Catalyst
Magazine November 2022 Issue 9
Welcome! Catalyst Magazine is a termly connection point for our Catalyst family: sharing news and stories, upcoming events, and highlights from around the world. It’s a way of keeping connected with what’s been happening throughout our movement and with everything coming up soon.
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Contents Welcome & News 04 Welcome from Simon 07 New Zealand Churches Update 10 New Zealand Prayer Points 11 Covid19 Fund Update Catalyst Stories 13 Serving the Poor in India 14 A Real Life Widows Mite 15 Unreached Residential Get To Know | Q+A 18 Church Plant, Middle East 22 Interview with Natalie Williams Events & Resources 24 Catalyst Global Prayer Day 26 Churches Changing Communities 27 Amplify Prophetic School 28 Project 23 29 Recommended Resources Page 3
Welcome from Simon It’s great to be able to introduce another Catalyst magazine and get to reflect on all that the Lord has done and is doing through our family of churches. From the work in New Zealand to the people we were able to help through the Covid fund to the disciples being made in Turkey. What incredible grace God has shown us! Recently, Caroline and I and a number of other Catalyst leaders returned from visiting the Newfrontiers global conference. We were able to mix with friends old and new and, again, were blown away by all the Lord had been doing through our global family. Many of the stories can’t be repeated due to the security concerns in the nations involved, but suffice to say that disciples are being made, churches are being planted and lives are being transformed in extraordinary ways in some of the most dangerous nations on earth to be a follower of Jesus. It was truly humbling and incredibly inspiring. As we look forward, I believe it’s important for us to ‘get our houses in order’ as we prepare for the potential turmoil around the world Page 4
that the brewing financial crisis is likely to bring. Can I encourage us all to be vigilant when it comes to personal and corporate financial stewardship in this season. This is a time to prepare, I believe, and ensure our people are prepared both spiritually and financially for potential shocks to the systems that we have relied on for so long. I believe that the church is called to be a storehouse for the poor more than ever in this season so let’s make sure the storehouse is in good condition so that when the time comes we can always be generous. This scripture has been in my mind for a while; "(8) And God will generously provide all you need. Then you will always have everything you need and plenty left over to share with others. (9) As the Scriptures say, “They share freely and give generously to the poor. Their good deeds will be remembered forever.” (10) For God is the one who provides seed for the farmer and then bread to eat. In the same way, he will provide and increase your resources and then produce a great harvest of generosity in you. Below: Leaders from across Newfrontiers meeting in Cyprus.
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(11) Yes, you will be enriched in every way so that you can always be generous. And when we take your gifts to those who need them, they will thank God." (2 Cor. 9:8–11 NLT-SE) Note Paul’s framework that he was trying to put in place a) God is the one who provide - we have to build on this revelation (v8) b) The aim is that we (the church) will have enough but also enough to share - especially with the poor (v8&9) c) When we take our gifts to those who need them the outcome is thanks to God (v11) There’s a harvest to be had in the upcoming season as the church demonstrates radical generosity. Let’s prepare ourselves and our churches for that end! Every blessing, Simon Holley Catalyst Team Leader Below: Ukrainian Family receiving food from the Catalyst Covid Fund
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New Zealand Churches Update Matt Hatch, who leads one of our Catalyst hubs, recently returned from visiting our churches in New Zealand, below he writes about the joys and the challenges facing our family in the Pacific Ocean. Aotearoa (New Zealand) is stunning. One visit leaves you asking God if he wants you to move there to plant churches. The people, land and bi-cultural makeup are uniquely stunning. Yet, it has been a long and difficult road to establish Word and Spirit churches over the last two decades. There have been setbacks, personal losses and even natural disasters that have a huge impact on people. Since its borders were closed in the Covid pandemic, spiritual recovery has been slow. I heard reports that many church members across the wider church found certain government decisions on public meetings divisive and have now left the church altogether. For our Catalyst churches, based in the North Island (Wellington and New Plymouth) and South Island (Nelson and Christchurch) they are working hard to recover, grow and build a sense of Page 7
