eginning the building project on site is a big moment. Work started on site at Roe Green Hall, Kingsbury on 7 October 2020 with a target finish date of 15 February 2021. These dates were agreed at a Pre-Contract meeting on site a week before. Church Growth Trust were there as both Client, represented by John Duffield, the Property Manager and as Contract Administrator through in-house architect Jonny Heaney.

Kings Church, Harrow, sent three people – the leader of the church, the leader of the church plant at the Hall and an elder who is acting as on-site liaison throughout the project. The Elder is also going to take photos as the build moves forward.  Finally the Contractors were represented by their builder and architect. After introductions, all seven people present agreed on the day-to-day site management, how stakeholders would be kept in the loop, how bills would be paid in a timely fashion to help cash flow and the main lines of reporting. After that, the detail of the build itself was left to the Contractors and Jonny. Jonny meets them once a month on-site for a progress meeting and sends an update note to the team via email. Another way of keeping in touch is through different groups on WhatsApp (Other forms of electronic communication are available) – it is nimble and allows photos / videos, instant messaging and means urgent matters can be dealt with quickly.

The first meeting is crucial to set the way forward for the project. Having a small, focussed and united team who all know their roles and are trusting one another to fulfil their tasks is the positive and constructive way forward, literally. 

Here are some great resources that you may find useful in planning for this Easter. 

The Comeback 

As God’s people, we have a sure hope that whatever darkness we might be feeling now, Easter is just around the corner and is a wonderful time for us to remember Jesus, the light of the world, making a way out of darkness for us.  Try out this video on the Evangelical Alliance website: 

My Hope is a series of evangelistic videos that are modern, relevant, short and punchy to get the message of Easter across. They are great to show online during meetings or at special events. 

If you are looking for a creative Easter outreach event, Johnny Prime, one of FIEC’s Associate National Directors, has written a courtroom drama which could be the perfect fit.  This is available as an online resource called “Who moved the Stone?”.  It is performed by Christ Church, Dunstable with an evangelistic talk by Johnny at the end.  It imagines one of the Roman soldiers from the tomb being put on trial for failing to guard the tomb.  It goes through the witnesses to the cross and resurrection and ends up with a modern day witness who gives her testimony to knowing the Lord Jesus.  It is accessible from FIEC’s website and is available free of charge to downloaded and used by local churches. https://fiec.org.uk/resources/putting-easter-on-trial 

Bible Society have many resources for Easter & Lent.  Lent is a time of reflection when we journey with Jesus on His path to the cross and celebrate His resurrection. Bible Society have a host of resources mainly for families to help you reflect and celebrate. 

https://www.biblesociety.org.uk/get-involved/easter/

Scripture Union have a great range of stock, perfect for Easter gifts, giveaways and seasonal services. Share the good news of Jesus this season with their resources. 

https://content.scriptureunion.org.uk/easter

Rural Ministries have an article called “From lament to celebration” in their latest Mosaic magazine with ideas for the Church to embrace more creatively the opportunities that exist all around you as you seek to celebrate the season and make the timeless Easter message more accessible. 

While we are unable to meet in our church buildings we can still be ‘Together at Home’.  Together at Home are providing free resources for churches to share with their families to help them explore the Bible and learn about God together whilst in their own homes. 

https://www.tath.co.uk/easter-resources

“Bringing hope in hard times – really good news” is a mix of good news stories on daily videos through March, special YouTube meetings over the Easter weekend and opportunities for people to join Alpha courses.  All of these are on Elim Pentecostal’s website.  

https://www.elim.org.uk/Articles/600715/Discover_Really_Good.aspx

Out of the 80 million Easter eggs sold in this part of the world every year, The Real Easter Egg is the only one which has an Easter story book in the box. 

https://meaningfulchocolate.co.uk/pages/real-easter-egg

Cornerstone Church at Crewe took the Tenancy of Bethany Gospel Hall in the middle of the pandemic, but between lockdowns.  This meant they were able to refurbish the property, after vandals had broken in, and start using the hall and the grounds in the summer for socially-distanced events.  They were also able to hold various Christmas activities, including outdoor carol singing and a nativity play.

January 2021 saw the end of their second year and the whole of last year had been an adventure, captured to share with you, in the clip below.

Having started as a church plant within the north of Crewe in the last few years, they are delighted to have their own building, as this enables them to establish a base in the community they are serving. 

CGT has purchased some Portacabins for their children’s work and these are now being installed, ready for the church to use after the current restrictions end. 

bout ten years ago, a fellowship in North London decided that they needed to build a more spacious entrance area with quality WCs and a new kitchen. In this way they would be Extending a warm welcome to visitors. As you might imagine much has changed. The original planning consent expired and a new planning permission was obtained. This included the need to secure a Road Closure Order for part of the site.

