Quick Update!
Wow so much has been happening since we left Australia 10 days ago. We have been scampering from city to city with brief chances to connect to wifi – primarily to video skype our kids at home. There hasn’t been much opportunity to blog unfortunately, but here’s a quick catch-up for anyone who may be remotely interested!
Day 1: DUBAI. What an incredible city! Sooo hot, and full of intriguing people. We stopped over for one afternoon and night to have a rapid tour of Dubai’s endless supply of massive shopping malls and opulent hotels. Also helped to re-set our body clocks before landing in UK. Alana’s first time outside Australia.
Day 2: MANCHESTER. Caught up with Glyn & Sophie Barrett, Matt Deaville and the team at !Audacious City Church. They are building an influential church in one of the UK’s most significant cities. Until now no church in Manchester was larger than 400 people (this in a city of 2 million+ people!). The Audacious guys are living up to their name, and are about to start their 4th Sunday service to be able to fit everyone in. Last weekend they had 390 people in the Sunday night service – only problem is they only have 280 chairs! They are believing for a breakthrough with a new building to be able to keep building a great church.
Day 3: BRADFORD. I stood in the pulpit in the cathedral where one of my ancestors was the Vicar in the 1800′s – he built schools, helped the poor and tried to bring change to a city which really wasn’t interested. Had the honour of preaching at Rocknations, the youth ministry of Abundant Life Church, Bradford. Amazing night, with many first time decisions and inspiring stories of radical lives changed. Got to hang out with Steve Gambill, and Dave & Abs Niblock. These guys are changing the city with the life of Jesus! Alana nearly got caught in the middle of a mini-riot in a shopping mall – police, security, gangs, screaming girls, and Alana hiding behind the jewellery display!
Day 4: CROYDON. Caught up with my sister, brother-in-law, 2 nieces, brother & sister-in-law who all live here. Roast dinner and Yorkshire pudding!
Day 5: KINGDOM LIFE CHURCH. Steve & Nicky Sutherland have planted a growing, energetic COC church in Croydon. We were so impressed by the quality of the people and the service. Planted 8 years ago from scratch, these guys are building a great multi-racial church. 4 people made decisions, and all of my resource got bought out! Now I’ve got nothing left for the rest of the trip! Just as well I built this site.
At night we visited Hillsong London. My goodness, that is church!! Not only is it full of life, packed with thousands of people (who have to queue to get in) and has the wow factor, the team are working so hard on connecting people and creating community. We were so privileged to be looked after by the team and get to hang out with them.
Day 6: LONDON. Shopping, Buckingham Palace, shopping, Thames, shopping, Hyde Park, shopping, MI5, Harrods. I love London!
Day 7: HILLSONG LONDON STAFF MEETING. Again we were honoured to see a bit of the inside workings of this great church. Really loved connecting with them, especially Kris & Kalleigh Mikkelson (Executive Pastors). They are two wonderful people who we just clicked with. Getting to know them was actually the highlight of our time in London.
Day 8: PARIS. Oui Oui Paris! Brendan White (Hillsong Paris pastor) gave us the lightning tour and caught up for lunch overlooking the Eiffel Tower. To his great delight I indulged in a Parisian delicacy of Steak Tartar – it’s a raw meat patty. Brendan & Camille are also building a great church in one of the world’s most secular, humanistic cities. So inspiring to hear what they are doing. At night we went to the top of the Eiffel Tower – this is one monument which actually lives up to the hype!
Day 9: PARIS ON FOOT. We spent the day taking in as much of Parisian life as possible, before sprawling on the lawn in front of the Eiffel with French wine and cheese, and watching the sun set slowly (at 10pm!) with hundreds of young French all around us. They all smoke so much, I’m sure I’m going to start craving nicotine – urgh!
Day 10: YORK. According to Rich Martin from Global York, this is simply THE GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD EVER! I have never met someone more passionate about the city they are called to! York is truly a cool place and we had so much fun with Rich & Jules, who are executive pastors for Dave & Shelley Shore. Global Youth went off at night with around 20 young people saying Yes to Jesus – many for the first time. Then we did a Q&A with their youth leaders, who had some very intelligent questions!!
We talked long into the night with our hosts Matt & Amanda Stephens, who are also key leaders in the church. Two years ago Matt brought a cheque as a gift to Kings to sow into our building fund, as Global are also believing for a building breakthrough. We were able to literally walk through the reaping of their sowing – they have been given the rent-free occupancy of a whole school complete with dance studio, computer labs, sports hall, cafe and more rooms than they know what to do with! This is an amazing miracle of blessing and provision!
Day 11: WIGAN. Leadership morning with Today’s Community Church, led by Dave & Helen Belfield. Another good church with an excellent building and a young, passionate team. Had a great time with Dave & Bek Cadman, two of the key pastors with a powerful story of God’s goodness, and looking forward to preaching in church tomorrow.
Now it’s off to dinner with Dave & Helen. Au revoir!
PS You can check out some photos at facebook.com/artieshepherd
day 10: YORK. i was one of the young ones that said yes to jesus and it had made my life feel different thank you