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Mission Matters @ St Andrew's
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St Andrew’s Church is a ‘mission minded’ church. By this we mean that we are aware that God’s purposes stretch from ‘here to the ends of the earth’. We believe we are all called to serve God in our local community and in communities away from here. To his end, we engage with a variety of organisation and people who are working out their ‘mission’ to serve God and take the Love of Christ to a needy world wherever the need exists. We do this in many ways.
Each year we give away a proportion of the money given to the church by its members to help support and encourage those who are working to bring relief from suffering, poverty and sickness and help to the disadvantaged, both here in the community of Cullompton and abroad in places such as Africa and Central America.
We try to keep a balanced approach to our mission awareness, looking to raise the profiles of organisations and church family members who engage in a variety of mission activities, both short term and long term, and both home and away.
In supporting these mission initiatives we give money, pray and keep up an awareness through regular communication with the church, via the weekly newsletter back page and notice board displays at the back of the church.
We promote the work of multinational organisations such as Church Mission Society, Tearfund, Toybox, Christian Solidarity Worldwide, Elam Bible College and Samaritan’s Purse, as well as the home based national group Church Pastoral Aid Society. We support local organisation such as the Tiverton based Church Housing Action Team (Mid Devon) Ltd and the Mid Devon Community Family Trust. The full list of the organisations that we have supported recently and a brief resume of what they do follows.
We also support church members who wish to do short or long term mission activities. These ‘missions’ can be for as little as three weeks to as long as full time for several years and involve all ages from 18 to 80. Examples of recent short and long term missions by church members are given below.
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CMS is committed to evangelistic mission, working to see our world transformed by the love of Jesus. A major part of their work is to send out missionaries to all parts of the world and it is able to do this by linking these missionaries to supporting churches. We are linked with mission partners Felipe and Sarah Yanez.
Felipe and Sarah and their two young sons, Sam and Aaron, are serving in Southern Spain, jointly sponsored by CMS and SAMS (South American Mission Society).
Their main ministry is to the immigrants in the Malaga area, helping them to assimilate into Spanish culture and teaching skills to help them into employment. As relationships are built opportunities arise to share issues of faith and links are made to their local church which has a mainly immigrant congregation. They also have a hospitality ministry for missionaries (mostly South American) in transit or on respite holidays from their ministries in the Mediterranean region.
For more info on CMS and SAMS visit www.cms-uk.org
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Each year we send a donation to the Tearfund Emergency Disaster Fund. Through this we help Tearfund to be at the forefront of bringing relief in all disasters situations. For instance Tearfund have been working long term responding to the emergency in Haiti. They ask us to pray as well as donate.
More info and a latest update visit www.tearfund.org
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Toybox promotes awareness of the plight of street children and works to alleviate their suffering in Guatemala & Bolivia. They have street teams, a day centre, hostel and homes, and work amongst the poorest communities to help prevent children going onto the streets.
Recently Toybox told us how our money helped three particular children
For more info visit www.toybox.org
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CSW is a global human rights organisation, working on behalf of those persecuted for their Christian beliefs, and, promoting religious liberty for all.
For more info visit www.csw.org.uk |
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Iran is in the heart of the Muslim world. Elam’s mission is to strengthen the Christian church in the Iran region, and beyond, by:- · training leaders, pastors and evangelists;
· providing Bibles, Christian books and other resources in modern Persian;
· sending out disciples;
· preaching Christ through TV and internet;
· giving relief for the poor and persecuted.
For more info visit www.elam.com
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Each year we support the Operation Christmas Child Shoebox Appeal which is run by Samaritan’s Purse
Samaritan’s Purse also engage in other activities as they ..‘Prepare the way to build sustainable livelihoods for children and their families’ in the poorest region of Liberia.
Samaritan’s Purse run:-
· Sheep and Goat Livelihood Programs
· Fish Farming Programsand
· Community Health Evangelism (CHE) Programs.
Along side these initiatives they have the ‘Gifts That Change the World’ Catalogue
You can buy a goat, chickens or a water filter or latrine!
