Back in the Swing of things...

Happy New Year Everyone! A little late I know but it's still January!

We have already been to the park 3 times this year and it has already been extremely busy, it's great to be back!

Last week I was unable to be there as I was at SWYM conference but I had some great feedback; the weather was bright and the team gave out over 90 hot chocolates including many to primary school children.  Yesterday the weather was dull and we gave out over 100 hot chocolates, and I think only 1 primary school child (parents are a bit more reluctant to take their children to the park after school when the weather isn't looking so bright and understandably so!), so when we thought it wouldn't grow anymore, when we thought it had capped at about 80  hot chocolate, it grows again and again! So prayers for our name memory, relationship building and growing our team would be amazing!  It would be great to have at least 5 people on the rota each week, currently we work on a fortnightly rota with a fantastic core team of 7  and a few other great volunteers who come and help when needed. So it would be great to have 3 more people who can commit to every other week.

Yesterday we introduced a new idea of having a discussion board.  Our reason being to encourage more conversations about God.  The first week went really well with many of the young people contributing to the board, see picture below...

Just in case the picture isn't very clear we wrote in the middle: "Christianity... boring, untrue and irrelevant? followed by: Jesus Said..."I am the way, the truth and the life..." (John 14:6 - The Bible).

The idea of the statements came from the Youth Alpha material and it did encourage some good conversations and helped us gain a better understanding of the thoughts of many young people in the park with regards to God and Christianity.  Here are a few examples of their comments below:

"If someone explained it I might understand"

"People have different views"

"I think it is an interesting religion"

"I don't believe but I respect it"

"Don't know what to believe"

"I don't know but I pray to something or someone"

"Untrue - not realistic"

"Definitely true however hard to understand"

"It's hard to follow God's rules"

Please pray that God would inspire us as to what to put on the board and that God would guide our conversations, that the young people would continue to be open to talking and again that we would have enough people on the team each week to have people manning the board ready to engage the young people in conversations as well as people serving hot chocolate, giving out biscuits, litter patrolling, playing football, building healthy relationships etc....!!!

So our key prayer points are:

• Thanks for the team we currently have
• Thanks for the conversations and relationships already starting to build
• Thanks for all the young people, children and parents we have met so far
• Name memory
• Relationship building
• Team Building... at least 3 more members who can commit to every other week
• God's guidance with the discussion board and conversations
• Continued openness in the young people to chat

Thank you once again for your prayers.

God bless

Karly

Christmas break

Hello!

Last Wednesday it had been pouring down with rain but God was good and it seemed to ease off as the young people were arriving... although by that time all the leaders were pretty damp! It was great to be joined by Rachel and Liz this week.  Despite the weather we gave out 82 of the packs we had made up, admittedly at least one boy took about 3 but he did promise me he would read everything that was in it!!!

The young people were very happy to receive the packs, telling their friends who were coming up after them.  Some did end up on the floor but not much considering how many we gave out... and anyway that gives me a chance to use my new found tool for evangelism... the black sack! 

Please pray that God would really speak to the young people through the packs, whether it is through reading what was inside or just the fact the church made an effort to give them a small gift at Christmas time, pray that it would have an impact on their lives.

We are enjoying spreading these seeds of God into people's lives in the park, pray that by the Holy Spirit these seeds would start to grow.  We are open to God using us in this with more conversations at the Park with Youth Alpha and other church/youth activities at Alma.  But pray that God would continue to guide and give us wisdom in this.

We are now on our Christmas break and continue to pray that God would reveal himself through this special season and that the young people would have a great time and a great rest.

Thank you for your prayers
Merry Christmas!
Karly

Last one before Christmas!

Hi All,

It has been great over the last couple of weeks to have had Alex Penrose and Christine Warren join us!!

2 weeks ago was strangely quiet due to the strikes happening but it was nice to meet some young people we hadn't met before...although one we met used to go to 7UP and was saying how much he had loved it! It would be great to pray for him and his friends, for opportunities to get to know them a bit more. 

Last week was back to normal with a crowd queueing for hot chocolate and biscuits, unfortunately we ran out of hot water before everyone had had one again... I think I will invest in another flask!

This Sunday the team put together some Christmas packs, which include a Christmas card from Alma Church, some chocolates, a tract explaining the gospel and an invite to the Youth Alpha Course starting in January and a Pulse/7UP/Youth Church Leaflet!  These will be given out tomorrow to the young people coming for hot chocolate.  Please pray that these will be received well and that we would see some young people coming along to Youth Alpha or Pulse/7UP etc also pray that it wouldn't become a load of litter in the local area!

Please continue to pray for our name/face memory, for healthy relationships to continue to grow, for dry weather, for more people (particularly for some who are around during the university holidays) to be added to the team and for young people to come to know Jesus!

Thank you for your prayers! We are expecting the life changing power of Jesus!

God bless

Karly

First Blog!

Hi! 

Welcome to the Park Outreach blog!!! We really hope that this will become a great tool for prayer and hope you find it encouraging to hear about what God is up to in Cotham Gardens!

The Park Outreach started about 6 weeks ago now and the team currently consists of; Ella Green, Richard Eves, Miranda Naish, Rachel Kelso, Jon Albon and myself (Karly).  We have all been pleasantly surprised by the response to the Park Outreach so far and have given out more hot chocolates than we ever expected... with just over 50 in the very first week and now we give out around 80, this is mainly to young people from Cotham Secondary School but we do meet some primary school children too with the people who collect them from school, all are very enthusiastic about hot chocolate! We have been blessed with mainly dry weather and have had a number of young people asking "why?" which has given us a great opportunity to tell young people that God loves them! We are starting to learn a few names and getting to know some of the young people a bit better but please pray that God would give us a supernatural ability to remember names and faces and that he will be in the midst of our conversations, pray that we would be bold and loving in our faith. Please also continue to pray that God would call more people to the team!

God bless

Karly :)