'housing schemes' Tagged Posts (Page 4)
How Far Should We Go in Discipleship Making?
Isaiah 58:10: ‘… if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.’ What does Isaiah mean when he uses the phrase, ‘spend yourself’ on behalf of the poor? In other versions it is translated as ‘pouring yourself…
Are You Sure You Want Converts From Inner City Housing Schemes?
BY ANDY CONSTABLE There is a lot of talk these days about living ‘missionally’ as the answer to the problems of the local church in housing schemes/council estates. People say that if we live like they did in Acts where everybody shared their possessions and spent more intentional time together…
Why Should We Take The Gospel To Housing Schemes Anyway?
Christians need to be seriously considering this question as, thankfully, more and more Christians seem to be taking notice of the dire gospel needs of many of our cities housing schemes/council estates. Personal experience has shown me that many ‘outsiders’ will come and help out at…
Understanding The Housing Scheme Mentality
There is lots of talk around at the moment about ‘cultural defeaters’ (a la Keller) and ‘common grace bridges’ when it comes to talk about the ‘Post-Christian‘ West. I recently spent the day with some ‘Crowded House’ Leaders in Sheffield and we were reflecting on what these terms mean in the context of a housing…
Superiority Complex? Try Service and Love
By Andy Constable There can be a temptation when coming to work in schemes to simply see the social problems that many schemes face. People from the outside see the drugs, crime, dysfunctional families and young teenage mothers. These stereotypes fuel a superiority complex where the ‘well-meaning’ Christian thinks that they are coming to release these ‘poor people’ from…
The Importance of Training Leaders
by Andy Constable When I wanted to start working in ‘poorer’ areas I genuinely thought that it would be a case of going in, sharing the gospel, praying and everything would change. Although these are the fundamentals of any gospel work I was naive about the culture, the work of the local church and the pressures involved working in a scheme. The heart was good but I…
Do Short Term Mission Trips Do More Harm Than Good?
Many years ago in Brazil we had a team come over from the UK to do some short term ‘missions’ work (defined in this article as 1-2 week trips run by local churches). What that meant in reality was that 10 young people came over to see our project, run a couple of holiday clubs, do some…