Stories round the campfire 

Several stories and videos of how churches and people in the Northern Baptist Association (NBA) are connecting with their communities in imaginative ways were shared on Friday night at the Baptist Assembly.

This is the transcript of the conversation between General Secretary Lynn Green and Linda Donaldson and Johnny Pozzo, regional ministers co-team leaders of the Northern Baptist Association. 

The videos shown during the session are embedded throughout this page  

 
Lynn Green (LG): One of the reasons we come together at Assembly is to listen to stories of what is happening across the whole of Baptists Together. This is so we can perceive and discern what God is doing in these days. We want to do this because as disciples and communities of faith our heart is to be obedient and to keep in step with the Holy Spirit.

Everyone here is aware of the huge changes that have been happening in the UK over the last 50 years and how this has impacted our churches and communities. Things we would have taken for granted in the 1980s have been swept away and this has led to big challenges for many of our churches. Now, I am aware that this is experienced differently in different parts of the UK. But some areas are definitely more impacted than others and tonight we want to be open to what God might be saying to all of us through that.



To do this we are going to be hearing from our Northern Baptist Association. As they tell their stories tonight, I encourage you to think about what you recognise, to notice your light-bulb moments, and consider what God might be saying to you in your own context.

But before we move on, I just want to set this evening in the bigger picture of what I sense that God has been saying to us as a movement in recent history. I began serving as General Secretary in 2013 and right from the start a key Scripture for me was Isaiah43:18-19 – “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up, do you not perceive it?” 

And in 2015 I shared the Beacons of Prayer vision I believe that the Lord gave me where I sensed that the Lord was longing for us to pray and make space for Him to speak and move so that He could be doing a new thing in and through us as Baptists Together. I believe that what we will hear tonight is an expression of our desire to pray and make space for God and our willingness to fan into flame God’s new thing. 


 Video 1: Introduction - Aiden and the cradle of Christianity 

 

The Christian church in the North East over the last 50 years?

LG: It’s great to have Linda Donaldson and Johnny Pozzo, Co-Regional Team Leaders for the NBA, with us. Linda, the video just reminded us that the North East is the cradle of Christianity in the UK, but can you give us a picture of what's it been like for the Christian church in the North East over the last 50 years?

Linda Donaldson (LD): I’ve lived in the North East for 40 years, and have seen how closely the church and the region have moved together. When I arrived it was a region reeling from and licking its wounds from de-industrialisation, the loss of coal-mining, shipbuilding, steel manufacture and other heavy industry. The heart and identity were ripped out of communities – they had been defined by those industries, they gave them their shared stories. The inevitable mistrust of institution that ensued, on top of a developing welfare state which had assumed many functions previously provided by the church, contributed to the church moving to the periphery in communities, rather than being at the heart as it had once been.

An ageing population, outward migration of younger people in search of jobs, increasing individualism and secularisation was all reflected in congregations that were smaller, older, less confident, and less embedded in community life. When I arrived in the mid-80s, the area had a recruitment problem but not a retention problem—if people came to study or work, like me they often stayed.

While the picture was of decline, at the same time there were always churches that were genuinely vibrant and missional, a brief surge in church planting took place led by a cohort of younger ministers fresh from training, all of whom offered an attractional model of church. People came. 

I invited a whole physiotherapy department to a church event and around 30 people came! Association assemblies were packed out back then, and churches genuinely associated together. 

With some exceptions though the trend was towards older and smaller congregations and an increasing number of churches were without ministers. We still associated back then—in the late 80s/early 90s, the associate minister of Heaton Baptist Church would take groups on Sunday to lead worship, preach and provide a bit of a congregation in some of the smaller churches.

The region faced these seismic changes, but the overall picture for churches has been one of gradual decline. Association life also contracted, with fewer ministers and churches engaging, preferring to collaborate locally with ecumenical partners. The socio-economic disparity between the north and south of the country is very much reflected in the church, with a constant struggle to fund and support mission and ministry.