‘whānau’ (Māori for deep, connected family) locally and across Aotearoa. I was impressed with their resilience and faith in God to bring renewal. There have also been quite a few leadership changes. Ken and Carol Shelley planted King's Church, Christchurch nearly twenty years ago. They recently handed over to Matt Parker and the elders until the arrival earlier this year of Tim and Angie Williams (from KCC, Hedge End, UK). Around 6 years ago Phil and Liz Cooper were sent out of Christchurch to plant Mosaic Church in Nelson. The church meets in an incredible Hub that is run by Habitat for Humanity. They have around ten NGO’s based in the office space, a social enterprise coffee shop, a large charity shop and the church has a designated room they use for outreach and Sunday meetings. Hundreds of people pass through this hub every week and it is full of potential. Phil and Liz have recently handed over the team leadership to Matt and Lou Walters. Both the Williams and the Walters would appreciate your prayers as they build strong teams and reach into their communities. ‘Tūrangawaewae’ is a well-known and powerful Māori concept. It literally means standing place (tūranga) and feet (waewae); and is often translated as 'a place to stand'. It refers to the places where we feel empowered and connected. Please pray for these church
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leadership teams to know God’s love giving them true and lasting Tūrangawaewae. Redeemer Church in New Plymouth is led by the remarkable Sean and Amy Fleming. They are wonderful leaders who are working hard to grow a Word and Spirit church. Pete and Julie Henare lead the team at King's Church, Wellington. They have sent out several families (led by Nat & Minneline Carey) to start a site that meets outside of Wellington in the Kapiti Coast. As many church planters and site leaders have found, it has been a challenging return from lockdown, they would value our prayers for their recovery and growth. Near the end of my time in Aotearoa, we gathered church leadership teams from these churches to talk about the future. The dream is to continue to strengthen and plant churches and grow the sense of ‘whānau’ across the churches. Let’s pray God continues to raise up men and women leaders who can partner with God to see this happen. Thanks for praying Matt Hatch
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New Zealand Prayer Points •
Churches and church plants are strengthened and continue to be resourced to extend God's Kingdom. That God brings recovery and growth.
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A great sense of togetherness and love is fostered between the leaders and future leaders of churches. Pray for the protection and flourishing of their families.
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God continues to raise up men and women leaders who can partner with God to establish more churches and raise up disciples.
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COVID19 Fund Update We are glad to announce that we have now fully utilised the Catalyst COVID-19 Crisis Fund and so are drawing it to a close. Back in 2020, in the wake of the pandemic, God spoke to Simon about raising £100,000 in a matter of weeks. The Covid Fund was set up with the aim to help those that found themselves unable to work and without government care and support. We're delighted to say that you, the Catalyst Family, went above and beyond all expectations; raising a whopping £682,000 in a matter of months. Because of your generous, heartfelt giving, we were able to distribute this money quickly through a network of our local churches in 21 countries worldwide. We now know that around 47,000 people have benefited from food or medical provision on an ongoing basis, due to the work of the Fund. We will soon release a video full of stories, its impact in communities and a report about the final use of the funds but for now we wanted to say we are so grateful for your generosity. Page 11
t o r i s s e Catalyst Stories For extended versions of these stories, plus loads more, check out catalystnetwork.org/blog Page 12
Serving the Poor in India Sundar and Sarah are from Church in the Peak Matlock, Derbyshire and share all that God has been doing in their lives, leading them to establish homes for abandoned children in India. On visits back to India, it was really heart breaking to see the poverty in the region where I (Sundar) am originally from as we travelled the bumpy roads through the tribal villages. God started stirring up my heart and gently whispered in a tangible way saying, ‘you need to do something for these people now’, so I began to respond to the Holy Spirit’s prompting. Soon our hearts started to stir for abandoned children.
