Thank you for logging onto the website to find out in more detail where we are at. We hope the following extracts from a letter to our close prayer partners will communicate our hearts and hopes. We also suggest you read the prophetic narratives we have posted about the Joseph season etc!
May the Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face shine on you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.
Roger writes: We begin with a big apology for leaving some of you to pray in the dark without a detailed update since the summer. We have had a period of extraordinary leading from God during this time, and the things we were hearing had so many ramifications and implications that it was impossible to go into any details about them until we had reached some clarity. We kept thinking it was coming and put off getting our itinerary and prayer information out until we were clearer and in the end months had gone by. It is a relief to us to be able to let you know now.
Simply put, since the “Passion 7 years on” event a year ago, the team has gone through a complete transition with the Lord repositioning us all in different ways, making clear that God's intentions were complete for that season of our lives together. In this context we have been hearing for some months that our time in London is coming to an end. The North West of England, where we began our life together, has been calling us more and more strongly, and we began to conclude that the Lord wanted us to shift our home base there. There was the beginnings of an indication of this in our last letter early in the Summer when we mentioned our intention of purchasing a small house to rent out in Lancaster, which would give us a little retreat base there as well as bringing in some income. In the end this fell through and left us wondering what we were hearing. Before long we clearly heard the Lord suggesting that Roger should apply to his old university in Lancaster, where we both met and began our married life and work for the Lord. There are several reasons behind this.
1. We believe that we are in a season of change in the life of the church in the western world that is at least as huge as the Reformation, and that needs some of us to wrestle with the issues at a very serious level. We remember people like Francis Schaeffer who was a huge help to the church at the beginning of this process back in the 60s, and we would like to prepare ourselves to become involved in a similar resource.
2. As many of you are aware this change is about repositioning the church into society to influence it at every level. Hence Roger is hearing the call to be positioned into the academic world both to learn and to influence it with the kingdom of God. He has been offered a place from next October to research 'How empire invades church and displaces the kingdom of God', preventing it from serving society in a positively counter-cultural way. He will be exploring how this happens and if / how it can be reversed, while walking alongside several borough and city situations in London and other parts of Europe and North America, using them as case studies.
3. We are exploring a contemporary appropriate shape for apostolic work at this time and sense that this is an apostle John type of season, where being set apart for intercession and reflection while engaging with the powers and issues of the day is the right shape for us. We are looking for a house on the Lancashire/Cumbria coast just North of Lancaster where we will welcome friends for informal times of seeking God and downloading revelation together. God has already drawn friends of many of us such as Anna Browne and Lee Ann Thompson into the region, and we sense that God is up to something yet to be fully understood!
We have no intention of drawing back from our commitment to the ministry we’re already deeply involved in, such as Building Together nationally and in London, Target Europe, our friends in Passion for Camden Town and Liberty or our overall calling to be a resource for tomorrow's church. I, Roger will clearly be travelling less but more strategically midweek, but at weekends and some weeks, will continue to be available within Europe and internationally (ready as ever, Sue adds, to do at least 2 weeks work every week J). Sue will continue to serve prophetically while discovering the wider implications of what the Lord has for her in this new season. Although our base will be in the North West, I have agreed to become the chairman of the trustees at the Prayer and Conference Centre at Ashburnham in Sussex and we will be spending time in the South every six weeks or so with our families and friends and available to serve the boroughs and cities we have been working alongside as well as serving the kingdom in any way we can.
With such a demanding change ahead, as you can see we will need your support in prayer and finance more than ever and ask you to pray with us about these developments. We pray that you will be excited as we are and want to strengthen or renew your partnership with us. You have been so extraordinarily faithful to us over the years, and would love to continue to walk together to complete the purposes of God in this stretching, amazing and unknown time!
Sue writes: REALLY big apologies for the long silence! As you can see, this has been an amazing rethink for us and we are glad to be part of the people of God in times of serious change and development! The way I am finding to walk through this is to continue to try and interpret the times and signs around us, so am writing up quite a lot of stuff at the moment as to the best Biblical narratives to steer us through such mind-altering times! Most of it is posted on the website.
