“Paul Ede has been much more successful in this in Scotland”my reflection on this is that it has been the product of an intentional strategy right from the word go, and that I have deliberately targeted churches who have a culture of mission and a vision to see new things happen.Only certain churches in Glasgow have the theology, culture and level of growth and potential pool of people to recruit from to make them viable partners.It seems that these mostly come from within the evangelical/Pentecostal free church spectrum.This is not a historical accident, nor necessarily surprising.Its also not sectarian in intent.Its just that these churches seem to be places where the vision of UE can take root and where God’s vision for church planting has already been fostered.They also happen to be places where passionate young Christians have come to faith and feel at home who might be prepared to jump into this type of mission with little or no financial support.So if you want to build partner churches, do it relationally and target churches where folk are actually going to be receptive to the vision of UE.
None of what has developed in Glasgow could have happened without the relationships of the Steering group and a significant amount of leg-work.There also seems to be have been a kairos moment of opportunity that only god could have fostered
A final word – be up front about UE’s values and its status.We want strong local partnerships but we have a distinct set of values and support structures.We are a distinct mission agency, but we want to build teams to foster churches who will later affiliate back into the denominations from which they have been drawn.This requires a Kingdom perspective and approach.
NB, UE is always going to be less likely to find partner churches amongst state-sponsored, parish based denominations because their world-view (shaped by ecclesiology) is in tension with the general free-church/missional approach of UE.There may be exceptions to this rule, but we have found that partner churches from these denominations have not come forth as yet.
Partner Churches
“Paul Ede has been much more successful in this in Scotland” my reflection on this is that it has been the product of an intentional strategy right from the word go, and that I have deliberately targeted churches who have a culture of mission and a vision to see new things happen. Only certain churches in Glasgow have the theology, culture and level of growth and potential pool of people to recruit from to make them viable partners. It seems that these mostly come from within the evangelical/Pentecostal free church spectrum. This is not a historical accident, nor necessarily surprising. Its also not sectarian in intent. Its just that these churches seem to be places where the vision of UE can take root and where God’s vision for church planting has already been fostered. They also happen to be places where passionate young Christians have come to faith and feel at home who might be prepared to jump into this type of mission with little or no financial support. So if you want to build partner churches, do it relationally and target churches where folk are actually going to be receptive to the vision of UE.
None of what has developed in Glasgow could have happened without the relationships of the Steering group and a significant amount of leg-work. There also seems to be have been a kairos moment of opportunity that only god could have fostered
A final word – be up front about UE’s values and its status. We want strong local partnerships but we have a distinct set of values and support structures. We are a distinct mission agency, but we want to build teams to foster churches who will later affiliate back into the denominations from which they have been drawn. This requires a Kingdom perspective and approach.
NB, UE is always going to be less likely to find partner churches amongst state-sponsored, parish based denominations because their world-view (shaped by ecclesiology) is in tension with the general free-church/missional approach of UE. There may be exceptions to this rule, but we have found that partner churches from these denominations have not come forth as yet.