Gather Movement January News

Dear friends,

Happy New Year!

As we all look ahead to what God has in store for 2025, we often find ourselves mulling over new ideas or new commitments to existing ones. Our Gather Movement team has gained some fantastic new additions last year and these wonderful people are bringing with them many skills and expertise which God is using for his glory in the movement. Together we’re leaning on God to find effective and innovative ideas for how the church can live out this great call to unity and transformation.

Last year we spent time on the theme “I See a New City”. This year we are hitting the ground running with lots of opportunities to learn new ways of doing just that. In this newsletter we’re sharing two places you can join us in learning new things for your unity group…

The Intercultural Church and City Transformation conference is happening in London on 31st January-1st February. We’re so excited to continue learning how we can celebrate the diversity of the Body of Christ in new ways.
The Gather Movement Learning Community is starting again on Tuesday 11th February. We’ve got a whole lot of practitioners and theologians ready to help us learn from each other this year.

Sign up for these great learning opportunities and let’s come together for a really exciting start to 2025!

Blessings
Roger Sutton

INTERCULTURAL CHURCH AND CITY
TRANSFORMATION ROUNDTABLE GATHERING

Date: January Registration starts from 12noon, 31st January – 1st February 4:30pm
Location: All Nations Centre, Vauxhall London
Theme: ONE BODY. Many Parts from every nation, tribe, people and language.

Join us for engaging short talks • Panel discussions • Inspiring workshops • Roundtable discussions • Biblical insights • Practical next steps • Prayer and worship • Two delicious hot meals!

4 TRACKS
The programme will break down into four dynamic tracks with focus on inter-ethnic, inter-generation and other subcultures:

Track 1:
Competence for Ministry and Spiritual Leadership Track

In this track, we will explore the practical aspects of the intercultural journey and provide you with a toolkit to support churches in their efforts. You will learn how to assess and improve the intercultural readiness of your church and city. We will introduce a free Individual Self-Assessment tool that will help you understand and develop your intercultural persona profile, identifying your strengths and areas for growth. Additionally, we will address the important topics of conflict resolution and reconciliation in intercultural settings and share success stories from others who have navigated the intercultural journey.

Track 2:
Intercultural Mission Track

Mission and Evangelism: Three big questions…
Girma Bishaw and Andy Frost explore: What do we mean by mission and evangelism? Why don’t we instinctively do things together? And why does it matter that we do?

Track 3:
Intercultural Worship and Fellowship Track

This track will explore and celebrate the power of music, faith, and unity in the diverse fabric of worship. This is a unique opportunity for worship leaders, musicians, and believers from all cultural backgrounds to come together, learn, and grow in their understanding of intercultural worship and fellowship. Through inspiring sessions, practical workshops, and gospel music from different languages, we aim to ignite a passion for unity in worship and equip participants to lead transformative worship experiences in their communities. Discover new melodies, embrace different traditions, and experience the beauty of worship that transcends boundaries.

Track 4:
From Theology to Theologies Track

The track "From Theology to Theologies" brings together scholars, theologians, and practitioners from diverse backgrounds to explore the dynamic nature of theology. We aim to bridge the gaps between different theological traditions and foster intercultural dialogue. Through discussions, presentations, and workshops, we will delve into how theology is shaped by cultural, social, and historical contexts. Participants will explore topics such as intersectionality, decolonization, inclusive practices, and intercultural dialogue. By creating a space for exchange, we aim to deepen understanding and collaboration among diverse communities.

Book Now

Our hope is that you’ll leave this catalytic gathering with:

greater awareness of the power of working interculturally
developed skills and insights for application
new friendships and connections
a fresh dose of inspiration and motivation!
a longer-term strategy

Book Now

For More Information

Why should you attend a Learning Community?

Mark Cowling, our host for the Learning Community shares some insights

“We feel there is still lots to learn in terms of how we do church unity and how we use the vehicle of unity to see the social, cultural and spiritual transformation of our places.

Here are 3 of the areas we are zooming in on…

1. Leadership in Unity

We’re seeing that it’s a new type of leadership which is required in a new context, because we’re not just thinking about our local church but about the whole town or city. So we’re learning from each other about new ways of leading in the context of unity.

2. Collaboration Across Churches
Learning to collaborate is a new learning journey that these webinars are supporting. We’re seeing some of the practicalities of churches coming together and building a foundation of unity takes time and it takes experience to do effectively.

3. Increasing Impact in Our Places
We’re also learning a lot about how we actually maximise our impact across a city or town. Churches already do fantastic things but collaborating across a place requires us to do things differently like working with civic and health authorities or collaborating with national charities. Also, understanding how we offer good help for our communities. Sometimes we can do a lot of well intentioned things but aren’t necessarily impacting the bigger needs. For example we might have a food bank which is meeting a crisis need but isn’t necessarily meeting the long term needs of loneliness, debt, unemployment. We can learn together about how we can work in unity for those things.”

Join us for our Gather Movement Learning Community.

HERE’S THE LEARNING COMMUNITY PROGRAMME
FOR H1 2025. PLEASE REGISTER IN ADVANCE

11 FEB 2025 • SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION

Elaine Morgan Greater Manchester Combined Authority Strategy Principal

11 MAR 2025 • SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION

Peter Heywood Founder Genesis Trust
Ruth Lancey Hideaway, Greater Manchester

8 APR 2025 • SPIRITUAL TRANSFORMATION

Dave King Gather Movement

13 MAY 2025 • CULTURAL TRANSFORMATION

Osoba Otaigbe Bible Society
Tani Omideyi Liverpool Lighthouse

10 JUN 2025 • SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION

Alison Dawson One Voice Social Action York

In December we had a brilliant Learning Community with a panel of unity group leaders from around the country, sharing their wisdom and reflections. If you missed it, you can catch up here.

Watch the December Learning Community Leaders

You can also catch-up on any Learning Communities that you missed by visiting our Learning Community Playlist of YouTube.

Learning Community YouTube Playlist

Discovering a Bigger Vision for Unity and Transformation in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough

Mark Cowling shares how the mapping process is helping connect churches with civic and health authorities to understand the needs of their communities. This is leading to new unity across the area and helping them discover opportunities for collaboration to bring greater transformation.

RECORDINGS OF SESSIONS NOW LIVE

THEOLOGY DAY 2024 PLAYLIST

Feedback from Attendees

Hear how Theology Day is helping them think about transformation for their cities and towns in a new way

“Very practical as well as inspirational"

- Charlotte, OXFORD -

“I’ve loved the way it’s stretched our thinking to think about God’s plan to renew the whole earth and salvation being much more than a personal thing but transformation coming to whole communities and cities”

- Andy, EXETER -

“So much good riches”

- Jamie, EXETER -

“I’ve been encouraged to continue thinking about the history before our church was planted in this area, to think about what has God done decades, centuries before, that we can be participating in that”

- Alicia, ESSEX -

“These gatherings here the UK have been really inspiring and helpful to me to really understand what we are doing, what we are looking at and how I can bring this further in the Netherlands”

- Sheelagh, THE HAGUE -

Our Vision is to see a unified Church working together across every city and town, to see social, cultural and spiritual transformation across the UK. We are grateful to God for how far the Movement has come but we still have a long way to go. Could you, or your unity group, help us to deliver this vision by becoming a Gather Movement Supporter?