One Woman & Her Dog - text version

The Manchester Story UP CLOSE

With a vision to plant 20 churches around the Greater Manchester region we set about forming a strategy for planting multiple churches. John Wimber had said that normally one church could only give birth to three to five new churches before it became tired and worn out. As I looked around the churches in Newfrontiers that had planted multiple churches I saw the same thing happening. After planting around three churches they seemed to have run out of energy and motivation to plant any more. Also the process of planting seemed to have a negative effect on the sending church, causing it to go through a long period of recovery before growth started to happen again. Over the past nine years the church that meets in Parrs Wood School, South Manchester, has sent out six church plants that now meet on their own on Sundays; not only has the church replaced the people sent, it also continues to have life and energy.

Armed with a prophetic word about ringing the city with churches, the first thirty members met fortnightly on Friday evening to pray from 8-11 pm. It was at one of these nights of prayer, just a few months into the church being launched, that a single girl from Bolton turned up (Bolton is situated on the North West tip of Greater Manchester). Conventional wisdom said, "build a large resource church before you start your next church plant", and so it came as a shock when during the course of the evening I felt God rebuke me, saying, "Have I not called you to plant twenty churches - why are you not starting this one now?" At the end of the evening we had started Bolton Family Church consisting of Sue and her dog!

The strategy was easy: Sue opened up her home and invited a couple of friends, and I would drive up with a car full of people. There were three main ingredients to the evenings - prayer, food and much laughter. In the next two years we started a number of very small pioneer churches that we began to describe as the "church meeting in the home." We kept everyone together for the Sunday meeting giving the pioneers freedom and much encouragement to use the rest of the week to build their new communities. Many who found themselves leading or hosting these new groups would never have led anything more than a cell group in their previous church, and some had not even done that very well! This strategy gave us the benefit of team ministry on the Sundays and all that growing numbers could offer, plus the release of energy, enthusiasm, gifts and vision from people keen to see something happen in their area.

OLDHAM & BOLTON CHURCHES

In 1996 we began to see how we could start a second Sunday meeting. None of the pioneer churches had grown sufficiently to begin one themselves on Sundays and we were very keen not to end up with a meeting led by one full-timer. To solve both these problems we decided to link two of the pioneer churches together for their Sunday meetings. Oldham and Bolton both had full-time leaders and so we teamed them to run a Sunday meeting in the North of the city, but eventually these churches had their own Sunday morning meetings locally, as they grew in numbers.

WARRINGTON CHURCH

The next challenge was Warrington. Over a couple of years a small group had been gathering and commuting to Parrs Wood on Sundays. For a while they enjoyed the fact that they had a larger meeting to come to and they could concentrate on their midweek program. However, it became a discouragement to new people joining and so with much heart searching, as they were such a small group, we launched a new Sunday meeting in Warrington. Due to the small numbers it has been hard work but a viable church has now emerged.

STOCKPORT CHURCH

Stockport was the next Sunday meeting to be launched. This presented us with another challenge. They represented nearly 50% of the Parrs Wood congregation and many of them had been there from the start. The group consisted of around 70 people (adults and children). The strengths of this group were in its community life and care for one another. We launched the church with two leaders, but one of the difficulties we had was in choosing who should be "lead" leader. We ended up asking them to jointly lead the church. This had the effect of locking them up as neither had freedom to make radical decisions. The church was safe but going nowhere! It took about two years, plus many mistakes and soul searching, before we finally solved the leadership situation: Andrew Davies moved with his family to lead the church and now both leaders are thriving in the new environment.

During this time Parrs Wood School began to build a new complex on the site which was going to be too large for our use. However, as we look back two years ago we are so grateful that we did not take the easy route and go for a smaller building. The church has grown from 80 to nearly 200 people - this has happened despite sending out another 30 people to start the North Manchester Family church. In the summer of 2002 we announced we would be sending another 25 people to start a Sunday meeting at Macclesfield, and that we are also starting a Sunday evening congregation in Rushholme (see the article by Dave Smith).

SALFORD CHURCH

Salford Family Church was initially planted out of Bolton Family Church. After a mission by The Message in 2000, we started an Eden Project on the Swinton Valley estate (near Salford). Howard and Naomi Kellett and Hayden Brophy moved in to pioneer this new work. We gathered the new Eden workers and our Salford church members into our Sunday morning meeting at Parrs Wood. After a period of gathering people we launched a new Sunday meeting in 2001 and the church was renamed 'North Manchester Family Church.'

After five years of church planting, Fallowfield and Levenshulme found themselves forming the bulk of the congregation remaining at Parrs Wood. They decided to merge the two groups and rename themselves 'South Manchester Family Church'; this has meant that the people have had to be amazingly flexible, and it has been costly for some to give up their ambitions for a season to join with others. We have learned many valuable lessons on the way - especially the need for the church to be a flexible wine skin.

LEEDS, BRADFORD & LIVERPOOL

Leeds was planted out from Oldham in 1998, with Nick Beale who had moved from Newcastle, and Jonathan and Karen Gray who moved from the south to lead the church. They had gathered a group of ten initially, meeting with Oldham before moving across. Tony and Kay Smith moved in September 2000 to be with them and the church currently has around 100 members.

Bradford has more of a chequered history, consisting originally of eight couples who had left Abundant Life Church. They met with Oldham on Sundays and Andrew Davies travelled to lead a group Thursday evenings. In January 2002, a Sunday morning celebration was started and in May Terry Henry began working part-time for the church. They now have around forty members.

Graham and Charlotte Webb, who moved up with Colin and Mary to plant the first church in Manchester, felt called to start a church in Liverpool. They moved in the summer of '99, now have around 60 people, and have started a church plant in the Wirral.