Eye-Opener Evening

Last night we were joined by Richard, the new Baptist Minister. That was a good thing because with holidays and other stuff going on, we were down to just Mary and Me, with Eric manning the fort back at the King's House.

Following a time of prayer we went out to Alexandra Gardens but nobody was there. Mary had the inspired idea though of looking in the playground to the rear of Florence Court. Sure enough, as we neared the area, there were screams and laughter coming from around a dozen or so kids. Hopefully the flats there have double-glazing that copes, otherwise times ahead will be not unlike the troubles in Alexandra Gardens last year.

We knew a few of the kids, which made them easier to approach and offer our hot chocolate. Others weren't so keen to take it - maybe they were suspicious of us, maybe they didn't realise it's really good stuff :o) Gradually more took it from us though as time went on, and we were able to chat. Also, more kids joined us so that there were probably around 15/16 of them by the time we left.

The age range, we guessed, was from about 12 up to 19. We knew the age of one of the older lads there because he was celebrating his 19th - with a case of lager. Everyone seemed safe, although the circumstances were less than ideal given the presence of booze. The lad whose birthday it was was VERY chatty. It's amazing what you can learn in the space of a few minutes, especially when someone's had a few too many. :o)

We said to those that we knew that we'd start at the King's House next week and that if they turn up we'll get the pizzas in. We'll see what happens.

Much love

John

King's House Visitors

As has happened for a few weeks now, last night we started with prayer at The King's House, with the intention of going out afterwards to see who was around. But we were really pleased when two lads we meet regularly were passing and they decided to come in and chat. They must feel easy in our company - 2 lads of 16 or so Vs 4 adults - and they were just happy to sit and natter.

Helen (Len) and I decided to take a walk to see who else was around, and on the way met with 6 more youngsters, much younger than the other lads, and suggested they'd get free hot chocolate if they dropped into The King's House. Then we continued up to Alexandra Gardens to see if anyone else was around - but there was nobody. 

Getting back to The King's House later, all of the kids were there, drinking, chatting (much of it silly chatter) but rubbing along nevertheless. The older ones weren't that keen to associate with the younger ones, but there was no animosity from either side. The older lads left and pinched one the younger lad's bikes - but we later saw up the road that they'd given it back. They were just having fun in the way that kids do.

What did come out of the nattering though was a possible child-protection issue that we must keep our eye on. But we have to be really sensitive here as well and no doubt we'll be taking advice on it. It was dark and these kids didn't look that old. I for one would really prefer to meet nobody out on the streets when it's dark. Meeting kids of this age is a worry but I guess a fact of life currently.

We think that in the coming weeks we'll probably get in some pizza and get out some of the kit that Chill & Chat uses, like their snooker table and air-hockey. Hopefully we can build up a clientelle for when The Vyne's drop-in gets going. If young people are going to be out (not at home), it's probably better for them to be somewhere safe. But we're only doing this in Knaphill one night a week, therefore we're only really scratching the surface.

Have to say again, our grateful thanks to Eric for enabling our use of The King's House. Just goes to show what a valuable facility we have in the village.

Thanks to all for your prayers

Love

John

Outside Light - Update 2009

It’s interesting that the Gloster Road Group, Outside Light’s forerunner, started four years ago but it’s only really in the last nine or so months that the wider world has cottoned on to the fact that UK society has a problem. The Princes’ Trust, London’s Mayor, New Economics Foundation and UNICEF have all now recognised that young people (the non-joiners) feel alienated and are unhappy. The consequences of this are all too obvious. Young people hang around on street corners ‘making a nuisance’ of themselves; some cause damage to property and a few cause damage to people. Our concern is that left to their own devices, with little adult input or interest, young people are in danger of falling into the wrong company and starting down a long and slippery slope.

