach into the darkest corners of our land, colour the very fabric of Northern Irish society and ultimately showcase our colourful Creator God.

‘In conclusion, we should all take heart because all our efforts …well, they probably don’t do any harm.’

He certainly didn’t look sure of himself and I didn’t take heart.

I’d chosen to do a degree in International Relations and Development with the hope of being equipped to serve God in my chosen field. Specifically, I wanted to help tackle some of the horrific injustices that are daily committed against the poor: global atrocities like human trafficking, enslavement and abuse. I felt somewhat equipped with knowledge and strategies, but in this lecture it was like any hope of genuine success had been surgically removed.

The development sector, like every other, has lost confidence that there are any abstract rights and wrongs, any objective and universal truths about who and what a person is and what counts as a transgression against them. Real advances in tackling injustice and violence against the poor require authority. Without authority, hope wanes.

‘The battle for justice in the world is not fought where we think it is. The struggle against injustice is not fought on the battlefield of power or truth or even righteousness. There are pitched battles waged on these ramparts, but the war is ultimately won or lost on a more forward front. In the end the battle against oppression stands or falls on the battlefield of hope.’ (Gary Haugen, Good News About Injustice)

As Christians, whether tackling injustice on a global or local front, from a secular or church-based platform, our level of hope will be directly mirrored in our level of love for the vulnerable, our willingness to engage in their cause, our determination to stand for what is right and our longevity of service in doing so.

Below are three reasons, among many more, why we must readdress this issue of hope and refuse to settle for anything less than a hope-filled, joyful approach to justice.

1) Because our commission is compelling

In Isaiah 1:17, God commands us to ‘seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow’. He does this with no sense of naivety or ignorance about the tonnage of power wielded by the strong against the weak, or the scale that oppression will take.

Acts of violent oppression against the poor are not new. Psalm 10 makes it clear that advances against the poor have been carefully strategized and executed since biblical times. Not only this, but the same considerations apply for the oppressor: a weighing up, and a conclusion that he will not be called to account (10:6). Thus, for him, the benefits outweigh the costs. Similar considerations must today be in the minds of some of the individuals behind human trafficking – now the third most profitable criminal industry, after arms and drug trafficking.

The Psalmist is confident that God sees these acts, hears the cries of the victims and is able and willing to break the arm of the wicked and evil man, calling him to account. As the pattern of scripture shows again and again His primary (although not ultimate) way of doing this is through His people.

2) Because our commission is achievable

In every generation God has raised up individuals and groups to meet tides of injustice head on. Behind these individuals are faithful givers, pray-ers and supporters.

In the summer of 2006 I had the privilege of working with one such group. Let me share the story of Elizabeth, a trafficked victim rescued with the help of International Justice Mission (IJM), and explain her journey between Psalm 27 and Psalm 34.

Elizabeth was seventeen when she was tricked into travelling across the border. Expecting to find legitimate work at her destination she instead found herself held captive inside one of Asia’s many brothels. Elizabeth clung to her one source of comfort, her Bible, and, when not forced to be with customers, sat in her room, number 5, and prayed for rescue. In the midst of extreme suffering Elizabeth wrote many verses on her wall, the most prominent being Psalm 27:1-3, and the words sum up the resolve of many of God’s image bearers around the world today:

The Lord is my light and my salvation –
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life –
of whom shall I be afraid?
When evil men advance against me
to devour my flesh,
When my enemies and my foes attack me,
they will stumble and fall.
Though an army besiege me,
my heart will not fear;
Though war break out against me,
even then I will be confident.

It was around this time that Elizabeth began to form a friendship with a supposed customer, Eugene. Eugene was an undercover investigator for IJM, an international human rights organisation built on the certainty that God is both just and able to use his people to bring rescue and relief. Once a portfolio of evidence had been collated, complete with undercover footage from inside the brothel, investigators worked with local police to secure a raid date. Elizabeth, as well as 28 girls and young women, seven of them minors, were set free that night.

IJM staff describe being with Elizabeth as being in the presence of greatness. Her story has encouraged countless supporters and on a recent visit to see Elizabeth, Sharon Cohn-Wu (Senior Vice President at IJM) asked her if she would mind reading the Psalm aloud. ‘No’ she said, ‘that Psalm was for when I was in the brothel, but God rescued me. I will read you Psalm 34:

I sought the Lord, and he answered me;
he delivered me from all my fears.
Those who look to him are radiant;
their faces are never covered with shame.
This poor man called, and the Lord heard him;
he saved him out of all of his troubles.
The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him,
and he delivers them.’

During my three months at IJM one of the things that struck me as most strange was the amount of laughter in the office, and the deep sense of hope that seemed engrained in the fabric of the organisation.