Ownership of the building – Roe Green Hall in Kingsbury – also changed as did the occupying church. But the outgoing fellowship was committed to God’s work and blessed the new church in helping to meet the financial cost of a new welcome area. And whilst it has taken more time than we had hoped for the project to go forward we can see that God has been kind and His timing has been perfect in so many ways. As a result the building contractors were instructed by Church Growth Trust in October and began building a new welcome area. There are some photographs below.

We will share the story of this project through a series of fortnightly articles. We hope the lessons we have learned through this project will be of interest to you. We will give links to plans and documents, share photographs and include interviews with different members of the teams involved in the project. It is also an opportunity for you to get involved by asking questions which we will try to answer, either directly or through the articles.

The weather was bad all week and Christ Church in Leamington Spa prayed for dry weather on the day of their Nativity Walk-through Extravaganza.  Thankfully, it was sunny during the event and as soon as they finished clearing up, the rain started. 

Samantha Lee, who is part of the ministry team at the church said: 

 “The Nativity Walk-through Extravaganza day at Christ Church was so awesome! As we cleared up, the Prime Minister announced the Christmas restrictions and a student had to leave straight away that evening to go home, so we were reduced in team for Sunday’s outdoor Carol Service, but Saturday’s event was truly in God’s hands”. 

The feedback from the event was excellent with one mum saying that it was wonderful to attend the walk-through nativity with real people and animals and that she was thinking of visiting the church when services restart.  Another lady gave really enthusiastic, positive feedback and said her husband, who normally doesn’t tolerate church things, said that he was impressed and had fun! 

Many that attended the event said how much it exceeded their expectations and the church want to do a similar event next Christmas even if Covid restrictions are fully lifted by then. 

Church Growth Trust thank God for the recent letting of Penhill Gospel Hall on the large Penhill Estate situated in the north east of Swindon to Discovery Church Swindon.

The Gospel Hall will now be the home of Discovery’s church plant, Penhill Community Church. Pastor Tom Price said,” We are thrilled to have been able to secure the Gospel Hall for our ministry. It gives us the platform to respond to God’s call to us as a church. We will reach out to the community with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and serve the people of Penhill in visible and practical ways.”

Speaking for Church Growth Trust, Giles Arnold, its Chief Executive said “ We are very grateful for the gifting of the building to us by the former Trustees of the Gospel Hall. We rejoice that in the Lord’s will the building has been let so quickly with the responsibility for Gospel proclamation from the Hall being passed on to Discovery Church. Our prayer is that God will richly bless their ministry and so secure the long term future of the building for its God-given purpose.”

As we have ended another year, the whole staff team at Church Growth Trust are grateful for all the amazing achievements during 2020 and we want to rejoice and share some of these with you.

• 100 church properties assessed as to their fitness for their God-given purpose
• Helped 31 of CGT’s occupying churches with building projects
• 25 visits to meet with trustees/churches of church properties where they are considering gifting to CGT
• 24 hours to move everyone to homeworking from the start of the pandemic
• Six planning consents for alterations and extensions to CGT’s properties
• One new architect (Jonny Heaney) started in September
• One new trustee (Richard Jones) started in February
• No staff put on furlough

Thank you for your support and encouragements during 2020 and we look forward to 2021 and many future years helping and providing the support you need.

Andrew Hodson, who is a Counties Evangelist, is a serial church planter based in the West Midlands.  Church Growth Trust has supported him in planting in Brierley Hill and helping the church lease a building for their weekly meetings and outreach. 

As Andrew grew up, he was part of Wollaston Evangelical Church, where his father is still an elder.  Wollaston is on the outskirts of Stourbridge and Andrew has wanted to plant a church in this area for years. Andrew says: “Sometimes, with church planting there is a specific call to a place and, other times, the Lord puts something in your way and asks you to trust his leading. This is how Wollaston has been.” The existing assembly have made the difficult decision to close, as they were small in numbers and mostly elderly.  It was natural therefore, with Church Growth Trust’s relationship with Andrew Hodson and Church in the Community, the church he leads, that we would want to talk to him about using Wollaston Evangelical Church’s building.  Andrew and Jordan Armstrong, a young man with a great musical gift who has been working with students in Stourbridge town centre, are keen to see a new work established at Wollaston and are planning for the building to be given a new lease of life in the New Year, when they start their tenancy from CGT.

“We are delighted to bless Andrew and the church as they step out in this new venture by giving them a huge concession on their rent and working with them to make the property more suitable for modern church use” says Giles Arnold CGT’s Chief Executive.  “It is so good to see this property being passed down from one generation to another and continue in its Gospel use.”