History

Urban Expression was launched in April 1997 through a partnership between Spurgeon's College and Oasis Trust. These organisations were already working together to run a Church Planting and Evangelism training course. Neither organisation is now directly involved with Urban Expression, which is an independent trust.

The director of this course, Stuart Murray Williams, who had planted a church in the inner city in the late 1970s, initiated Urban Expression in order to explore new ways of planting churches in inner city communities.

Juliet Kilpin, a graduate of the training course, was appointed as part-time co-ordinator of Urban Expression and worked with Stuart to establish this new mission agency. She and her husband, Jim, led the first church planting team in September 1997. She completed her three-year term as co-ordinator in March 2000 but was reappointed on a one day a week basis in October 2002 with responsibility for promotion and recruitment.

Seven church planting teams have been deployed in East or Southeast London. During 2006 our first team in Manchester was deployed and the leaders of the first team in Glasgow were also appointed. In 2007 a second team emerged in Manchester and in 2008 the leader of a a third team moved in. In 2008 the fully-formed Glasgow team began work. In 2009 team leaders were appointed to lead an eighth team in London, two teams in Stoke-on-Trent, a team in Birmingham and a team in Bristol.

In January 2004, Urban Expression Associates was formed - a network of urban church planters and others who share the Urban Expression core values and value the opportunity to interact and learn together.

In October 2005, our training course, Crucible, was launched in Birmingham - a one-year training programme focussing on church planting, urban mission and emerging church principles. For further information go to www.cruciblecourse.org.uk

In 2007 Jim & Juliet Kilpin were appointed jointly as co-ordinators, supported by a grant from the Baptist Union of Great Britain.

Also in 2007, Urban Expression Netherlands was formed. If you understand Dutch (!) you can read all about this at www.urbanexpression.nl

In 2008, we decided to introduce a third form of belonging to Urban Expression (alongside team members and associates) - mission partners.

During 2009, Urban Expression North America was formed.