Fresh!

David Goodhew

Description

Fresh ! offers a strong rationale for fresh expressions and pioneer ministries rooted in scripture and in the breath of the Christian tradition. This is tested against the realities of contemporary British culture and critiques of the notion of Fresh Expressions. It offers practical guidance for starting and sustaining such ministries in the long term. It provides a survey of best practice within Fresh Expressions and pioneer ministry.Fresh ! comes out of the mature reflection of church leaders and theologians who have been active in such ministries over a number of years, showing how such ministries are integral to the work of the church both now and over the long term.This is combined with valuable practical advice - the best kind of practical theology.

Sujets

• Religion
• Christian Church
• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Hymns Ancient & Modern Ltd
• Date de parution: 26 janvier 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780334048787
• Langue: English

Extrait

Fresh!
An Introduction to Fresh Expressions of Church and Pioneer Ministry
David Goodhew, Andrew Roberts, Michael Volland





Copyright information
© David Goodhew, Andrew Roberts and Michael Volland 2012
Published in 2012 by SCM Press
Editorial office
13–17 Long Lane,
London, EC1A 9PN, UK
SCM Press is an imprint of Hymns Ancient & Modern Ltd
(a registered charity)
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, SCM Press.
The Authors have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the Authors of this Work
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
978-0-334-04387-4
978-0-334-04459-8 (Kindle)
Typeset by Regent Typesetting, London
Printed and bound by CPI Group, Croydon



Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction : This Book is a Boat
The Rudder
1. Fresh Expressions and Pioneer Ministry: Central to the Christian Tradition
2. Fresh Expressions and Pioneer Ministry: For Such a Time as This
The Hull
3. Fresh Expressions: What They Are and What They Are Not
4. Best Practice in Fresh Expressions
The Sails
5. God’s Call to Pioneer
6. How to Pioneer a Fresh Expression of Church
7. The Long Haul

Conclusion. Fresh: A Call to be Apostolic, Catholic, Holy and One




Acknowledgements
The writing of Fresh! has taken place across several years. During this time we have received a great deal of help. We are grateful to Natalie Watson and the staff of SCM Press, both for suggesting the idea in the first place and for their encouragement and advice ever since. The staff and students of Cranmer Hall and the Wesley Study Centre in Durham, together with the participants of Fresh! – a course on fresh expressions based in York – have offered a hugely stimulating context in which to work on this book. Our thanks go to them for their support, insights and questions.
We are grateful to the staff of the national Fresh Expressions organization for all their help. A number of individuals have kindly read and commented on Fresh! , namely: John and Eileen Volland, Norman Ivison, Karen Carter and Ian Bell. Thank you to Lynda Barley and David Ison for information concerning Bradford Cathedral in Chapter 2. The Revd Gavin Tueno’s doctoral research, ‘Built on the Word: The Theology and Use of the Bible in Australian Anglican Fresh Expressions of Church’, brought helpful insights from an Australian perspective. All the above have greatly helped the writing of this book; however, the responsibility for the views in this work is the authors’ alone.
Fresh! is peppered with stories from individuals and individual churches. We are grateful to each person and each church for the insights and encouragements they have given us.
We are also grateful to the members of the fresh expressions and pioneer ministry research group, whose insights are quoted in Chapters 5–7: Jonny Baker, Ian Bell, Mark Berry, Mark Bryant, Steve Clarke, Jo Cox, John Drane, Ben Edson, Steve Hollinghurst, Chris Howson, Beth Keith, Joe Knight, Stephen Lindridge, Ellen Loudon, Ned Lunn, Ian Meredith, Chris Neal, Ben Norton, Dan Pierce, Janet Sutton Webb, Sue Wallace, Robert Warren, John Went and David Wilkinson.
We are conscious of all we have learnt from existing church communities that have nurtured, encouraged and challenged us – and been brave enough to begin new forms of Church. We wish to express our thanks to the people of St Oswald’s, Fulford, York; FEIG in Gloucester and the Wolverhampton and Shrewsbury Methodist District.
Natalie Watson and Mary Matthews at SCM Press, Christopher Pipe and Neil Whyte have been helpful, efficient and encouraging – thank you!
Finally, we wish to express our deepest thanks, respectively, to Lindsey, Shona and Rachel, whose support, love and patience made the writing of this book possible.
David Goodhew, Andrew Roberts, Michael Volland
February 2012