How might Outside Light help?
There’s an obvious need for young people to feel more valued than they do at present. Ideally they would enjoy better relationship with parents/teachers and other adults who are close to them. However, for whatever reason, this doesn’t seem to happen. Outside Light therefore has several objectives, amongst which are the following:

• To engage with young people, the non-joiners – to chat with them, not to judge them
  
• To show them that adults, with whom they’re safe, value them
  
• To help them wherever possible – some need help with reading etc
  
• To kick a ball around with them and take food and drinks out to them
  
• To ensure their viewpoint is understood and considered by the authorities and others
• To provide choice in spiritual matters – most are unaware of the availability of this dimension in their lives. IS this the reason that some lack a moral compass?
  

So far this year the weather has been against us in the sense that we’ve gone out on several evenings but have met only a small number of young people – except on one recent occasion when we met 15 or so, kerb to kerb across the road as we left my home one evening. :o)

On another occasion, George, Michelle and I met just the one lad. We had a flask full of hot chocolate, enough for 20 or so cups, and it was so cold that the majority of kids must have been tucked up watching tv somewhere. Anyway, this one lad was probably 20, and a karate teacher – he’d been out all day door-to-door selling, promoting his karate lessons. We struck up conversation with him at a bus stop and he was happy to chat. George shared the Gospel with him and this lad ended up giving George a big hug - his initiative, not George's - and accepting prayer. Without any exaggeration, he was genuinely pleased that we’d stopped and given him our time.

There are perceptions about young people that are easy to understand but nevertheless, in my experience, incorrect. The first of these is that young people aren’t interested in having a spiritual dimension to their lives. The above evidence says otherwise. I’ve also video of George chatting to 15 or so younger people, all sat around him on the grass listening and debating. I believe that it's not that they're not interested in spiritual stuff - more that they just don't know that they have a spritual option.

Secondly, there’s a perception that young people in groups are to be feared. Maybe some are, but to date we’ve only met those who have charm, wit and are happy to engage with us. They’re genuinely happy to see us. Apart from the police, we think that we might be the only adults other than their parents and teachers who acknowledge them on a regular basis. Often, as I’ve said above, they have poor relationship with parents and teachers. The police aren’t always able to say anything positive to them – circumstances usually dictate the opposite. Outside Light might, therefore, be the only adult contact they have that positively affirms them.

Funding
I’ve a suspicion that most of us are fearful of mentioning Jesus for the reason that the secular world will think us ‘mad’. From the early days, however, we decided that we would be completely lacking in integrity and trust and faith if we tried to hide our beliefs and our motive for our going out to young people. We realised that our stance might affect our funding – the work we do requires money - and in a world where some authorities find the Nativity 'risky', there's a reasonable chance that we'll be seen by some as threatening and without worth. However we prayed that the value of our work would be seen for what it is and that those holding the purse strings would be able to understand that the Christian ethic is a potential benefit to young lives. Christianity promotes selflessness, love for others and other strong moral values; the precise opposite, in fact, of many behaviours that are now widely accepted as a fact of life in the secular world. Underage drinking, teenage pregnancy and illegal drugs are, sadly, everyday events that take place around the lives of many of our young people. The more exposure young people have to these, the more ‘normal’ they seem to them. All we want is to redress that balance and encourage young people to think for themselves. We're NOT in the conversion game - although naturally we're delighted when someone is able to work out for themselves the benefits of Christianity. We have applications for funding being considered at the moment. We do hope that our openness will not go against us.

Volunteers
Our numbers have reduced over the winter period – but then so has the number of occasions on which we have been able to go out. God provides according to our needs. These coming weeks, however, we shall be hoping for our numbers to increase. Ideally we should like to go through an induction period with new volunteers so that child protection training etc might be delivered before they go out. If you’re interested in joining us please give me a ring – 01483 474737 - any time soon would be wonderful.

Other Updates
The Gloster Road team has been further developing relationships with the family of the young lad who has been in prison. The lad came out of prison, things seemed to be going well but then he was arrested again last week. I’ve yet to receive an update. However the great news is that the mother’s Christian commitment appears to be growing, to the extent that she has talked about starting a cell church for travellers in the Woking area. At the moment she attends a ‘Travellers’ Church’ in Slough, which is apparently the nearest church to us that caters for the Travellers’ community.

