Good News for Sheffield

The deaf hear

This summer, teams from Churches across Sheffield were working to support Christian festivals such as New Wine. One volunteer from Sheffield shared this story of a dramatic and moving healing:

“When we arrived to help at the young adults festival on the New Wine showground, the New Wine leaders told us they had seen so much physical and emotional healing over the last two festivals – more than they had personally ever seen before – including stories of two deaf children receiving hearing for the first time. “Then, on the opening night, I had the privilege of praying for a deaf lady (who had been deaf since young childhood) and watched as Jesus healed her and she instantly received hearing. “She had removed her hearing aids and could only lip read, and then suddenly she could hear me praying – and the music in the room – and then began to receive her speech back quite fast. It was extraordinary and vulnerable and you can never really prepare for a moment like this. I cry as I write about it now. She was very shocked, and so was I.

“We met several times more over the following days. She continued to be able to speak and hear like everyone else! She would regularly slip into sign language as it was so strange for her to be able to hear herself speak. Her church community was so excited and her parents were beside themselves – they had prayed for this to happen most of her life. I will never forget her joy at hearing the birds sing! Jesus is wonderful.”

Emmanuel Church leader Dave May healing called “miraculous” by his doctor

by Dave May

At the end of May, I was admitted to hospital.

Having been perfectly healthy just a week beforehand, I had turned as yellow as Bart Simpson, and was in a lot of pain. The doctors established that I was jaundiced due to problems with my liver, and looked for gallstones, but test after test came back negative. After a week of being unable to figure out what was wrong, the consultant scheduled a liver biopsy for the following day. As they described the procedure it sounded horrible and I was not at all keen to go through it. The next morning, just before I was expecting to be taken through for the biopsy, a different consultant came in to talk to me. She had good news: my bilirubin levels had dropped dramatically in the previous 24 hours. In fact, all my liver function tests had dramatically improved in that period. I’ve spoken to a number of doctors since and they have all said that when this level of change happens naturally, it’s much much slower. They had never seen such a massive improvement over just one day. The improvement was so good in fact that I was able to go home that same day. It was such an amazing example of healing that the consultant actually used the word “miraculous”, unprompted by me. The day that I was healed was the very same day that my church – Emmanuel Church – was having a day of prayer and fasting for me, as was Emmanuel Church in Oxford. I also know that many other church leaders and believers around the city were also praying, and it was just such a humbling and encouraging experience to see how many people – from so many church backgrounds – united to pray for me. I hope my story is an encouragement that can build and raise faith. I know there’s sometimes mystery and frustration around prayers that we’re praying that don’t work out like this, but I want to encourage you to keep going, keep praying, keep trusting, never give up in prayer.

Jesus is calling…

Unity in mission in S17

Over the last year, we have received increasing reports – from different churches across Sheffield – about:

• Increasing numbers of people coming to faith from completely unchurched backgrounds. • People claiming they have had Jesus appear to them in dreams and then turning up at churches seeking answers. Many of them have then made decisions to follow Jesus and join a

Church community. One recent story from a church leader in Sheffield:

I recently had the privilege to lead someone to give her life to Jesus. She came to our church for the first time, and I was sharing some stories of people who had had dreams about Jesus in Sheffield and had started following him. It turned out that – two months previously – she had dreamed vividly about Jesus. When she heard me share about people turning to Jesus in dreams she was flabbergasted and knew she had to respond to God.

by Andy Patrick

Oversight Minister & Priest-in-Charge of Christ Church Dore

Behold, how good and pleasant it is When brothers and sisters live together in unity!

On Saturday 24 September, church leaders from across the S17 postcode and beyond met at Christ Church Dore Community Centre for the Sheffield West Filling Station to make a commitment to work together in sharing the Gospel in a spirit of unity and collaboration. Together for Sheffield CEO Ben Woollard led a prayer of unity drawing on Psalm 133. In an act of prophetic imagination, church pastors and ministry leaders made a wall of prayer using foam bricks that had been handed out to all present. On these bricks the names of local churches and mission organisations were written, seeking the Lord's blessing as Christians work together to see God's kingdom grow across the community. The leaders donned builders’ high-vis jackets and hard hats as they prayed, as a reminder that we are co-workers in God’s service... God’s field, God’s building. It's truly encouraging to see the growing friendship and commitment to prayer in S17 as churches and groups partner together. Where there is unity there is blessing.