But understanding and explaining does not diminish the emotional tug and trauma of change. Moving to Camden Town 8 years ago was during a difficult time and it was a great relief to settle here with a very creative bunch of people on a journey together. It’s been quite a journey, not just here but across the whole nation and church as we all have experienced and for which we really thank God! This year’s change then was quite unexpected, but with hindsight quite reasonable and in many ways it seems to me now to be the completion, or certainly the next step of that which the Lord began to pull us into 8 years ago (NW1 to North West 2!!) But stretching the geographical distance between us and our friends and family here in the London area is a tough one (we’ve been in this great city for 30 years!) I have to admit to weepiness at the thought of being so much further from some very, very dear friends including dear Marjie with whom we have been in working partnership for 19 years (and living together for 12 of those!) and particularly from Chris and Gemma, and Joel and his partner Becca, although both sons assure us that we will see more of them if we live somewhere so nice! My mum has just completed her move from family home of 40 years to a lovely bungalow just a few minutes from my sister’s family, which is great but has also required great emotional energy of her and in a measure from us all. It’s been so good to be more closely involved with mum and my sister during the move and that also makes this a greater wrench. Thank you for praying for us in the aftermath of that major shift! Roger’s mum continues so hail, hearty, blessed and positive at 91 (next month), that I feel quite wimpish in comparison! I am thrilled at the new season of study for Rog and the reception from the university – very interesting responses to his thesis outline which I am also terrifically excited by. I am grateful for the sense of agreement and confirmation from caring and thoughtful friends who have prayed sensitively with us through these changes, and I love the size and scope of the changes God is calling for generally and so relieved to still be caught up in them – when I can breathe! So this is the feely stuff to go with the description from Roger’s keyboard!
In the midst, there is still much to do and it’s been very rewarding to continue doing what we do! Honestly thanks for those of you who have continued to pray even in the dark! We’ve had a fruitful November, visiting Newfoundland, Canada on reconciliation ministry both between the French and English settlers and with the representatives of the host peoples. We so thank God for the insights of these years that are giving life back to lands and people groups. Then we were in Lancaster to minister to churches in the region, with Clive Corfield, an excellent connection.
Rest of November? This weekend I am in Brighton with Matt and Rog will be in Yeovil, before we join Liberty church in Tottenham for their annual thanksgiving service with lots of African dancing on Sunday 28th! Sunday evening is also a gathering with the whole of P4CT. Thanks for joining in! December will be altered by the 12 day fast, though it coincides with Rog doing a week of prayer in Manchester. I will join the community there for the weekend and then hunker down in Anna Browne’s lovely cottage to mourn my way through the next week, while Rog spends some time with John Mulinde’s prayer conference. We’re hoping to visit Southampton, spend time on local stuff and possibly begin packing up the house, before straight after Christmas leaving on 28th for a week of worship and warfare with Skyline young people in Switzerland. January begins there then, Roger hopes to be attending the Africamp in Uganda, we will be with Simon Rennie in Colchester over the weekend of 22nd-23rd and hopefully sometime that month, moving house!
So please stand with us as you do and help us to be faithful! To all that God has in mind, no matter what the changes require. To you and your friendship and faithfulness to us, for so many years in some cases! To God and his people, wherever we can serve. And above all to the purposes of God in this nation and the lands of Europe at such a key time! As Rog said, we have been and are so very grateful for all your support, both in prayer and finance as well as visits, messages, coffee times and the ways of expressing relationship that keep us alive and persevering in spirit, soul and body.
We really want to hear from you and fill in the gaps in the story in any ways you would like. Please don't hesitate to ring, write, email or call.
Roger writes: We begin with a big apology for leaving some of you to pray in the dark without a detailed update since the summer. We have had a period of extraordinary leading from God during this time, and the things we were hearing had so many ramifications and implications that it was impossible to go into any details about them until we had reached some clarity. We kept thinking it was coming and put off getting our itinerary and prayer information out until we were clearer and in the end months had gone by. It is a relief to us to be able to let you know now.
Sue writes: REALLY big apologies for the long silence! As you can see, this has been an amazing rethink for us and we are glad to be part of the people of God in times of serious change and development! The way I am finding to walk through this is to continue to try and interpret the times and signs around us, so am writing up quite a lot of stuff at the moment as to the best Biblical narratives to steer us through such mind-altering times! Most of it is posted on the website.