London--Week 5 (Visiting with Church Leaders)

This past week we spent mainly spreading Boston Square reuseable shopping bags throughout the city of London (see previous posts).  We met with leaders from the various churches that we've been visiting here in London, and as a thank-you gave each of them a Boston Square bag and some dried fruit from West Michigan (don't worry, we bought it already dried).

On Tuesday we met with Hugh Palmer, the rector of All Souls Church, and on Wednesday with Canons Bruce Saunders and Andrew Nunn of Southwark Cathedral.  Then on Sunday, we visited Holy Trinity Brompton and met with Curate Toby Flint after the service.  All of them were very gracious in letting us pepper them with questions and doing their best to give us answers.  They were also extremely encouraging, interested in what God is doing at Boston Square, and supportive of us in ministry.  They each send greetings back to Boston Square.

We asked them mainly about their perceptions of the culture and society in London and how they are able to thrive in the midst of what we perceive to be a very "post-Christian" setting.  We'll have more to share when we return, but we were struck by how similar many of their answers were despite the rather extreme differences in the styles of each church.  Southwark is quite liturgical, All Souls mostly contemporary, and Trinity Brompton charismatic, but they all emphasized reliance on the Holy Spirit--seeing what God is doing in their midst and then having the courage to follow along and be a part of it.  They talked about the importance of being true to who they are (that is, being authentic) and also being focused outward from themselves rather than just inward.  Toby, in particular, in hearing some of the story of Boston Square, praised some of the change in our mentality at Boston Square from that of being afraid of what the future holds to trusting that whatever the future holds, it is in God's hands.  They together mentioned that some of the challenges they faced as churches in London were extreme individualism, rampant materialism, and then simply the international nature of the city--the whole world is coming to their door, and they need to put Christianity in conversation with any and every other worldview.  And, too, it was somewhat comforting to hear that they each faced their own financial challenges.

For those of you who have been through the Alpha Program and are wondering if we met Nikki Gumbel at Holy Trinity Bromptom (the speaker in the series of Alpha videos), he did lead part of the service we were at.  We were disappointed, however, that he was not wearing a blue shirt.

One thing that has struck us repeatedly is how important it's been to us how each church welcomes our children and how clear they are in terms of communicating both that children are welcome in the church and worship and also what services they provide for children during worship should the need arise.  For those of you involved in the nursery at Boston Square--thank-you!  You are often the first line of hospitality for visitors.

We are all pretty tired this week, so the plan is to try to take things a bit easier in the days ahead.

Peace to you all,
Pastor Jay

Misadventures of the week: (1) Emma's been sick again, and it's been stressful for all of us.  The biggest challenge has been sleeping at night.  One of the crazier moments of the week was during the meeting with Bruce Saunders and Andrew Nunn at Southwark Cathedral when Emma promptly announced that she needed to throw up.  We scrambled for a plastic bag and then moments later Brianna filled her nappy and left quite the cloud of stink throughout the room.  We could only shake our heads and apologize.  (2) To celebrate our anniversary we traveled to Dover to see the white cliffs.  Towering over the city is a 12th-century castle that we decided to tour.  We struggled up the steep hill with Emma in the stroller and Brianna on our back and purchased our tickets with a stream of sweat pouring down our faces.  After the purchase, we turned around to see a shuttle bus from the village unload a bevy of passengers right at the gate.  Arrghh.