Company Formation
Thanks to our solicitor, Mike Tinling of Barlow Robbins, Outside Light was registered as a company at the beginning of December. A recent meeting of Trustees decided to close down the Gloster Road group and transfer assets to the new Outside Light bank account. Also, the decision has now been taken to operate under our own Public Liability Insurance providing £5M cover, thus we shall no longer operate under the umbrella of the New Life Church insurance. However the church will kindly continue to provide financial support as before.

Getting Young People Indoors
Eileen Martin, Knaphill Residents Association's very own mover and shaker, has negotiated a ten-week trial use of The Vyne, the village community centre, specifically for those young people who tend to hang about on the streets. We have committed to providing one volunteer from Outside Light to assist inside the facility each week, whilst others of us will continue to go out and try to spread the word that the facility is open. If the young people take to the idea of the facility, and if it works to the satisfaction of The Vyne's managers, then there is hope that the arrangement will be allowed to continue. Naturally, our team will all work inside the facility if and when the young people all start to use it.

Before The Vyne opens as a youth facility though, The King's House Coffee Shop has kindly opened its doors to Outside Light on Monday evenings, allowing us to use that as a base, and to take young people back there for a drink if they want. Our thanks to the Trustees for their trust in us. Eric Pepper is facilitating our use of the premises until the insurers have confirmed in writing that they are happy with the arrangement - Eric, thanks again.

I wonder what will happen this year?
Will we see the acceptance of the secular world that there might be a role for an openly Christian group to engage with young people? I do hope so. We're trying to promote selflessness and a love for others. Surely that's a more positive path than they're likely to follow if they're left alone.

Will we see more volunteers joining us?

Will we see more churches joining us? Churches of different denominations?

Our most immediate need is for a new Treasurer. Our many thanks to Helen, who holds down a job that takes her from Blackpool down to the south coast, and who, despite living many miles from here in Aldershot, for four years has not only looked after the books but she's managed to go out with the Gloster Road Group on most Tuesday evenings throughout that time. Will another person come forward? We do pray so.

We have asked Woking Council to look at helping to provide a drop-in facility in Old Woking. There are potential premises that are empty and that are not unlike those that they have just provided for youngsters on the Barnsbury Estate. Please pray about this and I'll keep you updated with progress.

Your prayers would be appreciated for the above.

A passion for the name of Christ in all places

One of the key facets of Outside Light that I find hope in is its honesty and struggles. We are not an organisation that pretends to say all is well in the garden, we are in a fight, we believe we are God's soldiers. I hope you don't think we have suddenly gone into covert ops or anything, however we have been quiet on the communication front, but we are still here. 
 
So what has been happening, well we have stopped short of wearing black face paint although I have been pushing for this!! It would seem that we are going through a season of consolidation, pruning and fertilizing. We have been doing a fair bit of praying as well as venturing out onto the streets. However numbers of young people have dropped, it would seem it is too cold even for them.
 
We have been talking with other groups about a possible new youth drop-in centre very near to where we venture out. We are also in talks with Kings House Coffee shop to use that facility as a base for our Monday night venture. We hope that we are nearing approval for a set of floodlights for the Vyne field, one of the young people we have contact with has proposed and signed that, we pray that comes through. 
 
Tuesday night group have been maintaining contact with families in the gloster road area, however the team numbers have been a bit lower than normal. I personally have not been able to go on a Tuesday due to other commitments and more recently two members of the team have had to withdraw from the fold for the time being due to other commitments and a need for a season of rest. One of the members is Phil, a key figure in Outside Light, he is maintaining involvement and holds the trustee position and we will see him back in theatre in coming weeks we hope. 
 
Tuesday night had an encouraging encounter with a traveller family we have been speaking to, the young lad who we have shared the gospel with and prayed with has been in prison but recently was relased. Myself, Phil and Nancy ventured around and sat in the lounge drinking tea and chatting about God, reading the Bible and so on. The mother has invited us to a travellers' church in a couple of weeks and is extremley keen to take us; in additon she has talked about setting up a cell group in the area for travellers!! The daughter has now been going to church and came forward for an altar call a few weeks back, please pray that this is a move of God and not an emotional high, we would dearly love her to repent and totally surrender to Christ as all the family. Your prayers are what covers this and enables this, please pray. 
 