Preethi before and now
Jesus says to His disciples ‘do not hinder them, because the kingdom of God belongs to such as these’. (Matthew 19:14) So we said, ‘Why not? Let’s build a home for them’. Our most recent girl who joined us, Preethi, only 4 years old – if that, was often out begging alone – her mother, an alcoholic, stated she didn’t want her anymore, so it was a joy to welcome her and see her start to feel at home so quickly. Read more online... Page 13
Real Life Widow's Mite When costs rise should we stop giving to God? Can we trust God to provide when times get even harder? May Jane’s story of provision encourage us all to be quietly radical with our finances in this season. Jane was sadly widowed at the very start of lock down and had to bury Geoff under the ‘ten-people-per-funeral’ rule, that the UK government imposed back in Spring 2020. Since that time Jane’s fledgling, child-like faith has been a joy to behold. Just before our recent Gift Day, a day of prayerful financial giving towards the ongoing work of the church, Jane came to us; clearly frustrated. She expressed a desire to give financially to the church but was unsure how she would be able to do so, given her rising bills and living on a part-time wage. With no surplus income to speak of, Jane was worried about being able to cover her costs this winter. Yet, she recalled that she had some jewellery items that Geoff and others had given her. Wanting to contribute something to the church’s financial needs Jane transferred an amount of money to the church bank account in advance of selling her keep-sakes. However, Jane was surprised to find that the local valuer actually gave her twice the amount of money she had just given to the church! Within hours, God had seen this humble widow give out of her dwindling reserves and had doubled it in return! This story continues online! Find out what happens next here... Page 14
Unreached Residential Lisa Mason, a church planter from Bradford in the UK, writes for us about her experiences at the recent Unreached Residential. In the UK, September is seen as a time of new beginnings and fresh opportunities. We feel the pace start to ramp up from the quieter summer months as we begin to plan and prepare for all that the next term has in store for us. The Unreached Residential felt like an antithesis to this cultural drive to get busy doing, creating space for like minded people across the Newfrontiers family to gather and wait on God together. The Unreached Network represents a community of people across various apostolic spheres and in different nations joined by a common commitment to reaching the unreached, through partnership, training, supporting and caring for cross-cultural mission partners, with the goal of seeing the gospel preached and church communities established that are contextually appropriate. The Residential is an opportunity for those connected with the Page 15
Network to gather and connect together, to hear from God and receive fuel for the journey ahead. We enjoyed times of raw, passionate worship, cried out in intercession for our world, heard countless stories of lives lived for Jesus among the unreached and dreamed together of how God could use us to make his Son famous in our communities. God spoke powerfully through prophetic words to the whole gathering and to individual hearts to bring conviction, healing and direction. The speaker brought a powerful message exhorting us to keep our eyes fixed firmly on Jesus and challenging us to share stories from his word with those who he is asking us to welcome into our lives. A sense of belonging resonated through every conversation, here were people with the same passion and desire, the same conviction to go wherever God sends them and the same longing to see the bride of Christ reflecting the beauty of the diverse world that he has made. Read the full version of this article on our blog
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Get To Know
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Get To Know? Catalyst is a family of churches working in over 40 nations around the world, and in our 'Get To Know' series, there's an opportunity to introduce some of those churches a little more - giving an insight into the many unique contexts that Catalyst churches are working into around the world. There's also a chance to hear about encouragements and challenges, and different ways to be praying for our brothers and sisters across the family.
