Hasbury

The team is involved in a variety of ministries at Hasbury Christian Fellowship. Last Friday night we helped clear out rubbish behind the church yard. We filled an entire dumpster with broken bricks, concrete slabs and an old fence. Can you say tetanus? I was slightly concerned about the rusty nails poking out of everything, especially when you factor in the English tendency to wear sandals with socks in all warm weather, even for manual labor. I’m not quite ready yet to test out that overseas insurance for me or my teammates. Thankfully, everyone stayed safe and 4 doors were sanded and re-stained and we all had a lovely time.

Monday nights I get to hang out with the youth from Hasbury. I’ve only done this twice but I really enjoy it! The first time we had 6 girls but Monday night we had 11 youth! We put them to work HAHA. They made cookies and other treats to sell on Sunday morning to raise money for an AIDS organization. I shared about half of my testimony that night. I was a lil nervous since this was my first time giving a testimony to a group. Don’t know how I managed to escape this when I was a youth at Parkland but it’s unavoidable now. LOL Something to do with being a “missionary” I guess. It’s only slightly intimidating when 22 eyes are staring at you and you feel acutely aware that they’d probably rather be playing Xbox or eating another cupcake. But I’m learning to trust that the Lord will work and it’s up to Him and not my magical words o wisdom. So that eases the pressure a bit. I just have to be honest. Sure.

Wednesday Lilamaria and I went to a small house bible study. There were only 4 of us and it was ok. We just chatted and watched a video. BUT tomorrow Lila and Ulla and I have to give testimonies at another….lets say bigger bible study of elderly people. I promise not to take pictures. HA.

Next Sunday the team has to do a presentation on Phillipians 1 during the service. This. Should. Be. Interesting. If you’re lucky I might post a picture. :)

The Usual Suspects

My team lives on base at Lifehope in Halesowen. We are actually like 3 mini-teams in one. Half of our group make up the Kids N Things team. They are training every Thursday and Friday learning puppets, songs and dramas. They’ll be performing for other Holiday Clubs all the way through August.

One thing I’ve learned is that the English around here LOVE to have holiday clubs for kids. Many of the other OM teams help run these clubs as well. Usually they’re put on by a local school or church.

OK, so that explains half our team. Then 2 of our group do Korean and Chinese ministry, and the rest of us work with Hasbury Christian Fellowship and Christ Church in Lye. Oh yeah and 2 of our ladies help out with a youth group in Smethwick. See what I mean? Crazy. We’re all over the place. LOL

For both Hasbury and Lye we are doing LOTS of door-to-door. This is usually in the form of a community survey where we try and assess the needs of the neighborhood. Other times we just pass out literature about the local church. When people in these towns attend church they tend to go to the closest one. It's not like home where you might drive across town to your favorite church. A looooong time ago the towns were divided into parishes with one church for each parish or community. And from the surveys we've been able to gather that over half the community here between Halesowen and Lye is made up of families that have lived here 20-30 years. Most of the people we've met going door-to-door have never gone to church. Only for special occasions like Easter or baptisms. They usually tell us that their parents or grandparents attended but they never did. Keep in mind the person saying this tends to be between the ages of 50-80. So its been awhile for a lot of people. We're hoping to help the local church identify the needs in the area so they can better meet these people where they are.

I should also mention there are a lot of Muslims that have moved into the area in the past 10 years. So you may find 3 houses with elderly people and then 2 houses with young married Muslim families and LOTS of kids. They may or may not speak English.

Most people are very friendly and accommodating. I find that having a different accent really works wonders. Most people want to at least know where I’m from in the US!

Arrrrrg!!!

So we’re finally getting settled in to our ministry. For our first official team project we volunteered at the Fun Day at Edgbaston Cricket Grounds on June 13th . Remember Oasis church? It was the first church we attended when I got here. Oasis runs the kids events for the Fun Day and we volunteered to help out. Upon arrival we were instructed to dress like pirates.


This is why I LOVE my team. When we do something we really do it. LOL

Oasis is a contemporary church that meets under a GIANT tent at the cricket grounds. They had all sorts of fun face painting, games, crafts, movies and candy for the kiddies. My teammates and I handed out treasure maps mostly…but my day was made complete when I befriended 2 Circus guys on stilts. After that Lilamaria and I juggled and the circus guys gave us some pointers.
Maybe not what I expected as ministry, but I think it left a good impression of church people on the community and gave them a safe place to play. I also got to see my first Cricket Match and I climbed onto one of those giant trampolines...the kind where they put you in a harness and let you go crazy! :) All in all I think it was a great day!

Passion for Lye

Missions is all about FLEXIBILITY people. The ability to bend. HA. So for this week only, I've been put on a smaller team of girls that's working on the Passion for Lye Week. Here in England its like Spring Break this week, and several local churches in the town of Lye are working together in outreach. There's a men's event planned, a tea for the ladies, and a concert for the youth this Friday night. This week I'm working with Christ Church in Lye. Today we worked at their internet cafe...they provide coffee, tea and free internet to anyone who wants to drop in. We are supposed to go to the park and promote the week's events, but the rainy weather may keep us indoors.
The whole region is also gearing up for a little thing called the World Cup, maybe you've heard of it? I've already been invited to a game watching party next week when England plays the US!!!
Today I also got to make a giant English flag...from a giant sheet. LOL

Sunday the Lye team attended the youth service at Christ Church in Lye. The youth at this church are AMAZING. The service was entirely led by them. We sang songs, they did a skit, and the message was also brought by a guy about 17 years old. The theme this week for Passion is unity among the Body and the local churches.

Sunday afternoon Keith and his wife Ann who help run the internet cafe had us to their house for lunch. It was delicious! Afterwards they took us for a bit of hiking. We went on top of this HUGE hill where you could see all of the towns spread out. Gorgeous. (Clent Hills)

Sunday evening we attended service at a Salvation Army Church. I've never been to one before and it was fun! Mostly elderly people, but man those English can sing! They sing with ghusto and the songs were mostly old hymns that I recognized from when I was little. They also had a brass band! They had cute uniforms and everything.


So prayer requests for this week would be:
Pray for us as we try and promote these events. Pray that we find young people to invite to the concert Friday evening, and pray that God will use us to bless the Christ Church in Lye. There are members graciously feeding us all through out the week. One woman ran up to us Sunday night and was SO excited to have us over. She said...."No you can't go anywhere else before you come to my house and bless me!" She's supposed to be a good cook, and I for one am Stoked for some good cooking.

Also just throwing this out there....but OM Lifehope base where we are sleeping is in need of a NEW CD PLAYER. Desperately. Don't know if anyone can help with this but there it is!

Cheers!
Erin