But decline and poverty don’t define us, that’s never been the whole story; a pioneering, resilient thread of renewal, deeply contextual creativity and missional imagination has always been and remains evident from Berwick to Northallerton and Redcar to Kirkby Stephen. There are signs of life in almost all our remaining churches: with people walking into our churches off the streets, baptistries open for the first time in years, with almost all our churches serving their communities. Most churches are working for well-being and sharing the good news of God’s love for his world in beautifully contextual ways, and community initiatives providing a ministry of godly presence in an anxious and fractured world. And people coming to faith.



Johnny Pozzo (JP): This really resonates with our Bible passage this evening from Colossians 1, in verses 5-6, I love the sense of confidence and expectation rooted in God in verse 5… people who encounter Jesus, and they’re known for their love of the lost, and in verse 6 it says this same good news that came to you is going out all over the world. It is bearing fruit everywhere by changed lives.

LG: Yes and I really love verse 6 onwards. Good News is going out and bearing fruit. As General Secretary I have the huge privilege of seeing the fruit of the Gospel, not just across the UK but all around the world too. And we are being reminded of that here at Assembly as we listen to and learn from the global church through BMS World Mission. 

This passage talks about bearing fruit and changing lives and so we are going to see and hear some stories from the NBA now. You will immediately see how these Gospel expressions are connecting with reality in our communities right now.

LD: Changing context – in many North East communities’ people would leave their back doors open and neighbours would move in/out freely – not so any longer. Many people don’t know their neighbours. It can’t be coincidence that we are witnessing an increase in social isolation, loneliness and an increasing prevalence of mental health problems. 

We are now going to go to a video from Widdrington, a small village in Northumberland with a Baptist minister who heard God’s heart for lonely women. Karen is a pioneer in partnership with Alnwick Baptist Church; part funded by Home Mission and passionate in her love for Jesus and her love for people.


Video 2: Story – Widdrington Community Ministry 
 

 
 
LD: Loneliness, isolation and mental health struggles are not confined to adults. I’d like to introduce Dan Holland, our Children Young People and Families Lead, and Youth and Community Worker at Portrack Baptist Church where he started the first Youth Renew Café. 
 
Dan Holland: I want to share briefly about Children’s Youth & Families (CYF) Renew Wellbeing spaces. These look a lot like the adult spaces you may be familiar with, a quiet shared space where it’s ok for young people not to be ok. CYF Renew focuses on creating a simple, safe and sustainable space easy to run and easy to engage with.

Like the adult spaces, CYF Renew Wellbeing spaces welcome those who come along as co-contributors rather than guests; they bring activities and get to direct what takes place in the setting. The aim for us as leaders was to be present, prayerful and to operate in partnership. This is a space held with CYF rather than for them.

I set up the space for young people I worked with in a more traditional youth club setting. We based our club on the five ways to wellbeing which are important areas to focus on related to wellbeing or CLANGing.

CLANG stands for Connecting, Learning, being Active, taking Notice and Giving. We sought to support their mental health and general wellbeing by using these ideas to structure our group. CLANGing became part of our conversations as we explored what ways helped us in the different areas.

In my setting we started with a few prepared craft activities and open-ended materials where they could use them as they wanted. As we developed we took ideas from the young people seeking to be led by them. Some brought crafts they were working on, some gave us things they wanted to learn and do. It felt collaborative and encouraging. Each session ends with a prayer space that we set up and offered them as a way of engaging with their spiritual wellbeing.

We explained that prayer was helpful for our wellbeing and reflection and invited them to join in. Some did, others decided not to. The whole concept was that the young people were free to engage or not with every part of what we were offering. One week some of the young people offered to read our simple prayer liturgy and that became part of our pattern. Eventually they would do that prayer.

Another week after a bereavement on the estate, the young people asked if we could pray about that loss and so we talked with them about how they could respond. It was a gift to be allowed to mourn with them and make space for them to pray and reflect. Without this space separate from our youth club we wouldn’t have noticed and been able to react to what was going on with the young people.
 