Church Plant, Middle East Joel & Amie tells us about their experiences of spending the last several years planting in the Middle East. After meeting and falling in love serving together in a large Church in the centre of London we followed the leading of the spirit to move East, landing in the Middle East, in a city that is truly ‘global’. We had faith for God to establish an indigenous church in Page 18
the centre of our new city, and from there to see multiplication. From those who have gone before us, we knew that language was key… so initially we embarked on a 2 year language and culture learning journey. Thankfully we weren’t alone, having gathered a group of 12 people, mostly from Newfrontiers churches in the UK. The first few years were filled with lots of language lessons, making new friends, making mistakes, getting upset with taxi drivers and most encouraging of all meeting and building relationships with a handful of local believers. Which meant that when we publicly “launched” in December 2018, there wasn’t just a bunch of Brits tripping up on their words, but a sweet sense of what we’d hoped and prayed for. Like many new churches and particularly those in city centres over the last few years we’ve seen people come and go. But along the way, we’ve seen God continue to build and establish the community here, which is now around 40 people, of which more than 50% are local believers. Some of the locals amongst us have joined after moving to the city and a handful have also come to faith with us, through dreams and God appointed friendships. Over the past few years as we’ve seen the church established, we have also been truly blessed by the arrival of not just one but two captivating energetic boys, now aged three and one. The city we call home now makes London feel small and rather quiet to be honest, it’s growing each day and so is the general sense of people questioning “what’s life about” as inflation rises and the government continues to make decisions that baffle and isolate
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the people. But we know we truly have the words of eternal life and are continuing to dig deep, build family in the Church, equip and strengthen local believers to take the message of Hope and share it with their friends and family. One of the most encouraging things we’ve seen recently is a local believer starting to serve full time for the Church and it fills us with faith for this great nation that there are people like him, hungry for the presence of God, obsessed with the Word and motivated to do all he can to see the Kingdom come. The hope of the nation is surely in the hands of our local brothers and sisters as they increasingly take the lead. The soil here really is dry and sparse, with many strongholds seemingly insurmountable and yet it is in this barren land that see a glimpse of God at work, the hope of new life, salvation and a sense of the Spirit beginning something and so we believe for springs and rivers to flow, to see relationships, communities and workplaces transformed. Read the full version of this article on our blog Prayer Points • For the presence of the Holy Spirit to flow into this city, in and through our church and in our own hearts • That we will see many lives and communities made new • Indigenous leaders to be strengthened and grow in their faith and leadership
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Q
a
Q&A
Natalie Williams, Jubilee+ We recently caught up with Natalie Williams, CEO of Jubilee+ who work across Newfrontiers helping churches and individual Christians be better equipped to engage with those trapped in poverty. With a Cost of Living Crisis now on our Door Step here in the UK our local communities are beginning to feel the pinch. Overseas many of our churches are still feeling the effects of the pandemic on their economies and on local small businesses. The team at Jubilee+ felt God urging them to get ready for a crisis, at the time they couldn't have imagined just how that would unfold. Now they are one of the leading voices connected to our movement of churches that is able to offer hope, strategy and direction in this difficult time. We ask Natalie about the prophetic things God has been saying and what we can do to prepare for the season ahead... Watch here. Page 22
Events & Resources
Catalyst Global Prayer Day On November 10th we are launching a brand new prayer experiment. No matter where you live in the world, if you belong to a Catalyst church we’d love to invite you to join our online Catalyst Global Prayer Day. Times of uncertainty continue to rumble around the globe. There has never been a more important time to stand together as a global body of Christ and pray that God’s Kingdom would come and His will done on the Earth. We were inspired by the huge amount of people that wanted to pray for Ukraine after the war was announced. We’d love to harness this and see if God will start a prayer movement across the Catalyst Family, leading to more prayer events in the future. Whilst we loved being together in-person at our previous Prayer & Fasting gatherings we love the way the online format gives us an opportunity to gather as a world-wide family.
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On November 10th 2022 we will hold three zoom gatherings: 6-6:30am – Theme: Praise /Asking God for a Move of the Spirit 1-1:30pm – Theme: Prayer for the Ukraine 7:30-8pm – Theme: Economic Crisis Times listed are GMT – for your time zone please use this free tool. As well as the Zoom gatherings there will be a Facebook group and possibly a Whatsapp group running for the day, where we share hourly prayer points to keep prayer going throughout the day. This will allow more believers from other nations to get involved. Sign up here to receive the zoom code and further details of the event. On sign up you will also have an opportunity to send us a prayer request for your Nation, Church or Government. Matt Hatch tells us more about the event...