Introduction: This Book is a Boat
Fresh! is a studyguide on fresh expressions 1 of Church and pioneer ministry. It explains why these practices matter and how to go about them, combining scholarly analysis with dozens of examples of fresh expressions and pioneer ministry in practice. Fresh! is designed like a boat, with three sections: rudder, hull and sails. The rudder consists of Chapters 1 and 2. In Chapter 1, scripture, Christian tradition and, pre-eminently, the doctrine of the Trinity, show us that God calls the Church to pioneer fresh expressions of Church. Chapter 2 looks hard at the experience of contemporary Britain, and finds many signs of hope for the Church to balance the more widely publicized signs of decline. These two chapters provide the essential theological ‘steer’ for fresh expressions and pioneer ministry. The hull consists of Chapters 3 and 4, which define what ‘fresh expressions’ are and the principles behind them. This is the ‘body’ of the boat, holding those who travel in it. The sails are Chapters 5, 6 and 7. Here are resources for individuals trying to hear God’s call to pioneer new forms of Church – his call to grow more human in the process and to hear wisdom on how to go about this pioneering. The sails are necessarily flexible and fragile – in order to catch the wind of the Spirit.
David Goodhew built the rudder, Andrew Roberts took care of the hull and Michael Volland made the sails. Rudder, hull and sails are different from each other – and you will hear the individual author’s voice in each part – but they are interdependent in function. If you intend travelling, we recommend that you pay attention to them all.
Being ‘fresh’ is part of Christian DNA. Thus the epitome of Anglican establishment, the Declaration of Assent, to which all Anglican clergy have to subscribe, contains these subversive words regarding the Church:
It professes the faith uniquely revealed in the Holy Scriptures and set forth in the catholic creeds, which faith the Church is called upon to proclaim afresh in each generation.
‘Proclaiming afresh’ is, therefore, not some contemporary fad but is hardwired into church tradition. There has always been an urgency in the gospel message that will not permit us to wait for people to come to us – we have to go to them. We have to pioneer new ways of connecting with people if they are to connect with Jesus. We write this book from the shared conviction that doing Church in fresh ways, pioneering new ministries, is essential for all churches and all ministers in the current context – whether or not terms such as ‘fresh expressions’ or ‘pioneer ministry’ are deployed. This is not to paint a false division between ‘contemporary’ and ‘traditional’ – as this book shows, both are essential, both depend on and have much to learn from each other. Rather, it is to say that every priest, every minister has to facilitate the pioneering of new forms of Church – whether traditional or contemporary in form. Every parish, every circuit, every church needs to express Christian faith in a fresh way if it is to be truly a church. There is room for much freedom in how this is to be done, but the need for it to be done is, we believe, beyond question.
The need for fresh expressions and pioneer ministry does not mean jettisoning the immense riches of the Christian tradition. On the contrary, the best fresh expressions of Church will deeply value and be deeply rooted in historic practice and theology. But respecting the tradition is not the same as being traditional. Indeed, it is quite possible to be ‘traditional’ and yet misread the tradition. Faith rooted in the Trinity has always been a risk-taking enterprise, not a mandate for standing still. Specifically, any attempt at being fresh requires a far deeper engagement with the still neglected third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit. We argue that respect for Christian tradition will lead to a ‘fresh’ approach – and that it is excessive caution that fails to take seriously the historic inheritance of the Christian faith.
Who is Fresh! for? It is aimed at anyone training for church leadership, clergy and lay leaders and any Christian concerned to see the Christian Church effectively connect people with Jesus. David Goodhew and Michael Volland are Anglican clergy, while Andrew Roberts is a Methodist minister. Together we draw from our respective Anglican and Methodist traditions and from our experiences of starting new forms of Church, but each of us has learnt greatly from churches outside those communions and from the worldwide Christian Church. So Fresh! is written in a way that applies to a wide range of church contexts.
We have written Fresh! from the conviction that God has many new things he longs to do through his Church. We hope and pray that he may do much through you. And if this book aids you in that task, it will have more than fulfilled our hopes in writing it.
Note


1 In this book ‘fresh expressions’ (lower case) refers to concrete examples of new ways of being Church, while ‘Fresh Expressions’ (upper case) refers to the national team that supports this work. The Fresh Expressions tea