Last night Brigadier Durrant and his comrades Osborn and Smith ventured out after some very specific prayers. We turned the first corner from said Brigadier's house and were greeted with upwards of 15 youth all walking towards us taking up the whole road. We recognised some and vice versa, it was an answer to prayer. We carried on towards our usual spot and found 3 lads, we recognised one of them, we gave them some tracts and just had a bit of a catch up which was very natural and easy. I got a call today from a lady I worked with previously, she said "what have you been doing to my son..." turns out we were talking to her son, she recognised the tract I gave him as I had given her one similar. She was genuinely pleased that we were talking to him, the ripple has been talked about in that office and I am popping in to see them next week, it has kept another door ajar. The boy had said we were really easy to talk to, the mother was asking me to try and keep him on the straight and narrow!! God answered so many prayers last night. We need to keep stepping out for him.
 
This small army sometimes feels as if we are shooting tanks with pea shooters, yet we have (read in the style of American boxing ring announcer) the biggest of the biggest, the King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Heaven's champion, Alpha and Omega, Name above all names, The Almighty One, Light of the world yes that's right ladies and gentleman the undisputed heavy weight champion of the Universe Jesus the Christ....he humbled himself so much. 
 
We need recruits, will you take on the humility of Christ, forget what you are good or bad at, what's on telly, that you need to go to keep fit, and come and join us. I remember hearing about one man who got to the age of about 60 and realised who Christ was and what he had done for him, he fell to his knees and cried because he realised all the time he had missed in serving Christ, he knew that in heaven the treasure was God and all the souls he would see there...
 
We need a treasurer and more foot soldiers and all the prayers you can muster...
 
Keep on keeping on
George


For His Glory

Getting Harder - Getting Better

We were down to three of us this evening, colds and sore throats took their toll on the rest of our team and I found myself disappointed and a bit annoyed that I was perfectly healthy :o). My only faint excuse was hardly good enough - 'Lord' I prayed, 'I'd rather be tucked up in bed'. A week of Christian seminar/training would put a dent in most people's constitution and I'm an old bloke now - I feel the cold, especially in my feet :o)

After half an hour of chat and prayer, ever-enthusiastic George said, 'let's go'. My heart sunk and we walked up to Alexandra Gardens to the car park and, result!, there was nobody there - time to go home to the warm. But no, Mary said let's pray around the area. So we wondered up to the church, prayed around there and walked back past the car park. 'That's the roar of young people', George said. And he wasn't wrong. On the other side of the car park by The Vyne, there were a half dozen or so of our younger boys and girls. 

One, lets call her Haley, about 4'6" and with a cigarette on the go, says she's been visiting hospital because of a leg problem and was happy for George to pray for her. The lads were really keen to get hold of some of George's £20 notes - they look like £20 notes but they're really Christian tracts. At first we didn't know why the boys were so keen to get their hands on them until an unsuspecting lady wondered past, bent over and picked one up off the floor, (we hadn't seen it being dropped), putting it into her handbag - which of course caused great hilarity amongst the boys. There were some good conversations with the boys as well. They were really open, keen to chat and were very good company. 

I've been asked by Woking BC to find a young person to put their name to a funding application for lighting the Multi Use Games Area (MUGA). Now the boys want nothing more than this, but they're naturally reticent to stick their heads above the parapet. One lad, let's call him Tim, eventually said he'd do it but, he says, his writing and reading isn't that great, so we've said we'll lend him a hand. We have to keep in mind though that it's important that he uses his own words to explain how lighting would benefit him and other young people. 

We've known Tim a long while now. He was one of the first lads we met when we started visiting Alexandra Gardens. This evening he stepped away from his mates for a while and chatted to us about God. He's a 'science man' and his biggest problem is understanding who made God. Big question that one (if you find it hard to accept God's timelessness), especially bearing in mind that much of mankind is confused about who made us and believes we evolved from starfish. I asked Tim if he believed that too. After a couple of seconds he pointed out that it was unlikely as starfish have the ability to regenerate lost legs and we don't. Not bad for a lad who finds reading and writing difficult.