Whilst I was there, two of the investigators returned from short-term undercover work. They showed me video footage of little girls in a dark brothel being lined up for the picking. The investigator beamed, ‘they’re out now.’ I was obviously so pleased but was also curious as to how stayed so positive, knowing that there were hundreds more brothels in that city. ‘We saw six pimps arrested on one trip; think how many children, over how many years that represents. And soon we’ll go back and we’ll do it all again.’

Psalm 10 ends with the words ‘so that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more’. The investigators and staff I worked with that summer were convinced that man’s existence, power and ability to do evil is framed and limited. We serve a God whose existence, power and ability to do good is without boundaries, unframed and all-surpassing.

The work of justice is achievable.

3) Because success is guaranteed

Nothing secures hope more than knowing the way the story ends. At present, our job is to rewind the final picture, bringing the future total establishment of the kingdom into the present. But our resolve, and our levels of hope, are grounded in the fact that Jesus is going to return, ultimately, and bring justice to the earth.

At the beginning of the film Ocean’s Eleven, a casino mogul describes the previous attempts to rob casinos in Las Vegas. In only one of the attempted robberies did the man even make it past the front door. The camera focuses in on this guy, carrying bundles of cash and elated that he’s escaped the scene of the crime uncaught. If we were to press pause and stop the movie there, it could look as if the robbers, the murderers, the oppressors and the traffickers get away with it.

But before he has even left the car park, as anyone who has seen Ocean’s Eleven (or attempted to rob a casino!) knows, he is immediately gunned down by casino security, and dies in a heap on the floor. If we stop the story in the wrong place, it can look like injustice triumphs. But when we wind the tape forward to the end, it becomes obvious that no injustice is allowed to go unrighted. When we fix our eyes on the certainty of an ever-increasing kingdom of justice and peace, one in which wrongs are righted, death destroyed and pain undone, it grounds our fight for justice in a victory that is finally certain. It means our success is guaranteed.

We have a difficult, but compelling and thoroughly achievable, commission. The guarantee of Christ’s kingdom is that it will be filled with ever-increasing peace and justice. And one day, He will return to right all wrongs and undo all injustice. This gives us hope – the sort of hope that gives powerful foundations for pursuing justice on the earth, so that man may terrify no more.

(For more information on the work of IJM in the UK please visit www.ijmuk.org, and for their work in the USA visit www.ijm.org)

This excellent initiative is but one amongst many coming from Christians who believe that there is more to life than simple pious faith.  We are confronted with concepts such as ‘community mission’, ‘integral mission’ and ‘integrated theology’.

But what are we to make of the Square Mile question?  Maybe we need some definitions before we can answer the question.

What is ‘your community’?  What is ‘your church’?

Maybe we are in danger of falling into the same trap as the lawyer who questioned Jesus with his famous question ‘who is my neighbour’? Even putting that aside -  should ‘your community’ refer to a defined geographical area or is there another way of understanding community?

Does it have to do with our immediate circle of friends or family?  Maybe it just extends to our neighbours and work colleagues or maybe it can be seen as an all inclusive term covering the whole of our national life or even international life.

Also, are we supposed to think in terms of ‘gathered church’ or should we be thinking more in terms of a ‘sent church’ comprising many individuals in many diverse situations?

I do not ask these questions in order just to be difficult, as the answers that we give will be crucial in shaping the activities we get involved in.

The church, gathered or sent, can relate to its surrounding community in differing ways.  We hear stories of transformation, influence, responsibility and opportunity, all of which will necessarily be worked out in different ways depending upon which community we are referring to.

As with any human activity, we need to establish specific targets or goals in order to ensure that we achieve them.  What will our communities look like with our involvement?

David Muir, Director of Public Policy, at the EA suggests that “safe, prosperous and peaceful communities are what we are looking for”

Malcolm Duncan, Leader of Faith Works, wants to see “communities become safer places”

Charles Finney, in his 23rd Lecture on Revival (note to self: I really must read the other 22) says that the gospel “releases a mighty impulse toward social reform” and that the Church’s neglect of social reform grieved the Holy Spirit and hindered revival.  He also suggested that “the great business of the Church is to reform the world….The Church of Christ was originally organised to be a body of reformers.  The very profession of Christianity implies the profession and virtually an oath to do all that can be done for the universal reformation of the world.”

Tom Wright in The Challenge of Jesus tells us that “our task, as image – bearing, God – loving, Christ – shaped, Spirit – filled Christians, following Christ and shaping our world, is to announce redemption to the world that has discovered its fallenness; to announce healing to the world that has discovered its brokenness; to proclaim love and trust to the world that knows only exploitation, fear and suspicion.”

Reading these quotes, together with many others, it would be easy to assume that as soon as someone is born again, they become effective in changing the world around them.  Sometimes this is the case, but more often there is a need to train and equip people to see how personal salvation can bring about social transformation or as Tom Wright suggests, community redemption.

Something to think about before coming to the Everything Conference:
What would ‘transformation’ or indeed ‘redemption’ look like in your community?