For more info visit www.samaritans-purse.org.uk
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Churches Housing Action Team is a local charity in Tiverton working on behalf of the homeless in Mid Devon. Its mission is to reach out to all within the area around Tiverton who are homeless or without secure permanent accommodation. Through CHAT, the churches of Mid-Devon are reaching out with the love of Christ to those in real need, and making a positive difference in their lives.
For more info visit www.chatmid.org
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The Mid-Devon Community Family Trust facilitate:-
· marriage preparation, and marriage enrichment, courses that seek to help couples build strong and healthy marriages
· parenting and family relationship courses to help build healthy families
· the ‘Families Connecting’ Drop–In which is open to all and held regularly at the Cullompton College Surgery. Here they can spend time to listen to you and maybe help you work out some solutions to relationship issues within families and between couples.
For more info visit www.mdcft.org.uk
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Church Pastoral Aid Society provides support and resources for churches in the UK including support, training and resources for leaders, assistance with clergy appointments, Christian holidays for young people and grants to help with extra staff for the most hard-pressed churches.
CPAS are our patrons at St Andrew’s and helped us in selecting Ed, our current Priest–in-Charge, and our Curate, Ben, has had some excellent CPAS training.
For more info visit www.cpas.org.uk
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We also support individual church members who work in the mission field either for a short period or a long one.
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Several of our young members choose to do short term missions during their gap years ranging from a few weeks to the whole year. Activities range from working with inner city children in UK to serving poor village communities in Africa and beyond with organisations such as Agape, Oasis and n:flame.
Also we have helped and encouraged young church members wishing to engage on longer term Christian mission training at:-
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Some of our ‘older’ current church members have taken on different challenges with various organisations.
Chinese Church Support Ministries (AM-CCSM)
In late 2007 Church members William and Rowena Wheeler travelled for three weeks with a CCSM Courier Team taking Bibles and other Christian Literature to the persecuted Christians in China who have no regular access to Bibles, teaching or study materials.
Similarly in 2008 church member Avril Williams travelled for three weeks with a CCSM Mercy Team to an orphanage in China to help demonstrate good child care practice to the orphanage administration team as well as loving kindness to some of China’s abandoned children.
For more info on CCSM see www.am-ccsm.org.uk
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Mercy Ships
Church member Alicia Maries took her medical knowledge and specialised nursing skill and did a tour of duty on board the Mercy Ship docked in Monrovia, Liberia. There she worked non stop in the eye clinic and with ophthalmic surgeons in the ships operating theatre.
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Volunteer Mission Movement
Church members Rachael and Peadar Kavanagh have been working for several years in Zambiawith the Volunteer Mission Movement
Rachael and Paedar have been working with a community project run by the Holy SpiritSisters in Limulunga in Mongu, which is in the Western Province of Zambia and is one of the poorest and hottest regions.
Rachael has been involved in many agricultural projects inc. teaching how to grow various trees, to cultivate leaves and enrichment the soil. One tree is the Moringa tree whose leaves are high in protein and can be dried & ground to make a supplement for babies & children. This is also good for building up HIV patients prior to aids treatment.
Peadar has been involved in building projects like low cost housing, and, in a recent projects, has been making large concrete water storgage pots and raised gardens.
For more info on VMM see www.vmm.org.uk
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Church member Rev Tom Thompson has been involved with a Christian Community Project in Lagos, Nigeria for over twenty years.
From the beginning Tom was there when he purchased a ‘piece of land’ to develop a church and community centre building. It transpired that this ‘piece of land’ was in fact a river bed, and river was still flowing!
By making the site into a temporary ‘landfill’ facility they were able to raise the level above the water and then embark on creating a facility to serve as a church and a social welfare and education centre. Working with local Pastor Ogoro, Tom was able to teach skills in Church Leadership, Christian Evangelism and Building. We were able to help fund the upgrade of The Christians Elect Centre as it has progressed from a temporary structure to a more substantial building. Money sent by us was used to install a steel ring on top of the walls to make it ready for a new stronger roof. As well as being the main venue for the church fellowship, the Centre provides the community with facility for medical care and education.
We also supported Tom in another mission project Pastor Jack from Obambo North Kenya. We were privileged to have a visit from Pastor Jack to hear of his work with the Churches in North Kenya and Tom was able to go out to Obambo to train pastors in teaching and evangelism.
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