A prayer gathering for London, which started last year, is going online this November. It is one of several exciting initiatives now being developed by the relatively new London Gospel Partnership (LGP). Richard Bray, incoming LGP Chair, reports:
One of the great encouragements of the past 20 years in the UK has been the growth in churches working together across denominational lines in regional Gospel Partnerships. These partnerships have provided training, organised missions, and seen the fruit of church planting.
Since the founding of the South East Gospel Partnership (SEGP) in 2004, churches in the region have increasingly found they have been able to collaborate much more easily at a local level. This has left London as perhaps the last major region to develop its own Gospel Partnership.
London – a critical city
The development of a London Gospel Partnership has taken longer for a number of good reasons. The very size and diversity of London, a world city of over 8 million inhabitants, means that networks of like-minded churches have grown up within their own theological or cultural streams.
Nonetheless, there remains a Scriptural and practical impetus for churches and networks to collaborate in areas where they can do better together.
Exciting core programme
Over the past few years, led by William Taylor, Richard Coekin, Trevor Archer and others, a London Gospel Partnership vision has emerged.
The LGP aims to provide a limited programme of excellent events to resource London churches in their local mission. It is hoped that this will enable increasing relational familiarity and trust across the usual ‘sub-tribes’, and that closer collaboration will follow.
LGP now has a core programme:
• A conference for church leadership teams (replacing the old SEGP conference) was launched in 2019 with Kevin DeYoung as the main speaker. We plan to gather again on 6 February 2021, with Sam Allberry speaking.
• The long-standing London Preachers’ Conference is moving to a new slot (20-22 April 2021) and to a new venue to allow for growth. Our speakers will be Jason Roach and Julian Hardyman.
• The gathering to pray for London, held for the first time last year, will newly be online on 25 November this year.
With this programme in place, the LGP is now consulting a broader spectrum of London church leaders to see if we can serve more local churches without losing our clear gospel convictions and ethos. We are in the process of recruiting a number of younger and more diverse pastors to the steering group to provide energy and vision for gospel partnership flourishing in London for many years to come.
We would love to receive the input and ideas of London church leaders – and see you at one of these events soon!
