Tuesday 24 January 2012

Preparing for 40 Days


This is the first of a series of outlines of Vision talks I have preached – this one from January 2011

Acts 1:1-8. Jesus tells the disciples to await the promised Holy Spirit. As we prepare to launch into multi-site, elders decided to have 40 Days of prayer and fasting – going deeper into God before making a major reach.

Overview of preaching series in Acts 1 to 13 taking place over next 7 weeks to back up ‘40 Days’. Encourage fasting on Wednesdays to coincide with prayer celebrations in evening. (Explain different levels/types of fasting). Distribute home-produced but extremely professional 40 Days booklets – includes Bible study notes and prayer topics as well as FAQs re multi-site.

Outline need for 100 further volunteers to cover multi-site arrangements at end of 40 Days. Need to maintain revenue giving and rise to challenge of giving to multi-site as an extra. Everyone to receive a letter from me with all the details of what we will need and asking them to prayerfully review their giving.

Talk about the arrival of Lawrence and Mary, the first black African family in the church 14 years ago. Interview: Lawrence – ‘I want to be behind the new thing God is doing. We live only once!’ Mary – ‘I want to look back in 10 or 20 years and say – I was involved in starting that. We are building for future generations, too.’
Explain that to maintain the diversity balance we need 20 from the black community to go to the new Lee site with Phil Varley and Robert Kwami. Ask them to step up.