Finishing off at the end of the evening the three of us reflected on a great time out. The harder it is, the better it gets. But come next Monday, I'll still be thinking I wish I had a cold - unless I catch one between then and now, in which case no doubt I'll wish I could be going out with the others. But then, I'm only human.

Much love

John

New Opportunities

Monday was, well, wet! One of the few wet evenings since April - the third to be precise. Over the past seven months Tuesday evenings have remained dry with just a couple of drizzly spells. How good is that? Statistically, what are the chances? Anyway, we used Monday for prayer and fellowship and sorting out our thoughts on several issues. I spent Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at a Christian conference, so Phil's kindly provided the following report on what happened on Tuesday:

New Opportunities:

So Tuesday evening again, 7pm. What's in store for us tonight? Visiting youth and families we have got to know over the last four years? With team numbers low, it being dark outside and a little drizzly, it looked like it was going to be a quiet evening. Maybe we'll just stay in and pray. Stop right there! We serve a God who loves people and we are ready to serve him, all three and a half of us (Helen went home early, not well). With anticipation and past experience we know anything can happen. First of all a mother appears with four kids in tow 'is this the Tuesday club?' she asks. She comes from nearby flats and has heard from one of our regulars that the church runs a club for kids on a Tuesday night. Nancy and Helen explain to her that we are not a club as such but that we go out on a Tuesday night and meet teenagers in the streets and more frequently in their homes. They take her address and plan to contact her about kids club that meets on a Thursday. She walks off taking the four youngsters with her. Next a teenager turns up who we have had a lot of contact with, she wants to do some maths with Nancy, not because she's good at maths but because somewhere deep down and with so many failings at school she knows she has a need to be taught and to learn, to be good at something or if not good at it to just do something. Then a policeman turns up to introduce himself, that livens things up a bit, the mearest glimpse of a bobby's uniform sends some of these kids into a state of hyper activity and potential fitting, now three more young people have turned up outside. The language and behaviour becoming a bit near the mark, but the policeman's a pro, he's on our side and he's a good contact. We're really pleased to see him.

We make ourselves a coffee and after some chatting we decide to pray, its now 8.15pm. Prayer is always good on a Tuesday. It's honest, talking to God. He's our boss in this work and He has the final say, we try to follow His leading every step of the way and He really does love people, I feel His aching sometimes when I'm out on the street and I wish we could do more. Be there more.

Nancy suggests that we go and find the woman from the flats and give her the Kids Club leaflets. We all decide to go, all three of us. The least we can do is help out by giving these kids somewhere to go for 1 Saturday a month.  Nancy has the number of the flat. We go through Gloster Road and get to the flats; it's dark and we're unsure which flat it is. Looking up we see this guy leaning out of a window having a cigarette.

He says that the flat we are looking for is up where he is. It turns out that it's his flat and it was his partner that brought the kids down earlier. We end up sitting round the table talking to the parents with kids running around getting ready for bed. We decide to come back next week. It's a good contact. Yet another friendly contact in amoungst so many people with various needs. As we wander back we remember the prayers we prayed for this particular block of flats over a year ago now. We stood outside in the early hours of the morning one Saturday night and prayed that God would give us a link with these flats - a way in. 

Was this all a coincidence? Sometimes I find myself smiling, just thinking about how his timing is perfect and how good it is to be working for Him. This is typical of what happens on a quiet night these days. It's things like this that make me want to spend time seeking Him and praying for more, it also hurts because He hurts. There is so much need, once you start scratching the surface big chunks of hurting people are exposed. It may be hidden and not obviously seen but it's there. 

We'll go back there next week and He is going to be with us because this is His plan not ours.  

Phil

 

ASBO Candidates

http://www.flickr.com/photos/31868170@N07/show/

Pictures of those we're really worried about.