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!