LG: I’d thoroughly recommend thinking through how a CYF Renew Wellbeing space could work in your context.
Did you know that through your giving to Baptists Together Home Mission, you have been part of growing Renew Wellbeing centres to more than 300 locations!

Do either of those stories speak to your context? What resonates with you?

 

Responding to migration and asylum

JP: Another changing context is migration and asylum. Fifty years ago churches in the North East were monochrome, and leadership was entirely male – now they are richly diverse and beautiful. We are going to Redcar now for a very different story. 


Video 3: Story – Redcar and welcoming the stranger
 

 
LG: Redcar has benefited from a Baptist Insurance grant, and from Home Mission. And this reflects stories from Baptist churches around the country that are also supporting refugees and asylum seekers in a variety of ways.

We are part of the Joint Public Issues Team (JPIT) so that we can amplify local Baptist voices nationally. JPIT has been engaging with the Home Office to help them understand what churches like Redcar are doing to support refugees and asylum seekers. JPIT has also been encouraged by the now over 800 signatures of faith leaders (around 250 of which are Baptists) that have been added to a letter to the Home Secretary asking her to reconsider her plans that will keep refugee family members apart.

They also successfully campaigned alongside many of our Hong Kong church groups to maintain the settlement system they had been promised. And don’t forget that the work of Steve Tinning, our Public Issues Enabler, and JPIT is made possible through your giving to Baptists Together Home Mission.
 
 

Changing context – the unchurched

JP:  The next story we want to share is one in which the ministers are curating a ministry of presence in a town centre; meeting people where they are, offering love, hope, practical and pastoral care and directing people as able to God’s church.

At heart it’s all sharing God’s care and love for people – notice how reading talks about love for all God’s people and love for others.


Video 4: Story – Graham McBain – barbering in Hartlepool 

 

 

Engaging through a dementia choir

LD: Kingdom stuff doesn’t always result in seats being filled on a Sunday morning in traditional church, but lives and communities are being touched. We are seeing new life in Christ, and people engaging in multiple ways midweek and calling that church. In Hartlepool where Graham and Mairi are community pastors, three out of four Baptist churches in Hartlepool are growing. One of those churches is Headland Baptist Church.


Video 5: Dementia Choir at Headland Baptist Church
 

One dementia choir participant now attends Headland regularly with three others of her family. All were previously unchurched. Fiona’s ministry has also been supported by Home Mission, and has caused the church to flourish. 

A range of our churches had baptisms on Easter Sunday, one is Whitley Lodge Baptist Church – a church which only five years ago was looking at receiving palliative care; a new minister was appointed, then he oversaw the appointment of a community minister and on Easter Sunday that church opened its baptistry for the first time in 14 years, baptising three people. It shows a relationship between an inherited church and pioneer.

A funeral service held in a garden for someone who may never enter church… the fruit of the gospel and another for teenagers encountering bereavement for perhaps the first time in their lives… most of these encounters are with previously unchurched people. 

The enduring picture for me of the NBA is that of lots of little fires, lit where people have made space to listen to God and their context all over our association – beacons of prayer and hope, and reeds not burned out.
 
Back in 2020 you shared a prophecy with us Lynn and I recorded it in the moment with my phone. This has been significant for us in the NBA, and we believe that the stories we have shared tonight and so many others, show that bold, risk-taking, imaginative faith that God has put in our hearts.


Video 6: Now it's your turn - and Lynn's prophecy to the NBA in 2020
 

 
LG: Thank you NBA for sharing. Despite the challenges of your region and very limited resources, you are showing us faith-filled, imaginative, creative courage and a willingness to let the wind of the Holy Spirit take you. 

NBA is our smallest Association, but through your generosity and giving to Baptists Together Home Mission we are able to fan into flame all that God is doing in that region through sharing what we have so that we can see God’s Kingdom come in every region of Baptists Together.