Equip

EXPLAINING ‘EQUIP’

THE WHY

One of our values as a church is to EQUIP our people for successful, victorious Christian living. Wouldn’t it be great to have a church full of people taking giant and enthusiastic strides along their journey: maturing in their faith, developing their gifts and growing in their leadership?

On Sunday mornings our messages are intended to be practical, encouraging and challenging. Our midweek Connect Groups are great opportunities to discuss and press into the Sunday material with your friends. However, we felt that we wanted to push further than that. We wanted to give people the chance to take specific courses that would dig deeper in different, specific, relevant areas, to give them the chance to accelerate their personal spiritual growth.

THE WHAT

Therefore we have designed EQUIP – a six week block of centralised seminars or workshop-style sessions designed to explore such themes. The five courses on offer are:

1. Bible Foundations

2. Freedom in Christ

3. Listen, Learn, Love

4. Spiritual MOT

5. The Prayer Course

Over that period, Connect Groups will not be meeting formally, and instead you will be encouraged to sign-up for one of the courses on offer. There are so many areas we could cover … and hopefully, in time, we will. Some of the courses will repeat next time round. Others will develop and extend; some of the topics will be completely different.

The courses will be broad and diverse in their scope. Some will:

*        Help new Christians lay strong basic foundations;

*        Show you strategies to deal with the particular challenges you may be confronting right now;

*        Allow you to learn more about what we often call the ‘spiritual disciplines,’ like prayer and Bible study;

*        Give you the chance to dig deeper into areas of particular interest;

*        Present the opportunity to learn, practise and test specific skills;

*        Offer the chance to explore and develop your spiritual gifts and calling.

THE WHEN

The expectation is that we will run EQUIP blocks twice yearly: one in early summer, the other in the autumn. Sessions will start with coffee at 7.30. We’ll have a short time of sung worship at 7.45 and will then break out into groups around the building from 8.00. Groups will then finish sometime between 9.00 and 9.30.

WHAT TO DO NEXT?

Please take the time to read through the materials for the courses being offered this time round.

Once you’ve made your choice, please fill in the Sign Up Sheet in this pack. There are six weeks and, in order for you to really benefit from the course, you really need to be able to commit to coming to as many weeks as possible.

Return your Sign Up Sheet on a Sunday morning and the leader of the course will then set you up ready to start.

Finally, turn up for week one with your Bible, pen and notepad, listening ears and an open heart, ready to dive in!

A CLOSING WORD

We really hope that you find EQUIP helpful, enjoyable and stimulating. And above all, we pray that it helps you to grow: to grow stronger in your faith, more confident in what believe and better equipped to live it out.