10th November 2022 | Online Via Zoom
catalystnetwork.org/catalyst-global-prayer-day
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Jubilee+ Conference The Churches that Change Communities Conference run by Jubilee+ is not new to the conference circuit. However , arguably there may never have been such an important time to gather and seek God together in Milton Keynes or Online. The landscape of poverty in our nation has changed dramatically. Our social justice activities have had to adapt, sometimes repeatedly, in light of the pandemic, and now many in our communities are facing the devastating impact of the cost of living crisis. It sounds bleak, but we are not without hope. We’re expectant for a fresh move of God’s power at work across the UK, bringing mercy and justice into the very DNA of our churches, raising leaders from all backgrounds, and sparking seeds of revival. Book tickets here or at the link below...
12th November 2022 | Online or In Person
jubilee-plus.org/conference Page 26
Amplify Prophetic School Amplify Prophetic School is back for its second year. Launching their online 9 month training program for prophets/emerging prophets. Gathering once a month on a Thursday evenings via zoom from 7.15pm-9.00pm for teaching, discussions, impartation, activations and accountability. The year will have 2 in-person Encounter days hosted in Bedford which will also be live streamed for our international students. Phil Wilthew, Rob Davey and Charlene Frammingham will be leading the school and we have some amazing guest speakers such as Julian Adams and others. The course will offer you 3 small settings on zoom to connect with a mentor and have Q&A and biblical characters assignments.
Starts 24th November 2022 | Online Via Zoom
Booking and further information here Page 27
Project 23 Newfrontiers has a new name for their Students and twenties work: Project 23. Wanting to see a move of God in this current generation (Zs and Millennials), they will be gathering to talk about what it means for this generation to have a big vision for faith, for church, for the lost and for world mission. So what's the plan? On the Friday evening there will be street food, a hot topic panel, bingo (yup), and live music. We will think deep thoughts, hang out and catch up. On the Saturday we have some cracking speakers from across the Newfrontiers family who are going to talk big vision for faith, church, the lost and world mission. Taylor Bentliff (Editor and founder of Clarity Magazine) Andy McCullough (founder of Unreached Network, author and church planter) Katherine Brown (Mission lead for Fusion) Tom Scrivens (Pastor, Hope Church Ipswich and founder of Sent) Worship will be led by Chris Johnston (leads at Newday and Kings Community Church). Page 28
More details on the running order of the event will follow soon but basically it will start at 7pm on Friday 17th March and finish at 4pm on Saturday 18th March. Early bird ticket cost £10 and ends on February 1st 2023! After that the tickets will cost £25. Follow them on Instagram, Twitter, Tiktok and Facebook for hype...
17th-18th March 2023 | Milton Keynes
newfrontiers20s.com
Recommended Resources •
The Starfish and The Spirit by Lance Ford, Rob Wegner, Alan Hirsch (Book)
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A Non-Anxious Presence by Mark Sayers (Book) Responding to a Deepening Crisis by Jubilee+ (Booklet) available as a download or for physical copies contact communications@catalystnetwork.org
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The Broadcast Pod by Broadcast Network (Podcast)
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A Worldwide Family Catalyst is a movement of churches building communities that raise disciples who change the world. With our roots in Newfrontiers, we are a family of around 300 churches connected together through genuine relationship and served by a number of apostolic teams who aim to equip churches to raise pioneering disciples that see God's kingdom fill the earth.
Not connected with a Catalyst church yet? Take a look at the 'About' page on our website to find a church near you and get plugged in!
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www.catalystnetwork.org
communications@catalystnetwork.org