It’s the final countdown…….. (no not the end of the slackers / students favourite show but the last week at the 6th form centre!)

So here we are the final week of Emmanuel Church being a semi nomadic tribe of Israel. One week to go and we will no longer have to move chairs at the start and end of every meeting, one week to go until we will not have to cart down six massive crèche crates full of toys, one week to go until the kids can wreak our own building instead of one we have hired. No more hours of PA set up and take down, no more…. “why is the PA not working this week?!?!?”, no more acoustic qualities of the inside of an elephant to deal with. Oh happy day!

The 6^th form centre offered us a home when we need to find a new one, and it has seen the church grow from a handful of people to a stage where now we need two services to fit everyone in. It has been a place of refuge for us and we need to thank they college management for putting up with us for all this time. We have to thank God for providing it for us and sustaining us in our work while we have been camped there.

So this Sunday let’s thank Him for all He has done for us, not looking back with nostalgia but looking forward to the good thinks He has for us in the future!

However there are changes afoot, a new wind is blowing, Emmanuel is returning to the fray, to fulfil her calling in Durham, to take up the banner of God and plant it firmly in the city.  We are about to re-engage in battle, to push on, to take the land that Father has declared as ours.

These are exciting times, challenging times, we need to step up and step out, we need to work together, using all the gifts that Father has given us, to see the victory we are working towards by the grace of Jesus.

So lets pull together, arm ourselves, steel ourselves for battle, rally around the banner, listen to our leaders and move on into the new phase of our journey!

Strange thing is I feel the need to put on a Brian Blessed volume voice and shout “Emmanuel CHARGE!!!!!!!”(but that’s not my job)

The churches new shoes

As a church we have been working towards the opening of our new church building, the project which has taken three years and cost over £1,500,000 is in the final processes of fitting out. It has gone from a metal warehouse to a state-of-art conferencing facility with meeting rooms, auditorium, lifts, boardrooms and all sorts of other things. Pictures of the building can be found here.

Last night was out first meeting in the revamped building and it was decidedly weird. We have met in the building on a number of occasions prior to the conversion work starting but meeting in the nearly completed auditorium was strange.

I would compare it to a pair of new shoes; they look good but need ‘walking in’, they chaff a little around the toes and are a little tight on the heel, they feel strange to walk in compared to the comfortable old ones that have now fallen apart but were moulded to your feet.

Firstly as the drummer for the evening it was strange for a number of reasons

1.       We were on a stage for the first time. It might only be a foot or two tall but it was strange to be higher than everyone else

2.       I was at the side of the stage not in the middle and felt a little ‘apart’ from things in terms of the music group

3.       We were about 10 foot away from the congregation but it felt miles away and I didn’t get any ‘participation’ feel to the worship

4.       Although we were using the same sound system we use in our rented space on a Sunday and the sound was better due to better acoustics it still appeared to be a little ‘thin’

Having said all that I loved the worship of Jesus and God which to me felt close and personal.

Maybe the fact that there was about 90 people there for the meeting which was our usual mid week mixture of LOTS of worship and some praying that made it weird. This is more than we usually get due possibly to the new building, curiosity and a change of evening from Thursdays to Wednesdays. However in the room the size of the auditorium it did not feel that many people.

An important part of the evening was when we prayed for the elders who have led us to this place. They have been amazingly brave and have lead from the front in this venture, including putting down a non returnable deposit when we purchased the building from their own finances. They have been challenged to continue to lead from the front and to expect great things in the future with many coming to Jesus through the work of the church.

We also ‘prayed in’ a new member to the church; this young man has been with us from his teenage years and has grown into an amazing man of God. He is the first deposit into the growth of the church in Durham in this place.

I think however that he is more than that. He is a vision of the future. Our church has grown typically through attracting students, building them into the church and them then deciding to stay in Durham and work alongside us. This man is different; although he is not from Durham initially he moved here in his teens and grew up in Durham and attending Durham schools. He is a sign of a shifting emphasis in the church from almost purely student base to a church that truly represents all of Durham. Although we have seen many saved in the last couple of years that are local and from a none professional background, I believe that God wants us to be even more ‘Local’ in the future, so we will have a blend of different people in the church.

However given all this weirdness and strangeness it was amazing to be in our building which has been given to us by God to reach the people of Durham. Yes it might feel strange; yes it might feel weird, however given time to iron out the problems, and to make it ‘ours’ it will become a place where people can come and meet with the Living God, be healed by Him, feel His love, grace and compassion and where His people can be prepared, challenged and sent out into the harvest fields.

Thank you God for this wonderful gift, please help us to use it wisely to Your glory and Honour. AMEN!